WASHINGTON — During the height of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States military often carried out dozens of daily operations against Al Qaeda and other extremist targets with heavily armed commandos and helicopter gunships. But even before President Obama’s speech on Wednesday sought to underscore a shift in counterterrorism strategy — away from the Qaeda strongholds in and near those countries — American forces […]
Beirut, Lebanon – This was not an ordinary voting day. It was a parade of Syrians celebrating their embattled president, Bashar al-Assad, and expressing support for him in the battle to quell the uprising that erupted three years ago. Since early morning, tens of thousands of Syrians flocked to the heavily fortified area surrounding the Syrian embassy in Lebanon as expatriate voting began ahead of the June […]
Barack Obama has outlined his vision for the country’s foreign policy for the rest of his presidency, saying that the country will still lead, but will show more restraint before embarking on more military missions abroad. In a speech on Wednesday, the US president insisted that his country’s reliance on diplomacy over military intervention was working to resolve global crises such as Ukraine and Iran, and he […]
WASHINGTON — A United States citizen working in Syria with a militant group backed by Al Qaeda conducted a suicide bombing there Sunday, in what is believed to be the first time an American has been involved in such an attack, American officials said Wednesday. The suicide attack first surfaced on Tuesday in Twitter messages from the Nusra Front, an Islamist extremist group in Syria aligned with […]
A Turkish court has ordered the arrest of four former Israeli military chiefs over a deadly 2010 raid by Israeli commandos on a Gaza-bound Turkish aid ship which killed nine unarmed human rights activists. The court in Istanbul will ask Interpol to issue international arrest warrants for the four commanders, Cihat Gokdemir, a lawyer working on the case, told AFP news agency. Turkish prosecutors are seeking life […]
CAIRO — Helicopters hovered over parts of the Egyptian capital, Cairo, early Monday as voting in the two-day presidential election began. Security was tight in many neighborhoods. Police blocked off streets and parts of city blocks to protect voters at polling stations. More than 400,000 Egyptian police and army soldiers were deployed Monday for the election, and more than 14,000 judges are overseeing the vote at polling stations across […]
Even before his inauguration, India’s Prime Minister designate Narendra Modi made waves on the global stage, where once he was treated by many with suspicion – and by some as a pariah – for a rash of Hindu-Muslim violence that erupted 12 years ago in Gujarat, the state he ruled. Modi, 63, has spoken with the presidents of the United States and Russia, and he has become […]
CAIRO — Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the former army officer soon to be Egypt’s president, promises to remedy Egypt’s crippling fuel shortage by installing energy-efficient bulbs in every home socket, even if he has to send a government employee to screw in each one. “I’m not leaving a chance for people to act on their own,” Mr. Sisi said in his first and most extensive television interview. “My […]
Attacks on Nigel Farage, Ukip’s leader, by other politicians have not damaged his standing with voters Photo: EPA Nick Clegg was at his most priggish this week as he sought desperately to persuade the public not to back Ukip in the European elections. Indeed, he laid into not only Nigel Farage, but all those who back him – which, by my reckoning, could be some five million voters. […]
What do you do if you are a cheerful 25-year-old college student in Iran tired of your country and its people being portrayed in the world as angry, provocative and depressed? Answer: You make a video of your friends being happy, singing and dancing in the streets of Tehran to Pharrell Williams’ smash hit song “Happy.” “People of Tehran are happy! Watch and share our happiness! … […]
WASHINGTON — To those who lost loved ones in the suicide bombing of the American Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, in April 1983, it is often called “the forgotten bombing” — overshadowed by an even deadlier attack on a Marine barracks at the Beirut airport six months later. Now, a new book shines a spotlight on the embassy bombing, which killed 63 people, 17 of them American, including […]
The U.S. government warned banks and other businesses on Friday to be on alert for hackers seeking to steal data exposed by the “Heartbleed” bug, as a German programmer took responsibility for the widespread security crisis. On a website for advising critical infrastructure operators about emerging cyber threats, the Department of Homeland Security asked organizations to report any Heartbleed-related attacks, adding that hackers were attempting to exploit […]
AP | New York | Microsoft Corporation unveiled a new virtual assistant for Windows Phone devices Wednesday as it seeks to gain traction in a highly competitive and lucrative market for smartphones. The assistant, Cortana, is named after an artificial-intelligence character in the company’s ”Halo” video games. Cortana tries to be chatty like Apple’s Siri, while anticipating information you might want, like Google Now. Cortana is among the new […]
The U.S. National Security Agency has infiltrated servers in the headquarters of Chinese telecommunications and internet giant Huawei Technologies Co, obtaining sensitive information and monitoring the communications of top executives, the New York Times reported on Saturday. The newspaper said its report on the operation, code-named “Shotgiant,” was based on NSA documents provided by Edward Snowden, the former agency contractor who since last year has leaked data […]
As U.S. and European officials threaten sanctions in their face-off with Russia over Ukraine, Vladimir Putin’s $160 billion in oil and natural gas exports may be his most potent weapon to limit punitive measures. The U.S. and its European allies, set to meet today in Brussels, have few levers to deter Putin even as they warn Russia not to annex Crimea after a referendum in Ukraine’s southern […]
|By Aki Ito| Who needs an army of lawyers when you have a computer? When Minneapolis attorney William Greene faced the task of combing through 1.3 million electronic documents in a recent case, he turned to a so-called smart computer program. Three associates selected relevant documents from a smaller sample, “teaching” their reasoning to the computer. The software’s algorithms then sorted the remaining material by importance. “We […]
Singapore leapt five spots to top a global ranking of the most expensive cities as a stronger currency and price increases made it costlier to live in the island nation, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit. The republic beat Paris, Oslo, Zurich and Sydney, while Tokyo moved down to sixth position from first previously after the yen slid, the EIU’s latest Worldwide Cost of Living Survey released […]
In an age of aerial drones and driver-less cars, Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc is designing unmanned cargo ships. Rolls-Royce’s Blue Ocean development team has set up a virtual-reality prototype at its office in Alesund, Norway, that simulates 360-degree views from a vessel’s bridge. Eventually, the London-based manufacturer of engines and turbines says, captains on dry land will use similar control centers to command hundreds of crewless ships. Drone […]
India’s best-performing equity fund in the past five years is buying consumer companies, lured by revenue growth more than three times faster than the broader market even as rival money managers sell the stocks. R. Srinivasan, who runs the $200 million SBI Magnum Emerging Businesses Fund (MAGEMBG), owns shares of Page Industries Ltd. (PAG), which sells Jockey International Inc.’s undergarments, Redington (India) Ltd., a distributor of Apple […]
A previously unknown flaw in a recent version of Microsoft Corp’s Internet Explorer web browser is being used to attack Internet users, including some visitors to a major site for U.S. military veterans, researchers said Thursday. Security firm FireEye Inc discovered the attacks against IE 10 this week, saying that hundreds or thousands of machines have been infected. It said the culprits broke into the website of […]
President Barack Obama was sued by Senator Rand Paul over U.S. electronic surveillance he claims is illegal, adding to challenges that may land post-Sept. 11 government data collection in the U.S. Supreme Court. The Kentucky Republican announced today that he had filed his complaint in Washington federal court. Paul was joined as co-plaintiff by FreedomWorks Inc., a Tea Party-backed group. The filing couldn’t be immediately confirmed in […]
Google Inc., the company that leads Internet search, has gained a new superlative: top dealmaker. From buying a digital-thermostat developer to selling a mobile-phone business, Google has executed more deals than any company in the world over the past three years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg through January, up from 13th place in the three years prior. Advertising-firm WPP Plc was second, followed by chipmaker Intel […]
The U.N. nuclear agency said on Sunday that Iran had agreed to start addressing suspicions that it may have worked on designing an atomic weapon, a potential breakthrough in a long-stalled investigation into Tehran’s atomic activities. The development – although limited for now – marked a step forward in an international push to settle a decade-old dispute over Iran’s nuclear program. Tehran says this is peaceful, while […]
Air carriers flying to Winter Olympics host Russia were warned today to watch for toothpaste tubes containing materials that could be turned into a bomb, a U.S. law enforcement official said. The official declined to elaborate on the intelligence that sparked the warning, which was sent to U.S. and foreign airlines, just two days before the start of the 2014 games in Sochi, Russia. Security at Sochi […]
