• Hong Kong protest leaders prevented from boarding flight to Beijing

    Nov 14
    Student leaders of the Hong Kong protests have been prevented from boarding a flight to Beijing, where they hoped to meet with Chinese government officials in their push for greater democracy in Hong Kong.

    The three members of the Hong Kong Federation of Students – Alex Chow, Nathan Law and Eason Chung – were stopped from boarding a flight to Beijing at Hong Kong's main airport.
  • North Korea to send senior envoy to Russia
    North Korea announced that a special envoy has been appointed to visit Moscow, according to the state-run Korean Central News Agency.

    Choe Ryong-hae, a high-ranking member of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea and reported close associate of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, was appointed as the special envoy.
  • Sanctions on Russia will harm global economy - Putin

    The Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that sanctions imposed on his country by the EU and US will negatively affect the global economy.

  • Boko Haram capture symbolic town of Chibok

    Islamic militant group Boko Haram have captured Chibok, the town where they kidnapped more than 200 schoolgirls earlier this year.

    On Thursday evening Boko Haram militants reportedly overran Nigerian army defences in the town, situated in the Borno state.

    Several vigilante groups attempted to defend the town, with one of the vigilantes Musa Ali, saying “you couldn't count them because there were so many.”

    "All the security and the soldiers, they ran away and left us on our own. They didn't shoot at them, they just ran,” he added. “All the ammunition we had was finished, so there was no way we could attempt to hold the area.”

    However, Pogo Bitrus, chairman of the Chibok elders' forum, told Voice of America that “the fight, I believe, is not finished yet."

    In April of this year Boko Haram kidnapped schoolgirls from the town, with 219 of them remaining missing.

  • Transition plan to civilian led rule agreed in Burkina Faso
    A plan to transition between military rule to a civilian led government in Burkina Faso was agreed on Thursday, by the army, opposition parties, civil society groups and religious leaders.

    The transition charter was "unanimously voted" for by all sides, said a spokesperson for the talks.

    The military took control of the country with Lt Col Isaac Zida declaring himself head of state, after mass protests forced the president, Blaise Compaore, to resign on October 31.

    According to the agreed charter, an interim president will be selected by military, political, civil society and religious leaders. The interim president will then appointed a prime minister, who in turn will form a 25 member government.

  • Islamic State militants should be prosecuted at ICC concludes UN report
    Commanders of Islamic State militants should be tried at the International Criminal Court for war crimes in northeast Syria concluded UN investigators on Friday.

    A report based on over 300 interviews with witnesses and victims found that mass killings that constituted of “egregious violations of binding international humanitarian law and the war crime of murder on a massive scale,” had been committed by Islamic State commanders.
  • Car bombs target Egyptian and UAE embassies in Libya

    Two car bombs have exploded outside the UAE and Egyptian embassies in Libya, in an attack reportedly carried out by Islamic militant groups in Tripoli.

    The attack left two guards outside the Egyptian embassy wounded and three guards injured outside the UAE embassy. Both buildings were empty at the time of the explosion, after both countries alongside other nations, pulled diplomatic staff out of Tripoli.

  • Myanmar reforms backsliding warns Obama
    The US President Barack Obama warned this week that Myanmar's democratic reforms has slowed down and were even backsliding in an interview with Irrawady.
  • Israel denies entry to UN inquiry team
    Israel has denied entry to a UN inquiry team mandated by the UN Human Rights Council to investigate allegations of war crimes committed by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) against the Palestinian people in Gaza earlier this year.

    Israel's Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Emmanuel Nachshon, was quoted by the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, as saying the decision to stop the team from entering was made "in view of the [UN Human Rights] Council’s obsessive hostility toward Israel, the committee’s one-sided mandate and committee chairman William Schabas’ declared anti-Israeli positions."

    "[The committee is] a pretense that some inquiry is being held before the conclusions are published,” he added.

    “While Hamas launched thousands of rockets at Israel, the UN’s Human Rights Council made a decision stating Israel’s guilt in advance and set up a probe as a rubber stamp for its known positions."

  • India jails soldiers for Kashmir killings
    India has sentenced seven soldiers to life imprisonment for the murder of three youths in Indian-administered Kashmir four years ago.

    The seven soldiers, including two officers, were found guilty of luring the three young men from their homes, promising jobs and money, before murdering them. The soldiers then claimed that the men were Pakistani militants who they had killed in an encounter.
  • Nigerian army recaptures Mubi from Boko Haram
    The Nigerian army has recaptured the town of Mubi from militant Islamist group Boko Haram, said government officials on Thursday.

    Mubi, the second largest town in the north-eastern Adamawa state was captured by Boko Haram in October, who renamed it Madinatul Islam - City of Islam.

    Whilst the Nigerian army has not commented on the current situations, an anonymous military source told Reuters, the army was "on the verge of recapturing Mubi and other towns and villages taken over by the insurgents".

    Adamawa State Governor Bala Ngilari told reporters that "the insurgents have been flushed out of Mubi and are on the run."

    Meanwhile the UN's special representative for central Africa Abdoulaye Bathily said he was launching "an appeal to the international community to mobilise more in support of states' efforts in the battle against this terrorist group, whose atrocities have caused a worrying stream of refugees in neighbouring countries."
  • The worst could happen' in Burundi warns UN genocide adviser
    The United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide has warned that unless there is space for greater freedom in Burundi, “the worst could happen” ahead of elections next year.

    Adama Dieng, who was speaking at a UN-backed Rwandan genocide tribunal in Tanzania, said "the forces of evil must not be allowed to push certain actors toward criminal violence."
  • Britain launches first drone strikes in Iraq
    Britain's Ministry of Defence announced on Tuesday that it had launched its first drone strikes in Iraq against Islamic State (IS) militants this weekend.

    An RAF Reaper fired a Hellfire missile at IS militants who were reportedly laying improvised explosive devices in Bayji, north of Baghdad.

    The MoD said,
    "A series of coalition missions were conducted near Bayji, north of Baghdad, where ISIL terrorists were laying improvised explosive devices.”

    "UK Reaper continued to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assistance to coalition aircraft which enabled them to conduct further strikes.”
    Britain last month announced that it has authorised the use of spy planes and armed drones to fly surveillance missions over Syria.

  • Russian troops are entering Ukraine says NATO, as ceasefire collapses
    Russian troops and military convoys are entering Ukraine said a senior NATO commander on Wednesday, signalling the collapse of a ceasefire between Ukraine and pro-Russian rebels.

    "Russian tanks, Russian artillery, Russian air defence systems and Russian combat troops" have been seen, said US General Philip Breedlove, from a NATO air base near Naples.

    The Reuters news agency quoted Breedlove as saying he was "concerned about the increased movement" of Russian military convoys "in the past several days".

    Earlier this week, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) warned of the "rising" risk of renewed open conflict.

  • Serbian war crimes suspect receives hero's welcome
    Serbian politician Vojislav Seselj was greeted by hundreds of supporters in Belgrade on Wednesday, as he vowed to overthrow “Serbian traitors” on his return.

    Seselj, who has been released temporarily from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague to receive cancer treatment, said on his return,
    "They say it is temporary... But it will be temporary only until we overthrow from power (President) Tomislav Nikolic and (Prime Minister) Aleksandar Vucic, our renegades and Serbian traitors."
    Seselj, founder and president of the Serbian Radical Party, went on to say that the Serbian politicians in power had "sold our honour and gave up Serb nationalism to become servants of the West".

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