[VOA] Washington -- The United Nations General Assembly on Thursday elected Somalia to the 15-member U.N. Security Council for a two-year term starting in 2025.
[Daily Maverick] After failing to secure a majority in the recent elections, the ANC will start negotiations with other parties to form a government of national unity.
[UNHCR] Amidst the arid landscape, under the shade of acacia and mango trees, a sense of hope blossoms. It's not just the sound of bees at work; it's the promise of a brighter future for the refugees from Sudan and the Central African Republic (CAR) who have been calling Kerfi home for over a decade.
China’s exports to Russia amounted to $41.8 bln in the reporting period, while Russian supplies to the People’s Republic of China totaled $54.7 bln
According to the report, the European Commission wants to show support for Ukraine in this way before the start of Hungary’s EU presidency
STRIKE STAR Entertainment will host their second annual Screenwriters Workshop in Jamaica from June 20 to 21 at The Mico University College, Kingston. This educational charity workshop was established last year in collaboration with entertainment...
THE TOURISM Product Development Company Limited (TPDCo) and Guardsman Hospitality have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) for the adoption and maintenance of the newly refurbished Old Folly Scenic Park in Discovery Bay, St Ann. This...
The Students’ Loan Bureau (SLB) on Tuesday launched its first Information Hub at Northern Caribbean University (NCU) in Mandeville. Speaking at the inauguration, SLB Executive Director Nickeisha Walsh said this “strategic choice underscores the...
On a blustery week day along the boulder-lined Palisades stretch, water-booted and barefooted volunteers waded along the perimeter of the Kingston Harbour. The ready-to-work contingent comprised employees of JPS and the National Environmental and...
While sharing that she was still yearning to know the truth about what happened on the night her father was killed, the daughter of slain businessman Keith Clarke yesterday declared that she was coached by God to tell the truth about what she...
The World Health Organisation (WHO) director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, congratulated Narendra Modi on his 're-election' as the Prime Minister of India following the Lok Sabha elections. In response, Prime Minister Modi expressed his gratitude to his friend «Tulsi Bhai».
The Manchester Chamber of Commerce (MCC), in partnership with SnappLTD and the Golf View Hotel, will host the ‘Central Jamaica Business Expo 2024’ from June 7-8 in Mandeville. According to Simone Spence-Johnson, president of the MCC, this will be...
'Let's just hope we don't get another war like that again.' Those were the words of 104-year-old Percy Chafer, who served as a Gunner with the 7th Armoured Division 80 years ago on D-Day.
The Mail's ground-breaking podcast, The Trial of Lord Lucan, enters its most thrilling phase. From 6am on Friday morning, we are inviting you, the listener, to join the jury and seal his fate.
The event is expected to begin after 2:00 p.m. Moscow time
The yuan lost 0.5 kopecks, trading at 12.22 rubles
Also, flight crews of the two states practiced air strikes on dummy targets in the Syrian desert
Also work is under way to resume air service with Indonesia and Saudi Arabia, Russian First Deputy Prime Minster Igor Chernyshenko said
«We are only at the stage of drafting this project,» Evghenia Gutul said
«Comment la France entend-elle garantir la sécurité et la stabilité de nos territoires, face aux ingérences étrangères ?» a demandé la sénatrice, Lana Tetuanui, au premier ministre, lors des questions au gouvernement, au Sénat. L'élue a pointé le rapprochement de l'Azerbaïdjan avec les indépendantistes polynésiens et calédoniens.
The People's National Party (PNP) representative for Trelawny Southern is criticising the Government for not moving to ensure that a new member of Parliament is elected, eight months after Marisa Dalrymple-Philibert resigned.
The police have released the identity of the 23-year-old man who was shot and killed at his home on Barbican Road in St Andrew on Wednesday afternoon.
A delegation from The Gambia is wrapping up a five-day study tour to gain insights into Jamaica’s public sector transformation programme.
India adds Bihar's Nagi and Nakti bird sanctuaries to Ramsar list, ranking joint third globally with China. UK leads with 175 sites, followed by Mexico with 144.
«Day by day, we see more exercises and more foreign military presence,» Evghenia Gutul said
Washington believes that «Beijing and Moscow have effectively rejected» US proposal to discuss arms control without preconditions, Semafor reported
«We expect the increase in the demand for polymers at the approximately the same level - 10-20%,» Executive Director of the Russian petrochemical major Pavel Lyakhovich said
«Of course, the museums will inform us about any outcome,» Mikhail Shvydkoi said
The presumptive Republican nominee referenced misleading claims about undocumented minors who did not answer follow-up calls from authorities.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday criticised the West's delivery of long-range weapons to Ukraine, arguing Moscow could arm other countries with similar weapons to attack Western targets. The comment -- which Putin made at a rare press conference with foreign news outlets -- came after several Western countries including the United States gave Ukraine the green light to strike targets inside Russia, a move Moscow has called a grave miscalculation. «If someone thinks it is possible to supply such weapons to a warzone to attack our territory and create problems for us, why don't we have the right to supply weapons of the same class to regions of the world where there will be strikes on sensitive facilities of those (Western) countries,» Putin said. «That is, the response can be asymmetric. We will think about it,» he told reporters. But the 71-year-old Kremlin chief dismissed as «bollocks» suggestions Russia planned to attack NATO members. «There is no need to look for some imperial ambitions of ours. There are none,» he said. Putin warned that Western arms deliveries to Ukraine were «a very negative step», saying that donors were «controlling» the weapons. The Russian leader singled out Germany for particular criticism, saying that when the first German-supplied tanks «appeared on Ukrainian soil, it provoked a moral and ethical shock in Russia» because of the legacy of World War II. Referring to German authorities, he said: «When they say that there will be more missiles which will hit targets on Russian territory, this definitively destroys Russian-German relations.» - 'Irrecoverable losses' - Sitting opposite representatives from news outlets including AFP, Putin repeated that his country «did not start the war against Ukraine», instead blaming a pro-Western revolution in 2014. «Everyone thinks that Russia started the war in Ukraine. I would like to emphasise that nobody in the West, in Europe, wants to remember how this tragedy started,» Putin said. He declined to give the number of Russia's battlefield losses in the more than two-year conflict, saying only that Ukraine's were five times higher. «I can tell you that as a rule, no one talks about it,» Putin rebuffed, when asked why Russia had not yet disclosed a figure. «If we talk about irrecoverable losses, the ratio is one to five,» he said. The issue of military casualties is extremely sensitive in Russia, where all criticism of the conflict is banned and «spreading false information» about the army carries a maximum 15 year jail sentence. When asked about the killing of AFP video journalist Arman Soldin in Ukraine last year, likely as a result of Russian rocket fire, Putin indicated Moscow was ready to help investigate. «We will do everything in our power,» he said. «We are ready to do this work. I do not know how it could be done in practice since this person died in a warzone.» - 'Burned to the ground' - Putin was also probed about what a victory for former US President Donald Trump or incumbent Joe Biden would mean for US-Russia relations -- an issue the Russian leader shrugged off. «By and large there's no difference,» he said. However he called Trump's recent criminal charges for business fraud politically motivated, arguing his conviction «burned» the idea that Washington was a leading democracy. «It is obvious all over the world that the prosecution of Trump... is simply the utilisation of the judicial system during an internal political struggle,» Putin said. «Their supposed leadership in the sphere of democracy is being burned to the ground,» the Russian leader added. Trump became the first former US head of state ever convicted of a crime last week after a New York jury found him guilty of 34 felony charges in a hush money case. Trump, who faces an election in November that could see him return to the White House, has praised Putin as a «smart guy». Putin also said Russia and the United States were in «constant contact» over a possible prisoner exchange that would free jailed US journalist Evan Gershkovich who was arrested on espionage charges last year. «The relevant services in the US and Russia are in constant contact with one another and of course they will decide only on the basis of reciprocity,» Putin said. © Agence France-Presse
A Gaza hospital said at least 37 people were killed in an Israeli strike on a UN-run school on Thursday, that the Israeli military alleged housed a «Hamas compound». The raid came after US, Qatari and Egyptian mediators resumed talks aimed at securing a truce and hostage-prisoner swap in the eight-month war triggered by Hamas's October 7 attack on Israel. The Israeli military said it had «eliminated» several militants in a «precise strike on a Hamas compound embedded inside a UNRWA school» in the Nuseirat area of central Gaza. Military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari later said nine «terrorists» were killed when fighter jets attacked three classrooms where about 30 militants from Islamic Jihad and Hamas were hiding. The United States has called on Israel to be «fully» transparent about the strike. «The government of Israel has said that they are going to release more information about this strike, including the names of those who died in it. We expect them to be fully transparent in making that information public,» State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters. UN chief Antonio Guterres called the strike «just another horrific example of the price that civilians are paying». «There will need to be accountability for everything that has happened in Gaza,» his spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called for the strike to be «independently investigated». Israel accuses Hamas and its allies in Gaza of using schools, hospitals and other civilian infrastructure including facilities run by UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, as operational centres -- charges the militants deny. The Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir al-Balah, near Nuseirat, said it had received the bodies of at least «37 martyrs» from the strike. Faisal Thari, a displaced Gazan who had sought refuge at the school, told AFP: «Why? What have we done for them to bomb us?» Hamas in a statement decried a «new crime... against our people». A medic said another Israeli pre-dawn strike killed six people in a house in Nuseirat refugee camp, and witnesses reported intense shelling in the Bureij and Al-Maghazi camps in the same area. Israeli warplanes also carried out strikes in parts of Rafah, a source in Gaza's southernmost city told AFP. - Spain joins ICJ case - The military said a soldier was killed in Gaza on Thursday, bringing to 295 the death toll since its ground offensive in the Palestinian territory began on October 27. The war was sparked by Hamas's October 7 attack, which resulted in the deaths of 1,194 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures. Militants also took 251 hostages, 120 of whom remain in Gaza, including 41 the army says are dead. Israel's retaliatory military offensive has killed at least 36,654 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory's health ministry. Israel has faced growing diplomatic isolation, with international court cases accusing it of war crimes and several European countries recognising a Palestinian state. Spain, which last week sparked Israeli fury by formally recognising Palestinian statehood, said Thursday it would become the latest country to join South Africa's case at the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of «genocide» against Palestinians in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has meanwhile accepted an invitation from lawmakers in the United States, his main ally and military backer, to address Congress on July 24, a congressional source told AFP. - Peace push - US President Joe Biden last week outlined what he called a three-phase Israeli plan to halt the fighting for six weeks while hostages are exchanged for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and the delivery of aid into Gaza is stepped up. G7 powers and Arab states have backed the proposal, and on Wednesday 16 world leaders signed alongside Biden calling for Hamas to accept the deal. «There is no time to lose. We call on Hamas to close this agreement,» said a White House statement. Egypt's state-linked Al-Qahera news quoted a high-level source Thursday saying that Cairo had «received positive signs from the Palestinian movement signalling its aspiration for a ceasefire». But Beirut-based senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan on Thursday cast doubt on the proposal, calling it «just words said by Biden in a speech». Qatar's foreign ministry spokesman said Thursday that Hamas has not yet given its response on the truce plan. Major sticking points include Hamas insisting on a permanent truce and full Israeli withdrawal -- demands Israel has rejected. - Lebanon 'escalation' - The war has sent regional tensions soaring, with violence on the rise involving Israel and its allies on the one hand, and Iran-backed armed groups on the other. Regular cross-border clashes between Israeli forces and Lebanon's Hezbollah movement, which have forced mass evacuations on both sides, have intensified. The Israeli military on Thursday announced a soldier was killed in a Hezbollah drone strike the day before on Hurfeish. Israeli politicians have threatened more intense fighting against Hezbollah, which last fought a major war with Israel in 2006. Netanyahu was in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, a day after saying Israel was «prepared for a very intense operation» along the border with Lebanon. «The state of Israel is in a difficult campaign on many fronts,» he said at a military command centre. «This effort is being carried out amid complicated international pressure on us.» The US State Department's Miller has said any «escalation» in Lebanon would «greatly harm Israel's overall security». © Agence France-Presse
Minneapolis (HOL) — The FBI raided a residence in Savage, Minnesota, early Wednesday morning as part of an ongoing investigation into an attempted jury bribe in the Feeding Our Future fraud trial. The home, located on Hampshire Lane, was reportedly purchased by one of the trial’s defendants, Abdiaziz Shafii Farah, with money allegedly embezzled from federal meal programs.
