International

Footballer Emiliano Sala’s family grieved on Friday after British authorities formally identified his body as the one recovered from the submerged wreckage of a plane that went down in the Channel more than two weeks ago. “We can now begin to mourn our son and our brother,” the Argentine Cardiff City striker’s family said in a statement. “We would like to thank …

President Donald Trump appeared prepared to ignore the US Congress’s Friday deadline to determine who ordered the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi amid new revelations that Saudi Arabia’s crown prince spoke of threatening the journalist with a “bullet.” With pressure mounting in Washington and Riyadh, the US president theoretically had until Friday to designate those responsible for the murder of Khashoggi, who was strangled …

WASHINGTON: Pakistan has begun to play a behind-the-scenes but central role in supporting US peace talks with the Afghan Taliban, including by facilitating travel to negotiations, US officials and Taliban sources say. Also read: How Pakistan can help with the Afghan peace process The Pakistani assistance, which has not been reported in such detail before, also includes exerting pressure on the …

WASHINGTON: US special envoy for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad said on Friday that Pakistan had released Taliban leader Mullah Baradar at his request to help expedite the Afghan peace talks. Khalilzad, who returned this week from almost a month-long peace mission to South Asia and the Middle East, said that he had discussed conditions for the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan with the Taliban, …

LONDON: The Bank of England on Thursday slashed its forecast for UK growth this year to 1.2 per cent from 1.7pc, blaming the downgrade on a global economic slowdown and “the fog of Brexit”. “UK economic growth slowed in late 2018 and appears to have weakened further in early 2019,” the BoE said after keeping its main interest rate at …

PARIS: Billions of tonnes of meltwater flowing into the world’s oceans from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets could boost extreme weather and destabilise regional climate within a matter of decades, researchers said on Wednesday. These melting giants, especially the one atop Greenland, are poised to further weaken the ocean currents that move cold water south along the Atlantic Ocean …

BRUSSELS: British Prime Minister Theresa May and EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker sparred on Thursday during “robust” talks on the UK’s Brexit plans, and agreed to hold more negotiations that could push the sealing of any deal to within a month of Britain’s scheduled departure. Looking at the ever tighter deadline and yawning divisions, May said “it’s not going to …

NEW YORK: The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) will double its annual funding to $6.2 million for the entity which investigates sexual abuse complaints raised by Olympic athletes, Republican Senator Chuck Grassley said on Wednesday. Grassley, who is chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, asked the USOC in a letter two weeks ago to outline the steps being taken to …

PARIS: France took the exceptional step of recalling its envoy to Rome on Thursday to protest against a “provocation” from the Italian government, laying bare the tensions between the two historic allies. France’s foreign ministry recalled its ambassador to Rome for consultations over a series of comments from Italy’s two deputy prime ministers, Luigi Di Maio and Matteo Salvini. “For …

MOSCOW: Another US-Russia nuclear pact is in danger following the US move to withdrawfrom a Cold War-era arms control treaty, a senior Russian diplomat said on Thursday. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov charged that the US refusal to negotiate an extension to the New Start treaty signals Washington’s intention to let it expire in 2021. He warned that time is running …