News

18 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: AP) – A cease-fire went into force early Tuesday in Yemen’s Red Sea port of Hodeida after intense fighting between government-allied forces and Shiite rebels erupted shortly before the U.N.-brokered truce took hold in the contested city, Yemeni officials said. They said artillery shelling and heavy machine gun fire shook districts in…

17 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: REUTERS) – Thousands of Hungarians thronged the streets of Budapest on Sunday in the fourth and largest protest in a week against what they see as the increasingly authoritarian rule of right-wing nationalist Viktor Orban. Braving sub-zero temperatures, setting off flares and waving Hungarian and European Union flags, about 10,000 demonstrators walked…

14 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: AP) – Senators voted Thursday to recommend that the U.S. end its assistance to Saudi Arabia for the war in Yemen and put the blame for the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi squarely on Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, in a direct challenge to both the longtime Middle East ally and…

13 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: FIDES) – Yesterday the American President Donald Trump, signed the Iraq and Syria Genocide Relief and Accountability Act of 2018. The law, which defines as Genocide crimes perpetrated in recent years by Jihadists on Christians and Yazidis in Iraq and Syria, commits the US government to supplying aid to victims of violence…

12 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: INDEPENDENT) – The ruling party of India’s prime minister Narendra Modi has suffered a major setback just a few months before a general election, trailing the rival Congress Party in three key state polls. In the last set of state elections before the whole country goes to the ballot box in spring, preliminary results showed bad defeats…

11 DECEMBER 2018 (VOA) –  In the desert outside Mosul there is a giant sinkhole, once thought a natural wonder, with stories about it going back for generations. There are believed to be as many as 10,000 or more bodies decomposing inside, unceremoniously dumped by Islamic State militants, after or during the killings. And as…

10 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: REUTERS) – Yemen’s warring parties held the first direct talks in U.N.-led peace efforts in Sweden on Sunday to iron out a prisoner swap, one of several confidence-building measures intended to help launch a political process to end nearly four years of conflict. Since talks began on Thursday, U.N. officials have been…

07 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: WWM) – Over 100 Christians have been arrested in Iran in the past week and nearly 150 in the past month, as part of the government’s attempt to “warn” Christians against proselytising over Christmas, according to the advocacy director of religious freedom charity Article 18. Mansour Borji called the number of arrests…

06 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: REUTERS) –  President Emmanuel Macron’s government is dropping further fuel-tax hikes in next year’s budget in the face of protests across France over living costs, his prime minister said on Wednesday, a day after announcing their suspension for six months. The Macron administration is struggling to defuse the anger driving the “yellow…

05 DECEMBER 2018 (SOURCE: INDEPENDENT) – Yemen’s recognised government and the Houthi rebels have agreed to a massive prisoner swap to boost UN efforts for a ceasefire deal, as a rebel delegation flew to Sweden for a fresh round of peace talks. The agreement was struck by UN envoy Martin Griffiths, who was in the rebel-held capital Sana’a on…