International

UNITED NATIONS: The world is losing patience with the Taliban, a UN envoy told the Security Council on Tuesday, as the Islamist regime shows no sign of allowing girls’ education and question marks remain over its links to Al Qaeda. Markus Potzel, the United Nations deputy representative in Afghanistan, told the council that while there have been some positive developments …

GENEVA: The World Trade Organisation’s chief said on Tuesday she belie­ves the world is heading towards a global recession due to multiple colliding crises, and called for radical policies to revive growth. WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said Russia’s war in Ukraine, the climate crisis, food price and energy shocks plus the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic were creating the conditions …

RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman was named the country’s prime minister on Tuesday. King Salman also ordered a cabinet reshuffle, naming his son Khalid Bin Salman, the former deputy defence minister, as the new defence minister. Prince Abdulaziz Bin Salman stays as energy minister under a new cabinet, to be headed by the crown prince, according to …

US State Secretary Antony Blinken on Tuesday defended military sales to Pakistan after criticism from growing US partner India, which considers itself the target of Islamabad’s F-16 planes. Blinken met in the US capital with India’s foreign minister a day after separate talks with Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari. The US-Pakistan alliance, born out of the Cold War, has frayed over Islamabad’s relationship …

Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari wants the world to engage the Taliban, and has warned of dangerous consequences if Afghanistan’s rulers are again isolated. In an interview with AFP on a visit to Washington, Bilawal cautioned against creating “parallel governance” after the United States, distrustful of the Taliban, put Afghanistan’s frozen assets in a professional fund in Switzerland. “We’ve learned from the past that when …

BEIRUT: Depositors scuffled and long lines formed at Lebanese banks on Monday as they partially reopened after a week-long closure following a slew of heists by customers desperate to access their money. But most banks remained shut, welcoming only a handful of depositors on appointment, and there was anger from those seeking to withdraw frozen funds desperately needed to weather …

MOSCOW: President Vladimir Putin on Monday granted Russian citizenship to whistleblower Edward Snowden, who exposed massive surveillance by the US National Security Agency and was granted refuge by Moscow. A presidential decree included Edward Joseph Snowden, born on June 21, 1983, on a list of newly-minted Russian citizens at a time when relations between Washington and Moscow are at historic …

LONDON: Britain on Monday warned it could fine TikTok 27 million pounds ($29m) over a potential failure to protect children’s privacy on the Chinese-owned video app. The Information Commissioner’s Office said the social media company “may have processed the data of children under the age of 13 without appropriate parental consent”. The ICO also found that the short-form video platform …

SAO PAULO: Fires in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest have surged in September, already making it the worst month in more than a decade, government data showed on Monday, after a jump in deforestation during an election year. National space research agency INPE reported 36,850 fire alerts in the region so far this month, a 120pc rise over the full month last …

KANDAHAR: A mass grave containing the remains of 12 people has been uncovered in Afghanistan, Taliban officials said on Monday. The grave was found by villagers over the past few days in the town of Spin Boldak, bordering Pakistan, a site of fierce fighting between former Afghan government forces and Taliban fighters before the hardline Islamists seized power last year. …