WASHINGTON: Nearly 175 Saudi military aviation students have been grounded as part of a “safety stand-down” after a Saudi Air Force lieutenant shot and killed three people last week at a US Navy base in Florida, officials said on Tuesday. The FBI has said US investigators believe Saudi Air Force Second Lieutenant Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani, 21, acted alone when he …

RIYADH: Qatar’s emir on Tuesday skipped a Gulf summit billed as a potential “reconciliation conference”, but leaders’ calls for integration provided more signs of a thaw between Doha and regional power Saudi Arabia. In a sign of the changing mood, the Doha delegation received a warm welcome in Riyadh, with Saudi Arabia’s King Salman and the Qatari prime minister exchanging …

WASHINGTON: US lawmakers are demanding a full and open congressional debate on Afghanistan after a media report revealed that three US administrations repeatedly misled Ameri­cans on the Afghan war. “After 19 years, we need to have a full, open debate on whether or not we should still be at war,” said Senator Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican. “This is not …

PRAGUE: A gunman killed himself on Tuesday after shooting dead six patients at a hospital in the eastern Czech city of Ostrava, in what the premier has called “an immense tragedy”. The attacker gunned down people at close range at the trauma ward of the Faculty Hospital in Ostrava, a steel hub located some 300 kilometres (190 miles) east of …

  WASHINGTON: House Democrats announced two articles of impeachment on Tuesday against President Donald Trump abuse of power and obstruction of Congress — pushing towards historic votes over charges he corrupted the US election process and endangered national security. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, flanked by the chairmen of the impeachment inquiry committees, stood at the Capitol in what she called a …

Somali security forces shot dead five Al Shabaab gunmen, who had killed three civilians and two soldiers during an attack on a hotel near the presidential residence in Mogadishu on Tuesday night, police said early on Wednesday. Al Shabaab, an Al Qaeda linked militant group, frequently launches bombing and gun raids in Mogadishu in a bid to topple Somalia’s UN-backed …

Aung San Suu Kyi is set to speak out in Myanmar’s defence at the United Nation’s (UN) top court on Wednesday, a day after the former democracy icon was urged to “stop the genocide” against Rohingya Muslims. Once hailed internationally for her defiance of Myanmar’s junta, the Nobel peace laureate will this time be on the side of the southeast …

A suicide bomber in Afghanistan detonated explosives on Wednesday outside the United States’ (US) main military base of Bagram in an attack that wounded five people, Afghan and Nato officials said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast. All five wounded in the attack at the southern entrance to the base were Afghans, said Wahida Shahkar, a …

KARACHI: Echoing the longstanding reservations over the results of the sixth population census, the Sindh Assembly on Tuesday unanimously demanded a third-party audit of five per cent of census blocks in the country. The opposition Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan moved a resolution in Tuesday’s session chaired by Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani. Interestingly, the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party supported the MQM-P and …

LAHORE: Hazardous smog that was the worst in the region once again blanketed Lahore on Tuesday, causing eye, nose and throat irritations and aggravating pulmonary diseases. Smog also lowered temperatures as it continued to block the sun till around 10am. The Air Quality Index (AQI) was all-time high at some places. It was higher even than in Delhi which normally …