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WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — President Joe Biden signed a hate crimes law Thursday aimed at protecting Asian Americans who have suffered a surge in attacks during the Covid-19 pandemic. Racism, Biden told Asian American politicians and senior members of Congress in a packed room at the White House, is “an ugly poison that has long plagued our nation.” Reeling off a list of violent incidents, which took place against a backdrop of anti-Chinese […]
by Sakher Abou El Oun with Ben Simon in Jerusalem JERUSALEM, Undefined (AFP) — A ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, the Islamist movement which controls the Gaza Strip, came into force early Friday after 11 days of deadly fighting that pounded the Palestinian enclave and forced countless Israelis to seek shelter from rockets. Celebrations were heard on Gaza streets in the minutes after the truce began as cars honked their horns and some guns were […]
COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh (AFP) — Bangladesh authorities on Thursday imposed a lockdown in five Rohingya refugee camps in the country’s southeast after a spike in coronavirus cases in recent days, officials said. The restrictions barred gatherings and movement between camps, which are home to more than 100,000 Rohingya refugees, Bangladesh’s deputy refugee commissioner Shamsud Douza told AFP. “We imposed the restrictions from today after sudden spikes in coronavirus cases in the five camps,” he said, […]
PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) — A young Pakistani was killed as he pretended to shoot himself while being filmed by friends for a TikTok video, police said Thursday. Hamidullah, 19, who police said was well-known locally on social media, held a friend’s pistol to his temple and pulled the trigger, unaware the gun was loaded. “The young man died on spot,” said Badshah Hazrat, a senior police official in the northwestern Swat Valley. While the clip […]
AHMEDABAD, India (AFP) — A major new storm was brewing in the Bay of Bengal off India’s east coast, forecasters warned Thursday, just days after the biggest cyclone to hit the west of the country in decades left at least 110 people confirmed dead. Scientists say cyclones in the region are becoming both more frequent and stronger as climate change leads to warmer sea temperatures. Cyclone Tauktae pummelled India’s western coast late Monday and left […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — China on Thursday branded the United States an “out-and-out security risk creator” in the South China Sea, after an American warship sailed through waters near the disputed Paracel Islands. Tensions in maritime waters claimed by both China and many of its neighbors have ratcheted up recently, with Beijing staging live-fire drills and sending hundreds of fishing vessels to a reef claimed by the Philippines. China’s military said the USS Curtis Wilbur, […]
GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories (AFP) — Israeli strikes killed seven people including a disabled man, his pregnant wife, and their three-year-old child in the besieged Palestinian enclave of Gaza on Wednesday, the health ministry said. Another person died of wounds sustained the day before, the ministry in Gaza told AFP, bringing to 227 the number of people killed in Israeli bombardment in the coastal strip since May 10. © Agence France-Presse
by Sakher Abou El Oun with Sebastian Smith in Washington GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories (AFP) — US President Joe Biden called for a “significant de-escalation” in Israel’s conflict with Gaza’s armed groups ahead of a diplomatic push Thursday to stem the violence, as the sides traded further fire. Israeli fighter jets hit the residences of at least six Hamas leaders, according to an army statement, which said “military infrastructure” was stored at each site. As […]
YANGON, Myanmar (AFP) — Desperate residents of a Myanmar town hit by clashes between the military and an anti-junta defence force pleaded for help Wednesday as the UN warned the fighting may have forced thousands to flee. Government forces used artillery to flush out rebels from the western town of Mindat after fighting broke out on May 12, a spokesman for a local insurgent group said, and later cut off its water supply. One resident […]
by Sakher Abou El Oun with Jonah Mandel in Jerusalem GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories (AFP) — Deafening air strikes and rocket fire once more shook Gaza overnight and early Wednesday amid an international diplomatic push to broker a ceasefire after more than a week of bloodshed. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel’s bombing of Gaza had set its Hamas Islamist rulers back “many years” since it began on May 10 in response to Hamas rocket […]
NEW DELHI, India (AFP) — India on Wednesday reported a record 4,529 coronavirus deaths in a single day even as the number of new cases in its devastating new wave fell. The daily pandemic death toll has been rising in recent days as cases spread into rural districts with poor health facilities. With the latest deaths, India’s official toll has now risen to 283,248 behind the United States on more than 600,000 deaths and Brazil […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — Engineers were inspecting a skyscraper in southern China on Wednesday, a day after it triggered widespread panic when it suddenly began shaking, as people took to social media to ask if shoddy construction may have been to blame. The 300-meter (1,000-foot) SEG Plaza in the southern city of Shenzhen near Hong Kong began swaying in the early afternoon on Tuesday, prompting people inside and those on the streets below to flee. […]
