The number of US forces stationed in Afghanistan will be reduced to less than 5,000 in the coming months, US Defense Secretary Mark Esper said in an interview with Fox News. The withdrawal, which would account for around half of the 8,600 personnel in the country, will be completed by […]
Newsline
60 posts
The Polish government intends to fully reopen schools on September 1, Education Minister Dariusz Piontkowski said on Wednesday, despite a recent renewed spike in coronavirus infections. Cases started rising after restrictions on public gatherings were eased. On Tuesday, authorities reported the fourth record daily increase in a week, with 680 […]
Ireland plans to take “a very cautious approach” to easing Covid-19 restrictions in the coming weeks, Deputy Prime Minister Leo Varadkar has said. Tuesday’s statement came ahead of a government meeting that will decide whether to reopen bars or ease travel restrictions, Reuters reported. “I know that is going to […]
Germany is contending with a second wave of the coronavirus, the head of the country’s doctors’ union said in an interview published on Tuesday. The number of daily confirmed coronavirus cases has risen steadily in recent weeks. “We are already in a second, shallow upswing,” Susanne Johna, president of Marburger […]
Vietnam has no plans for a nationwide lockdown, the government said. “We will only implement social distancing in areas considered virus epicenters, and will not pursue a widespread lockdown,” Mai Tien Dung, the government’s spokesman, told a monthly meeting of reporters on Monday. Selective lockdown measures will allow the government […]
Argentina will extend a mandatory lockdown until August 16 as its coronavirus cases continue to rise, President Alberto Fernandez said on Friday. The lockdown, which has been the strictest in the capital Buenos Aires, was due to expire on Sunday. The South American nation has seen its caseload spike in […]
Washington on Friday imposed sanctions on a powerful Chinese company in the Xinjiang province and two officials for what it said were human rights abuses against Uighurs and other ethnic minorities. The move is the latest blow to US-China relations. The US Treasury Department said it blacklisted the Xinjiang Production […]
China’s State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Tuesday slammed the United States for “reckless provocation of confrontation” after the two countries ordered tit-for-tat closures of each other’s consulates. In a call with his French counterpart Jean-Yves Le Drian, Wang warned that China-US relations could “fall into the abyss […]
Australia has registered 10 new coronavirus-related deaths over the past 24 hours, marking the deadliest single-day toll for the country since the pandemic began. The latest victims were aged between their 40s and 80s, with seven of the deaths occurring in care homes. The fatalities bring the cumulative death count […]
The Taliban has said it is ready for talks with Afghanistan’s political leadership after the Muslim holiday of Eid ul-Adha at the end of July. The movement also offered to hand over the last of the government prisoners in a week’s time, providing the government frees the last of its […]
The campaign team for the opposition challenger in Poland’s presidential election, Rafal Trzaskowski, says it now wants the vote annulled, citing numerous irregularities. The liberal Warsaw Mayor lost the July 12 runoff by a narrow margin to conservative incumbent President Andrzej Duda. Trzaskowski, who received 48.97 percent of votes, earlier […]
Iranian judicial authorities have halted the execution of Amirhossein Moradi, 26, a cellphone retailer, Said Tamjidi, 28, a student, and 26-year-old Mohammad Rajabi. Babak Paknia, a lawyer representing one of the accused, told AFP that “we conveyed a request [for a retrial] to the Supreme Court and they have accepted […]
Russia’s defense minister Sergey Shoigu and his Azeri counterpart Zakir Hasanov have discussed the situation in the Southern Caucasus during a phone call, Russia’s Ministry of Defense has said. The talks come after almost a week of border clashes between Azerbaijan and Armenia, which have left more than a dozen […]
Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Angela Merkel discussed implementing the Minsk agreements to peacefully solve the conflict in eastern Ukraine in a phone call on Wednesday. Putin “emphasized the counter-productivity of Ukrainian attempts to distort the substance” of the agreements, amid Kiev’s statements about the need to review […]
The government in Hanoi has agreed to resume commercial flights to and from China after months of closure due to the coronavirus pandemic. The Transport Ministry, however, said on Monday that the frequency and timing of flights was still being discussed. With 372 infections and no deaths, Vietnam has seen […]
The leader of Spain’s Catalonia Quim Torra has called on the residents of the city of Lleida to follow his government’s home confinement orders, after a rise in coronavirus cases. The statement came despite a Spanish judge’s decision to bar the lockdown. Quim Torra told reporters on Monday it was […]
Police forces dismantled a makeshift shelter camp in the northern French port of Calais on Friday, removing hundreds of migrants. The dismantling was one of the biggest operations of its kind in several months. Since the easing of the coronavirus lockdown and the reopening of borders within the EU, migrants […]
Beijing said on Friday it will impose reciprocal measures in response to US sanctions on Chinese officials over alleged human rights abuses against the Uighur Muslim minority. Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters in Beijing that the US action represented serious interference in China’s affairs and was deeply detrimental […]
The United States and Russia are not enemies and cannot afford to stop talking to one another, Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov has said. Speaking on Russia-US relations during a video conference organized by the Washington-based Center for the National Interest on Wednesday, he said: “There is an […]
As part of rolling out the UK’s own sanctions agenda for alleged human rights abuses around the world, London has blacklisted 25 Russian nationals, including the head of the Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin. Bastrykin has led the law enforcement agency – the Russian equivalent of the FBI in the US […]
China began pulling back troops from along its contested border with India on Monday, Indian government sources said. A clash between the two countries last month left 20 Indian soldiers killed. Beijing has yet to confirm whether it suffered casualties. On Monday, the Chinese military was seen dismantling tents and […]
Britain’s talks on separation with the European Union resume on Monday with few signs of compromise on a new trade agreement and time running out to avoid a messy split. London will host EU negotiator Michel Barnier after a round of face-to-face talks ended a day early last week in […]
The Foreign Ministry in Beijing said on Monday that the United States had deliberately sent its ships to the South China Sea to flex its muscles. China also accused Washington of trying to drive a wedge between the countries in the region. Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian made the comments in […]
A rocket fired toward Baghdad’s Green Zone, where the US’ and other embassies are based, failed to reach the diplomatic compound and, instead, landed near a house, Iraq’s military said on Sunday. A child was injured. Citing police sources, Reuters reported that a missile defense system protecting the US embassy […]