EGYPT: Security officials say a Christian man has been shot dead by suspected Daesh militants while inside a barber’s shop in Egypt’s turbulent northern Sinai.The late Saturday killing in the coastal city of Al-Arish came one day after the Daesh group’s local affiliate warned it would escalate attacks against Christians.The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media.Ayoub is at […]
KIRKUK, Iraq At least two people were killed and six injured when multiple Islamic State suicide bombers attacked a base in northern Iraq where U.S. military advisers are stationed, security sources said on Sunday. In addition, two of the militants died when they detonated their vests at the entrance to the K1 base overnight, and three more were killed by Kurdish peshmerga forces who control the Kirkuk […]
By Ingrid Melander | PARIS PARIS After a tumultuous election campaign filled with scandal and surprises, the French public began to vote on Sunday on whether a pro-European Union centrist or an anti-EU, anti-immigration far-rightist will lead them for the next five years. Opinion polls indicate they will pick Emmanuel Macron, a 39-year-old ex-economy minister who wants to bridge the left-right divide, resisting an anti-establishment tide that […]
Hamas announced on Saturday that it had chosen Ismail Haniyeh, a longtime leader of the militant Islamist group in Gaza, as its new political chief, after signalling a more pragmatic line in a new policy document. Mr Haniyeh served as a deputy to Khaled Mashal, the outgoing political leader of Hamas, and is expected to continue his policies. As head of the group’s political bureau, Mr Mashal […]
Government agencies want their own backdoor into communications. Image: iStockphoto More details of how the UK’s new surveillance law will operate have been revealed, in details about the use of encryption. Under draft regulations to support the new Investigatory Powers Act, the government will be able to issue ‘technical capability notices’ to companies with more than 10,000 UK users to make it easier for police, spy agencies […]
A corner of Wall Street has been gripped by the unknown identity of a trader that has been buying up Vix call options priced at 50 cents each, swelling to account for nearly 10 per cent of the listed market. The FT has now reported that bankers with knowledge of the trades say the so-called “50 Cent” – a reference to the American rapper known for his […]
CAIRO: The head of Egypt’s Al-Azhar university, one of the world’s leading Islamic seats of learning, has been replaced after labelling a controversial Muslim reformer an apostate, the institution said.The development came as Al-Azhar is pressured by critics who say the venerable Sunni Muslim authority has not done enough to counter Islamist extremism.Ahmed Hosni Taha, the acting university president, had been forced to apologize on Thursday after […]
The campaign team of French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron says it has been the victim of a “massive and co-ordinated” hacking operation ahead of Sunday’s election. Around nine gigabytes of data were posted online to Pastebin, a document-sharing site that allows anonymous posting. It was not immediately clear who was responsible for releasing the files. The documents, posted on Friday night, appeared to contain details of emails […]
Microsoft has shown how Windows Defender ATP detected anomalous updater behavior. Image: Microsoft Microsoft is warning software vendors to protect their updater processes after discovering a “well-planned, finely orchestrated” attack that hijacked an unnamed editing tool’s software supply chain. As Microsoft’s threat response group explains, the attackers used the update mechanism of a popular but unnamed piece of editing software to gain a foothold in several high-profile […]
By Adrian Croft and Geert De Clercq | PARIS PARIS France sought to keep a computer hack of frontrunner Emmanuel Macron’s campaign emails from influencing the outcome of the country’s presidential election with a warning on Saturday it could be a criminal offence to republish the data. Macron’s team said a “massive” hack had dumped emails, documents and campaign financing information online just before campaigning ended on […]
The campaign team of French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron said late on Friday night that it had been the victim of a “massive and co-ordinated” hacking operation. Nine gigabytes of data were posted online to Pastebin, a document-sharing site that allows anonymous posting, Reuters reported. It was not immediately clear who was responsible for posting the data. Voters are preparing to go to the polls on Sunday […]
SEOUL/WASHINGTON North Korea on Friday accused the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and South Korea’s intelligence service of a failed plot to assassinate its leader Kim Jong Un with a biochemical bomb at a military parade in Pyongyang. North Korea has a history of accusing the United States and South Korea of planning preemptive military attacks and to target its leaders, but analysts said it could be the […]
Mr. Greenblatt got a very different message at an earlier dinner with two other prominent Palestinians, Salam Fayyad and Ziad Asali, and two American Jewish diplomats, Elliott Abrams and Dennis B. Ross. They all told him that a breakthrough was not realistic now, and that Mr. Trump would be better off pursuing incremental advances, like bettering the economic fortunes of the Palestinians. Continue reading the main story […]
By Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON A draft of President Donald Trump’s new counterterrorism strategy demands that U.S. allies shoulder more of the burden in combating Islamist militants, while acknowledging that the threat of terrorism will never be totally eliminated. The 11-page draft, seen on Friday by Reuters, said the United States should avoid costly, “open-ended” military commitments. “We need to intensify operations against […]
Less than two days before the final round of France’s presidential election, the political party of candidate Emmanuel Macron said its computer systems were hacked. The statement comes after thousands of alleged party-related documents — including emails, contracts and accounting documents — were leaked. The party, En Marche! (On the Move), said that some of the documents are valid and were obtained several weeks ago after both […]
By Eric Auchard and Bate Felix | FRANKFURT/PARIS FRANKFURT/PARIS A large trove of emails from the campaign of French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron was posted online late on Friday, 1-1/2 days before voters go to the polls to choose the country’s next president in a run-off against far-right rival Marine Le Pen. Some nine gigabytes of data were posted by a user called EMLEAKS to Pastebin, a […]
By Mica Rosenberg and Dan Levine | NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO Legal challenges to President Donald Trump’s temporary travel ban on people from some Muslim-majority countries heat up again next week when two U.S. appeals courts consider whether it is constitutional. The legal fights may end up at the U.S. Supreme Court perhaps in the fall, many months after Trump first issued an executive order […]
The internet has enabled a more seamless flow of information, thereby empowering journalists to share their stories with the world. It is a unifying medium across borders that help journalists bring their stories to light. Considering the worldwide reach of the internet and the growing impact of news through social media, censorship of journalists has been steadily increasing. The world is reeling from the challenge of maintaining […]
Of those who favor limits, the vast majority — four out of five people — say presidential campaigns should last for one year or less, the poll indicates. Democrats are most likely to want president campaign limitations, although most Republicans and independents want them, too. “Too long” was the most common answer poll respondents gave when asked to briefly describe Election 2016. “Long,” “crazy” and “bad” followed. […]
Families of three victims killed in the 2015 San Bernardino, California, shooting are suing Google, Facebook, and Twitter over claims that the tech companies knowingly allowed the Islamic State to share its propaganda on the respective social media and web platforms. The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California on Wednesday, May 3. The 32-page complaint states that the three […]
Significantly, the agreement to establish the de-escalation zones has not been accepted by all opposition groups, and it left loopholes for Syria to continue undiminished attacks on the rebels, factors that combined to hinder the last attempt by Iran, Russia and Turkey to forge a cease-fire. Continue reading the main story Nevertheless, one of the representatives of the Syrian opposition groups at talks in Astana, Kazakhstan, Col. […]
By Mathieu Rosemain and Andrew Callus | PARIS PARIS Centrist French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron extended his lead in the polls over his far-right rival Marine Le Pen on Friday, the final day of a tumultuous election campaign that has turned the country’s politics upside down. The election is seen as the most important in France for decades with two diametrically opposed views of Europe and France’s […]
By Tife Owolabi | YENAGOA, Nigeria YENAGOA, Nigeria At least six Nigerian soldiers have been killed in new military campaign against militants in the country’s restive Niger Delta oil hub, security officials said on Friday. The southern swampland has been largely quiet since the start of the year because militants halted attacks against oil pipelines to give the government a chance to conduct peace talks. But in […]
BANGKOK Thai police found 35 migrants from Myanmar abandoned and wandering in a southern forest on Friday, raising fears that smuggling and trafficking routes are flourishing despite a crackdown by authorities. The 28 men and seven women were discovered by villagers in Tha Sala district in Nakorn Si Thammarat province, police said. They were on their way to Malaysia and had no identification cards on them. “They […]
