LONDON: The family of a 10-year-old Muslim boy demanded an apology on Wednesday after he was quizzed by British police for writing that he lived in a "terrorist" house instead of a "terraced" house during an English class. Police interviewed the boy at his home in Lancashire, northwest England, o

PARIS: French President Francois Hollande pledged Monday to redefine France’s business model and declared what he called “a state of economic and social emergency,” unveiling a 2-billion-euro ($2.2 billion) plan to revive hiring and catch up with a fast-moving world economy. The measures he propose

TAIPEI: The Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) Tsai Ing-wen has been elected Taiwan’s first female president. Tsai took a commanding lead in the election results late Saturday evening, and the candidate for the China-friendly Nationalist Party conceded a massive loss. Tsai had about 60 percent

NORTH CHARLESTON: Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump and top challenger Ted Cruz ended a longstanding truce in spectacular fashion on Thursday night with bitter exchanges during what may have been Trump’s strongest debate performance to date. The New York billionaire and the Texas se

DUBAI: The leader of al-Qaida is threatening Saudi Arabia over its mass execution of 47 people, many of whom were tied to the terror group.  Ayman al-Zawahiri delivered the message in a recording earlier this week that was reported by the SITE Intelligence Group.  The seven-minute speech exhorte

ISLAMABAD: Four countries — Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the United States — were cloistered away late into the night Monday trying to lay a foundation they hope will eventually lead to peace talks between the Afghan government and Taliban fighters. But in the end, the biggest decision that appe

Pathankot terror attack: Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif has already said that a transparent investigation will be made and those involved will not be spared. With National Security Advisor Ajit K Doval leaving for Paris late Monday night and Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar in Male, New Delhi is li

BAQUBA, Iraq:Bombings killed 20 people and wounded dozens at a cafe in the Iraqi town of Muqdadiyah northeast of Baghdad on Monday, officers said. A bomb exploded at the cafe and a suicide bomber detonated an explosives-rigged vehicle after people gathered at the scene, a police captain and an ar

MOSCOW: Russian investigators have opened a criminal probe in the case of a patient who died after he was punched in the head by a doctor. The announcement of the probe Saturday said the incident took place Dec. 29 in a hospital in Belgorod, 570 kilometers (350 miles) southwest of Moscow. Video of

JEDDAH: The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has appointed four Arab women to top positions in the 47-year-old organization. The OIC is the world’s second-largest international organization after the United Nations, consisting of 57 countries. Iyad Madani, the OIC’s secretary general, is

BEIJING: The Chinese capital Beijing will shut down 2,500 polluting firms in 2016 in its latest environmental protection efforts to reduce pollution as the city continues to be engulfed by smog most part of the year. The Fengtai, Fangshan, Tongzhou and Daxing districts are required to close 2,500

ISLAMABAD/NEW DELHI: Condemning the Pathankot attack in one voice - for the first time following a terror strike in India, Pakistan's civilian and military leadership on Friday promised full cooperation with New Delhi in eradicating the menace of terrorism from the region, a denunciation that would

TRIPOLI, Libya: A truck bomb exploded in the western Libyan city of Zliten near a police base, killing at least 60 policemen and wounding 200 on Thursday, officials said. No one claimed responsibility for the bombing, but a local Daesh affiliate has been trying to gain a foothold in Zliten from its

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama on Tuesday described new steps his administration will take to tighten gun rules and urged Americans to vote for candidates who do more to prevent gun violence, wiping back tears as he remembered children who died in a mass shooting. As Obama delivered a powerf

BEIJING: China’s stock market lurched lower again Monday, triggering “circuit breakers” that halted trading. The slump was the latest episode in months of turmoil for Chinese investors. China’s market benchmark soared 150 percent between November 2014 and early June 2015, as cheerleading in the sta

COLOMBO: Up to 100,000 people still living in camps six years after the end of Sri Lanka’s brutal ethnic war will be given land to build homes within six months, President Maithripala Sirisena told AFP Sunday. “It is an ambitious target, but I will see that all the internally displaced people are g

China has commissioned its first nuclear power plant in one of its ethnic autonomous regions as it rapidly expands the country’s nuclear reactor network to cut down coal burning and CO2 emissions. The first reactor of the Fangchenggang Nuclear Power Plant in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region can s

SANAA(Yemen): Pro-government fighters in Yemen attacked and killed a senior al-Qaida leader and three people traveling in his convoy near a security checkpoint in the southern Abyan province on Friday, Yemeni officials said. Ali Abed al-Rab bin Talab, better known as Abu Anwar, was the extremist