Tag: Middle East

Syria rebel gains as UN raps govt evacuation ‘strategy’

BEIRUT, Lebanon (AFP) – by Rana Moussaoui Rebels and jihadists battled pro-government forces in the central Syrian province of Hama Thursday as the country’s UN envoy warned that more people could be forcibly evacuated from towns besieged by the regime. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said at least 25 civilians, including children, were killed in government air strikes as fighting raged in Hama, south of the opposition-held Idlib province. Anti-government groups, which […]

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Libya says last chemical weapons stocks shipped out

TRIPOLI, Libya (AFP) – by Mohamad Ali Harissi Libya has shipped the last of its chemical weapons stocks out of the country, officials said Tuesday, under a UN-backed plan to ensure the arsenal could not fall into the wrong hands. The move will ease fears that extremists like the Islamic State group could gain access to the weapons in Libya, which has been wracked by chaos since the 2011 overthrow of Moamer Kadhafi. A senior […]

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Iraq forces retake key town south of Mosul

QAYYARAH, Iraq (AFP) – by Abdelhamid Zebari Iraqi forces on Thursday pushed the Islamic State group from Qayyarah, a northern town considered strategic for any future offensive against the jihadists’ last stronghold of Mosul. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi hailed the victory as a key step in the fight against IS but hours later suffered yet another political setback when lawmakers impeached his defence minister. Special forces, backed by US-led coalition air strikes, wrapped up a three-day […]

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Turkey strikes IS as Syria border tensions flare

ISTANBUL, Turkey (AFP) – by Stuart WILLIAMS Turkey on Tuesday pounded Islamic State (IS) jihadists in Syria with new artillery strikes as expectations grew of a major Ankara-backed offensive against the group after a deadly suicide bombing on its soil. With tensions flaring on the Turkey-Syria border following the bombing in the nearby city of Gaziantep that left 54 people dead, Turkish howitzers on Monday hit jihadist and Kurdish rebel targets across the frontier. Turkey has […]

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UN bracing for massive flight from Iraq’s Mosul

GENEVA, Switzerland (AFP) – The United Nations said Tuesday it was rushing to build camps to accommodate what it expects to be a mass exodus from Mosul once a battle begins for Iraq’s second city. The UN refugee agency warned that an expected battle to liberate Mosul, the Islamic State group’s last major urban stronghold in Iraq, was likely to “dramatically worsen” the displacement situation in the country. Iraq is already facing one of the world’s […]

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Deadly battles as Yemen army seeks to break Taez siege

ADEN, Yemen (AFP) – Deadly clashes raged on Monday between Yemeni government forces battling to secure an entrance to the besieged city of Taez and Shiite Huthi rebels surrounding it, military sources said. Backed by a Saudi-led Arab coalition, Yemeni troops launched an offensive last week to break the rebel siege on Yemen’s flashpoint third city, in the country’s southwest. The heaviest fighting Monday was near its western entrance where air strikes by the Arab […]

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Syrian regime jets hit Kurdish positions, even after US warning

HASAKEH, Syria (AFP) – by with Thomas Watkins in Washington Syrian regime jets pounded US-backed Kurdish forces in northeastern Syria for a second day Friday, even after the US-led coalition scrambled jets to protect its military advisers working on the ground. In another escalation of Syria’s bloody conflict, warplanes from President Bashar al-Assad’s regime were bombarding the city of Hasakeh — targeting Kurdish forces that for months have worked closely with coalition military advisers helping local […]

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Saudi facing ‘long’ Yemen war after talks fail

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) – by Ian Timberlake Six months after Saudi Arabia said its war in Yemen was winding down, air strikes are again pounding rebels and rockets flying across the border, with no end to the conflict in sight. Facing criticism of its bombing campaign and a budget crunch from low oil prices, Riyadh is keen to bring an end to the intervention it launched last year against Shiite Huthi rebels and their allies, […]

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Rocket kills 7 civilians in Saudi as Yemen probe begins

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) – Saudi Arabia suffered its worst civilian death toll Tuesday in cross-border shelling from Yemen as an anti-rebel coalition it leads launched an investigation into a deadly strike on a hospital. A rocket fired by rebels in Yemen killed seven civilians in Najran city in the highest reported number of non-combattant casualties in the kingdom’s south since the Arab coalition intervened in Yemen 17 months ago. “It killed four citizens and three […]

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Russia launches first Syria raids from Iran base

MOSCOW, Russia (AFP) – by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber Russia said Tuesday its warplanes flew out of an Iranian airbase for the first time to bomb jihadist groups in Syria, as fighting raged for control of the ravaged city of Aleppo. The deployment marks a major switch in the bombing campaign the Kremlin launched in September to support Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, as until now Moscow had only flown raids out of its bases in Syria and Russia. Russia’s defence […]

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Yemen govt threatens to boycott peace talks

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AFP) – Yemen’s government threatened Thursday to boycott UN-brokered peace talks, on the eve of their expected resumption in Kuwait, unless Iran-backed rebels commit to the terms of a United Nations resolution. The UN said however that it still had not been informed of any boycott from any side while affirming that the talks were scheduled to resume on Friday after a two-week break. More than two months of negotiations between President Abedrabbo […]

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How one man spread a killer virus in hospital

PARIS, France (AFP) — A single patient infected 82 people with the deadly MERS virus in an overcrowded South Korean emergency room in 2015, according to a scientific investigation released Saturday. The study, published in the medical journal The Lancet, maps a lethal outbreak of Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) in South Korea that caused 186 known infections in all, including nearly 40 fatalities. The case is the most prolific transmission of MERS virus from one […]

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