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by Amal Jayasinghe Agence France-Presse COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s navy has rescued an elephant that got into difficulties after being washed out to sea, a spokesman said Wednesday, calling it a “miraculous escape.” Chaminda Walakuluge said the Navy mounted the 12-hour rescue after spotting the elephant struggling to stay afloat around eight kilometers (five miles) off the island’s northeast coast. Divers aided by wildlife officials approached the distressed animal and tied […]
MANDALAY, Myanmar (AFP) – Hundreds of Myanmar farmers entered the seventh day of protest over land grabs on Wednesday, demanding the government return seized fields and protect them from a surge in prosecutions over property disputes. Land ownership is one of the most contentious issues in formerly junta-run Myanmar, where the army is accused of rampantly confiscating land during its 50-year rule. Anger over land-grabs was a key factor that helped Aung San Suu Kyi’s […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) – A baby panda in Japan has survived its crucial first 30 days, zoo officials said Wednesday, as a fresh video showed the cub at one-month-old. The female panda was the first to be born at Tokyo’s Ueno Zoo in five years. The rare birth delighted animal lovers and businesses keen to cash in on the excitement that the panda generated. Footage released by the zoo shows the cub being weighed and measured by […]
TEHRAN, Iran (AFP) – Iran and Oman will work to boost their ties, the Islamic republic’s President Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday, as a diplomatic crisis continued to persist in the Gulf. “Iran and Oman have for years had fraternal relations and the best must be made of these good relations to reinforce them,” Rouhani said as he met Oman’s foreign minister. The Iranian government’s website reported Foreign Minister Yussef Bin Alawi as […]
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) — An agreement between Qatar and the United States on combating terror funding is “insufficient,” the four Arab states that imposed sanctions on the emirate said in a joint statement Tuesday. The memorandum of understanding announced in Doha during a visit by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is “the result of pressure and repeated calls over the past years by the four states and their partners upon Qatar to stop supporting terrorism,” said […]
TRIESTE, Italy (AFP) — Seven European Union and six Western Balkan nations hold an annual summit Wednesday in Trieste, with leaders hoping to bolster security in one of the continent’s more vulnerable flanks and forge closer ties. The summit will be preceded this year by a meeting of French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni, with the continued flow of migrants into the EU expected to be high on the agenda. […]
PARIS, France (AFP) – France will cut taxes on businesses and individuals by roughly 11 billion euros ($12.6 billion) next year, faster than the government had originally intended, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe has said. The goal is to create incentives for investment, hiring and economic growth, Philippe told Les Echos daily in an interview published on its website late Tuesday. President Emmanuel Macron has promised to put France’s financial house in order, with plans to […]
SAN FRANCISCO, United States (AFP) – Facebook on Tuesday said that advertisements will begin popping up on Messenger home screens globally after promising tests with users in Australia and Thailand. “Messenger ads are going global,” the Facebook-owned mobile messaging service said in an online post. “People will see Messenger ads in the home tab of their Messenger mobile app.” Facebook enticed businesses to take advantage of a new tool for creating ads for Messenger, which […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) – Drug manufacturer Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals was fined $35 million Tuesday for supplying and not reporting suspicious massive orders of its highly addictive oxycodone, helping to fuel the United States addiction crisis. The Justice Department said the company agreed to pay the amount to settle allegations that it did not meet obligations to report to the Drug Enforcement Administration suspect orders from pharmacies in Florida and elsewhere. Mallinckrodt, which manufactures drugs in […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) – Washington on Tuesday invited cancer-stricken Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo to come to the United States for medical treatment, renewing its call for Beijing to free him. “We continue to call on the Chinese authorities for his full parole, and also for the release of his wife,” US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said. “We continue to call on China to release him so that he can receive medical treatment wherever […]
COATZACOALCOS, Mexico (AFP) – A Honduran journalist who sought asylum in Mexico after a colleague he collaborated with was murdered has been killed in the violent state of Veracruz, authorities and activists said. Edwin Rivera Paz was followed by gunmen and shot dead in broad daylight Sunday in the eastern city of Acayucan, said local authorities and the media rights group Reporters Without Borders. The TV news cameraman is the seventh journalist killed this year […]
(Reuters) — Brazilians burnt effigies of President Michel Temer in a Sao Paulo street on Monday (July 10) to denounce moves by the conservative government to push through with reforms that protesters say will take away work and pension rights. Temer replaced impeached leftist President Dilma Rousseff just over a year ago with a vow to turn around the economic fortunes of Brazil’s flailing economy via austerity measures. But allegations of corruption have dogged his administration […]
