International

VIENNA: Gustav Klimt’s well-known Attersee lake painting tilted by two degrees, Egon Schiele’s painting of a tree in late autumn rotated by five degrees. As part of the initiative “A Few Degrees More”, Vienna’s Leopold Museum has tilted 15 paintings by the number of degrees unchecked climate change could affect the landscapes depicted. The initiative, launched on Wednesday, comes after …

NEW YORK: A New York grand jury will not meet after all on Wednesday, US media reported, delaying a decision on whether to charge ex-president Donald Trump over hush money paid to a porn star. The panel, which operates in secret, usually gathers on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons, leading to speculation that a vote on a historic indictment of …

WASHINGTON: Few expect Chinese President Xi Jinping’s diplomacy to yield breakthroughs in the Ukraine war. But in Washington, there are fears Beijing may succeed elsewhere — in winning credibility on the world stage. Xi pushed forward positions on Ukraine during two days of talks in Moscow, a week after China announced the restoration of ties between Iran and Saudi Arabia — rivals in a …

ISLAMABAD: The Asia-Pacific region will miss the 2030 target year by several decades to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals as the total number of years required to achieve the SDG targets in the region has increased, a United Nations report said on Wednesday. According to the SDG Progress Report 2023 released by the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia …

The UK police arrested a suspect on Wednesday who set on fire an elderly Muslim man while he was walking towards his home from a mosque in Birmingham. The victim suffered serious burn injuries on his face, Al Jazeera reported. A video of the incident is widely circulating on social media platforms. The CCTV camera footage shows a suspected young man wearing …

The Saudi and Iranian foreign ministers spoke by phone to mark the beginning of Ramazan, vowing to meet “soon” to implement a landmark bilateral reconciliation deal, Riyadh said on Thursday. The Saudi minister, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, called Hossein Amir-Abdollahian and the pair “exchanged congratulations on the occasion of the holy month of Ramadan”, which begins Thursday in both countries, …

A court in western India found opposition leader Rahul Gandhi guilty of defamation on Thursday for a speech he made in 2019 in which he referred to thieves as having the surname Modi, and sentenced him two years in prison. Gandhi was present at the court in Surat, a city in Gujarat, which is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state. …

In phone calls with his Saudi and Iranian counterparts, Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Tuesday hailed the resumption of ties between the two countries and termed it a “harbinger for peace, prosperity and development for the entire region”. The two regional heavyweights announced on March 10 a Chinese-brokered deal to restore ties seven years after they were severed. The deal is …

RIYADH: Saudi Arabia has announced that Ramazan will start on Thursday after the moon was not sighted on Tuesday. In Pakistan, the Central Ruet-i-Hilal Committee will meet today (Wednesday) for the sighting of the Ramazan moon. Saudi Arabia’s supreme court ruled on Tuesday evening that Shaban will end on Wednesday, meaning Ramazan will begin the following day, the official Saudi …

NEW YORK: A judge on Tues­day rejected former US President Donald Trump’s bid to delay the scheduled Oct. 2 trial in state Attorney General Letitia James’ civil fraud lawsuit, calling the date “written in stone.” Justice Arthur Engoron in Supr­e­­me Co­­u­­rt in Manhattan agreed to req­uests by Trump and other def­endants to push back some deadlines for gathering evidence. “You …