At Qayyarah Airfield West, a sprawling Iraq base 40 miles south of Mosul, a United States Army task force fires Himars satellite-guided rockets at targets. Apache attack helicopters, equipped with Hellfire missiles, stand ready to carry out their missions from the base’s airfield. Continue reading the main story Not to mention the punishing airstrikes by American and allied warplanes and drones. A flurry of attacks were carried […]
By Yara Abi Nader and John Irish | GENEVA GENEVA The main opposition group at Syrian peace talks in Geneva wants to meet Russian envoys to discuss what it says are Moscow’s broken ceasefire promises, a move diplomats say aims to put pressure on the Russian-backed Syrian government delegation. Russia has sought to revive diplomacy since its air force helped the Syrian army and allied militias defeat […]
In recent weeks, Mauricio Macri, Argentina’s president, has faced a storm of criticism. After failing to condemn an official who offended many when he played down the gravity of Argentina’s military dictatorship, he is now accused of favouritism towards his father’s company in negotiations over the repayment of a $300m debt to the state after a botched privatisation of the post office in the 1990s. But however politically tone […]
By Marton Dunai | BUDAPEST BUDAPEST Hungary has begun building a second line of fence along its southern border with Serbia, a government spokesman said on Monday, a move likely to exacerbate criticism from some of the country’s European Union partners. Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s right-wing government considers migration to be one of the largest threats to the status quo in the EU. But officials in Brussels […]
Submitted by Alex Gorka via The Strategic Culture Foundation, The rifts within the EU continue to widen as Poland and Hungary join together in opposition to the EU bureaucracy. Soon after Poland’s ultra-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party came to power in October 2015, the Polish parliament passed a law allowing the government to appoint the judges of its choosing to the highest court and not recognize […]
By Tom Perry and Humeyra Pamuk | BEIRUT/ISTANBUL BEIRUT/ISTANBUL Turkey-backed Syrian rebel groups clashed with government forces near a city in northern Syria they captured from Islamic State, the second such confrontation in that region this month. The clash late on Sunday took place in an area where the sides are waging separate campaigns against Islamic State. Russia, which backs the Syrian government, intervened to halt the […]
Apologies to Dickens, but this really might be the best and the worst of times for American journalism. As near-daily attacks on the press are launched from President Trump’s Twitter account and trust in the media sinks to record lows, readers are subscribing to national newspapers in droves and newsrooms across America are infused with a renewed sense of mission. “This is a moment where you’ve got […]
By Stephanie Nebehay and John Irish | GENEVA GENEVA Syrian activists called on Sunday for the Assad government to engage in serious talks on political transition and for the United Nations to strengthen the fragile ceasefire as violence engulfed parts of the country. U.N. mediator Staffan de Mistura said a militant attack in Homs on Saturday was a deliberate attempt to wreck the Geneva peace talks, while […]
By Stephen Kalin | MOSUL, Iraq MOSUL, Iraq U.S.-backed Iraqi forces pushed deeper into western Mosul on Sunday, aiming to capture a bridge across the Tigris which would link the city’s government-held eastern bank with the ongoing offensive against remaining militants in the west. The bridge is the southernmost of five bridges spanning the Tigris. All were damaged in strikes by the U.S.-led air coalition, and later […]
LONDON Islamic State militants are planning “indiscriminate attacks on innocent civilians” in Britain on a scale similar to those staged by the Irish Republican Army 40 years ago, the head of the country’s new terrorism watchdog said. In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph published on Sunday, Max Hill, the lawyer tasked with overseeing British laws on terrorism, said the militants were targeting cities and posed “an […]
By Trevor Hunnicutt and Jonathan Stempel | NEW YORK NEW YORK Billionaire Warren Buffett, whose stock picks over several decades have enriched generations of Berkshire Hathaway Inc (BRKa.N) shareholders, delivered a black eye to the investment industry on Saturday, urging ordinary investors to buy plain-vanilla index funds. “When trillions of dollars are managed by Wall Streeters charging high fees, it will usually be the managers who reap […]
Video Airstrikes in Syria More than 30 people were killed Saturday in attacks on two Syrian security offices in the central city of Homs. In Douma, on the eastern outskirts of the capital, Damascus, men evacuated children from the rubble of destroyed buildings after a reported government airstrike. By REUTERS and THE ASSOCIATED PRESS. Photo by Sameer Al-Doumy/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images. Watch in Times Video » […]
BEIRUT The Syrian army and its allies made a sudden advance on Saturday and Sunday into areas held by Islamic State in northwest Syria, a war monitor said, as the jihadist group retreated after losing the city of al-Bab to Turkey-backed rebels on Thursday. The eastwards advance in an area south of al-Bab has extended Syrian army control across 14 villages and brought it within 25km (15 […]
KABUL, Afghanistan — At least 10 police officers and the wife of a police commander were killed in an ambush by Islamic State militants in the northern province of Zawzjan, a provincial official said on Saturday. Mohammad Reza Ghafori, a spokesman for the Zawzjan provincial governor, said that the police officers were ambushed Friday as they left a mosque. The wife of the police commander heard about […]
GENEVA A United Nations peace envoy said a militant attack in Syria on Saturday was a deliberate attempt to wreck peace talks in Geneva, while the warring sides traded blame and appeared no closer to actual negotiations. Suicide bombers stormed two Syrian security offices in Homs, killing dozens with gunfire and explosions including the head of military security, prompting airstrikes against the last rebel-held enclave in the […]
By Tom Miles and Yara Abi Nader | GENEVA GENEVA Syria’s opposition is impatient for face-to-face peace talks in Geneva, but things could fall apart if Russia does not pressure President Bashar al-Assad on holding talks and push it to abide by a ceasefire, an opposition member said on Saturday. The United Nations opened the peace talks with a symbolic ceremony on Thursday, attended by representatives of […]
By Isabel Coles | MOSUL, Iraq MOSUL, Iraq U.S.-backed Iraqi forces pushed deeper into western Mosul on Saturday after retaking the city’s airport from Islamic State and punching into built-up areas of the jihadists’ last major stronghold in the country. Troops advanced in several more populated, built-up southern districts and about 1,000 civilians walked across the frontlines, the largest displacement since fighting began a week ago in […]
Photo Credit Rukmini Callimachi/The New York Times I’m in northern Iraq and spent the day traveling to the front lines of western Mosul, where Iraqi government forces are battling the Islamic State for complete control of this city. Along the way, my colleagues and I met a villager who had just escaped. The villager, Lahib Muhammed Ali, lived on a dairy farm. He said that because the […]
BEIRUT Militants attacked two Syrian security offices in the western city of Homs on Saturday with guns and suicide bombers, killing at least 42 people including a senior officer, a war monitor said. The attackers killed the head of military security and 29 others at one of its headquarters in the city and 12 more people at a branch of state security in attacks that began early […]
In a war in which the United States has sought to minimize its own military footprint, this militia has become the American military’s ally of choice in northern Syria and its best hope of taking Raqqa in the coming months. Continue reading the main story But the budding alliance has drawn the United States deeper into the complex politics of northern Syria and prompted furious objections from […]
Iraqi fighter jets struck Isis positions in neighbouring Syria on Friday, in what officials said was retaliation for a spate of car bomb attacks in the capital Baghdad. The air strikes coincided with Iraq’s ground forces pushing deeper into the western half of Mosul and reaching the first residential districts. Iraq’s second city, a critical Isis stronghold split by the Tigris river, is divided between government forces […]
Photo Christian families who had left El Arish, in northern Sinai, arriving at a church in Ismailia, Egypt. Credit Ahmed Aboulenein/Reuters CAIRO — Dozens of Egyptian Christian families fled their homes in the northern Sinai Peninsula on Friday, driven by a targeted campaign of Islamist violence that has killed at least seven people in recent weeks. People flooded into a church compound in the city of Ismailia, […]
As with the worlds of haute couture and prêt-à-porter in fashion, France’s small-cap companies depend vitally on the success of the main Paris bourse. Yet as the country braces itself for the presidential election, and as US and other international investors start reducing their French holdings, a flight from the small-caps to the larger, more liquid French companies might be expected. But the opposite has actually been […]
Uber is under attack once again today as the Twittersphere quickly concluded it was behind a smear campaign against a former engineer for the company, Susan Fowler Rigetti, who dropped a scathing blog post earlier this week detailing sexual harassment claims while working at Uber over the course of a year. Rigetti tweeted today people were being contacted for “personal and intimate info” about her, causing many […]
