International

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Friday that a decoupling of the US and Chinese economies would be “virtually impossible” and would destabilise global markets, in comments made while on a visit to Beijing packed with talks with officials and businesses. Yellen’s four-day trip is her first to China as Treasury chief, and she is the second high-ranking US …

THE HAGUE: Canada, Britain, Sweden and Ukraine have taken Iran to the UN’s top court to seek damages for families of passengers on a jetliner downed by Tehran in 2020, they said on Wednesday. The case lodged by the four countries, which had a number of citizens on board, asks the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to order Iran to …

THE HAGUE: A record-breaking summer storm hammered the Netherlands and Germany on Wednesday, killing two people and throwing international air and rail travel into chaos. Storm Poly packed howling winds of up to 146 km/h, toppling trees and forcing the cancellation of 400 flights from Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport, one of Europe’s busiest hubs. Meteorologists said the storm was the strongest …

LONDON: Britain’s defence minister on Wednesday said allegations of unlawful killings in Afghanistan being examined by an independent inquiry relate to UK special forces. The inquiry which opened in March was “now reaching the stage of substantive hearings, and I can confirm that the allegations relate to the conduct of UK Special Forces”, Ben Wallace told parliament in a written …

UNITED NATIONS: Religious scholars from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Indonesia are trying to convince Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers that Islam does not ban women from going to school or work, says the UN mission chief in Afghanistan. In an interview with UN News, UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan’s (UNAMA) acting chief Markus Poztel said the United Nations should work as a “bridge builder” …

JENIN: Palestinian fighters paraded in Jenin on Wednesday and angry crowds confronted senior Palestinian Authority officials, accusing them of weakness, after one of the largest Israeli military operations in the occupied West Bank in years. The two-day operation, which the Israeli military claimed targeted infrastructure and weapons depots of militant factions in the Jenin refugee camp, left a trail of …

WASHINGTON: The deadliest Mediterranean shipwreck in years that killed hundreds of Pak­istani migrants was a preventable tragedy, according to a Washington Post report published on Wednesday. The 38-page report, based on boat-logs, and interviews with survivors and government officials, also casts doubt on a claim by Greek officials that their coast guards failed to rescue the passengers because they refused to accept their …

SAN FRANCISCO: Facebook and Instagram owner Meta will launch a paid subscription service starting at $11.99 a month allowing users to verify their accounts, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced on Sunday, following a similar move by Elon Musk at Twitter. Meta Verified, which will roll out first in Australia and New Zealand this week, will let users verify an “account with …

More than 10 million people have signed up to Threads, Meta’s rival to Twitter, within the first few hours of its launch, the company’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Thursday. The app went live on Apple and Android app stores in 100 countries at 2300GMT on Wednesday, and will run with no ads for now, but its release in Europe …

A car ramming and stabbing incident in Tel Aviv wounded seven people on Tuesday before a suspect was shot dead, on the second day of Israel’s biggest military operation in years in the occupied West Bank. Palestinian group Hamas praised the “heroic” incident as “an initial response to crimes against our people in the Jenin camp” where Israeli forces had killed 10 people in …