International

GENEVA: The United Nations said on Thursday it had set up a special trust fund to provide urgently needed cash directly to Afghans through a system tapping into donor funds frozen since the Taliban takeover in August. With the local economy “imploding”, the aim is to inject liquidity into Afghan households to permit them to survive this winter and remain …

President Joe Biden on Thursday said the United States would come to the defence of Taiwan if the island were attacked by China, which considers it part of its territory. “Yes,” he responded when asked in a CNN town hall about defending Taiwan. “We have a commitment to that.” Biden’s statement was at odds with the long-held US policy known as “strategic …

DAMASCUS: A rare bombing of an army bus in Damascus and government shelling shortly after of a town in rebel-held northwest Syria killed at least 27 people on Wednesday, in the deadliest flare-up in months. Two bombs planted on an army bus in central Damascus were detonated early in the morning, killing 14 people, in the worst such attack there …

BERLIN: Police on Wednesday arrested two former German soldiers accused of trying to form a “terrorist” paramilitary group to fight in Yemen’s civil war, prosecutors said. The two men had taken steps to “create a paramilitary unit of 100 to 150 men” composed of former police officers and soldiers, the Karlsruhe federal prosecutor’s office in southwestern Germany said. Named as …

PARIS: The world’s nations are currently planning to produce more than double the amount of coal, oil and gas consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, the United Nations said on Wednesday. Ten days before a climate summit that is being billed as key to the viability of the Paris Agreement temperature goals, the UN’s Environment Programme said …

WASHINGTON: The Biden administration has selected Thomas West, a diplomat with years of experience in dealing with Afghanistan, as America’s new Special Representative for the war-torn country. Mr West, who previously served as the Deputy Special Representative, replaces Zalmay Khalilzad who concluded the US-Taliban deal in February 2020 after two years of negotiations. Mr West has also served on then-Vice President …

SEOUL: North Korea successfully tested a new type of submarine-launched ballistic missile, state media reported on Wednesday as the nuclear-armed country seeks to show off its ever-expanding military capabilities. Tuesday’s test, carried out near Sinpo, the site of a major naval dockyard, came as both Koreas build up their weapons technology in what could become an arms race on the peninsula, and …

Nine months after being expelled from social media for his role in inciting the Jan 6 Capitol insurrection, former President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he is launching a new media company with its own social media platform. Truth Social will be created through a new company formed by a merger of the Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG) and a …

DEHRADUN: The death toll from days of flooding and landslides in India and Nepal crossed 100 on Wednesday, including several families swept away or crushed in their homes by avalanches of mud and rocks. Experts say that they were victims of ever-more unpredictable and extreme weather across South Asia in recent years caused by climate change and exacerbated by deforestation, damming and …

Four people were killed and 47 were hurt in a gas explosion at a BBQ restaurant in China on Thursday, the local government said. The explosion in northeastern Shenyang city shattered the windows of nearby buildings and halted traffic, state media said. Nothing was left of the restaurant except exposed structural beams, according to videos circulating on Chinese social media. …