He became the richest officer of Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine last year. Lately, he’s been trying the role of Augusto Pinochet. The chief military prosecutor of Ukraine, Anatolii Matios, doesn’t mince words while conveying his anti-Semitic attitude... More »
Destroyed buildings from clashes are seen in the Old City of Mosul, Iraq July 10, 2017. Iraqi forces clashed with Islamic State militants holding out in Mosul’s Old City on Wednesday, more than 36 hours after Baghdad declared victory over the jihadists in what... More »
BEIRUT A suicide bomber detonated an explosive vest on a bus in Syria near the Atmeh border crossing with Turkey late on Sunday, killing at least 32 people, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The bus was carrying fighters from foreign-backed rebel f... More »
DUBAI U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned an air strike on a school in northern Yemen that killed 10 children and called for an investigation, while the Saudi-led coalition said the attack had targeted a training facility run by the Houthi group. Aid ... More »
NEW DELHI Two armed militants attacked a police station in Indian-ruled Kashmir on Monday, police said, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi delivered his annual Independence Day speech in the national capital, New Delhi. The gunmen were unable to take control of t... More »
By Douglas Busvine and Nidhi Verma | NEW DELHI NEW DELHI Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi took aim at supporters of “terrorism” in his Independence Day speech on Monday, ratcheting up criticism of Pakistan while avoiding direct mention of month-long protest... More »
By Minwoo Park | SEONGJU, South Korea SEONGJU, South Korea About 900 South Koreans shaved their heads on Monday to protest against a government decision to place a missile defense system designed to counter North Korean missile threats, in the southeastern cou... More »
By John Whitesides | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON U.S. House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said on Saturday she has been flooded with “obscene and sick” calls and text messages after a hacker linked to Russia posted personal contact information online for her and hu... More »
ISTANBUL Turkish police detained 17 suspected militants in a sweep in Istanbul on Thursday that included a raid on offices of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), state media said, hours after twin bomb attacks hit the mainly Kurdish southeast. Sec... More »
MOSCOW Russian President Vladimir Putin has held a meeting with his Security Council to discuss additional security measures for Crimea after the clashes on the contested peninsula, the Kremlin said on Thursday. Russia was considering tightening security at th... More »
BEIRUT A Russian military helicopter carrying five people was shot down in the north of Syria’s rebel-held Idlib province on Monday, the Russian defence ministry said. Russian air forces are supporting President Bashar al-Assad in Syria’s five-year-old civil w... More »
BEIRUT Syrian rebel fighters have launched a major assault on government-held southwestern parts of Aleppo to try to reopen supply lines after the army and its allies tightened their siege of opposition-held parts of the city last week. The rebels are trying t... More »
BANGKOK The mother of a leading activist against the military junta in Thailand was charged on Monday with insulting the country’s monarchy in a one-word Facebook post. Patnaree Chankij was brought to a military court in Bangkok after the country’s attorney ge... More »
KABUL The Taliban claimed responsibility for a truck bomb attack on a military and logistics services compound, mainly used by foreigners, in Kabul early on Monday after a powerful explosion was heard all around the city. However, casualties appear to have bee... More »
DUBAI Islamic State on Sunday condemned as an “apostate” a U.S. Muslim soldier killed in Iraq whose story has re-ignited debate in the 2016 presidential election on the role of Muslims in American life. Dabiq, the militant group’s online magazine, showed a pic... More »
MOSCOW The Kremlin says it had zero involvement in the hacking of Democratic Party emails while U.S. officials say the hack originated in Russia. We may never know who is right, but one thing is for sure – Russia had motive, capability and form. Seen through K... More »
KABUL Civilians are being killed and wounded in record numbers in Afghanistan, the United Nations reported on Monday, just days after one of the deadliest attacks ever in Kabul. Overall at least 1,601 civilians were killed and 3,565 wounded in the war in the f... More »
ISTANBUL/ANKARA Turkey widened a crackdown on suspected supporters of a failed military coup on Sunday, taking the number of people rounded up in the armed forces and judiciary to 6,000, and the government said it was in control of the country and economy. Pre... More »
BEIJING Freedom of navigation patrols carried out by foreign navies in the South China Sea could end “in disaster”, a senior Chinese admiral has said, a warning to the United States after last week’s ruling against Beijing’s claims in the area. China has refus... More »
HONG KONG When activists began setting fire to trash bins and hurling bricks at police during a February riot in Hong Kong, Chris Lee became more convinced his decision to leave his siblings and mother behind and move to Taiwan was the right one. Hong Kong, lo... More »
CLEVELAND Cleveland’s police union called for the suspension of a state law allowing people to carry firearms during the Republican National Convention but Ohio’s governor said he was powerless to act despite heightened security concerns with the killing on Su... More »
CLEVELAND The head of the Cleveland police union on Sunday urged Ohio’s governor to declare a state of emergency and to suspend laws allowing the open carrying of firearms during the Republican National Convention, after the shooting of six police officers in ... More »
WASHINGTON The U.S. missile defense system to counter attacks from rogue states like North Korea has no proven capability to protect the United States and is not on a credible path to achieve that goal, a science advocacy group said on Thursday. The ground-bas... More »
SEOUL South Korea announced on Wednesday the site where a U.S. THAAD anti-missile defense unit will be deployed against North Korea’s missile and nuclear threats, a plan that has angered China and prompted a North Korean warning of retaliation. South Korea and... More »
BEIRUT/AMMAN Rebel areas of Aleppo have stockpiled enough basic supplies to survive months of siege by Syrian pro-government forces that cut off their half of the city last week, even though some goods are running out, an opposition official said. Government f... More »
ANKARA Turkey aims to develop good relations with Syria and Iraq, and both countries need to be stable for counter-terrorism efforts to succeed, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Wednesday. Turkey has long been one of Syrian President Bashar al-As... More »
FALLUJA, Iraq Iraqi forces recaptured the last district held by Islamic State militants in the city of Falluja on Sunday and the general commanding the operation declared the battle complete after nearly five weeks of fighting. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi c... More »
BAGHDAD/ERBIL, Iraq About 40,000 residents of Falluja, Islamic State’s besieged stronghold near Baghdad, have fled in the last three weeks, but a similar number are trapped despite the Iraqi army’s attempts to secure escape routes for them, officials said on T... More »
PARIS/LES MUREAUX A Frenchman who pledged allegiance to Islamic State stabbed a police commander to death outside his home and killed his partner, who also worked for the police, in an attack the government denounced as “an abject act of terrorism”. Larossi Ab... More »
BRUSSELS Britain, Germany and the United States advanced plans on Tuesday to spearhead a new NATO force on Russia’s border from next year, but some eastern allies said the alliance’s effort must go further to deter Moscow. Weeks before a critical NATO summit i... More »
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – When British art curator Sue McAlpine first visited makeshift migrant camps in Calais on Frances’s northern coast, the sight of families living in muddy tents and children wearing flip-flops in the middle of winter saddene... More »
SINGAPORE China rebuffed U.S. pressure to curb its activity in the South China Sea on Sunday, restating its sovereignty over most of the disputed territory and saying it “has no fear of trouble”. On the last day of Asia’s biggest security summit in Singapore, ... More »
BEIJING China hopes to establish counter-terrorism intelligence sharing with France as the Asian giant seeks greater international support for its anti-terror fight, China’s state-run Xinhua news agency reported citing an exchange between officials of the two ... More »
ULAANBAATAR U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Sunday the United States would consider any Chinese establishment of an air defense zone over the South China Sea to be a “provocative and destabilizing act”. U.S. officials have expressed concern that an ... More »
AMMAN The Syrian army pushed into Raqqa province, home to the de facto capital of Islamic State, after a major Russian-backed offensive against the militants, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday. The offensive is the third big assault on t... More »
SINGAPORE The United States stepped up pressure on China on Saturday to rein in its actions in the South China Sea, with top defense officials underlining Washington’s military superiority and vowing to remain the main guarantor of Asian security for decades t... More »
SINGAPORE The recent lifting of the U.S. arms embargo against Vietnam boosted trust between the former enemies, but significant weapons purchases are some way off, a senior Vietnamese military official said on Saturday. Deputy Defence Minister Nguyen Chi Vinh ... More »
SINGAPORE Japanese Defence Minister Gen Nakatani said on Saturday that Japan and South Korea agreed to expand an emergency communication system between their defense ministries, including adding a new direct line between defense ministers. Tensions have been h... More »
WASHINGTON A U.S. congressional committee has launched an investigation into the Federal Reserve’s cyber security practices after a Reuters report revealed more than 50 cyber breaches at the U.S. central bank between 2011 and 2015. The House Committee on Scien... More »
After shooting dead a gorilla at the Cincinnati Zoo to save a 3-year-old boy, zoo officials said they had collected a sample of his sperm, raising hopes among distraught fans that Harambe could sire offspring even in death. But officials at the main U.S. body ... More »
SARAJEVO A group of artists unveiled a huge mural of David Bowie in Sarajevo on Saturday to commemorate the British musician’s humanitarian work during the Bosnian war. To the sound of Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” up to 300 people attended the inauguration of the m... More »
LONDON British Prime Minister David Cameron stands by his description of Donald Trump’s proposal for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States as “divisive, stupid and wrong”, a spokesman said on Monday. Trump, when asked about Cameron’s criticism,... More »
LONDON Donald Trump said he was unlikely to have a good relationship with David Cameron because the British prime minister cast the U.S. presidential candidate as “divisive, stupid and wrong” for proposing a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States.... More »
ISTANBUL Turkish and U.S.-led coalition forces struck Islamic State targets north of the Syrian city of Aleppo on Sunday, killing 27 fighters, state-run Anadolu Agency and other media reported. Turkish artillery and rocket launchers fired into Syria while warp... More »
SOCHI, Russia An effort to show off the superiority of Russian military equipment backfired on Thursday when the door handle of a jeep fell off just as President Vladimir Putin was inspecting the vehicle. The Kremlin leader was being shown an array of military... More »
MUNICH A German national stabbed four passengers at a train station near Munich early on Tuesday, killing one man and injuring three, in an attack police said appeared to have an Islamist motive. Witnesses said the assailant, a 27-year-old man, shouted “Allahu... More »
ANKARA Tayyip Erdogan’s ambitions for a swift move to strong presidential rule could suffer if dissidents in Turkey’s nationalist opposition succeed in a party leadership challenge that could bolster their party’s electoral support. A bid by several hundred me... More »
MOSCOW Russia and the United States have agreed to extend the “regime of calm” in Syria’s city of Aleppo for another 48 hours starting from May 10, RIA news agency on Tuesday quoted Russia’s Defence Ministry as saying. (Reporting by Lidia Kelly- Editing by Dmi... More »
LONDON Former NATO secretary generals warned on Tuesday that a British exit from the European Union would help enemies of the West while ex-U.S. foreign and defense chiefs cautioned that Britain would have less clout outside the bloc. The double warning comes ... More »
CANNES, France Security at the Cannes film festival, which opens on Wednesday, will be intense as France is still facing a high risk of attack, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said on Monday. With 45,000 people expected to visit the May 11-22 event,... More »
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission and Federal Trade Commission have asked mobile phone carriers and manufacturers to explain how they release security updates amid mounting concerns over security vulnerabilities, the U.S. agencies said on Monday... More »
VILNIUS A faceless skull with a crown of spikes and blood pouring from its wounds, symbolizing a Syrian caught in the horror of civil war, stares out from a painting on the wall in a student theater in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius. This is just one image by ... More »
VILNIUS Pussy Riot punk performer Nadya Tolokonnikova is looking for a new audience — readers and, ideally, financial backers who can turn her two-year-old news website into a full-blown contender on Russia’s media scene. She first rose to prominence by donnin... More »
HANOVER, Germany/WASHINGTON President Barack Obama will announce on Monday he plans to send as many as 250 additional U.S. troops to Syria, a sharp increase in the American presence working with local Syrian forces fighting Islamic State militants, U.S. offici... More »
TOKYO Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, speaking ahead of a visit to Beijing, said on Monday China was making the world “worried” with its military buildup and maritime expansion in the East and South China Seas. Ties between China and Japan, the world’... More »
MAKHMOUR, Iraq Towering over his Kurdish partner at a checkpoint in northern Iraq, U.S. volunteer John Cole cuts an unusual figure on the road to the newest front in the war against Islamic State. Seven feet (2.1 meters) tall and holding his assault rifle upsi... More »
DUBAI Yemeni government forces and their allies killed more than 800 al Qaeda fighters when they advanced into the port city of Mukalla, the Saudi-led pro-government coalition said. Yemeni and Emirati soldiers seized the seaport on Sunday, depriving the group ... More »
WASHINGTON The White House will likely make a decision by June on whether it will release some classified material withheld from the public 9/11 Commission Report, a former U.S. senator who co-chaired the congressional inquiry into the attacks said on Sunday. ... More »
CHANHASSEN, Minn. Prince’s remains have been cremated and his family and friends attended a private ceremony on Saturday to pay their respects to the late pop superstar at the studio complex where he died in a suburb of Minneapolis, a Prince spokeswoman said. ... More »
HOLLYWOOD, Fla./WASHINGTON Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump attacked his top Democratic rival Hillary Clinton on Friday, calling her “crooked,” and promised his supporters that he would not bore them by becoming overly presidential. The commen... More »
BEIJING China will launch a “core module” for its first space station some time around 2018, a senior official told the state-run Xinhua news agency on Thursday, part of a plan to have a permanent manned space station in service around 2022. Advancing China’s ... More »
LONDON A meticulous recreation of the 1,800-year-old Arch of Triumph in Palmyra, Syria, destroyed by Islamic State militants last year, has been erected in Trafalgar Square in what London Mayor Boris Johnson called an act of defiance. The 5.5-metre (20ft) mode... More »
MILAN Three late 15th century paintings missing since they were looted by Nazi troops from a Tuscan villa over 70 years ago have been recovered and two people have been accused of receiving stolen goods, police announced on Monday. The works, of religious them... More »
TOKYO The Japanese share market plunged 3 percent on Monday after a series of earthquakes measuring up to 7.3 magnitude struck a southern manufacturing hub, killing at least 42 people and forcing major companies to close factories. About 30,000 rescue workers ... More »
KUWAIT Peace talks in Kuwait aimed at ending over a year of civil war and a Saudi-led intervention in Yemen will not begin on Monday as planned, officials from the warring sides said, amid objections over continued fighting despite an announced ceasefire. Dele... More »
BEIRUT Syrian rebel groups announced a new battle against government forces on Monday, a sign of escalating violence that has undermined a ceasefire deal and threatens to derail U.N.-led peace talks. The groups, which included factions fighting under the banne... More »
BAGHDAD U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter flew into Iraq on Monday to discuss offering more help in the fight against Islamic State, possibly including sending in more U.S. troops, officials said. Carter would meet Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi and Defe... More »
BRASILIA Brazil’s leftist President Dilma Rousseff suffered a humiliating loss in a crucial impeachment vote in the lower house of Congress on Sunday and is almost certain to be forced from office months before the nation hosts the Olympics. Fireworks lit up t... More »
WASHINGTON Actor and director George Clooney, a supporter of Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid, broke ranks over campaign financing on Saturday to condemn the “obscene” sums of money in U.S. politics and praised Clinton’s chief political rival in the process.... More »
ADEN A shaky truce took hold in Yemen on Monday under a U.N.-backed effort to end a war that has made the country a front in Saudi Arabia’s region wide rivalry with Iran and caused one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. The war-damaged capital Sanaa spe... More »
HIROSHIMA, Japan John Kerry on Monday became the first U.S. secretary of state to pay his respects at Hiroshima’s memorial to victims of the 1945 U.S. nuclear attack, raising speculation that U.S. President Barack Obama might make his own visit in May. Followi... More »
PARIS French Prime Minister Manuel Valls was to meet student and youth leaders on Monday in an attempt to defuse opposition to proposed labor reforms that have triggered public demonstrations and a nocturnal protest movement in several cities. The labor bill s... More »
GOA, India U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter began a three-day visit to India on Sunday, seeking to advance a relatively new defense relationship with a country Washington sees as a counterweight to the growing power of China. In a sign of the importance Carte... More »
Headlines screaming “Deportations to begin” and “Markets sink as trade war looms” top a parody newspaper front page the Boston Globe posted on Saturday, with a scathing editorial denouncing Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump’s candidacy. The mock... More »
BOSTON For days after the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, Americans were glued to the news, eager to know who had planted the homemade devices that ripped through the crowd at the finish line, killing three people. The world got its first look at the suspects th... More »
LISBON Portuguese Culture Minister Joao Soares resigned on Friday, a day after threatening to slap critics who had called him incompetent and rude. A post on his Facebook page saying he wanted to slap two newspaper columnists, followed by what was seen as a ha... More »
JOHANNESBURG With their economy flatlining, currency on the ropes and politics in turmoil, many South Africans are turning to humor for relief, mainly at the expense of President Jacob Zuma and his $16-million home improvements. Within minutes of Zuma survivin... More »
BRAZZAVILLE Police in Congo’s capital Brazzaville exchanged heavy fire with unidentified gunmen on Monday, witnesses said, in the first significant outbreak of violence since President Denis Sassou Nguesso won re-election last month in a disputed poll. Young o... More »
BERLIN At an hour-long meeting in Moscow on March 23, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov irritated his German counterpart by raising the case of a German-Russian girl who said she was raped by migrants in Berlin earlier this year. After the girl’s claims w... More »
BAKU Three Azeri servicemen were killed in fresh fighting with Armenian-backed separatists over the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region on Monday, Azerbaijan’s Defence Ministry said. Azerbaijan had halted its attacks but Armenia was still “aggravating the situat... More »
MILWAUKEE Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump predicted that the United States is on course for a “very massive recession,” warning that a combination of high unemployment and an overvalued stock market had set the stage for another economic slum... More »
WASHINGTON Donald Trump is facing bipartisan pressure to adopt a more presidential tone in his White House run including from Democratic President Barack Obama and Republicans who worry his missteps may do irreparable harm to the party and his campaign. The Re... More »
BEIRUT Protesters attacked the Beirut office of Saudi-owned newspaper Asharq al-Awsat on Friday in response to a cartoon published by the paper criticizing the Lebanese state. The cartoon depicted the Lebanese flag with the words “an April fool…” written above... More »
BEIRUT The Saudi-owned television news channel Al Arabiya shut its offices in Lebanon and dismissed 27 employees, two of its journalists said on Friday, in a sudden move that comes amid political tensions between Riyadh and Beirut. Protesters also attacked the... More »
U.S. hospitals should brace for a surge in “ransomware” attacks by cyber criminals who infect and shut down computer networks, then demand payment in return for unlocking them, a non-profit healthcare group warned on Friday. The Health Information Trust Allian... More »
DUBAI A Saudi-led military coalition on Monday said it had completed a prisoner swap in Yemen, exchanging nine Saudi prisoners for 109 Yemeni nationals ahead of a planned truce and peace talks aimed at ending the year-long war with Houthi rebels. The statement... More »
DUBAI The secretary of the Iranian National Security Council has congratulated Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on regaining the city of Palmyra, Tasnim news agency reported on Monday. “The determination of the Syrian nation, government and army to eliminate t... More »
LAHORE, Pakistan Pakistani authorities hunted on Monday for breakaway Taliban militants who once declared loyalty to Islamic State after the group claimed responsibility for an Easter suicide bomb targeting Christians, that killed at least 70 people. The attac... More »
BAGHDAD/ERBIL, Iraq Iraq’s armed forces started an offensive against Islamic State in the northerly Nineveh province on Thursday in what a military statement described as the first stage of an operation aimed at liberating the city of Mosul. The assault was la... More »
PARIS Salah Abdeslam, the prime surviving suspect for November’s Paris attacks, will no longer fight extradition to France but wants to return to his home country to explain himself as soon as possible, his lawyer said on Thursday. “Salah Abdeslam has asked me... More »
NEW YORK A consultant to Iran’s mission to the United Nations has been criminally charged with violating a U.S. law against dealing with that country, according to an indictment made public on Wednesday. Ahmad Sheikhzadeh, 60, faces seven charges including con... More »
WASHINGTON Shortly after last November’s attacks on Paris by a Brussels-based Islamic State cell, a top U.S. counter-terrorism official traveling in Europe wanted to visit Brussels to learn more about the investigation. When the official tried to arrange meeti... More »
JAKARTA Indonesia on Thursday urged Chinese ships not to enter its territorial waters, days after it protested against what it called a breach of its sovereignty by a Chinese coastguard ship. Indonesia is not embroiled in rival claims with China over the South... More »
BRAZZAVILLE Congo Republic President Denis Sassou Nguesso has won a new five-year term with 60.39 percent of the vote, the interior minister said on Thursday, extending his long rule over the oil-producing nation that first began in 1979. Interior Minister Ray... More »
JAKARTA Ride-hailing apps Grab and Uber must partner with a transport business and register their cars by the end of May if they want to continue to operate in Southeast Asia’s largest economy, a minister said on Thursday. “Uber, Grab are app companies. If the... More »
BUENOS AIRES U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday championed Argentina’s new center-right leader Mauricio Macri as an example for other countries in Latin America, praising the fast pace of reforms to strengthen the economy. Obama, on a two-day visit to Ar... More »
WASHINGTON The Obama administration is expected to blame Iranian hackers as soon as Thursday for a coordinated campaign of cyber attacks in 2012 and 2013 on several U.S. banks and a New York dam, sources familiar with the matter have told Reuters. The Justice ... More »
SÃO PAULO If any symbol captures the anger of rich and upper-middle class Brazilians who have taken to the streets to protest against President Dilma Rousseff, it might be a giant, inflatable yellow duck. The 40-foot (12-meter) high duck presides over Sao Paul... More »
ANKARA The death toll in a car bomb attack in the Turkish capital Ankara has risen to 37 people, Health Minister Mehmet Muezzinoglu said on Monday, adding that 71 people were still being treated in hospital. Of those in hospital, 15 were in serious condition, ... More »
SAO PAULO/BRASILIA Hundreds of thousands of Brazilians flooded the streets on Sunday in the biggest ever protests calling for President Dilma Rousseff’s removal, reflecting rising popular anger that could encourage Congress to impeach the leftist leader. The d... More »
