International

Summer has just begun in the Northern Hemisphere but a brutal heat wave is already gripping parts of Europe, China and the United States, where record temperatures expected this weekend are a stark illustration of the dangers of a warming climate. Extreme heat advisories have been issued for more than 100 million Americans with the National Weather Service forecasting particularly …

Several areas of India’s capital New Delhi remained inundated on Friday after water from the Yamuna river, which runs through the city, flowed in through a broken drain regulator, authorities said. Footage from news agency ANI showed roads surrounding the city’s iconic Red Fort completely flooded, with broken down trucks and buses abandoned at several spots, only their windshields and roofs …

LONDON: Oil prices rose on Wednesday, with benchmark Brent futures breaching $80 a barrel for the first time since May, after US inflation data spurred hopes the Federal Reserve may have fewer interest rate hikes in store for the world’s biggest economy. US data showed consumer prices rose modestly in June and registered their smallest annual increase in more than …

PARIS: Google’s artificial intelligence-powered medical chatbot has achieved a passing grade on a tough US medical licensing exam, but its answers still fall short of those from human doctors, a peer-reviewed study said on Wednesday. Last year, the release of ChatGPT — whose developer OpenAI is backed by Google’s rival Microsoft — kicked off a race between tech giants in …

VILNIUS: The United States and global allies unveiled new security assurances for Ukraine at a Nato summit on Wednesday, designed to bolster the country’s defences against Russia over the long haul while Kyiv strives for membership in the alliance. Members of the world’s most powerful military bloc offered the prospect of long-term protection a day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky …

GENEVA: The World Health Organisation warned on Wednesday that the surge in bird flu outbreaks among mammals could help the virus spread more easily among humans. Since late 2021, Europe has been gripped by its worst-ever outbreak of bird flu, while North and South America have also experienced severe outbreaks. This has led to the culling of tens of millions …

JENIN: Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas vowed to rebuild the Jenin refugee camp during a rare and brief visit on Wednesday, a week after a deadly Israeli raid dest­royed much of the camp in the occupied West Bank. Abbas, 87, hailed the Jenin camp as an “icon of struggle” during his first trip to the area in more than a decade, …

LONDON: One of Britain’s leading news anchors, Huw Edwards, was named by his wife on Wednesday as being the BBC presenter facing allegations he paid a young person thousands of pounds for sexually explicit photos, the broadcaster reported. Edwards announced the death of Queen Elizabeth to the nation in September and has led coverage of the biggest events in Britain since the …

WASHINGTON: The Biden administration has once again assured Islamabad that it does not want Pakistan to choose between the United States and China. Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar said in a newspaper interview last month that Pakistan had enough problems of its own and did not want the added headache of a new Cold War between China and …

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi begins a two-day visit to France on Thursday where he will attend the traditional Bastille Day military parade as guest of honour and discuss major new defence deals. French President Emmanuel Macron’s red-carpet welcome for the Hindu nationalist leader comes weeks after Modi was given the rare honour of a White House state dinner in Washington — …