ISTANBUL: An independent Ukrainian Orthodox church was created at a signing ceremony in Turkey on Saturday, formalising a split with the Russian church it had been tied to since 1686. The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, signed the “Tomos” in Istanbul in front of clerics and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, forming the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. It forces Ukrainian …

SANAA: The UN envoy for Yemen arrived in the capital Sanaa on Saturday for talks to shore up a cea­sefire in the country’s lifeline port city of Hodei­­da, an AFP photographer said. Martin Griffiths is sche­duled to hold talks in Sa­­n­aa with Houthi rebel leaders before visiting Saudi ca­­pital Riyadh to meet Ye­­meni government officials. While in Sanaa he will …

TEHRAN: Iran is to deploy its newest warship to the Atlantic Ocean on a five-month mission — the navy’s longest in a decade, the conservative Fars news agency reported on Saturday. “The navy has had a plan to deploy a flotilla to the Atlantic Ocean for a few years and now everything seems prepared to launch the mission,” said Fars, …

BERLIN: Germany’s BSI cyber defence agency on Saturday defended its role in responding to a far-reaching data breach, saying it could not have connected individual cases it was aware of last year until the entire data release became public. The government said on Friday that personal data and documents from hundreds of German politicians and public figures including Chancellor Angela …

WASHINGTON: Husain Haqqani, a former ambassador to the United States, said on Saturday he had not received any warrants about inquiries from Pakistani authorities over the past seven years. “It seems to be another gimmick aimed to gullible Pakistani media. New allegations filed more than seven years after my forced resignation are obviously manufactured,” Mr Haqqani said in a press …

WASHINGTON: US Vice President Mike Pence and other senior Trump administration officials met on Saturday with Democratic congressional staffers to try to break a deadlock over a proposed border wall and end a two-week-old partial government shutdown. President Donald Trump is demanding $5.6 billion to build a wall along the US border with Mexico but Democrats in control of the …

THIRUVANAN-THAPURAM: Twin arson and bomb attacks rocked southern India on Saturday, continuing a violent backlash that followed the entry of two women into a Hindu temple that forbids female devotees. The Sabarimala temple in Kerala state has been at the centre of a prolonged showdown between religious hardliners and authorities since September, when India’s top court overturned a ban on …

KARACHI: The stock market started on a firm footing in the first week of the new year with the benchmark KSE-100 index claiming gains of 380 points (0.13 per cent) and settle at 37,548. There was slight effect of fresh January buying while the positive trend that followed two earlier weeks of sluggish performance was underpinned mainly by the massive …

MOSCOW: Russia demanded an explanation from the United States on Saturday over the arrest of one of its nationals, amid tensions between the two countries after Moscow held a US citizen for alleged espionage. FBI agents arrested Dmitry Makarenko on Dec 29 on Saipan, the largest of the Northern Mariana Islands, a US commonwealth in the Western Pacific. A federal …

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump is in the “process of evaluating” whether to withdraw some troops from Afghanistan, says Vice President Mike Pence while stressing the need to reconsider America’s involvement in “never-ending wars”. “The president has been very clear about that. And now, I think, the president is in the process of evaluating options about what has been an …