IGIHE

Tag: InternationalNews

  • Netanyahu renews rejection of French peace initiative

    {France is hosting an international conference in Paris in June aimed at reviving the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.}

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has renewed rejection of a French peace initiative, telling the visiting French prime minister that peace cannot be forged through international conferences but only through direct negotiations.

    “Peace just does not get achieved through international conferences, UN-style,” Netanyahu said on Monday at a press conference with French Prime Minister Manuel Valls.

    “It doesn’t get to fruition through international diktats or committees … seeking to decide our fate and our security when they have no direct stake in it.”

    Paris plans to hold ministerial-level talks on June 3 as a first step in reviving Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations, which came to a halt in April 2014.

    The talks would initially exclude Israel and Palestinian authorities but would bring together representatives of the US, Russia, the United Nations and the European Union, as well as representatives from Arab and European nations.

    The French hope that beginning with non-direct talks could lay the groundwork for an agreement later between Israel and the Palestinians.

    The Palestinians have welcomed the French effort, but Israel has rejected it out of concern the country will be faced with foreign dictates.

    Instead, the Israeli leader proposed sitting down for direct talks in Paris with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

    “I will sit alone directly with President Abbas in the Elysee Palace, or anywhere else that you choose,” Netanyahu said.

    Speaking to broadcaster i24news, Valls said direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians had failed.

    “The role of world powers is to ensure a regulated dialogue,” Valls said in Tel Aviv.

    The French premier is expected to meet Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah in Ramallah on Tuesday.

    Earlier this year, France’s former foreign minister Laurent Fabius said France would recognise a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem if the conference and efforts to revive Israeli-Palestinian talks fail.

  • Pope in historic talks with Grand Imam of Al-Azhar

    {Unexpected meeting between Francis and Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb followed easing of tensions during reign of Benedict.}

    Pope Francis has met the grand imam of Cairo’s Al-Azhar Mosque at the Vatican in a historic encounter that was sealed with a hugely symbolic hug and exchange of kisses.

    The first Vatican meeting on Monday between the leader of the world’s Catholics and the highest authority in Sunni Islam marks the culmination of a significant improvement in relations between the two faiths since Francis took office in 2013.

    Our meeting is the message,” Francis said in a brief comment at the start of his meeting with Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, Vatican officials told a small pool of reporters covering the event.

    In a statement on the trip, Al-Azhar, an institution that also comprises a prestigious seat of learning, said Tayeb had accepted Francis’ invitation in order to “explore efforts to spread peace and co-existence”.

    The “very cordial” meeting lasted around 30 minutes, the Vatican said in a statement after the talks. In all, the imam spent just over an hour at St Peter’s.
    Conciliatory gestures

    Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said in a statement that the pope and the imam had “mainly addressed the common challenges faced by the authorities and faithful of the major religions of the world”.

    At the meeting, the pope presented the imam with a copy of his recent encyclical, Laudato Si’, a letter to the faithful in which he urges the world to wake up to the threat posed by climate change and also calls for a rebalancing of the economic relationship between the industrialised and developing worlds.

    Tayeb decided to accept the invitation to Rome as a result of the numerous conciliatory gestures Francis has made to the Muslim world since being elected in early 2013.

    “If it were not for these good positions the meeting would not be happening,” the imam’s deputy, Abbas Shuman, told AFP on Sunday.
    Ties were badly soured when the now-retired Benedict made a September 2006 speech in which he was perceived to have linked Islam to violence, sparking deadly protests in several countries and reprisal attacks on Christians.

    After the tensions of the Benedict years, Francis moved quickly to set a new tone, sending a personal message to the Muslim world to mark the end of the first month of Ramadan of his pontificate.

    The Argentinian pontiff followed up by pushing various inter-faith initiatives and he was accompanied by both Rabbi Abraham Skorka and Islamic studies professor Omar Abboud when he visited Jordan and Israel in 2014.

    But perhaps the gesture that clinched the deal was the most dramatic piece of political theatre of his papacy: his April visit to the refugee crisis island of Lesbos which concluded with him bringing three Syrian Muslim families back to the Vatican.

    Pope Francis made several gestures towards Islam including bringing Syrian refugees to the Vatican

  • Independent candidate wins Austrian presidential polls

    {Alexander van der Bellen beats far-right leader Norbert Hofer of Freedom Party in knife-edge election.}

    Independent candidate Alexander van der Bellen has won Austria’s presidential election after far-right leader Norbert Hofer conceded defeat.

    The interior minister said on Monday that Alexander Van der Bellen won 50.3 percent of the vote in Sunday’s knife-edge election, compared to 49.7 percent for Hofer, presented as the friendly and moderate face of the anti-immigration, populist Freedom Party (FPOe).

    “Of course I am sad,” Hofer said on Facebook as he conceded defeat. “I would have loved to have looked after this wonderful country for you as president.

    “Please don’t be disheartened. The effort in this election campaign is not wasted, but is an investment for the future.”

    Preliminary results late on Sunday had put Hofer 3.8 percentage points ahead in the runoff for the largely ceremonial but bitterly fought-over post of Austrian head of state, but postal ballots, which account for about 12 percent of eligible votes, swayed the result in Van der Bellen’s favour.

    A record 700,000 postal ballots were counted during Monday, dramatically putting Van der Bellen ahead by just over 31,000 votes in the final tally.

    Hofer, right, of the Freedom Party, conceded defeat to Van der Bellen, left, on a Facebook post on Monday

  • US court acquits police officer in Freddie Gray case

    {Edward Nero cleared for death of Gray, an African American, who sustained fatal injuries while in police custody.
    }
    A police officer in the US city of Baltimore was cleared of assault and other charges relating to the death of an African American man after he was taken into police custody last year.

    Officer Edward Nero is one of six officers facing charges in the Freddie Gray case and was found not guilty of second-degree assault, reckless endangerment and misconduct in office.

    Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake called for calm following the verdict and said Nero would face an administrative review by the police department.

    “This is our American system of justice and police officers must be afforded the same justice system as every other citizen in this city, state and country,” she said in a statement.

    The trial of another of the officers ended in a mistrial last year when the jury could not reach a conclusion, and Nero had opted instead to have a judge hear his case.

    Gray suffered a severe neck injury after his arrest on April 12 last year, apparently while being transported in the back of a police van.

    He complained about breathing difficulties, fell into a coma and died one week later. The 25-year-old had been taken into custody for carrying an illegal switchblade.

    Gray’s death was one of several recent killings of African American men by police officers that touched off demonstrations in the United States.

    Nero’s acquittal raises questions whether prosecutors will proceed with the trial of four other officers, whose charges are still pending, Al Jazeera’s Tom Ackerman, reporting from Washington DC, said.

    Our correspondent said the police union supporting Nero has urged the government to drop all the charges.

    Gray's death was one of several recent killings of black men by police officers that touched off demonstrations in the US

  • Syria civil war: ISIL bombs rock Assad-held cities

    {String of car bombs and suicide attacks hits hospital entrance, bus station and other places in Latakia and Jableh.}

    At least 148 people have been killed in multiple attacks claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group in areas controlled by the Syrian government, a monitoring group said.

    Syrian state TV also reported the attacks, putting the death toll at 78.

    Simultaneous car bombs and suicide bombers hit bus stations, hospitals and elsewhere in the coastal cities of Tartus and Jableh on Monday, appearing to severely breach government defences, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

    The attacks were the first of their kind in Tartous, capital of Tartous province and home to a Russian naval facility, and in Jableh in Latakia province, near a Russian-operated air base.

    Footage broadcast by the state-run Ikhbariya news channel of what it said were scenes of the blasts in Jableh showed several twisted and incinerated cars and minivans.

    The Observatory said 148 people were killed in series of attacks attacks. It said there were seven explosions that ripped through both locations simultaneously: Four in Jableh, including three suicide bombs and one car bomb, and four in Tartus, two suicide bombers and one car bomb.
    US State Department as well as UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemned the attacks.

    The Kremlin said the bomb blasts underscored the need to press ahead with Geneva peace talks after the collapse of a February 27 ceasefire due to intensifying violence in a war that has killed at least 250,000 people.

    Russian President Vladimir Putin reiterated his readiness to fight with the Syrian government against “the terrorist threat” and sent his condolences to Assad, the Kremlin said.

    Syria’s Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi said in an interview with Ikhbariya that terrorists were resorting to bomb attacks against civilians instead of fighting on the front lines, and vowed to keep battling them. The government refers to all rebels fighting against it as terrorists.

    In Jableh, dozens were killed when a car bomb went off near a bus station, followed by a suicide bomber who detonated his explosive belt inside the station. Two men blew themselves up at the electricity company and outside the emergency entrance of a city hospital.

    Dozens more were killed in Tartus when a car bomb went off in the bus station, and then two men blew themselves up when people gathered, according to the observatory.

    ISIL claimed responsibility for the attack through one of its media arms, Amaq.

    “It is the first time in this war that simultaneous attacks of this scale took place in Latakia,” Al Jazeera’s Stefanie Dekker, reporting from Gaziantep in neighbouring Turkey, said.

    Dozens were killed in Tartus when a car bomb went off in the bus station

  • Austria presidential election too close to call

    {Postal ballots will determine whether anti-immigration candidate will become EU’s first far-right head of state.}

    Austria’s presidential election was too close to call on Sunday, meaning postal ballots were set to determine whether an anti-immigration candidate would become the European Union’s first far-right head of state.

    A victory for Freedom Party candidate Norbert Hofer would be a landmark triumph for parties across Europe that have capitalised on Europe’s migration crisis and widespread dissatisfaction with traditional parties of power.

    It would be all the more remarkable for being in a prosperous country with low unemployment, where two centrist parties have dominated since it emerged shattered from World War II after its annexation by Nazi Germany in 1938.

    “The sovereign has spoken,” Hofer’s opponent, former Greens leader Alexander Van der Bellen, told broadcaster ORF. “What exactly it has said – Hofer or Van der Bellen – we will know tomorrow afternoon.”

    A projection by the SORA institute for broadcaster ORF, based on 100 percent of votes cast in polling stations and an estimate of the outcome of postal voting, showed a statistical dead heat on 50 percent each. The margin of error was 0.7 percentage point.

    The provisional result from the Interior Ministry, which did not include postal ballots, showed Hofer ahead with 51.9 percent to van der Bellen’s 48.1 percent.

    Postal votes will not be counted until Monday and their exact number is not known. They tend to be used by the more highly educated, a spokesman for SORA said, a group among which 72-year-old Van der Bellen has greater support.

    Interior Minister Wolfgang Sobotka said he expected there would be about 750,000 postal ballots, roughly 12 percent of Austria’s 6.4 million eligible voters.

    Hofer, left, is facing Bellen, right, in the tight presidential race

  • Obama says Afghan Taliban’s Mullah Mansoor dead

    {US president calls apparent death an “important milestone” after several drones attack Mansoor’s car in Pakistan.}

    US President Barack Obama has said Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansoor was killed in a US strike.

    In a statement on Monday, he called Mansoor’s death an “important milestone”.

    “We have removed the leader of an organisation that has continued to plot against and unleash attacks on American and Coalition forces, to wage war with the Afghan people, and align itself with extremist groups like al Qaeda,” he said.

    Afghanistan’s Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah said on Twitter a day earlier that Mansoor was dead, the country’s spy agency also said he had been killed, and a source close to Mansoor told Al Jazeera he believed the reports to be true.

    The Taliban has not yet issued an official statement though some of the group’s officials earlier denied the reports.

    The Taliban has not yet issued an official statement

  • Tajiks vote on allowing president to rule for life

    {Constitutional changes, if passed as expected, will allow President Rahmon to rule the central Asian state for life.}

    Polls closed in ex-Soviet Tajikistan on Sunday in a referendum on constitutional changes almost certain to strengthen the hold of long-time President Emomali Rahmon and his family over the Central Asian state.

    The country’s electoral commission, which declared the vote valid, said some 88.3 percent of the roughly 4.3 million eligible voters had cast ballots by 1300 GMT.

    The 63-year-old leader has ruled Tajikistan for nearly a quarter of a century, demonstrating what critics say is an increased disregard for religious freedoms, civil society and political pluralism in recent years.

    Many residents of the Tajik capital appeared enthusiastic in their support for Rahmon, who led the country out of a five-year civil war that began in 1992, less than a year after independence.

    “Rahmon brought us peace, he ended the war, and he should rule the country for as long as he has the strength to,” 53-year-old voter Nazir Saidzoda told AFP news agency.

    Other voters were more pessimistic about their leader’s ability to pull the country of eight million out of economic difficulty.

    “Everything that is being done is for [the regime] to hold on to power for as long as possible,” 37-year-old Marifat Rakhimi said.

    “We are waiting for a better economy and the disappearance of corruption.” Rakhimi added.

    The amendment to lift the limit on his time in office applies only to Rahmon, owing to the “Leader of the Nation” status parliament voted to grant him last year, which also affords him and his family permanent immunity from criminal prosecution.

    Other amendments include lowering the minimum age required to be elected president from 35 to 30 and a ban on the formation of parties based on religion.

    The age-limit change could position Rahmon’s 28-year-old son, Rustam, for an early succession, while restrictions on political parties come amid the ongoing trial of key members of a banned Islamic party.

    The Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRPT) had been widely viewed as moderate before the government branded it a “terrorist group” last year, stripping away the most significant formal opposition to the Rakhmon regime.

  • Iraq PM declares offensive to retake Fallujah from ISIL

    {Reports of heavy artillery shelling of the city that was the first to be captured by ISIL in 2014.}

    Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi has announced the start of an offensive to retake Fallujah from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which was quickly followed by reports of heavy shelling of the city.

    “By the name of God, we are here to announce that the Iraqi flag will soon be flying in the sky of Fallujah,” Abadi said.

    “Today, we will tear down the black flags of these despicable strangers who abducted this dear city. The time has come to liberate Fallujah and the victory will be ours. ISIL has nowhere to go but to flee the city.”

    Earlier on Monday, the army had told residents of Fallujah to leave.

    Families who could not leave should raise white flags to mark their locations, the army’s media unit said on State TV.

    Fallujah was the first Iraqi city to fall to ISIL (also known as ISIS) in January 2014, six months before the group swept through large parts of Iraq and neighbouring Syria.

    The army “is asking the citizens that are still in Fallujah to be prepared to leave the city through secured routes that will be announced later”, the broadcast said.

    The city on the Euphrates River, 50km west of the capital, had a prewar population of about 300,000.

    It is encircled by Iraqi forces and a coalition of Shia Muslim armed groups known as Hashid Shaabi.

    Known as the “City of Minarets and Mother of Mosques”, Fallujah is a focus for Sunni Muslim faith and identity in Iraq. It was badly damaged in two assaults by the United States army against suspected al-Qaeda members in 2004.

  • Thailand school dormitory fire kills 17 schoolgirls

    {At least 17 girls have been killed by a fire which swept through their school dormitory in northern Thailand.}

    The fire broke out on Sunday evening when many of the girls, aged between five and 13, were asleep, said police.

    One official told AFP that 38 students had been in the dorm at Pithakkiart Witthaya school in Chiang Rai, which takes children from the region’s poor hill tribes.

    Two girls are still missing and another five were injured, two seriously.

    Police Col Prayad Singsin said the cause of the fire was still under investigation.

    Local media showed images of the two-storey building consumed by flames, with firefighters tackling the fire.

    The deputy governor of Chiang Rai, Arkom Sukapan said some of the students had still been awake so were able escape.

    “But others were asleep and could not escape resulting in the large number of casualties.”

    The Nation newspaper said the victims’ bodies had been sent to a local hospital for identification, while a search continues for the two missing girls.

    The bodies of the young victims are being taken to hospitals for identification