by Mushtaq MOJADDIDI Agence France Presse KABUL, Afghanistan (AFP) — More than 40 people were killed and dozens wounded in a suicide blast targeting Shiites in Kabul Thursday, officials said, with chaotic scenes at the city’s hospitals as anguished families sought loved ones. The Sunni Islamic State group (IS) claimed responsibility for the gruesome assault on the pro-Iranian Tabayan cultural centre, the third deadly attack it has claimed in the Afghan capital this month. Up […]
International
Putin warns terror suspects can be killed ‘on the spot’
by Anna SMOLCHENKO with Marina KORENEVA in Saint Petersburg Agence France Presse MOSCOW, Russia (AFP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Thursday that armed criminals could be “liquidated on the spot,” calling the blast that tore through a Saint Petersburg supermarket and wounded 14 people an “act of terror.” On Wednesday evening, a homemade bomb placed in a locker at the supermarket in northwestern Saint Petersburg, Russia’s second city and Putin’s hometown, went off sowing […]
Trump ‘disappointed’ in China over NKorea sanctions
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — US President Donald Trump — who has often hailed China’s efforts to put pressure on North Korea — hit out at Beijing Thursday for failing to cut off Pyongyang’s oil supply, saying such moves prevented a “friendly solution” of the crisis. “Caught RED HANDED – very disappointed that China is allowing oil to go into North Korea,” Trump said on Twitter. “There will never be a friendly solution to the […]
From stardom to politics: some precedents
PARIS, France (AFP) — Former international football star George Weah, who has won Liberia’s presidential run-off, follows several celebrities who have achieved the top job in their countries. However, only one sportsman — Hungary’s double Olympic fencing champion Pal Schmitt — has previously become president. Here are some precedents: US: Reagan and Trump B movie actor Ronald Reagan, who played in Hollywood for more than two decades, was the first cinema star to enter the […]
Alabama Democrat officially declared winner in US Senate race
by Chris Lefkow Agence France-Presse WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Democrat Doug Jones was formally declared the winner of the bitterly contested US Senate race in the southern state of Alabama on Thursday, whittling down the Republican majority in the chamber by a crucial seat. Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill certified the results of the December 12 special election and dismissed claims of voter fraud by the campaign of the defeated Republican candidate, Roy […]
Top Italian chef to open community kitchen in Paris
PARIS, France (AFP) — Top Italian chef Massimo Bottura, whose Osteria Francescana was named the world’s best restaurant last year, is in talks to open a community kitchen in Paris that would serve the homeless and other people in need. “Discussions are underway to set up a canteen in the basement of the Madeleine Church,” Jean-Francois Rial, chief executive of the group Voyageurs du Monde, told AFP Thursday. “It is still just a project, nothing […]
UN bars four N.Korean ships from international ports
by Philippe RATER Agence France-Presse UNITED NATIONS, United States (AFP) — The UN Security Council on Thursday denied international port access to four North Korean ships suspected of carrying or having transported goods banned by international sanctions targeting Pyongyang, diplomats told AFP. The ban of the four vessels — the Ul Ji Bong 6, Rung Ra 2, Sam Jong 2 and Rye Song Gang 1 — brings the UN’s total number of blocked ships to […]
New York mobster jailed two years after heist acquittal
NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Two years after he was sensationally acquitted of murder and the 1978 Lufthansa heist, New York mobster Vincent Asaro finally got his comeuppance Thursday, sentenced to eight years for arson. Asaro, 82 — a capo from the Bonanno organized crime family — now faces the possibility of spending the rest of his life behind bars for ordering an arson attack on a car in 2012. In June, Asaro, whose […]
Russia’s Putin calls Saint Petersburg blast ‘act of terror’
MOSCOW, Russia (AFP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday called an explosion that tore through a Saint Petersburg supermarket, wounding 13 people, “an act of terror.” “As you know, an act of terror took place in Saint Petersburg yesterday,” he said at a meeting of military officers in the Kremlin. The homemade bomb went off in a locker at the supermarket on Wednesday evening, officials said. Anna Mityanina, vice governor of Saint Petersburg, […]
40 dead, dozens wounded in multiple blasts in Kabul, Afghanistan
By Mushtaq Mojaddidi Agence France Presse KABUL, Afghanistan (AFP) — At least 40 people were killed and dozens more wounded in multiple blasts at a Shiite cultural centre in Kabul on Thursday, officials said, in the latest deadly violence to hit the Afghan capital. There was no immediate claim of responsibility but the Taliban was quick to deny involvement in the assault near the Afghan Voice Agency, a media outlet which earlier reports had […]
Tillerson defends foreign policy record at year’s end
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) – The United States’ top diplomat defended his country’s foreign policy record on Wednesday, saying progress had been made in the last year to rein in North Korea’s nuclear ambitions and to counter the “immense challenges” posed by Russia, China and Iran. In an opinion piece in the New York Times, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said some 90 percent of Pyongyang’s export earnings had been cut off by a series of international […]
Innovative medical aid for Gabon’s ‘poorest of the poor’
by Hervé Bar Agence France-Presse LIBREVILLE, Gabon – “Here you’re in the heart of precarious living,” one of Gabon’s first medical responders says in Kolo Ngoum, a grubby shanty suburb of Libreville that has seen no doctors in ages. Residents initially express surprise at the arrival of an ambulance belonging to the SAMU-Social (Service for Urgent Medical Aid), but once they see stethoscopes and other common instruments, they smile with reassurance. “This is a good initiative,” says […]





