Global News

By Joris Bolomey AFP | Posted TOE Faouzi Abdulbagi Mahammat Anour woke up in Tine, Chad, with a burnt face and his right eye missing after being attacked on the Sudanese side of the border by a drone. The attack happened on the morning of June 10, when the 18-year-old was grazing his family’s livestock northeast of the twin town of Tina in Sudan, in an area still outside the control of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Eight hours later, he found himself in a hospital in Tine, with his hands burnt and bandaged. His 15-year-old cousin, Tadjerdin Mahammat Anour, was at his bedside. The conflict in Sudan has pitted the country’s army against its former allies the RSF since April 2023, killing more than 11,000 civilians and forcing over 15 million to flee their homes, according to the UN. – 1,000+ killed – Another cousin, aged just 16, was killed on the spot, said Tadjerdin, dressed in a white tunic and also with burns on a large part of his fa...

By Reuters and Posted by TOE Britain, France and Germany raised the alarm on Wednesday over recent Chinese activities off the ‌east coast of Taiwan, where China has mounted coast guard ‌patrols, saying they threaten regional stability and freedom of navigation. China, which views democratically ​governed Taiwan as its own territory, earlier in June sent coast guard ships into the waters off the island’s east coast for what it called a “special maritime traffic law-enforcement operation”, angering Taipei. China said the ‌operation was in response ⁠to Japan and the Philippines, saying they would begin formal talks on their maritime boundaries, which Beijing viewed ⁠as involving Chinese waters off Taiwan. China has also been sending maritime survey ships into the same waters. “We have noted with concern novel ​Chinese activity ​in the waters east of Taiwan,” ​the de facto British, ‌French and German embassies in Taipei said in a rare joint...

By Eltayeb Siddig, Nafisa Eltahir and Khalid Abdelaziz Reuters and Posted by TOE Last month, Ali Rizkallah, a commander in the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group, was welcomed to Sudan’s capital ​Khartoum and given a uniform and a rank in the armed forces he had spent about  three years fighting . The army-affiliated government hailed his defection — the latest in a series of ‌high-level switches that have been reshaping Sudan’s alliances and boosting the military in  one of the deadliest conflicts  of the century. But many others have balked at the sight of Rizkallah and other former RSF figures feted in public, holding press conferences and sometimes literally embracing their former rivals. They fear that the defectors will evade justice for alleged crimes committed under their command. ‘I CAN’T FORGIVE THEM,’ SAYS DARFUR WOMAN “These RSF soldiers, even if they seek God’s forgiveness, I can’t forgive them because of what I ​...

By Associated Press | Posted by TOE U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer resigned on Monday, paving the way for Britain to have its seventh prime minister in just over a decade. He said he was stepping down as leader of the governing Labour Party but will remain caretaker prime minister until a new Labour leader is chosen by the party. Andy Burnham, who won a special parliamentary election last week, is the front-runner to replace Starmer as Labour leader. Starmer won a landslide victory at a general election in 2024, but a series of missteps badly damaged his credibility. Here’s the latest: EU leader praises Starmer European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen praised Starmer’s legacy after news of his resignation in a post online on Monday. “It can take many leaders years to grow into the statesman you became in just two years,” she said on X. “European and Ukrainian security is stronger because of you. Thank you, dear K...

By Humeyra Pamuk, Dave Graham and Tala Ramadan Reuters and Posted by TOE U.S. Vice President JD Vance arrived for peace talks with Iran at a Swiss mountaintop resort on Sunday as foreseen in a tentative peace deal, but the diplomacy was overshadowed by Iran’s announcement that it had reimposed its blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. A memorandum of understanding on a path to end the ‌war, agreed a week ago, calls for the Strait to be reopened and a halt to all hostilities, including in Lebanon, which Washington’s ally Israel invaded in March. But with little sign of an end to ‌fighting there, Iran said on Saturday it had shut the Strait again. U.S. officials have disputed that the Strait is closed and said 55 merchant ships had crossed it on Saturday. But on Sunday Iran’s Fars news agency cited a military source as saying no new permits were being ​issued for ships to cross until further notice. OIL PRICES TUMBLED AFTER AGREEMENT ANNOUNCED As oft...

By José Arturo Cárdenas AFP | Posted by TOE Bolivia’s president declared a state of emergency on Saturday and deployed soldiers and bulldozers to raze anti-government roadblocks that have paralyzed the Andean nation. For more than six weeks, unions, Indigenous groups and coca farmers have marched through cities and blocked roads across the country with rubble, logs and debris in protest against the conservative government. Major cities have suffered acute shortages of fuel, food and medicine, the economy has lost billions of dollars, and the protests have threatened to topple Bolivia’s first non-socialist government in two decades. President Rodrigo Paz appeared in a predawn televised address on Saturday to warn protesters they would face “the full force of the law” as he moved to end the crisis.  He declared a 90-day state of emergency, which curbs the right to protest and allows the military to be deployed domestically. Hours after...