Author: News Desk

Ukrainian forces were holding their positions in intense street fighting and under day and night shelling in Sievierodonetsk, officials said, as Russia pushes to control the bombed-out city, key to its objective of controlling eastern Ukraine. Sievierodonetsk and its twin city Lysychansk, on the opposite bank of the Siverskyi Donets river, are the last Ukrainian-controlled parts of Luhansk province, which Russia is determined to seize as one of its principal war objectives. Ukraine’s Security Council Secretary Oleksiy Danilov said on Thursday the situation in Sievierodonetsk was “extremely complicated” and Russian forces were focusing all of their might in the area.…

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Friday the European Union should offer the integration of all six nations of the Western Balkans into the EU by 2033 in what he called a “bold but necessary step”. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has lent a new sense of urgency to the need to tie Montenegro, Serbia, Albania, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Kosovo closer to the 27-member EU, in part to counter growing Russian and Chinese influence in the region. The link could entail full membership or an alternative community. In an article published in Politico ahead of a summit in Greece…

China’s U.N. envoy said on Thursday that Beijing does not want to see North Korea carry out a new nuclear test, which is partly why China vetoed a U.S.-led bid to impose new U.N. sanctions on Pyongyang over renewed ballistic missiles launches. But Ambassador Zhang Jun warned against making presumptions on how Beijing might react at the United Nations if North Korea goes ahead with its first nuclear test since 2017. Washington has warned such a test could happen at “any time” and it would again push for more U.N. sanctions. “Let’s see what will happen, but I think we…

The Nasser bin Hamad Premier League 2022-2023 will kick off officially on September 11. Meanwhile, the first round of the Second Football Division Championship will be given the go-ahead on September 8. Bahrain Football Association (BFA) has also announced that the preliminary phase of His Majesty King’s Cup will be held on September 19. The BFA Cup competition will be organized at the beginning of September 2022. According to the BFA announcement, the first registration window for the new season will be held from June 16 to September 6. First and second divisions clubs are allowed to sign four foreigners,…

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has granted  USD 30 million to support the Afghanistan Humanitarian Trust Fund (AHTF), which operates under the umbrella of the Islamic Development Fund (IsDB), in coordination with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). The grant comes in line with Saudi  humanitarian and relief efforts and assistance to brotherly and friendly countries through King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre (KSrelief) and the Saudi Fund for Development (SFD). The move aims at  alleviating the suffering of the Afghan people and limiting the risks of deteriorating the critical humanitarian conditions and possible economic collapse in Afghanistan, which…

Two Britons and a Moroccan who were captured while fighting for Ukraine were sentenced to death on Thursday by a court in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), one of Russia’s proxies in eastern Ukraine, Russian news agencies reported. The court found the three men – Britons Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner and Moroccan Brahim Saadoun – guilty of “mercenary activities and committing actions aimed at seizing power and overthrowing the constitutional order of the DPR”, the Interfax news agency quoted a court official as saying. The three men were captured while fighting for Ukraine against Russia and Russian-backed forces…

The Russian government added 551.4 billion roubles ($9.5 billion) to its emergency reserve fund on Thursday as the Kremlin steps up its stimulus package in a bid to protect the economy from the impact of Western sanctions and its actions in Ukraine. “The funds will be used in part to implement measures aimed at ensuring the stability of economic development in the conditions of external constraints,” the government said in a statement announcing the cash injection. The reserves boost came from extra profits generated by Russia’s vital oil and gas exports, which are bringing in hundreds of millions of dollars…

Russian President Vladimir Putin says the West will not be able to cut itself off from Russian oil and gas for several years. He added that nobody knows what might happen in that time, so Russian companies would not be “concreting over their oil-wells”. It comes as a US official admitted that Russian profits on energy may be higher now than they were before the war. The EU currently imports around 40% of its gas from Russia. The bloc has pledged to reduce its dependency on Russian oil by 90% by the end of 2022, but so far has not…

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned that millions of people could starve because of a Russian blockade of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports which he said had left the world “on the brink of a terrible food crisis.” Russia has seized large parts of Ukraine’s coast, blocking farm exports and driving up the cost of grain. Zelenskiy said Ukraine was now unable to export large amounts of wheat, corn, vegetable oil and other products that had played a “stabilising role in the global market”. “Millions of people may starve if the Russian blockade of the Black Sea continues,” he said in a…

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Thursday that Russia’s invasion of his country posed a huge threat of pollution to water basins, including the Sea of Azov. In an address to a ministerial meeting of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), he also underlined the need for green energy to replace Russian natural gas supplies following Russia’s invasion on Feb. 24.