Author: News Desk

Australia has defended its ties with the Solomon Islands, after the Pacific nation’s leader made a scathing attack on critics of a new China pact. On Tuesday, Solomon Islands PM Mannasseh Sogavare said foreign governments were undermining his country over the security deal. https://youtu.be/scA4XZRYFzk Australia and the US fear China could build a naval base in the region. Australian leader Scott Morrison denied any interference towards his country’s Pacific “family”. In a wide-ranging speech to parliament, Mr Sogavare lashed critics of the agreement, questioned the West’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and lauded China’s treatment of Christians. Without specifically…

Almost three times as many people have died as a result of COVID-19 as the official data show, according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) report, the most comprehensive look at the true global toll of the pandemic so far. There were 14.9 million excess deaths associated with COVID-19 by the end of 2021, the U.N. body said on Thursday. The official count of deaths directly attributable to COVID-19 and reported to WHO in that period, from January 2020 to the end of December 2021, is slightly more than 5.4 million. The WHO’s excess mortality figures reflect people who…

Firefighters slowed the advance of the largest wildfire in the U.S. as heavy winds relented Wednesday, while President Joe Biden approved a disaster declaration that brings new financial resources to remote stretches of New Mexico devastated by fire since early April. U.S. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez announced the presidential disaster declaration during an evening briefing by the U.S. Forest Service about efforts to contain the sprawling wildfire in northeastern New Mexico, which has fanned out across 250 square miles (647 square kilometers) of high alpine forest and grasslands at the southern tip of the Rocky Mountains, The Associated Press (AP)…

Taiwan signalled on Thursday that it had abandoned a plan to buy advanced new anti-submarine warfare helicopters from the United States, saying they were too expensive. Taiwan had earlier said it was planning to buy 12 MH-60R anti-submarine helicopters, made by Lockheed Martin Corp unit Sikorsky, but domestic media said the United States had rejected the sale as not being in line with the island’s needs. Asked in parliament about recent changes to Taiwan’s purchases of new U.S. weapons, Defence Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng mentioned the helicopter case first. “The price is too high, beyond the scope of our country’s ability,” he…

Beijing returned to work on Thursday after a five-day Labour Day holiday with China’s capital on high COVID alert as it tries to eradicate an outbreak it has managed to limit to dozens of new cases a day for about two weeks. Authorities in Beijing are determined to avoid the fate of China’s commercial hub of Shanghai, where most of its 25 million people have endured more than a month of increasingly frustrating confinement to their residential compounds. The capital’s streets were slightly less busy than on a normal working day as authorities have encouraged people to work from home…

Civilians including women and children remain trapped inside Ukraine’s besieged city of Mariupol and a prolonged ceasefire is needed to ensure their evacuation as Russia presses its assault, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Thursday. After failing to capture the capital Kyiv in the early weeks of a war that has killed thousands and flattened cities, Russia has accelerated attacks on Ukraine’s east and south. Pavlo Kyrylenko, governor of the eastern region of Donetsk, said at least 25 civilians were wounded as Russian forces shelled Kramatorsk, and town some 180 kilometres (112 miles) west of Luhansk. Moscow declared victory over…

Sweden has received assurances from the United States that it would receive support during the period a potential application to join NATO is processed by the 30 nations in the alliance, Foreign Minister Ann Linde said in Washington on Wednesday. Sweden and neighbour Finland stayed out of NATO during the Cold War, but Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its invasion of Ukraine have led the countries to rethink their security policies, with NATO membership looking increasingly likely. Both countries are concerned they would be vulnerable during an application process, which could take up to a year to be…

Bulgaria’s parliament voted on Wednesday to allow repairs of Ukrainian heavy military equipment and seek ways to help Ukrainian exports of grains and electricity, sidestepping proposals to provide direct military aid to Kyiv. European Union and NATO member state Bulgaria has condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine, supported sanctions against Moscow, refused to pay for Russian gas with roubles and hosted over 90,000 Ukrainian refugees. But the Black Sea country remains one of the few in the 27-member EU to have not sent arms and ammunitions to Kyiv as one of the four coalition partners, the Russia-friendly Socialists, opposed the…

Beijing shut scores of metro stations and bus routes and extended COVID-19 curbs on many public venues on Wednesday, focusing efforts to avoid the fate of Shanghai, where millions have been under strict lockdown for more than a month. The central city of Zhengzhou earlier also announced restrictions, joining dozens of big population centres under some form of lockdown as China seeks to eliminate a virus believed to have first emerged in Wuhan city in late 2019. But that uncompromising battle is undermining its growth and hurting international companies invested there, data shows, and has also fuelled rare public outbursts…

The Fak Kurba initiative, which seeks to free those jailed for insolvency in Oman, has so far managed to release more than 1,000 prisoners during the month of Ramadan. The highest number of released prisoners are from Muscat governorate at 196, 190 from North Al Batinah and 148 from South Al Sharqiyah.