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US warships sailed through the sensitive Taiwan Strait on Thursday in the second such mission this month, drawing a protest from Beijing. It happened almost two weeks after a Chinese aircraft carrier group used the same waterway. China, which claims democratically run Taiwan as its own, has been angered by stepped-up United States support for the island, including arms sales and its warships sailing through the Taiwan Strait. The US Navy said the guided-missile destroyers USS John S McCain and USS Curtis Wilbur had “conducted a routine Taiwan Strait transit December 31 in accordance with international law”. “The ships’ transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the US commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific. The United States military will continue to fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows.” China’s Defence Ministry condemned the trip as “provocation” and “a show of force”, adding Chinese ships and aircraft trailed the US vessels. The passage of the ships sent t

The United States may seek to try a man accused of killing American journalist Daniel Pearl after a Pakistani court ordered his release, according to acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen. Last week, a Pakistani court ordered the release of British-Pakistani Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, the main suspect in the 2002 kidnapping and murder of Pearl, a Wall Street Journal reporter, after his conviction was overturned. “The separate judicial rulings reversing his conviction and ordering his release are an affront to terrorism victims everywhere,” Rosen said in a statement. If efforts to reinstate Sheikh’s conviction were not successful, he said, “The United States stands ready to take custody of Omar Sheikh to stand trial here. “We cannot allow him to evade justice for his role in Daniel Pearl’s abduction and murder,” Rosen added. In April, a court in Sindh province overturned Sheikh’s murder conviction and acquitted three others serving life sentences in connection with the case. The four are

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said the military cooperation between his country and Turkey would not be deterred by the sanctions imposed by the United States on Ankara over its acquisition of a Russian missile defence system. “Relations between Russia and Turkey are self-sustainable and self-sufficient, they don’t depend on someone’s aggressive and hostile actions and whims,” Lavrov said on Tuesday. “They are based on the national interests of each of our countries and on our determination to continue mutual cooperation and mutual benefit by searching for a balance of interests.” The US earlier this month punished Turkey for buying Russia’s S-400 air defence system, imposing rare sanctions against a NATO ally, with officials in Washington saying Ankara’s purchase of the missile system constituted a threat to the security alliance. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at the time assured Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu that the US sanctions were intended to prevent

Police say a search for bodies has been called off after a boat capsized earlier this week on Lake Albert which divides Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo klling dozens. The boat, which was carrying about 50 people, capsized on Wednesday when it “hit a strong wind” and “went under water”, leaving 26 people dead, local official Ashraf Oromo told AFP news agency on Saturday. The region’s police spokesman Allan Hakiza on Saturday said 21 survivors have been rescued. “We have called off the search because we have no more claims. We suspect that overloading and bad weather was responsible for the accident. The boat was supposed to carry 40 people,” Hakiza told DPA news agency. Also Read: DRC- Albert boat capsize, 26 comfirmed death along Uganda lake. Hundreds of people die each year on Uganda’s lakes and authorities blame the accidents on bad weather, overloading and a near absence of a force to police traffic on the country’s water bodies. Lake Albert, Africa’s seventh-largest

26 people confirmed death when their boat sank on Lake Albert, which marks the border between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ugandan officials told AFP news agency. The boat was carrying passengers between two Ugandan locations in the lake’s northeast on Wednesday when it “hit a strong wind” and “went under water”, local official Ashraf Oromo said on Friday. “The boat had over 50 people on board, 26 bodies have been recovered, 21 people were rescued,” Oromo said. “A search is ongoing and no more survivors are expected.” Local authorities in the DRC said at least 33 people died. Eight people survived the incident that occurred near the locality of Kolokoto in Mahagi territory of DRC’s Ituri province, a spokesman for the provincial government told Anadolu Agency. A regional police marine officer, Samuel Onyango, confirmed the accident. “Because of failure to adhere to safety measures and fast changing weather patterns, Lake Albert has many accidents,” Onyango said

The two leaders spoke on Friday about moving forward with a United States brokered agreement announced earlier this month to normalise bilateral ties, according to the Israeli statement. “The leaders congratulated each other over the renewal of ties between the countries, the signing of the joint statement with the US, and the agreements between the two countries,” said the statement. “In addition, the processes and mechanisms to implement the agreements were determined,” it added. Four bilateral deals were signed on Tuesday between Israel and Morocco, centering on direct air links, water management, connecting financial systems and a visa waiver arrangement for diplomats. Israel and Morocco are also due to reopen diplomatic offices. Netanyahu also thanked King Mohammed VI for hosting an Israeli delegation this week. King Mohammed VI underscored the close ties between the Moroccan Jewish community and the monarchy, the Royal Court said in a statement. Morocco has North Africa’s largest

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Turkey would like to have better ties with Israel and that talks at intelligence level continue between the two sides, but has also criticised Israeli policy towards Palestinians as “unacceptable”. Speaking to reporters after Friday prayers in Istanbul, Erdogan said Turkey had issues with “people at the top level” in Israel and that ties could have been “very different” if it were not for those issues. “The Palestine policy is our red line. It is impossible for us to accept Israel’s Palestine policies. Their merciless acts there are unacceptable,” Erdogan said. “If there were no issues at the top level, our ties could have been very different,” he added. “We would like to bring our ties to a better point.” Turkey was the first Muslim-majority country to recognise Israel in 1949. They enjoyed warm relations and strong commercial ties until Erdogan’s rise to power. In recent years, Ankara has repeatedly condemned Israel’s occupation in the West Bank an

“On this day, when the word of God became a child, let us turn our gaze to the many, all too many, children worldwide, especially in Syria, Iraq and Yemen who still pay the high price of war,” he said. “May their faces touch the consciences of all men and women of good will, so that the causes of conflicts can be addressed and courageous efforts can be made to build a future of peace,” he said. Pope Francis also made a plea for authorities to make COVID-19 vaccines available to all, insisting that the first in line should be the most vulnerable and needy, regardless of who holds the patents for the shots. “Vaccines for everybody, especially for the most vulnerable and needy,” who should be first in line, Francis said in off the cuff remarks from his prepared text, calling the development of such vaccines “light of hope” for the world. “We can’t let closed nationalisms impede us from living as the true human family that we are,” the pope said. He called on the leaders of nations, busine

Turkish journalist Can Dundar has been sentenced in absentia to 27 years and six months in prison for espionage and aiding an armed organisation, according to his lawyers. Dundar, the former editor-in-chief of Turkish daily newspaper Cumhuriyet, and a colleague, Erdem Gul, were both sentenced in 2016 to five years in prison for publishing a video purporting to show Turkish intelligence trucking weapons into Syria, They were later released pending appeal. Now a resident of Germany, he had faced up to 35 years in jail for allegedly supporting “terrorism” and military or political espionage. Dundar’s lawyers refused to attend the final hearing on Wednesday. “We do not want to be part of a practice to legitimise a previously decided, political verdict,” they said in a written statement before the hearing. German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas criticised the ruling as a “hard blow against independent journalistic work in Turkey”, which he called a fundamental right. “Journalism is not a crime