Britain has apologised after an egg was thrown at a Saudi military official during a visit to London, Saudi state media said Sunday. An anti-war activist last week attempted a citizen’s arrest of General Ahmed Assiri, spokesman for the Saudi-led Gulf coalition fighting rebels in Yemen, before another threw an egg that hit Assiri in the back. British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson called Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed […]
BEIRUT An Iranian-American detained in Iran since last summer has been released on bail of approximately $60,000, the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported Sunday. Robin Reza Shahini was arrested by the Revolutionary Guards while visiting family in the northeastern city of Gorgan last July and subsequently sentenced to 18 years imprisonment on charges of threatening national security, according to HRANA. Shahini went on a hunger […]
GENEVA: The UN on Friday said “incremental” progress was made during a fifth round of talks between Syria’s warring parties, but warned the “real peace negotiations” had yet to begin.Syrian government and opposition representatives had been “serious and engaged” during the latest nine days of talks in Geneva, UN mediator Staffan de Mistura told reporters.He said all sides were “keen and ready to return to Geneva for […]
Those risks have been amplified by President Trump, whose administration has said it is “putting Iran on notice.” The tough talk from Washington has given early movers like Total pause, raising concerns as to whether long-awaited opportunities will materialize, or if the Trump administration will take a harder line and tighten already-complex rules on doing business with Tehran. Continue reading the main story Some major global companies […]
TEHRAN: Iran has banned some of its women players from billiard sports competitions for a year for violating the Islamic codes of conduct at a tournament in China, sporting authorities announced.The Disciplinary Committee of Bowling, Billiard and Boxing Federation did not reveal the nature of the alleged offenses, saying it would name the transgressors later.“Women sent to China Open (billiard) competitions will be banned from all domestic […]
“Trying to fight ISIS while pretending that we can ignore the Syrian civil war that was its genesis and fuels it to this day is a recipe for more war, more terror, more refugees, and more instability,” Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Thursday night. Photo Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson, left, with Mevlut Cavusoglu, Turkey’s foreign […]
With Adam Rawnsley Looking for a deal. Michael Flynn, President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, has offered to be interviewed by the FBI and House and Senate investigators examining the Trump campaign’s potential ties to Russia, in exchange for immunity from prosecution, “but has so far found no takers,” according to the Wall Street Journal. In a statement on Thursday evening, Flynn’s lawyer Robert Kelner, […]
Turkey gets Six Senses Turkey will get its first Six Senses resort on May 1, when the hotel group takes over the management of the Canyon Ranch Wellness Resort at Kaplankaya, on the country’s south-western coast. The property is situated in a wild area of the Aegean coast, a 50-minute drive from Bodrum, and has 141 guest rooms and 154 private residences. Further development will include a […]
BEIRUT/ANKARA: More than 5 million Syrians are now refugees, the UN said Thursday, as aid groups urged the international community to end the country’s six-year war and provide more assistance.The new figures mean around a quarter of Syria’s population has fled since the March 2011 start of a conflict that has killed over 320,000 people.The UN refugee agency UNHCR urged more international assistance, with spokeswoman Cecile Pouilly […]
ISTANBUL Turkish state-run lender Halkbank’s operations and transactions fully comply with national and international regulations, it said in a statement regarding the arrest of its deputy general manager Mehmet Hakan Atilla in the United States. Atilla was charged on Tuesday with participating in a multi-year scheme to violate sanctions against Iran and conspiring with Turkish-Iranian gold trader Reza Zarrab, who is already on trial in a case […]
By Michelle Nichols | NEW YORK NEW YORK The United States’ diplomatic policy on Syria for now is no longer focussed on making the war-torn country’s president, Bashar al-Assad, leave power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said on Thursday, in a departure from the Obama administration’s initial and public stance on Assad’s fate. The view of the Trump administration is also at odds with European […]
ZURICH The “political temperature” in the Balkans has risen significantly, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama told a Swiss newspaper, citing tensions in Macedonia over the country’s ethnic Albanian minority. Balkan states Albania, Macedonia, Serbia, Bosnia, Kosovo and Montenegro all hope to join the European Union, but political feuds, ethnic strife and lingering misgivings over the wars of the 1990s complicate this process. [nL5N1GY69H] Rama, the Socialist Party […]
The food tour has become one of the great tourism successes of the last decade, and most major cities have some sort of walk and taste tour available. These tours are also diversifying – concentrating on specific cuisines and honing in on certain neighbourhoods. It’s this delving-beyond-the-staple citybreak diet that makes such tours worth their while – and not just as a chance to explore the local […]
By Lesley Wroughton | ANKARA ANKARA U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrived in Turkey on Thursday for talks with a NATO ally crucial to the fight against Islamic State but increasingly at odds with Washington and its European partners. Tillerson will meet President Tayyip Erdogan to discuss the U.S.-led fight against Islamic State, including the planned offensive against its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa, where Turkey has […]
The State Department on Wednesday notified Congress of its intent to proceed with the sale without the conditions, according to Micah Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Congress now has two review periods to examine the sale and raise any objections. Continue reading the main story Mr. Tillerson will attend his first meeting of NATO on Friday in Brussels, where he may run into […]
“We recognized the nature of the fight was going to change and that we had to ensure that authorities were down to the right level and that we empowered the on-scene commander,” General Votel said. He was speaking specifically about discussions that he said began in November about how the fights in Syria and Iraq against the Islamic State were reaching critical phases in Mosul and Raqqa. […]
Managing containers isn’t easy. That’s where such programs as Docker swarm mode, Kubernetes, and Mesosphere can make or break your containers initiatives. Perhaps the most popular of these, Kubernetes, has a new release, Kubernetes 1.6, that expands its reach by 50 percent to 5,000 node clusters. Conservatively, that means Kubernetes can manage 25,000 Docker containers at once. The latest Kubernetes makes managing huge numbers of containers easier […]
In a country that is becoming increasingly modern and globalised, there is a renewed focus on what it means to be Emirati and what can be done to preserve local heritage. This weekend, the courtyard of Al Ain Palace will be transformed into a traditional market, with food stalls and demonstrations of traditional medicine practices, such as hijama and tajbeer splinting, for the campaign “My Heritage, My […]
The United States Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security has removed Chinese telecommunications technology solutions provider ZTE from its trading blacklist following the company pleading guilty to illegally exporting products to Iran. “Upon recommendation by BIS, the company and ZTE Kangxun Telecommunications Ltd will be removed from the Entity List on 29 March 2017 (United States time),” ZTE said in a statement [PDF] to the […]
HAVANA Cuban President Raul Castro participated in an “intimate and simple family ceremony” on Tuesday interring the ashes of his sister Agustina del Carmen Castro Ruz, according to state television. Agustina was the youngest of the seven Castro siblings, including Raul and Fidel, who together have run the island nation for nearly 60 years. Agustina, who kept a low public profile, died on Sunday in Havana at […]
WASHINGTON The U.S. Commerce Department will remove Chinese telecom equipment maker ZTE Corp (000063.SZ) from a trade blacklist after the company admitted to violating sanctions on Iran, the Commerce Department said in a notice made public on Tuesday, At the same time, the Commerce Department said it would impose severe restrictions on former ZTE chief executive, Shi Lirong, who the agency accused of approving efforts to skirt […]
Photo One of Bahman Jalali’s photographs, part of “Iran-Iraq War” (1980-1988), which is among those that won’t be displayed at the Aipad Photography show. Credit Bahman Jalali, courtesy Ag Galerie Tehran When this year’s edition of the Aipad Photography Show opens on Thursday, one of its booths will be empty — a casualty of President Trump’s travel ban. Ag Galerie, which was to have its debut at […]
The Gulf emirate of Qatar is tiny, but it’s made a name for itself by placing big bets. Thanks to vast reserves of natural gas, its 2.6 million residents enjoy the world’s highest per-capita income: $129,700 a year. Qatar has acquired more than $335 billion worth of assets around the globe, buying up trophies such as London’s Shard, the tallest building in Europe. The emirate has also […]
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told Reuters on Tuesday that Russia could use Iranian military bases to launch air strikes against militants in Syria on a “case by case basis.” Russia and Iran are both key allies of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and have played decisive roles in the past 18 months to turn the tide of the Syrian conflict in his favour. Russian jets used […]
