Tag: InternationalNews

{Journalists and members of Alexandrov Ensemble choir among 91 aboard plane that crashes off Sochi coast, officials say.}

A Russian military plane with 91 people on board has crashed into the Black Sea shortly after taking off, the Russian defence ministry said.

A rescue team found debris at the suspected crash site off the coast of the resort town of Sochi, Interfax news agency reported, citing an unidentified source, on Sunday.

Local news agencies reported that fragments of the Tu-154 plane were found 1.5 kilometres off the coast of Sochi at a depth of 50 to 70 metres.

Other news agencies reported that parts of the plane and undercarriage, and also an oil slick were found some six kilometers from the coast.

There was no word on possible survivors.

The plane, which was on its way to Latakia in Syria, was carrying 81 passengers and 10 crew members, Interfax news agency reported.

The Tu-154 is a Soviet-designed three-engine airliner.

Al Jazeera’s Natasha Ghoneim, reporting from Moscow, said the plane disappeared from radar only minutes after takeoff.

“Reports here in Moscow are saying that the passengers included journalists, military personel and members of the famous Alexandrov Ensemble, an official army choir of the Russian armed forces,” Ghoneim said.

The Russian defence ministry said the Alexandrov Ensemble was to perform a concert at the Russian air base in Latakia.

Rescue services of aviation units of the Southern Military District in Krasnodar and neighbouring regions were engaged in the search for the plane, the defence ministry said.

{Resolution urging end to activities in occupied territory lauded by Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Iran among others.}

Much of the Middle East has welcomed a UN resolution that calls on Israel to end settlements on occupied Palestinian land.

Fourteen UN Security Council members voted for the Egypt-drafted resolution on Friday. The US abstained, defying calls from Israel and Donald Trump, the US president-elect, to block the text.

The resolution demanded that Israel “immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem” and said the establishment of settlements by Israel has “no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law”.

Jordan, one of the few Arab states with diplomatic ties to Israel, on Saturday welcomed the “historic” resolution, saying the vote paved a way for a two-state solution.

“This historic decision expresses the consensus of the international community on the illegality of Israeli settlements and reaffirms the Palestinian people’s historic right [to live] in Jerusalem and its historic lands,” Mohammad al-Momani, Jordan’s information minister, said Saturday.

An estimated 430,000 Israeli settlers currently live in the West Bank and a further 200,000 Israelis live in East Jerusalem, which Palestinians see as the capital of their future state.

Israel for decades has pursued a policy of constructing Jewish settlements on occupied Palestinian territory captured by Israel in a 1967 war with its Arab neighbours including the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.

Most countries view Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank and East Jerusalem as illegal and an obstacle to peace. Israel disagrees and has been on the defensive since the vote.

The UN resolution states that settlements are “dangerously imperilling the viability of the two-state solution”.

Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, lauded the result as a “victory for the justice of the Palestinian cause”.

He said Trump, who will take office in January, was now faced with a choice between “international legitimacy” or siding with “settlers and extremists”.

Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian ambassador to the UN, urged the Security Council to “stand firm by this decision” and “not be cowed by negative threats or spin” after Israel said it would refuse to recognise the resolution.

In addition to calling it “shameful”, Israel has recalled its ambassadors to New Zealand and Senegal for their role in the passing of the resolution.

{{‘Justice is possible’}}

Xavier Abu Eid, a senior adviser to the Palestine Liberation Organisation, told Al Jazeera the resolution was a “message that justice is possible”.

“Now what we have to do is translate this resolution into concrete action,” he said.

Mushir al-Masri, a senior Hamas politician from the Gaza Strip, said the Palestinian group believes that the resolution clearly underscores the world’s rejection of Israeli policy.

“Hamas welcomes the vote in favour of the resolution and welcomes the positive changes in the international positions that support the Palestinian rights at the international agencies,” Fawzi Barhoum, Hamas spokesman in Gaza, said in an emailed press statement.

For his part, Dawood Shihab, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad spokesman in Gaza, said in an emailed statement that the overwhelming vote in favour of the resolution “is a clear condemnation of the [Israeli] occupation policies and its aggression against the Palestinian people. It is a Palestinian victory”.

Echoing others, an official at Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry said that the kingdom hopes the resolution “will contribute to reviving the peace process in the region … which will result in the establishment of an independent Palestinian estate with East Jerusalem as its capital”.

Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Qatar’s foreign minister, also welcomed the adoption of the resolution, and called for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

Bahram Qasemi, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman, said Iran welcomed “any move” which guaranteed the “true demands” of Palestinians.

“As far as we are concerned, the resolution of the Palestinian issue requires serious and decisive measures by the international community to fulfil the rights of the innocent Palestinian people and to fight the Zionist regime’s expansionist policies,” he said, referring to Israel.

The UN resolution formally enshrines the international community’s disapproval of Israeli settlement-building and could spur further Palestinian moves against Israel in international forums.

{More than 22.5 million poultry killed amid the worst bird flu epidemic in farms across South Korea in recent times.}

South Korean authorities have culled more than 22.5 million poultry this winter, according to an official, as part of intense efforts to contain its worst bird flu epidemic in recent history that has affected farms across the country.

The total number slaughtered since November 18 accounts for about 15 percent of the country’s poultry stock. The first outbreak was reported at a chicken farm in Haenam, about 420km south of the capital Seoul.

Authorities also plan to kill an additional 2.97 million chickens and ducks across the country in coming days, the country’s Yonhap News Agency reported on Saturday.

“Korea has suffered from several bird flu outbreaks since 2003. I can tell you this year is the worst year ever,” said Oh Se-ul, chairman of the Korea Poultry Association.

The outbreak – the first in nearly seven months – has been caused by the highly pathogenic H5N6 strain of bird flu, a new type of virus that was first detected in South Korea.

{{Previous cases}}

In 2014 South Korea had culled 14 million birds amid a bird flu outbreak. As of the end of March this year, the country had killed more than 156 million chickens and more than 9.5 million ducks, according to government data.

Because most of the birds culled since last month are egg-laying hens, the consequential shortage in eggs has caused their prices to rise sharply.

In South Korea, the average retail price for 30 eggs has risen nearly 25 percent to $5.68 since November 18 – the highest in more than three years, according to state-run Korea Agro-Fisheries & Food Trade Corp.

According to data from the institution, it is the highest month-on-month increase in egg prices in nearly a decade.

Besides the price increases, some stores are restricting egg purchases.

To ease the shortage, South Korea’s agriculture ministry is seeking to import egg-laying chickens and eggs from the US, Spain and New Zealand.

Analysts say the egg shortage is expected to last at least one year as it could take up to two years for egg and poultry industry to raise baby chickens and rebuild flocks.

Yoon Se-young, a farmer in Seoul, says he is worried because the government has not yet announced any plans to compensate farmers who had to cull their poultry.

“It has been a month since I had to kill all my chickens and bury them,” he said. “However, I have not heard of any clear explanation on how the government will compensate for my loss.”

Jeong In-hwa, a member of South Korea’s Parliamentary Agriculture Committee, says that with the issue of President Park Geun-hye’s impeachment taking the spotlight, the media has failed to highlight the bird flu epidemic.

“As the impeachment becomes the most important national issue, protesters at candlelight rallies are dominating the headlines,” he said. “Because of that, the avian flu isn’t getting much attention.”

{{Japan and China}}

Japan and China have also taken serious measures to control the bird flu outbreak that spread across northeast Asia.

Japan launched a new chicken cull on a southern island, days after gassing hundreds of thousands of birds about 2,400km to the north.

Tackling Japan’s sixth outbreak since end-November, Kyushu authorities said they will gas just over 120,000 chickens after the H5 virus was detected on a farm.

The outbreak in Japan’s Miyazaki prefecture follows the gassing of more than 200,000 chickens at a farm in the northern island of Hokkaido last weekend and brings the country’s cull this season to nearly a million chickens and ducks.

The cases in Japan – outbreaks before Miyazaki were all confirmed as H5N6 bird flu – are the first in nearly two years, with the bird cull now standing at its highest in six years.

In China, chickens are being fed more vitamins and vaccines while farmers also ramp up henhouse sterilisation in an effort to protect their flocks.

As part of its protection drive, China now has bans in place on poultry imports from more than 60 countries, including South Korea and Japan as well as parts of Europe now also experiencing a bird flu outbreak.

The last major outbreak in mainland China in 2013 killed 36 people and caused about $6.5bn in losses to the agriculture sector.

According to the website of China’s agriculture ministry, delegations from Japan, South Korea and China gathered in Beijing last week for a symposium on preventing and controlling bird flu and other diseases in East Asia.

{US president-elect reacts after UN Security Council voted in favour of calling for an end to Israeli settlements.}

Donald Trump has vowed to change things at the United Nations when he takes over at the White House next month, after the UN Security Council’s vote in favour of a resolution demanding the halt of settlement activity by Israel in occupied Palestinian territory.

The resolution was put forward at the 15-member council for a vote on Friday by New Zealand, Malaysia, Venezuela and Senegal a day after Egypt withdrew it under pressure from Israel and US president-elect Trump.

Israel and Trump had called on the US to veto the measure but it ended up abstaining, resulting in the resolution being adopted with 14 votes in favour to a resounding round of applause.

It is the first resolution the Security Council has adopted on Israel and the Palestinians in nearly eight years.

“This is a day of victory for international law, a victory for civilised language and negotiation and a total rejection of extremist forces in Israel,” chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat told Reuters news agency.

“The international community has told the people of Israel that the way to security and peace is not going to be done through occupation … but rather through peace, ending the occupation and establishing a Palestinian state to live side by side with the state of Israel on the 1967 line,” Erekat said.

Israel refused to recognise the UN resolution and retaliated by recalling its ambassador to New Zealand and Senegal.

“Israel rejects this shameful anti-Israel resolution at the UN and will not abide by its terms.” said Netanyahu.

“At a time when the Security Council does nothing to stop the slaughter of half-a-million people in Syria, it disgracefully gangs up on the one true democracy in the Middle East, Israel, and calls the Western Wall ‘occupied territory’.”

New Zealand Foreign Minister Murray McCully said the decision should have been no surprise to Israel which knew Wellington’s position long before the UN vote.

“Israel has informed us of their decision to recall their ambassador to New Zealand for consultations,” McCully told AFP news agency in a statement.

“We have been very open about our view that the [Security Council] should be doing more to support the Middle East peace process and the position we adopted today is totally in line with our long established policy on the Palestinian question.

“The vote today should not come as a surprise to anyone and we look forward to continuing to engage constructively with all parties on this issue.”

The resolution demands that “Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem.”

Malaysia and Venezuela also sponsored the UN resolution but do not have diplomatic relations with Israel.

{Headless body of Shu Nar Myar found after he spoke to media during rare government-guided tour of restive Rakhine state.}

The headless body of a Muslim villager has been found days after he spoke to reporters on a rare government-guided media tour of restive northern Rakhine state, Myanmar police said on Friday.

Police did not give a motive for the killing of the 41-year-old man, whose body was found floating in a river, but said he spoke to Burmese journalists on Wednesday in Ngakhura village.

“On Thursday his family said he had disappeared after giving interviews to journalists,” Police Colonel Thet Naing in Maungdaw town told AFP news agency.

“This afternoon [Friday] I got the report his headless body was found… We have confirmed from villagers that it is him,” he said.

Myanmar soldiers have taken control of the dangerous and remote region bordering Bangladesh since October 9 when armed men raided police posts, killing nine officers.

Troops have killed more than 80 people in Rakhine since the start of crackdown, according to official figures.

Conflict analysts at the International Crisis Group say fighters behind the border post attacks have also killed several Rohingya “informers” perceived to be working with Myanmar authorities.

At least 34,000 Rohingya Muslims have since fled to Bangladesh, taking with them allegations of mass-killings, rape, and torture at the hands of Myanmar’s security forces.

The Myanmar government has vigorously denied the accusations, setting off the latest war of words over a stateless minority whose status is one of the country’s most incendiary issues.

{{Rare media tour
}}

In a statement Friday, the president’s office confirmed that a man – whom they identified as Shu Nar Myar – had been killed, adding he had denied stories of military abuse when speaking to the reporters.

“Shu Nar Myar is the one who revealed that there was no case of arson by the military and police forces, no rape and no unjust arrests,” the statement said.

Two Burmese reporters, who did not want to be named, told AFP they interviewed the man on Wednesday at his village and had been contacted by police to say he was missing.

The rare media tour of the area – open only to Burmese journalists – was organised by the government amid mounting pressure on de-facto civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi to allow access to the conflict zone.

Her government has responded to growing international alarm over the crisis with a dogged information campaign aimed at batting back reports of military abuse.

Northern Rakhine has been under lockdown for more than two months since the hundreds of armed men launched surprise attacks on border posts.

The International Crisis Group says the attackers are from a Saudi-backed group called Harakah al-Yaqin, which emerged after a wave of sectarian violence cut through Rakhine in 2012.

The Rohingya have languished under years of dire poverty and discrimination from a government that denies them citizenship.

The United Nations and other rights groups have repeatedly called on Myanmar to grant them full rights, describing the Rohingya as one of the world’s most persecuted minorities.

{As many as 100 refugees drown off Italian coast, raising 2016 record death toll over Mediterranean to at least 5,000.}

Around 100 people are missing and feared dead after two shipwrecks off Italy, raising the estimated death toll among refugees on the Mediterranean this year to at least 5,000 – a new annual record, UN agencies said on Friday.

Deaths linked to Mediterranean crossings by refugees have spiked in 2016, as arrivals to Europe fell.

Last year, over a million people crossed the sea – mostly from Turkey to Greece – with 3,771 deaths recorded. But this year, about 360,000 people have successfully crossed, most between Libya and Italy, with far more deadly results.

“The latest information we have is that yesterday, in two incidents, as many as 100 people lost their lives,” said William Spindler, spokesman for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR.

“The number of people who have lost their lives on the Mediterranean this year has now passed 5,000,” he added. “That means that on average, 14 people have died every single day this year in the Mediterranean trying to find safety or a better life or safety in Europe.”

Citing survivors’ accounts, Joel Millman, of the International Organization for Migration, said that at least 57 people were feared dead following the capsizing on Thursday of a rubber dinghy carrying between 120 and 140 people.

He said eight bodies had been recovered in that area. Another 40 people were feared dead from another dinghy carrying about 120 people.

Millman said he did not immediately have further details about the possible causes of the shipwrecks.

UNHCR said the Italian coastguard carried out a total of four rescue operations in the central Mediterranean on Thursday, including the rescue of about 175 people from another dinghy and a wooden boat.

The coastguard helped the rescued survivors to disembark at the western Sicilian town of Trapani.

Among possible causes for the increase in deaths on the Mediterranean this year, the refugee agency cited a worsening quality of vessels used, as well as the tactics adopted by smugglers to prevent detection by authorities – such as sending many boats out at the same time, which makes the work of rescuers harder.

{US currently has an estimated arsenal of about 7,000 nuclear warheads, second only to Russia with a few hundred more.}

Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin are both calling for their countries to strengthen their nuclear arsenals.

At an annual end-of-year meeting with defence chiefs on Thursday, Putin said Russia’s military can overpower any potential foe, but it should build up its nuclear capability.

Putin – who has said Trump has confirmed to him he is willing to mend ties between the two countries – said bolstering the nuclear arsenal should be a chief objective for 2017.

“We need to strengthen the military potential of strategic nuclear forces, especially with missile complexes that can reliably penetrate any existing and prospective missile defense systems,” the Russian leader said.

Trump, meanwhile, tweeted the United States must “greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability”. He said the nation must do so until the rest of the world – as he put it – “comes to its senses” regarding nuclear weapons.

Trump’s transition website says he will modernise the nation’s nuclear arsenal so it will remain an “effective deterrent”.

The United States currently has an estimated arsenal of about 7,000 nuclear warheads, second only to Russia, which has a few hundred more.

During the next decade, US ballistic missile submarines, bombers, and land-based missiles – the three legs of the nuclear triad – are expected to reach the end of their useful lives.

Maintaining and modernising the arsenal is expected to cost at about $1 trillion over 30 years.

The open talk of ramping up nuclear capabilities – reminiscent of Cold War pledges – marks a jarring departure from the stance of President Barack Obama, who in a famous speech in Prague in 2009 called for the elimination of nuclear weapons.

Laicie Heeley, a nuclear expert at the Stimson Center, a nonpartisan anti-nuclear proliferation think-tank in Washington, told AFP news agency it was “reckless” for Trump to tweet on the topic without offering details.

“To make such a loaded statement without context or follow-up is irresponsible at best,” she said.

“We could be talking about a return to the Cold War here, when the threat of a nuclear catastrophe was very real. Russian rhetoric is already moving in that direction. It wouldn’t take a lot to bring us back there.”

{Social Democratic Party, which won recent elections, proposes little known Sevil Shhaideh to take key post.}

Romania could have its first female prime minister, an economist who is a member of the country’s small Muslim community.

Romanian President Klaus Iohannis said on Thursday he would appoint a prime minister designate after Sunday as he needed time to assess a proposal made by the Social Democrat Party (PSD), the winners of a December 11 parliamentary election.

Liviu Dragnea, chairman of the PSD, proposed that Sevil Shhaideh take the post of prime minister. The announcement was a surprise because her name is not widely known in Romania.

Shhaideh, 52, is a party member but did not run as a member of parliament in the election. She was the minister for regional development for six months in 2015, and is currently an official in the regional development ministry.

If approved by parliament, she would also become the country’s first Muslim prime minister.

Dragnea is banned from taking the role because he has a conviction for election fraud.

{{‘Hard-working and loyal’}}

On Wednesday, Dragnea called his April 2016 conviction “unjust” and said the law that stops him from being prime minister was “profoundly unconstitutional”. The new parliament could vote to change the 2001 law that bans anyone with a conviction of holding a ministerial post.

Later Wednesday, Dragnea was elected speaker of parliament’s Chamber of Deputies while the former Senate speaker, Calin Popescu Tariceanu, was re-elected.

Dragnea, who continues as head of the party, is expected to have significant influence over a government headed by Shhaideh.

“If appointed, she would be prime minister, but the political responsibility stays with me first of all,” Dragnea said, praising Shhaideh for her knowledge of public administration and for being hard-working and loyal.

The left-leaning Social Democrats easily won the December 11 parliamentary election, but did not secure a majority and will govern with a minority partner.

{After weeks of heavy fighting, Damascus announces complete victory in the battle to retake eastern Aleppo from rebels.}

The Syrian army announced the country’s second city Aleppo has been fully recaptured from rebel fighters, the government’s biggest victory in the nearly six-year civil war.

The last group of rebels and their families holed up in a small enclave in eastern Aleppo were evacuated on Thursday, under a deal that gives the army and its allies full control of the ancient city after years of fighting.

“Thanks to the blood of our heroic martyrs, the heroic deeds and sacrifices of our armed forces and the allied forces, and the steadfastness of our people, the General Command of the Army and the Armed Forces announces the return of security and stability to Aleppo,” said a military statement read by an army general on state television.

The statement said the victory in Aleppo is a “strategic transformation and a turning point in the war on terrorism and a deadly blow to the terrorist project and its supporters”.

It is a further incentive, it added, to go on fighting to “eradicate terrorism and restore security and stability to every span of the homeland”.

It represents a momentous victory for President Bashar al-Assad and a crushing defeat for Syria’s opposition.

Western Aleppo erupted in celebratory gunfire seen on Syrian TV, which showed uniformed soldiers and civilians shouting slogans in support of Assad.

The ancient city of Aleppo had been divided into rebel and government parts since 2012.

The announcement came shortly after state television reported that the last convoy carrying rebels and civilians had left eastern Aleppo.

“The last four buses carrying terrorists and their families arrived in Ramussa”, a district south of Aleppo controlled by government forces, the channel said.

Rebel evacuations were set in motion last week after Syria’s opposition agreed to surrender its last footholds in eastern Aleppo. Since then, some 35,000 fighters and civilians have been bused out, according to the United Nations.

Ahmed Qorra Ali, an official with the rebel group Ahrar al-Sham, confirmed “the last convoy has left the rebel-controlled area”.

Earlier, the Red Cross said more than 4,000 fighters had left rebel-held areas of the city in the “last stages” of the evacuation.

Rebel forces agreed to withdraw from the bastion after a month-long army offensive that drove them from more than 90 percent of their former territory.

The evacuation agreement was brokered by Russia, which launched air strikes in support of Assad’s regime last year, and Turkey, which has supported some rebel groups.

The loss of east Aleppo is the biggest blow to Syria’s rebel movement since fighting started in March 2011. More than 310,000 people have been killed since then.

It puts the government in control of the country’s five main cities: Aleppo, Homs, Hama, Damascus, and Latakia.

“The liberation of Aleppo is not only a victory for Syria but also for those who really contribute to the fight against terrorism, notably Russia and Iran,” state news agency SANA quoted President Assad as saying before the army announcement on Thursday.

The Syrian government’s recapture of Aleppo is a major turning point in the Syrian civil war with potentially powerful political repercussions.

“On the political level, this is a great loss,” Yasser al-Youssef of the Nureddin al-Zinki rebel group told AFP news agency. “For the revolution, it is a period of retreat and a difficult turning point.”

Referring to Assad’s closest allies, Ali of the Ahrar al-Sham rebel group said: “Aleppo is now under the occupation of Russia and Iran.”

{Separately, UN says mortar fire targeting aid distribution kills four relief workers and seven civilians in 48 hours.}

Three suicide car bombs driven by ISIL fighters killed at least 15 civilians and eight Iraqi policemen on Thursday in an eastern suburb of Mosul, a military statement said.

The attacks targeted Kokjali, a suburb that authorities said they had retaken from ISIL almost two months ago. A military spokesman told Reuters news agency the vehicle bombs went off in a market.

Meanwhile, mortar fire killed 11 people – including four aid workers – as civilians gathered to receive assistance in the war-torn city of Mosul, the United Nations said on Thursday.

Iraqi forces launched an operation on October 17 to retake Mosul – the country’s last city held by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) – and have retaken part of its eastern edge. But these areas are still exposed to deadly artillery attacks, suicide vehicle bombings, and sporadic gunfire.

“According to initial reports, four aid workers and at least seven civilians queueing for emergency assistance in eastern Mosul city have been killed by indiscriminate mortar fire,” Lise Grande, UN humanitarian coordinator in Iraq, said in a statement.

“Within the last 48 hours, there have been two separate incidents”, which also wounded as many as 40 people, she said.

Mahmud al-Sorchi, a spokesman for volunteer fighters from Nineveh province, of which Mosul is the capital, said mortar fire killed aid workers from a local organisation called Faz3a.

The UN’s Damian Rance told Al Jazeera it is still unknown who targeted the aid workers and civilians. But he said ISIL combatants retreating from the military offensive have repeatedly shelled areas after they are retaken by the army, killing or wounding scores of residents fleeing in the opposite direction.

“I do not think we will ever know for certain which party fired the mortar rounds on Thursday,” said Rance, a UN communications officer based in Mosul.

“However given that Iraqi forces have not been using artillery in Mosul city, and given that it is likely that the mortar rounds came from probable ISIL held locations, the probability that the mortar rounds were fired by ISIL is high.”

Mosul’s civilians are increasingly being caught in the crossfire, Human Rights Watch said in a statement on Wednesday.

More than 100,000 people have been displaced since the battle for the key city began more than two months ago, but the Iraqi government has encouraged civilians to stay in their homes if possible.

This keeps the number of people fleeing from reaching the catastrophic proportions estimated by some aid organisations before the Mosul operation began, but also exposes civilians to significantly more danger than they would face if they moved to camps.