Thousands of men, women and children from Myanmar’s Rohingya minority have fled the country over what the army is calling a crackdown on insurgents. A Wall Street Journal article examines the intensification of a long-simmering conflict between Yangon and the Rohingya Muslims, who are denied citizenship in the predominantly Buddhist Southeast Asian state. Here is a short history of the Rohingya people. 8th Century: The Rohingya, a […]
Shortly after the Berlin truck terrorism suspect Anis Amri was killed in a shoot out with Milan police, railway tickets found on Amri’s body showed he had traveled from Chambery in south-eastern France to Turin and then on to Milan, according to Italy’s Ansa. Which is strange because while he kept ticket stubs, he had virtually nothing else on him: Milan police said Amri was carrying few […]
Lately, cybersecurity has been the place where IT’s optimism goes to die. It’s been a tough road for companies and organizations the past few years as their network defenses have been bent and broken on a consistent, and often dramatic, basis. Hacks that topple over a billion user accounts are shocking and make a solution seem impossible. But IT is resilient despite on-going challenges in staffing, budgeting, […]
By Tom Westbrook | SYDNEY SYDNEY Australian police said on Friday they had foiled a plot to attack prominent sites in the city of Melbourne with a series of bombs on Christmas Day that authorities described as “an imminent terrorist event” inspired by Islamic State. Police laid terrorism charges against one man, and were expected to charge at least three others, after authorities conducted overnight raids on […]
Deutsche Bank and Credit Suisse have agreed to pay out billions to resolve a probe into the alleged mis-selling of mortgage-backed securities at the height of the US housing bubble, striking deals before the Trump administration takes power. The deals came as federal prosecutors announced they were suing Barclays and two of its executives over the issue of allegedly fraudulent residential mortgage-backed securities. The suit followed the breakdown of talks […]
Donald Trump turned up the heat under Lockheed Martin about the cost of its F-35 fighter jet, tweeting on Thursday that he had asked rival defence contractor Boeing to price its F-18 Super Hornet as an alternative. “Based on the tremendous cost and cost overruns of the Lockheed Martin F-35, I have asked Boeing to price-out a comparable F-18 Super Hornet!” Mr Trump tweeted on Thursday evening. […]
Mr. Trump, who last week nominated as ambassador to Israel a bankruptcy lawyer who heads a fund-raising effort for a West Bank settlement, made clear on Thursday that he would not wait for his inauguration to weigh in. In a statement, he said bluntly that the resolution should be vetoed. Continue reading the main story “As the United States has long maintained, peace between the Israelis and […]
A Hoaxy search reveals articles that claim cannabis cures cancer. The graph on the left shows the rise in these claims over the past five months. The graph on the right shows the claim’s spread on social media. Credit: Indiana University The Observatory on Social Media at Indiana University has launched a powerful new tool in the fight against fake news. The tool, called Hoaxy, visualizes how […]
Now that you have a new internet media streaming device, you’ll need something to watch on it. I cut the cord in 2009 and here are the best services I’ve found since then. Cord-cutting and video-streaming is replacing traditional cable and satellite TV. Jonathan Alcorn/Reuters/Corbis Before launching into it, though, you should know things are changing. Cord cutting is no longer remarkable, it’s normal. The media companies […]
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump on Thursday called for the strengthening of their countries’ nuclear capabilities. Speaking at a meeting of defence chiefs in Moscow, Mr Putin said Russia needed to “strengthen the strategic nuclear forces, for that we should develop missiles capable of penetrating any current and prospective missile defence systems”, according to the Tass news agency. Mr Putin claimed Russia’s military was able to repel […]
The seizure of all of Aleppo by Mr. Assad and his allies signals a turning point in the nearly six-year conflict. Continue reading the main story Mr. Assad’s army relied heavily on foreign military support from Russia, Iran and Shiite militias like Lebanon’s Hezbollah to surround the rebel-held area. Months of shelling and airstrikes that killed hundreds of people and reduced entire neighborhoods to rubble finally routed […]
ANKARA Bana Alabed, the young Syrian girl who drew global attention with her tweets from Aleppo before being evacuated to Turkey this week, says she hopes to go back to her hometown one day and fulfil a dream. “When I grow up I want to become a teacher and go back to Aleppo and teach the children of Aleppo,” Bana told Reuters in an interview in Ankara […]
Hygge, the Danish art of cosiness that has become Europe’s latest lifestyle trend, is boosting demand for spices such as cinnamon, cardamom and vanilla. Growing popularity of the Nordic art of living, which encapsulates all things cosy from cashmere to candles, has coincided with soaring global demand for spices due to unusual weather conditions in the main growing regions. Alongside a growing appetite for spice-laden Scandinavian cakes […]
By Ellen Francis and Stephanie Nebehay | BEIRUT/GENEVA BEIRUT/GENEVA The Syrian army said on Thursday that it had retaken complete control of Aleppo after the last rebel fighters were evacuated from the city, handing President Bashar al-Assad his biggest victory of the war. The army said it had brought “security and safety” to Aleppo, ending four years of rebel resistance in parts of the northern Syrian city. […]
By Mohamed Argouby, Joseph Nasr and Steve Scherer | OUESLATIA, Tunisia/BERLIN/ROME OUESLATIA, Tunisia/BERLIN/ROME In his impoverished Tunisian hometown, Anis Amri drank alcohol and never prayed, his brothers say. Then after joining the wave of migrants crossing the Mediterranean, he ended up in an Italian jail, only to emerge an utterly changed man. Now he is prime suspect in this week’s attack on a Berlin Christmas market and […]
According to the Facebook page, Mrs. Elyakim was originally from Haifa, attended Galilee High School in Tiberias and studied at Ohalo College, which trains teachers. In August 2009, she posted a series of pictures from Berlin, including shots of the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, remnants of the Berlin Wall and an old Allied checkpoint, although those images evidently came from a previous winter, since some included Christmas […]
WASHINGTON The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said on Thursday it is canceling an inactive registry program for visitors from countries where extremist groups are operating, a plan similar to a Muslim registry considered by President-elect Donald Trump. The National Security Entry-Exit Registration Systems program, known as NSEERS, was suspended in 2011, DHS spokesman Neema Hakim said in a statement. He said the program was determined to […]
KINSHASA At least six people were killed and 150 wounded in clashes between Pygmies and Bantus this week in southeastern Congo, a local activist said on Thursday, the latest flare-up in a three-year ethnic conflict that has killed dozens. David Ngoy Luhaka, a priest and member of the Diocesan Commission for Justice and Peace, said fighting broke out on Tuesday when a Pygmy militia attacked the town […]
By Michelle Martin and Michael Nienaber | BERLIN BERLIN Investigators found fingerprints of a Tunisian suspect in the Berlin Christmas market attack on the door of the truck that ploughed through the crowds, killing 12, German media said on Thursday, as a nationwide manhunt for the migrant was underway. Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the attack in which a truck smashed through wooden huts selling gifts, […]
GENEVA More than 4,000 fighters were evacuated overnight from east Aleppo to opposition-held areas, under an agreement between the warring sides overseen by the International Committee of the Red Cross and Syrian Arab Red Crescent, the ICRC said on Thursday. “Overnight between Wednesday and Thursday, in one of the last stages of the evacuation, more than 4,000 fighters were evacuated in private cars, vans, and pick-ups from […]
Dec 22, 2016 12:33 pm IST India’s business world has had its share of scandal and success this year and that has been reflected in headlines and during heated discussions on nightly news shows. From Cyrus Mistry’s unceremonious ousting as Tata Sons chairman to Vijay Mallya’s ongoing battle with Indian authorities from the U.K., there has been plenty to write and talk about. To quantify the business […]
AMMAN Thousands of rebels and fighters were still waiting on Thursday to be evacuated from the last rebel bastion in Aleppo city but difficulties including harsh weather were complicating the final phase of the operation, a rebel spokesman said. Ahmed Kara Ali, the spokesman for the rebel group Ahrar al Sham, which is involved in the negotiations, told Reuters “large numbers” were left but that it was […]
2016 was fact-checking’s finest year [1]. No it wasn’t, it was the year of “post-truth” [2] — some preferred “post-fact” [3] — and fact-checking is a fool’s errand. The discussion about facts in journalism worldwide has rarely been as fractured and animated as it has been in 2016, so we collected 366 links, one for each day of the year, to try and make sense of what […]
The man being sought in connection with Monday’s attack on a Berlin Christmas market had been under police surveillance for months on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack, but later fell off the authorities’ radar screen. A manhunt was under way across Europe on Thursday after German authorities issued an appeal for information about the suspect, a 24-year-old Tunisian man, Anis Amri. Germany’s federal prosecutor put out a Europe-wide […]
