Kunduz / AFP Taliban militants on Saturday captured a district in northeastern Kunduz province, near the provincial capital where militants scored their biggest victory in 14 years last September. The militants, waging a bloody insurgency to topple the Western-backed Kabul government, have intensified their attacks nationwide and tightened their grip on the besieged capital of Helmand province southwest of Kunduz …

  Washington / AFP US Vice President Joe Biden and Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko in a phonecall urged a speedy resolution to the conflict with pro-Russian separatists amid a spike in tensions with Moscow, the White House said. Biden and Poroshenko “expressed concern over the recent surge in fighting in eastern Ukraine, where ceasefire violations by combined Russian-separatist forces are at …

  Ankara/ AFP Donald Trump sought to reboot his flagging presidential bid, dismissing his tainted campaign chairman and seeking to broaden his shrinking support base by appealing to black voters and visiting flood-ravaged Louisiana. The resignation of the seasoned Republican strategist Paul Manafort—under fire for his pro-Kremlin ties and role in a Ukrainian corruption scandal—represents the Republican nominee’s latest effort to …