Author: AFP
Ankara on Friday condemned what it said was a “deliberate” attack by Israel on a Turkish-built hospital in the Gaza Strip. “We strongly condemn the destruction by Israel of the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital,” said a foreign ministry statement.
Tunisian President Kais Saied has dismissed prime minister Kamel Madouri, his office said on Friday, as the North African country grapples with major economic issues. Madouri, a technocrat appointed last August as part of a cabinet reshuffle, was replaced by Sarra Zaafrani Zenzri, the former minister of public works, the presidency said. Zaafrani, 62, becomes Tunisia’s second woman premier after Najla Bouden, who was in the post from October 2021 to August 2023. She takes office as Tunisia also faces criticism from the United Nations over the imprisonment of Saied’s political opponents and as rights groups decry a rollback on…
A report by Israeli settlement watchdogs says settlers have used grazing to seize control of 14 percent of the occupied West Bank through the establishment of shepherding outposts in recent years. In their report, “The Bad Samaritan”, Israeli NGOs Peace Now and Kerem Navot said that in the past three years, 70 percent of all land seized by settlers was “taken under the guise of grazing activities”. Settlers in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, use herding to establish a presence on agricultural lands used by Palestinian communities and gradually deny them access to these areas, according…
A scathing book about Facebook parent company Meta, whose author has been barred from promoting her work, entered at the top of the New York Times bestseller list after its first week of release in the United States. The book also ranks fourth on Amazon’s bestseller list, the platform showed on Thursday. In “Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed and Lost Idealism,” which was released on March 11, Sarah Wynn-Williams recounts working at the tech titan from 2011 to 2017. Wynn-Williams’s book includes claims of sexual harassment by longtime company executive Joel Kaplan, a prominent Republican and ally…
The EU said Thursday its tariffs targeting American goods in retaliation for US levies on steel and aluminium would start in mid-April, two weeks later than planned, to give more time for dialogue. US President Donald Trump’s 25-percent tariffs on imports of the metals took effect on March 12, to which the European Union immediately responded with two sets of countermeasures set to begin on April 1 and mid-April. Among the US products set to be targeted were bourbon, boats and motorbikes. Two European sources told AFP that France, Spain and Italy pushed the European Commission to delay its measures…
Chinese e-commerce giant PDD Holdings announced Thursday slower revenue growth for the third quarter running, as the Temu owner confronts trade tensions between Beijing and Washington. The Shanghai-based company posted revenues of 110 billion yuan ($15 billion) in the three months to December 31, up 24 percent year-on-year. The figure was down on the 44 percent growth recorded in the third quarter, continuing a slowdown following 86 percent growth in the second quarter and a 131 percent surge at the start of 2024. As owner of overseas e-commerce platform Temu, PDD Holdings is expected to face further challenges as US…
Two United Nations employees were killed in a strike on one of the global body’s buildings in Deir el-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, a UN source told AFP on Wednesday. The two dead were employees of the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS) and the UN mine-mitigation service UNMAS, the source said.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said on Tuesday that a deadly new series of Israeli airstrikes in Gaza put at risk a plan to release hostages held by Hamas. “We are following with great concern the resumption of fighting in Gaza… which jeopardises the objectives we are all working towards: the release of all hostages and a permanent end to hostility, as well as the restoration of full humanitarian assistance in the (Gaza) Strip,” Meloni told the Italian Senate.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy arrived in Helsinki on Tuesday ahead of an official visit to Finland on Wednesday, the office of Finnish President Alexander Stubb said in a statement. The two presidents will discuss Finland’s support for Ukraine, including steps to end Russia’s war, and meet with defence industry companies, it added.
A phone call between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin over a potential ceasefire in Ukraine has started and was going “well,” the White House said Tuesday. The call began at 1400 GMT and so far had continued almost an hour, deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino said on X. “The call is going well, and still in progress,” he said.