TEHRAN – Japan’s leader may have made the right call after all, if not for his country then for himself. Media polls indicate Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s ruling coalition will handily win a general election Sunday, possibly even retaining its two-thirds majority in the more powerful lower house of parliament, AP reported. Japanese voters may […]

TEHRAN – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan highlighted the importance of the use of national currencies in trade, noting that it will have positive repercussions for the economy. Speaking at the Developing-8 (D-8) Organization for Economic Cooperation Summit in Istanbul, Erdogan said that switching to national currencies will revolutionize trade relations, Daily Sabah reported. “There […]

Germany’s Funke media group, which includes the Berliner Morgenpost, reported Saturday that more than 600 asylum applicants, comprising 250 persons with Turkish diplomatic passports and 380 with identity papers showing them to be senior Turkish public servants, have sought asylum in Germany since last year’s coup attempt in Turkey.Last year’s coup attempt, blamed by Turkish […]

Former UN chief Kofi Annan urged the Security Council on Friday to push for the return to Myanmar of hundreds of thousands of Muslim Rohingya who have been driven out in an army campaign.Annan, who led an advisory commission to the Myanmar government, said world powers must work with the country’s military and civilian leaders […]

Four Moldovan citizens were killed and two others were injured when a cargo plane chartered by the French military crashed into the sea near the airport in Ivory Coast’s main city, Abidjan, on Saturday, Ivorian and French officials said.Four French soldiers survived the crash but were injured, Ivory Coast’s Security Minister Sidiki Diakite told reporters […]

French President Emmanuel Macron, accused by critics of being out of touch with ordinary people, denied in an interview with a German magazine he was aloof, saying that he was merely trying to stamp out cronyism between politicians and the media. The 39-year-old former banker was caught on video earlier this month saying during a […]

China’s ruling Communist Party has agreed to amend the party constitution, expected to embed President Xi Jinping’s political thought, ahead of next week’s five-yearly party congress in which Xi will further tighten his grip on power.The party’s Central Committee, the largest of its elite ruling bodies, on Saturday passed a previously announced proposal to amend […]

Green groups on Friday slammed US President Donald Trump for choosing a nominee for White House environmental panel who wrote in an opinion article last year that carbon dioxide is not a pollutant.The White House said on Thursday that Trump had nominated Kathleen Hartnett White, who served as Texas’s top environmental regulator, to the White […]

North Korea threatened Australia of dire consequences if it continues to back US military, economic and diplomatic pressure on Pyongyang, its state-run media said Saturday.The message on the official KCNA news agency said: “[Australia] will not be able to avoid a disaster,” Anadolu reported.“Lately, Australia is showing dangerous moves of zealously joining the frenzied political […]

Baghdad has set a pre-dawn Sunday deadline for Kurdish Regional Government forces (Peshmerga) to abandon positions in the disputed oil province of Kirkuk they took during the fightback against the self-styled Islamic State terrorist group, a senior KRG official said.The reported ultimatum comes as thousands of Iraqi troops and allied militia are locked in an […]