WASHINGTON: Paleontologists said on Thursday they had discovered a new giant carnivorous dinosaur species that had a massive head and tiny arms, just like Tyrannosaurus rex. The researchers’ findings, published in the journal Current Biology, suggest that small forelimbs were no evolutionary accident, but rather gave apex predators of the time certain survival advantages. Meraxes gigas — named after a …

COLOMBO: For the last two weeks, Sri Lankan doctor Thusitha Kahaduwa has left his car in the garage and done his patient rounds by bicycle, spending hours each day criss-crossing the commercial capital Colombo. The 41-year-old is among countless thousands, many of them middle-class professionals, who have switched to two wheels for everything from work commutes to grocery shopping after …

LONDON: The heads of MI5 and the Federal Bureau of Investigation warned on Wednesday about China’s commercial espionage thrust in the West, in a rare joint address at the British intelligence service’s London headquarters. Speaking to an audience of officials and business executives in Thames House, MI5 Director General Ken McCallum and FBI Director Chris Wray said the threat from …

MAKKAH: With her husband back at home in Tunisia and draped in a national flag, Laila al-Qarni urges all Muslim women to perform Haj without a male guardian, after the requirement was shelved last year. The Saudi authorities’ move has brought a whole new dimension to the annual pilgrimage. “Why do women have to be accompanied by a male anyway? …

DUBAI: The Taliban and the United Arab Emirates are poised to strike a deal for the Gulf nation to run Kabul airport and several others in Afghanistan that could be announced within weeks, according to sources familiar with the negotiations. The Taliban, whose government remains an international pariah without formal recognition, have courted regional powers, including Qatar and Turkey, to …

BALI: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Bali on Thursday to discuss Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine ahead of a G20 ministerial meeting overshadowed by the war. The pair were pictured holding a bilateral meeting on the Indonesian resort island as the world’s top economies gather to discuss the most pressing global issues on Friday, with …

Huge crowds of pilgrims started praying on Saudi Arabia’s Mount Arafat early on Friday, the high point of the biggest Haj pilgrimage since the pandemic forced drastic cuts in numbers for two years in a row. The worshippers, capped at one million including 850,000 from abroad chosen by lottery, spent the night at camps in the valley of Mina, seven kilometres from …

As many as a dozen candidates were on Friday eyeing up replacing Boris Johnson as British prime minister who is quitting after his Conservative Party turned on him, as opponents said they wanted him out of Downing Street immediately. Johnson said on Thursday that he would step down as Conservative leader and British premier following resignations by more than 50 government ministers, and many …

Japan’s former prime minister Shinzo Abe, the country’s longest-serving leader, was pronounced dead on Friday afternoon, the hospital treating him confirmed, after he was shot at a campaign event. “Shinzo Abe was transported to (the hospital) at 12:20pm. He was in a state of cardiac arrest upon arrival. Resuscitation was administered. However, unfortunately he died at 5:03pm,” said Hidetada Fukushima, …

More than 900 firefighters backed by aircraft were deployed on Friday to battle a massive blaze in France’s southern Gard region that burned 600 hectares (1,500 acres) overnight. “This fire is far from being done, there are fronts in hard-to-reach areas that we haven’t tackled and that are advancing freely,” said Eric Agrinier, a senior member of the fire service. …