GENEVA/BERLIN/BEIRUT: Peace talks aimed at ending the conflict in Syria will resume in Geneva on March 9, UN envoy Staffan de Mistura’s office said Tuesday, announcing a two-day postponement. “Intra-Syrian peace talks will resume in the afternoon of 9 March,” de Mistura’s office said in a stateme

BAGHDAD: The death toll from devastating back-to-back market bombings carried out by the Daesh group the previous day in eastern Baghdad climbed to 73 on Monday, officials said. Several of the critically wounded died overnight while 112 people remain in hospital, two police officials said. Also, at

BEIRUT: Most major armed opposition groups in Syria have indicated they are ready to participate in the plan to cease hostilities on Saturday, as long as the Syrian government upholds its obligations under the deal, a senior Obama administration official said on Friday. US President Barack Obama wa

ISLAMABAD: Lawmakers in Pakistan’s largest province on Wednesday gave unprecedented protection to female victims of violence, in a bid to stem a rising tide of gender-related abuse in a country ranked as the world’s third most dangerous place for women. The bill redefines “violence” to include “any

JERUSALEM: A report by two Israeli rights groups released Wednesday says dozens of Palestinian detainees at an Israeli detention facility are subjected to mistreatment, which in some cases amounts to torture. The report by B’Tselem and HaMoked presents accounts by 116 Palestinian detainees on condi

WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama on Tuesday presented a long-awaited roadmap to close the controversial US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, saying it was time to shutter a facility that betrayed US interests and values. With less than a year left in office, Obama unveiled a plan that says the U

ANKARA, Turkey: A car bomb went off in the Turkish capital Wednesday near vehicles carrying military personnel, killing at least 28 people and wounding 61 others, officials said. The explosion occurred during evening rush hour in the heart of Ankara, in an area close to parliament and armed force

MUNICH: Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev raised the specter of a “permanent war” or a “world war” if powers failed to negotiate an end to the conflict in Syria and warned against any ground operations by US and Arab forces. Medvedev, speaking to Germany’s Handelsblatt newspaper on the eve o

PARIS: Outgoing French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius on Wednesday accused Russia and Iran of “complicity” in the “brutality” of the Syrian regime. “There is both the frightening brutality of Bashar Assad’s regime... and — I am going to name those responsible — there is complicity on the part of R

BEIRUT: A suicide car bomber dispatched by the Daesh group struck near a police officers’ club in the Syrian capital, killing at least 10 people and destroying a number of cars. Syrian state TV reported the toll and showed footage of the blast scene, including several damaged vehicles and a burnt-o

WASHINGTON: North Korea has expanded a uranium enrichment facility and restarted a plutonium reactor that could start recovering spent fuel in weeks or months, the US intelligence chief said Tuesday in delivering the annual assessment by intelligence agencies of the top dangers facing the country.

NEUBRANDENBURG: German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday tried to placate the increasingly vocal critics of her open-door policy for refugees, insisting that asylum seekers from Syria and Iraq would go home once the conflicts there had ended. Merkel, despite appearing increasingly isolated ove

BEIJING: Rescuers on Friday pulled out four miners who had spent 36 days trapped underground in a collapsed mine in eastern China. The gypsum mine in Shandong province collapsed on Christmas Day, killing one and leaving 17 missing, including the four survivors. In the days that followed, rescuers

BEIJING: US Secretary of State John Kerry and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi agreed on Wednesday on the need for a significant new UN Security resolution targeting North Korea after its Jan. 6 nuclear test, though there were few signs of concrete progress. Kerry, on a two-day visit to Beijing,

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama says he will ban the use of solitary confinement for juveniles and low-level offenders in federal prisons, citing the potential for “devastating, lasting psychological consequences” from the use of the isolation as punishment. The move comes amid a national mov

PESHAWAR, Pakistan: Officials say a northwestern Pakistani university where Islamic militants gunned down 21 students and teachers last week has reopened for classes amid tight security. University official Kabir Khan says classes at the Bacha Khan University in the town of Charsadda resumed on Mon

WASHINGTON: Tens of millions of residents from northern Georgia to New Jersey have shuttered themselves inside to wait out a mammoth storm that has made travel treacherous and could dump up to 2 feet of snow in some areas. Blizzard warnings stretch from northeastern Virginia to New York City, with

DAVOS: Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “welcomes” Syrian refugees arriving in Toronto not as asylum seekers but as citizens. Speaking at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, Prime Minister Trudeau said: “I welcomed them as new Canadians and as the future of the Ca