International

MOSCOW: The first feature film shot in space premiered in Russian cinemas on Thursday, as Moscow delighted in beating a rival Hollywood project amid a confrontation with the West over Ukraine. The Challenge is about a surgeon dispatched to the International Space Station (ISS) to save an injured cosmonaut. Russia sent an actress and a film director for a 12-day …

A Singaporean man is scheduled to be hanged next week for conspiring to smuggle a kilogram of cannabis, rights groups said, in the city-state’s first execution in six months. Singaporean Tangaraju Suppiah, 46, will be sent to the gallows on Wednesday, according to a notice from the prisons department received by his family and posted on social media by rights …

NEW YORK: Fox News on Tuesday disposed of one legal threat with its $787.5 million defamation settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, but the network still faces a $2.7 billion lawsuit from another voting technology company, Smartmatic USA, over its coverage of debunked election-rigging claims. Dominion accused Fox and its parent company Fox Corp of ruining its business by airing claims that its machines were …

Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari will attend a meeting of the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation (SCO) to be held in India next month, the Foreign Office said on Thursday. “Bilawal Bhutto Zardari will be leading the Pakistan delegation to the SCO Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) being held on May 4-5 2023, in Goa, India,” FO spokesperson Mumtaz Zahrah Baloch announced …

UNITED NATIONS: The United Nations is ready to take ‘baby steps’ towards recognising the Taliban as it considers options to persuade Afghanistan’s de facto rulers to soften their attitude towards women. For reviewing the option, and its repercussions, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres will host a meeting of special envoys for Afghanistan from around the world in Doha on May …

GENEVA: Rather than fixating on the impact of the world’s soaring population, the world should look at women’s reproductive rights to shore up “demographic resilience,” the UN said on Wednesday. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) — the UN’s sexual and reproductive health agency — acknowledged there was widespread anxiety over the size of the world’s population, which is expected …

KHARTOUM: Sudan has degenerated into a battleground for two rival generals, but they are backed by complex webs of international alliances with conflicting interests that could imperil the country’s future, analysts say. Missiles, air strikes and gunfire have been ceaseless in Khartoum since April 15 as army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan wages war with his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, …

OTTAWA: About 155,000 federal workers in Canada walked off the job on Wednesday after failing to reach a deal for higher wages and work-from-home guarantees, a strike that affects a range of public services from tax returns to passport renewals. The Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) union said contract negotiations would continue, and Prime Minister Justin Tru­deau stressed the …

At least 85 people were killed and hundreds injured in a crush at a Ramazan cash handout in Yemen early on Thursday, as the impoverished country suffered one of its worst tragedies just as optimism was growing over its bitter civil war. Three people were detained over the incident in Sanaa — Yemen’s rebel-held capital — after large crowds gathered …

  An Indian court on Thursday rejected a plea by top opposition figure Rahul Gandhi for a stay on a defamation conviction that prompted his expulsion from parliament last month. Gandhi, 52, who was sentenced to two years imprisonment for remarks he made in 2019 seen as insulting to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and those sharing his surname, had been looking to …