International

DOHA: Three Pakistani firemen died in a training accident in the Qatari capital weeks before the start of the World Cup, officials said on Thursday. Authorities said the three were not taking part in a multi-national World Cup security exercise currently being held around Doha that includes simulations of “chemical incidents” and demonstrations. Officials did not give details of the …

NEW DELHI: Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said on Thursday he hoped to have Gilgit-Baltistan as part of India to complete the mission the Modi government began by annexing held Kashmir in Aug 2019. Mr Singh is visiting the occupied region to celebrate the landing of Indian forces in the state a day after New Delhi allegedly signed the Instrument of Accession …

VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis warned seminarians in Rome of the dangers of online pornography, in a transcript published by the Vatican on Wednesday, calling soft porn a temptation that “weakens the priestly heart”. “Dear brothers, be careful of this. The pure heart, the heart that receives Jesus every day, cannot receive this pornographic information,” he said on Monday, telling the …

LONDON: President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that the world faced the most dangerous decade since World War Two, accusing what he cast as a declining West of engaging in nuclear blackmail against Russia. Putin said he had no regrets about sending troops into Ukraine, and accused the West of inciting the war and playing a “dangerous, bloody and dirty” …

THE HAGUE: Climate activists glued themselves to Johannes Vermeer’s “Girl with a Pearl Earring” at a Dutch museum on Thursday in the latest stunt targeting famous artworks, but the painting was undamaged. Three men were arrested after the attack at The Hague’s Mauritshuis museum on the 1665 masterpiece which has inspired a bestselling novel and a Hollywood film. They trio …

WASHINGTON: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine highlights the “acute threats” posed by Moscow, but China is the most consequential challenge for the United States, the US military said in a statement of its overall strategy released on Thursday. The Pentagon also made clear — amid Russian talk of use of a nuclear weapon in the Ukraine war — that the United …

NAQURA: Israel and Lebanon struck a US-brok­ered maritime border agreement on Thursday that opens up lucrative offshore gas fields for the neighbours that remain technically at war. US President Joe Biden hailed the “historic” deal that comes as Western powers clamour to open up new energy production and reduce vulnerability to supply cuts from Russia. The agreement was signed separately …

At least 15 people were killed in an attack on a Shia Muslim shrine in the Iranian city of Shiraz on Wednesday, state news agency IRNA said, as security forces elsewhere clashed with protesters marking 40 days since the death of Mahsa Amini. Early reports of the attack gave varying accounts. The local police chief said there had been a single attacker, …

Iranian security forces opened fire on protesters who massed in their thousands on Wednesday in Mahsa Amini’s hometown to mark 40 days since her death, a human rights group said. “Security forces have shot tear gas and opened fire on people in Zindan square, Saqez city,” Hengaw, a Norway-based group that monitors rights violations in Iran’s Kurdish regions, tweeted without specifying …

THE HAGUE: Dutch authorities said on Wednesday they were investigating reports that China has set up two illegal police stations in the Netherlands which it uses to harass dissidents. Dutch media reported that the police posts in Amsterdam and Rotterdam purported to offer diplomatic assistance, but that they had not been declared to the Netherlands. China’s foreign ministry said the …