| Joe Biden: more than 40 years in US politics Posted: 21 Oct 2015 02:03 PM PDT  US Vice President Joe Biden, who on Wednesday opted out of another run for the White House in 2016, is the consummate Washington insider who has spent more than four decades in politics. 1942: Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr. is born on November 20, 1942 in Scranton, Pennsylvania into an Irish Catholic family. November 1972: At 29, Biden is elected to the US Senate for the state of Delaware.
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| Iran will not back Syria's Assad 'forever,' minister says Posted: 21 Oct 2015 01:54 PM PDT  Iran will not work to keep Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in power "forever", Iran's deputy foreign minister said during a trip to Britain on Wednesday. It was the first visit by an Iranian delegation to Britain since the two countries re-opened their embassies in London and Tehran due to a thaw in relations. While Iran has "no fighting force, as such" in Syria, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said Tehran had increased the number of its military advisors there to help Assad prevail against a range of opposing forces in a civil war that has that has killed 240,000 and displaced millions.
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| EU calls mini summit as Balkans buckle under refugee crisis Posted: 21 Oct 2015 01:42 PM PDT  The EU Wednesday called a mini summit with Balkan countries on the migrant crisis, as Slovenia became the latest state to buckle under a surge of refugees desperate to reach northern Europe before winter. The leaders of Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Romania and Slovenia will meet in Brussels Sunday with their counterparts from non-EU states Macedonia and Serbia, the office of European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said.
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| Three years after U.S. consulate attack, Benghazi still at war Posted: 21 Oct 2015 01:19 PM PDT  By Ayman Al-Warfalli BENGHAZI, Libya (Reuters) - Partly burned and still abandoned, the high-walled villas that once housed the U.S. consulate compound in the Libyan city of Benghazi now sit on a frontline of a nation at war with itself. Three years after militants killed U.S. ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans in an attack on the facility, Benghazi is back in U.S. news headlines as White House contender and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton faces a Congressional hearing on the incident on Thursday. For Libyans and Benghazi, though, the war never really disappeared.
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| Renewed Kurdish conflict chokes economy in southeast Turkey Posted: 21 Oct 2015 01:10 PM PDT  Just a few months ago, the Hasan Pasa caravansary in southeast Turkey was teeming with visitors, but now the market in the converted inn is deserted as scared shoppers stay away amid fresh violence in the Kurdish conflict. "The resumption (of fighting) has hit us hard," says Ahmet Onen, who has a boutique selling souvenirs and traditional Kurdish outfits in the 16th-century Ottoman building in the city of Diyarbakir. For the past three months, life here has moved instead to the beat of deadly clashes between Turkish security forces and fighters of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
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| In Trudeau, Canadians seek to reclaim liberal stance on world stage Posted: 21 Oct 2015 12:34 PM PDT Canada's Liberal government comes to power with a long list of progressive policies many Canadians are eager to see implemented, from legalizing marijuana to resettling more Syrian refugees. On the world stage, Liberal leader Justin Trudeau, the 43-year-old son of former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, has pledged to reassert Canada's traditional position as a humanitarian soft power. In a phone call to the White House, he told US President Barack Obama that Canada would remove its six fighter jets from the US-led bombing campaign, but maintain humanitarian aid and training, according to news reports. |
| Syrian refugees are quietly trickling into the US: How many, and where? Posted: 21 Oct 2015 12:28 PM PDT A small stream of Syrian refugees are quietly beginning to find homes in the US, a tiny part of the global effort to resettle some 4.1 million Syrians worldwide. Syrian refugees have been placed in 130 cities and towns across the country. |
| Iraqi forces claim found 365 IS bodies in Baiji graves Posted: 21 Oct 2015 12:28 PM PDT  Iraqi forces said Wednesday they found 19 different mass graves containing the bodies of 365 fighters from the Islamic State group in the reconquered town of Baiji. An army officer confirmed a large number of IS bodies had been discovered in mass graves, but could not say how many and mentioned that some had also been found in another neighbourhood. In a statement, the security forces said that "the total number of graves discovered by the heroes of the Popular Mobilisation is 19".
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| Editorial Roundup: Excerpts from recent editorials Posted: 21 Oct 2015 12:08 PM PDT Excerpts from recent editorials in newspapers in the United States and abroad: |
| Q&A: A look at Qatar, future home of Muslim teen clock-maker Posted: 21 Oct 2015 12:01 PM PDT  DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Ahmed Mohamed, the 14-year-old Muslim from Texas detained after his homemade clock was thought to be a bomb, will soon be moving with his family to Qatar to attend school thanks to the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development.
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| Dutch stop recognising child marriages abroad Posted: 21 Oct 2015 12:00 PM PDT  Dutch authorities Wednesday moved to close a loophole under which minors married abroad were allowed to join their spouses in the Netherlands, which has registered record numbers of asylum seekers. Amid growing concerns over the number of child brides resulting from the wars in Syria and Iraq, the Dutch government Wednesday gave notice its laws would be changed from December 5. "The law aimed at combatting forced marriages provides that a marriage carried out abroad between those under 18 will no longer be recognised in the Netherlands except if both spouses have since reached 18," says the law published in the official government journal.
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| Bahrain charges 24 with trying to set up Islamic State branch in kingdom Posted: 21 Oct 2015 11:49 AM PDT Twenty-four people face trial in Bahrain for trying to set up a branch of the Islamic State militant group and promoting the overthrow of the Gulf Arab state's monarchy, the public prosecutor's office said on Wednesday. Bahrain was swept by protests during the 2011 "Arab Spring" uprisings in which the Shi'ite majority demanded political reforms from the Sunni Muslim ruling family. The new case was the first time Bahrain named the Sunni Islamic State in connection with alleged militancy inside the island kingdom, which hosts the U.S. Fifth Fleet as a bulwark against Shi'ite Iran across the Gulf. |
| Two armed US Predator drones crash in Iraq, Turkey Posted: 21 Oct 2015 11:39 AM PDT  The US Air Force recently lost control of two armed Predator drones in separate incidents in Turkey and Iraq, a US military official said Wednesday. The Predators were both carrying air-to-surface Hellfire missiles when they crashed, but these were safely recovered along with the aircraft. In the first case on October 17, a Predator crew reported a "lost link and subsequent crash while the Predator was flying southeast of Baghdad," military spokesman Colonel Steve Warren said.
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| Kuwait, France agree helicopter deal: Paris Posted: 21 Oct 2015 11:13 AM PDT  Kuwait signed 2.5 billion euros ($2.8 bn) worth of military fixed and provisional deals led by the purchase of 24 Airbus-built Caracal helicopters, the French government said Wednesday. Paris said Kuwait would purchase 24 helicopters for a billion euros with an option for a further six. The agreements came a month after Kuwait agreed to buy 28 Typhoon combat warplanes from the Eurofighter consortium.
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| Iraqi forces' progress toward Ramadi slows: US Posted: 21 Oct 2015 11:09 AM PDT  Iraqi security forces battling Islamic State jihadists have made significant advances around Ramadi but progress to recapture the city has slowed in recent days, a US military spokesman said Wednesday. Colonel Steve Warren, who works in Baghdad for the US-led coalition conducting air strikes against IS targets in Iraq and Syria, said Iraqi forces had progressed along several lines toward Ramadi and successfully repelled a string of IS counterattacks. The Iraqi troops were "consolidating and reorganizing their forces in preparation for continued offensive operations," he said.
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| 14 Facts About Joe Biden You Should Know Posted: 21 Oct 2015 10:57 AM PDT Joe Biden, a colorful politician with deep experience in foreign policy and criminal justice issues, was forced today to scuttle a lifelong ambition to occupy the Oval Office. The 72-year-old Biden — a lawyer and one-time Delaware county council official — has been on the national stage since he first won election to the Senate in 1972 as the sixth-youngest senator in U.S. history. "I believe we're out of time — the time necessary to mount a winning campaign for the nomination," Biden said Tuesday. |
| The Latest: France to send more police to Calais Posted: 21 Oct 2015 10:51 AM PDT  DOBOVA, Slovenia (AP) — The latest news as migrants make their way across Europe by the tens of thousands, fleeing war or seeking a better life. All times local:
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| Syrian Kurds form new administration in semi-autonomous area Posted: 21 Oct 2015 10:49 AM PDT  BEIRUT (AP) — Syria's Kurds have expanded their semi-autonomous region in northern Syria, announcing Wednesday a new administration in a majority Sunni-Arab town they seized from the Islamic State group this summer.
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| Vice Media goes dark for journalist jailed in Turkey Posted: 21 Oct 2015 10:31 AM PDT  ISTANBUL (AP) — Vice Media carried out a two-hour blackout on its websites Wednesday to call attention to an Iraqi Kurdish journalist who has been held in Turkish jails without charges since being arrested while working for the news organization.
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| Police warned before jihadist stormed Canada's parliament Posted: 21 Oct 2015 09:16 AM PDT  Federal police were warned about Islamic State group threats against its officers days before the first jihadist attacks on Canadian soil in October 2014, but budget cuts had forced patrols around Parliament to be reduced, a report said Wednesday. Canada's public broadcaster CBC cited documents it obtained nearly a year after a gunman shot dead a ceremonial guard and stormed Parliament before being killed himself. "ISIS threats against law enforcement in the West are real... (and) Canada is not immune to such threats," it said.
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| Family of woman who died at Turkish airport: No foul play Posted: 21 Oct 2015 08:20 AM PDT LONDON (AP) — The family of a British woman who died in an Istanbul airport bathroom while in transit to Iraq says it agrees with Turkish authorities that there were no signs of foul play. |
| More than 100 migrants land at British RAF base in Cyprus Posted: 21 Oct 2015 08:02 AM PDT  More than 100 migrants crowded into two boats landed at a British airbase on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus Wednesday, bringing the crisis that has rocked much of Europe to British sovereign soil. The Cypriot interior ministry said marine police spotted "two fishing boats with 114 irregular migrants anchored inside base waters," and that there was a total of 28 children, 19 women and 67 men on board. Personnel at the Royal Air Force base at Akrotiri, near the city of Limassol, said those who came ashore were in good health.
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| Town joins Kurdish-led order in Syria, widening sway at Turkish border Posted: 21 Oct 2015 06:59 AM PDT  A Syrian town captured from Islamic State by Kurdish-led forces in June joined the Kurdish-led political order in northern Syria on Wednesday, officials said, a move likely to deepen Turkish concerns about the Kurds' expanding role just over the border. The town of Tel Abyad was captured by the Kurdish YPG militia with help from U.S.-led air strikes. A local leadership council including representatives of Tel Abyad's Arab, Kurdish, Turkmen and Armenian communities declared it part of the system of autonomous self government established by the Kurds, two officials who attended the meeting said.
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| U.S., allies conduct 18 air strikes in Syria and Iraq: military Posted: 21 Oct 2015 06:39 AM PDT A coalition led by the United States conducted 14 air strikes against Islamic State militants in Iraq on Tuesday, concentrating the bombardments near the cities of Kisik and Sinjar, according to a statement released on Wednesday. The Combined Joint Task Force said six attacks near Kisik struck a car-bomb facility belonging to the group and also destroyed five Islamic State staging areas. On the same day, the coalition conducted four air strikes in Syria, all near Manbij. |
| Upstaged NATO searches for '360-degree' response to Russia Posted: 21 Oct 2015 06:38 AM PDT  By Robin Emmott TRAPANI, Italy (Reuters) - The brass band played, the flags waved and Western generals delivered speeches brimming with resolve as NATO began big war games in the central Mediterranean this week. NATO, which waged an air campaign to help Libyan rebels oust Muammar Gaddafi, then left that country to descend into anarchy, is not a player in Syria and is watching uncomfortably as its former Cold War adversary Russia widens its role there. The speed and scope of Moscow's intervention in Syria's four-year-old civil war, coming after Russia's seizure of Crimea and support for pro-Kremlin rebels in eastern Ukraine last year, wrong-footed the U.S.-led alliance and has heightened soul-searching about its future.
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| IMF: Low oil prices, turmoil keeps Mideast growth 'subdued' Posted: 21 Oct 2015 06:17 AM PDT  DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The International Monetary Fund said Wednesday a fall in oil prices and deepening turmoil in parts of the Middle East will keep growth in the region subdued this year at 2.5 percent.
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| Iraq's cholera outbreak exceeds 1,800 cases: health ministry Posted: 21 Oct 2015 05:55 AM PDT  Iraq's first major cholera outbreak since 2012 has risen to more than 1,800 cases, including six deaths, and spread to the northern Kurdistan region, a health ministry spokesmen said on Wednesday. The illness, which can lead to death by dehydration and kidney failure within hours if left untreated, was detected last month west of Baghdad. A spokesman for the Kurdistan health ministry confirmed two cases in Erbil and two others in Duhok but said there were no fatalities.
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| Sectarian hate takes root as Yemen anti-Houthi forces push on Sanaa Posted: 21 Oct 2015 05:45 AM PDT  By Angus McDowall MARIB, Yemen (Reuters) - Mohsen Saleh al-Muradi does not just want to drive the Shi'ite Houthi fighters out of Yemen's capital 130 km (80 miles) from his home town, he wants to hunt them down and stamp them out. "I will keep fighting all the way to Maran," said the slight, moustached native of the north Yemen town of Marib, wearing a bright red headscarf and a bullet pouch on his chest, referring to the Houthis highland stronghold. "I want to trample them under my feet." In a messy conflict of many fronts, the forces backed by wealthy neighboring Gulf states against the Houthi fighters that control Sanaa often have little in common with each other and scant enthusiasm for the leader on whose behalf they are ostensibly fighting: President Abd Rabbu Mansour al-Hadi.
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| Boat migrants come ashore at British RAF base in Cyprus Posted: 21 Oct 2015 05:39 AM PDT  By Michele Kambas ATHENS (Reuters) - More than 100 migrants came ashore at a British military base on Cyprus on Wednesday, the first time in the migrant crisis that refugees have landed directly on British sovereign soil. Two fishing boats carrying them were sighted in the early morning off RAF Akrotiri, a sprawling facility on a peninsula on the southern coast of the island. Although the migrants arrived on what is considered British territory, officials said an agreement was in place with Cyprus, which would assume responsibility for them.
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| Lebanon turns back 53 people trying to leave illegally by boat Posted: 21 Oct 2015 05:05 AM PDT The Lebanese army said on Wednesday its naval forces returned to shore a boat carrying 53 people trying to leave the country illegally from the northern coastal city of Tripoli. Earlier this month, at least five members of a Lebanese family drowned and others were missing after the boat carrying them from Turkey to Greece sank in the Mediterranean. |
| Internships Offer Arab Students a Taste of Careers Posted: 21 Oct 2015 04:00 AM PDT Before recently graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in interior design from Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar, Meriem Aiouna participated in an internship with the Swedish chain Ikea. Aiouna, an Algerian national, says the marketing aspect of the internship also allowed her to understand the importance of teamwork and communication. Internship opportunities like the one Aiouna took part in are offered at many Arab region universities and allow students to gain practical experience in their respective field. |
| Iraq's ruling alliance, militias urge PM to seek Russian strikes Posted: 21 Oct 2015 02:49 AM PDT  By Ahmed Rasheed and Saif Hameed BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's ruling alliance and powerful Shi'ite militias have urged Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to request Russian air strikes on Islamic State militants, who control large parts of the country, members of the coalition and militias told Reuters. Growing pressure on Abadi to seek Russian support puts him in the delicate position of trying to appease his ruling coalition, as well as militias seen as a bulwark against Islamic State, while keeping strategic ally Washington on his side. America's top general, Joseph Dunford, said on a trip to Baghdad on Tuesday that the United States won assurances from Iraq that it would not seek such strikes.
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| Special Report: Power failure in Iraq as militias outgun state Posted: 21 Oct 2015 02:33 AM PDT  By Ned Parker ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) - In April, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi sat at a conference table in his Baghdad office with almost two dozen men in combat fatigues. The men were not officers in the Iraqi Army, but representatives of the Shi'ite paramilitary groups that have led the fight against Islamic State. Hadi al-Amiri, one of the most senior militia leaders, delivered a long and forceful monologue on his fighters' recent victories.
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| Hajj stampede death toll tops 2,000: foreign figures Posted: 21 Oct 2015 01:51 AM PDT  Dubai (AFP) - The death toll from last month's hajj stampede has topped 2,000, according to tallies given by foreign officials, making it the deadliest disaster in the pilgrimage's history by far.
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| Trudeau promises policy departures in post-Harper Canada Posted: 21 Oct 2015 01:18 AM PDT  TORONTO (AP) — With a host of policies that differ dramatically from his predecessor, Justin Trudeau's victory over the most conservative leader in Canada's history will reverberate beyond the country's borders.
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| Nazi crime researchers probing IS over Yazidi 'genocide' Posted: 21 Oct 2015 12:11 AM PDT  A group that documented Nazi war crimes is now investigating whether massacres committed by Islamic State jihadists against Iraq's Yazidi minority amount to genocide. "We are not seeking to be sensational but to establish the stages of the criminal process for each category of the Yazidi -- men, women, children -- in order to back up the claim of genocide," Andrej Umansky, criminal law specialist at Cologne University, told AFP. The Yazidis are neither Arabs nor Muslims and have a unique faith which IS jihadists consider to be heretical and polytheistic.
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| IS not alone in looting Syria cultural heritage: study Posted: 20 Oct 2015 10:51 PM PDT  The Islamic State group may dominate headlines about the destruction of heritage sites in Syria, but it is far from the only culprit, new US research warned Wednesday. The Syrian regime, Kurdishand other opposition forces are also major players in the destruction, according to the study led by a specialist in Middle East archaeology at Dartmouth University. The findings, published in the journal Near Eastern Archaeology, are based on analysis of satellite imagery from nearly 1,300 out of Syria's estimated 8,000 archaeological sites.
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| Tens of thousands flee new Syria offensives Posted: 20 Oct 2015 08:30 PM PDT  Tens of thousands have fled new regime offensives in Syria, the UN said, as Russian air strikes were reported to have killed 370 people so far, around one third of them civilians. With the Russian bombing campaign now in its fourth week, Moscow and Washington announced they had agreed measures to ensure air safety over Syria, where a US-led coalition is also carrying out strikes. The exodus was focused south of second city Aleppo, one of five areas where loyalist forces have launched offensives since Russia began its air war on September 30.
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| Top U.S. general seeks momentum in Iraq, bucks 'stalemate' label Posted: 20 Oct 2015 08:10 PM PDT  By Phil Stewart BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. Marine General Joseph Dunford, who took over this month as America's top military officer, pledged on Tuesday to seek new ways to build momentum in Iraq's battle against Islamic State and bucked descriptions of the conflict as a "stalemate." Emerging from his first trip to Iraq as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Dunford said he was encouraged by the latest battlefield gains, including an advance to secure most of the strategic Baiji oil refinery. After operational briefings from U.S. commanders and talks with Iraqi leaders, Dunford also said Iraqi security forces had taken critical terrain around the city of Ramadi "and tightened the noose." The advances, he said, marked a sharp contrast with the picture in Iraq less than two months ago, when the last chairman, General Martin Dempsey, described the state-of-play in Iraq as tactically stalemated.
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| Why bother? Polling at 1%, US candidates refuse to bow out Posted: 20 Oct 2015 07:47 PM PDT  Washington (AFP) - Their campaigns flatlined long ago. But several low-polling candidates in the US presidential race insist they are still viable contenders, even as voters and experts ask: Why?
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