By Reuters Staff DUBAI (Reuters) – The United Nation’s envoy for Afghanistan is due to arrive in Qatar on Tuesday to meet with Afghan government and Taliban representatives this week in a fresh push on the fractious Afghan peace process, two sources familiar with the talks said. The visit comes as the United States is […]
By Reuters Staff DUBAI (Reuters) – The United States on Monday expressed alarm at “genuine security threats” to Saudi Arabia from Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis and elsewhere in the region after attacks on the heart of the Saudi oil industry, and it would look at improving support for Saudi defences. Earlier in the day, the U.S. […]
By Reuters Staff DUBAI (Reuters) – Iran has released British-Iranian aid worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe from house arrest at the end of her five-year prison sentence, but she has been summoned to court again on another charge, her lawyer said on Sunday. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said his government would continue to do everything possible to […]
Coronavirus pandemic Pope Francis has condemned extremism in the name of religion on a historic visit to Iraq where he discussed the plight of the Christian minority. Hostility, extremism and violence are “betrayals of religion” he told an inter-faith prayer service. Iraq has been wracked by religious and sectarian violence, both against minorities and between […]
Coronavirus pandemic Pope Francis has called for an end to violence and extremism, on the first ever papal visit to Iraq. The pontiff is making his first international trip since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Covid and security fears have made this his riskiest visit yet, but the 84-year-old insisted he was “duty bound”. […]
By Ali Kucukgocmen ISTANBUL (Reuters) – The fiancee of slain Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi said on Thursday that world leaders should not maintain relations with a “murderer”, after a U.S. intelligence report implicated Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler in his killing. Khashoggi, a critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was last seen entering […]
The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor has opened a formal investigation into alleged war crimes in the Palestinian territories. Fatou Bensouda said the probe would cover events in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip since June 2014. Last month, the Hague-based court ruled that it could exercise its criminal jurisdiction over the […]
By Maayan Lubell JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli defence minister Benny Gantz said on Saturday his “initial assessment” was that Iran was responsible for an explosion on an Israeli-owned ship in the Gulf of Oman. “Iran is looking to hit Israeli infrastructure and Israeli citizens,” Gantz told the public broadcaster Kan. “The location of the ship […]
By Aziz El Yaakoubi, Marwa Rashad DUBAI (Reuters) – Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman may have been spared direct punishment after a U.S. intelligence report implicated him in the killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, but he has not emerged unscathed. The declassified report, based on CIA intelligence, concludes that the prince approved an operation […]
Killing of Jamal Khashoggi US President Joe Biden has talked by phone with King Salman of Saudi Arabia as he seeks to put relations with America’s old ally on a new footing. He “affirmed the importance” the US “places on universal human rights and the rule of law”, the White House says. Mr Biden made […]
