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HONG KONG, China (AFP) — Low-cost carrier Hong Kong Airlines said Friday it will delay salary payments to some staff, warning its business has been “severely affected” by the political unrest in the city. Nearly six months of protests in the international finance hub have dealt its tourism sector a massive blow, and airlines serving the city have struggled. “Hong Kong Airlines’ business is severely affected by the social unrest in Hong Kong and […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone, an ardent conservative who worked to forge a stronger military alliance with the United States, has died at the age of 101, local media said Friday. In-office for five years from November 1982 to November 1987, Nakasone was known for trying to integrate the nation defeated in World War II as a full-fledged member of the West during the Cold War era. He poured his […]
DAMASCUS, Syria (AFP) — Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad on Thursday approved a $9.2-billion budget for his war-torn country, official media reported. The 2020 budget, approved by Syria’s parliament before being signed off by Assad, sees the country’s deficit rise by 54 percent compared to the current budget, according to the pro-government newspaper Al-Watan. The country’s devastating eight-year war has inflicted damage estimated by the United Nations last year at some $400 billion. The Syrian pound […]
MALE, Maldives (AFP) — Disgraced Maldives ex-president Abdulla Yameen was sentenced to five years in prison for money laundering on Thursday after a corruption probe into the former strongman’s rule of the luxury tourist destination. Yameen, who ran the Indian Ocean archipelago with an iron fist before his shock election loss in 2018, was accused of illegally transferring one million dollars from one of his bank accounts during an ongoing graft investigation. The 60-year-old was […]
by Sunghee Hwang Agence France Presse SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) — North Korea fired two “unidentified projectiles” on Thursday, Seoul said, as nuclear talks between Pyongyang and Washington remain deadlocked. The projectiles were fired eastwards from South Hamgyong province and came down in the Sea of Japan, also known as the East Sea, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said. They added that the launch, the latest in a series by Pyongyang, was […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — China warned Thursday that it was ready to take “firm countermeasures” against the United States after President Donald Trump signed a law supporting pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong. “The nature of this is extremely abominable, and harbors absolutely sinister intentions,” the foreign ministry said in a statement, without specifying what measures Beijing might take. Trump signed the law on Wednesday after it received almost unanimous US congressional support. In a statement, […]
HONG KONG, China (AFP) –Hong Kong police on Thursday entered a ransacked university campus where authorities faced off for days with barricaded pro-democracy protesters, looking for petrol bombs and other dangerous materials left over from the occupation. The Hong Kong Polytechnic University became the epicenter of the territory’s increasingly violent protest movement when clashes broke out on November 17 between police and protesters armed with bows and arrows as well as Molotov cocktails. The standoff […]
KARBALA, Iraq (AFP) — Iraqi anti-government protesters blocked roads in the country’s south with burning tires on Wednesday, like schools and public offices stayed shut a day after deadly clashes with security forces. The country has been rocked by the biggest wave of protests since the 2003 US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein, leaving more than 350 people dead and around 15,000 wounded since early October. Violence had erupted in the southern holy city of Karbala […]
KATHMANDU, Nepal (AFP) — At least 18 people died after a bus skidded off a highway in Nepal and plunged into a deep gorge on Wednesday, authorities said, as rescuers scoured the steep terrain for survivors. The bus was traveling from the hilly Arghakhanchi district west of Kathmandu to the southern city of Butwal when it left the road and plummeted some 350 meters (1,150 feet) to the ground. “We have recovered dead bodies of […]
ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates (AFP) — Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visited the United Arab Emirates Wednesday, as efforts to end the nearly five-year war in Yemen gain momentum. Riyadh and Abu Dhabi are close allies and key members of a military coalition backing the government in Yemen against the Iran-aligned Huthi rebels. But an Emirati drawdown in July followed by fighting in southern Yemen between UAE-backed separatists and the government — still […]
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) — Bangladesh said Tuesday it will shut hundreds of soot-belching brick kilns around its capital Dhaka as part of measures to reduce thick smog enveloping the city and pushing air quality levels to among the world’s worst. Residents in several other cities in South Asia, including India’s capital New Delhi and Lahore in Pakistan, have also been breathing toxic smog in recent weeks amid uncontrolled emissions and crop burning. Air Visual, an […]
HONG KONG, China (AFP) — Hong Kong’s unpopular leader Carrie Lam said on Monday her government would “listen humbly” to the public after voters dealt a humiliating election setback to the Beijing-backed establishment she heads. “The government will certainly listen humbly to citizens’ opinions and reflect on them seriously,” she said in a statement issued by the government. Hong Kong’s pro-democracy camp scored a crushing victory in community-level elections held on Sunday, a result that […]
