Authorities in the United States have arrested two suspected Chinese government agents in connection with an alleged plot by Beijing against the exiled anti-communist Falun Gong spiritual movement. China banned Falun Gong, based broadly around meditation, in 1999 after 10,000 members appeared at the central leadership compound in Beijing in silent protest. The group has called for people to…
Russia has dismissed criticism from US President Joe Biden over Moscow’s deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, saying Washington for decades has done the same throughout Europe. Russia said on Thursday it was pushing ahead with the first deployment of such weapons outside its borders since the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, and…
Two football teams exiled from cities in war-battered eastern Ukraine play each other on Sunday in the safer western part of the country with the league title at stake. The showdown between Ukrainian Premier League leaders Shakhtar Donetsk and second-place Dnipro-1 at Arena Lviv can be decisive in a football season that is finishing on…
US President Joe Biden will host Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Washington, DC next month, the White House has announced, in a trip the Biden administration said aims to “affirm the deep and close partnership” between the two countries. In a statement on Wednesday, the White House said Modi will make an official state visit to…
The Democratic Republic of Congo has commenced discussions with neighbouring Uganda for possible use of the East African country’s planned crude oil pipeline to export petroleum, DRC’s hydrocarbons ministry said. Uganda is developing the $3.5bn 1,445km (898-mile) East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) that will start from oil fields in its Albertine rift basin on…
The foreign ministers of Russia, Syria, Turkey and Iran have met in Moscow for high-level talks on rebuilding ties between Ankara and Damascus after years of animosity during Syria’s war. Syria’s Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad was quoted as saying by the Syrian state news agency SANA that “despite all the negatives of the past years, there…
Ten people were killed in a landslide in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s Lubero territory in North Kivu province overnight on Wednesday, local authorities have said – additional victims of recent heavy rains that have killed hundreds in floods in the broader region. A recent downpour loosened the earth on a hillside above a village…
So-called earthquake diplomacy is a potential opportunity for Ankara and Athens to mend fences after elections in both countries this month. That seems to be the prevailing theory in the US State Department, after earthquakes in February killed tens of thousands of people in Turkey and left 1.5 million homeless. “It is in everyone’s interest here to work towards…
A nondescript apartment in Istanbul’s business district is the nerve centre of a drive to propel more women into Turkish politics. But with some 60 million voters due to cast their ballots in presidential and parliamentary elections on Sunday, the mood at the office of Ben Secerim, or I Choose, is one of disappointment. The…
LinkedIn, the social media platform for professional connections, has announced plans to cut more than 700 jobs and close its app for those seeking jobs in China. In a letter to employees on Monday, LinkedIn Chief Executive Ryan Roslansky said the company would shed 716 jobs and scrap its job-hunting app in China in response…
