International

Hong Kong offers bounties for 5 activists accused of security crimes

  By Holmes CHAN HONG KONG, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – Hong Kong police on Thursday offered HK$1 million bounties for information leading to the capture of five overseas activists accused of national security crimes, adding they would be pursued “till the end”. All five are living abroad after Beijing imposed a sweeping national security law on the financial hub in 2020 to quash dissent after massive pro-democracy protests. Thursday’s bounties were the second batch […]

Denmark says arrests foiled terror attack

COPENHAGEN, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – Danish authorities said on Thursday they prevented a terror attack, after three arrests in Denmark and a fourth in the Netherlands. Officials did not go into details of the suspects or give any indication as to the possible target of the alleged plot. “It was a group that was planning an act of terror,” Flemming Drejer, head of operations at the PET intelligence service, told a news conference. There […]

Newly-confident Putin vows victory in Ukraine

MOSCOW, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – President Vladimir Putin talked up Russia’s offensive in Ukraine Thursday as he staged a marathon press conference a week after saying he plans to stay in the Kremlin until at least 2030. Clearly bolstered by Kyiv’s recent struggles on the battlefield, the 71-year-old looked relaxed as he brushed off nearly two years of Western sanctions and reaffirmed his maximalist goals in Ukraine. “There will be peace when we achieve […]

Seoul scrambles jets after Chinese, Russian warplanes approach

SEOUL, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – South Korea’s military said Thursday it scrambled fighter jets as two Chinese and four Russian military planes entered its air defence zone, an area wider than the country’s airspace. The Chinese and Russian planes entered and exited the Korea Air Defence Identification Zone (KADIZ) in the East Sea, also known as the Sea of Japan, from 11:53 am (0253 GMT) to 12:10 pm, Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said. […]

Armenia, Azerbaijan exchange war prisoners

By Emil GULIYEV BAKU, Dec 13, 2023 (AFP) – Armenia and Azerbaijan on Wednesday swapped prisoners of war, a first step towards normalising relations since Baku retook control of the long-disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region in a one-day autumn offensive. It is the first time the neighbours have exchanged prisoners since the lightening September offensive. Azerbaijan’s military operation ended almost three decades of Armenian separatist control of Karabakh, forcing tens of thousands of ethnic Armenians to flee. […]

Philippines deports 180 Chinese detained in anti-trafficking raid

MANILA, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – The Philippines deported 180 Chinese nationals on Thursday after they were detained in a raid on a suspected sex-trafficking and online scam operation in the capital Manila, officials said. Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese and Filipino nationals were among the nearly 600 people found inside a compound during the operation in October. Sex toys, a massage parlour, karaoke rooms and a restaurant were found in the building operated by a business […]

Israel bombs Gaza as rift with US grows

By Mai Yaghi with Rosie Scammell in Jerusalem GAZA STRIP, Palestinian Territories, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – Israel bombed Gaza on Thursday as a top White House advisor was due to arrive in Jerusalem with a rift growing over US calls for its ally to exercise restraint. The war, now in its third month, began after the October 7 attacks on Israel by Palestinian militant group Hamas that Israeli officials say killed 1,200 people, mostly […]

Oil at the root of Guyana-Venezuela border row

By Barbara AGELVIS CARACAS (AFP) – The discovery of vast oil deposits is blamed for reigniting a decades-old territorial dispute between Venezuela and Guyana that fast worsened as Guyana started granting licenses to multinationals to exploit crude in waters claimed by both countries. This is what we know about the showdown over the Essequibo region that has the world on edge. – How much oil in Essequibo? – The 160,000-square-kilometer (62,000-square-mile) territory has been administered […]

Far from Venezuela-Guyana oil flap, Mango Landing just wants peace

By Patrick FORT MANGO LANDING, Guyana, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – Robinson Flores, a Venezuelan who has been living in Essequibo for years, has no time for politicians fighting over the disputed oil-rich region run by Guyana. Life in this sleepy border village along the muddy Wenamu River is just fine, thank you, he says. And the flap that exploded in recent months as Venezuela lays claim to Essequibo is an unwelcome disruption. “Politicians do […]

At least 16 dead in motorway pile-up in Venezuela: fire brigade

CARACAS, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – At least 16 people died and six more were seriously injured after a fiery 17-vehicle pile-up on a highway in Venezuela, the country’s fire chief Juan Gonzalez told AFP on Wednesday. “So far there are 16,” Gonzalez said when asked about the death toll in the crash earlier in the day on the Gran Mariscal de Ayacucho highway, which connects the capital, Caracas, with the east of the country. […]

Biden slams “baseless stunt” as House formally launches impeachment inquiry

By Camille CAMDESSUS WASHINGTON, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – The US House of Representatives voted Wednesday to formalize an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, escalating Republicans’ battle with Democrats ahead of the 2024 election in a move Biden himself slammed as a “baseless” stunt. Republicans, seizing on Biden’s son Hunter’s controversial international dealings, have yet to provide evidence of corruption by the president, and the Democratic-led Senate would be unlikely to convict him even […]

French school in shock after 12-year-old threatens teacher with knife

By Laurent BANGUET, Clarisse LUCAS RENNES, France, Dec 14, 2023 (AFP) – A 12-year-old schoolgirl threatened a teacher with a knife in an apparent murder attempt at a French school on Wednesday, prosecutors said, the latest incident in the country’s increasingly tense education system. No one was injured in the incident during English class in the northwestern city of Rennes but prosecutors said they have opened a criminal investigation into attempted murder. Born in 2011, […]