30-08-2022 COLOMBO: In her outstretched palms, 49-year-old Nilanthi Gunasekera holds her family’s last remaining handful of dried fish – a reminder of Sri Lanka’s worst economic crisis in decades. She is just one of the millions of Sri Lankans battling a calamitous decline in living standards, as they find themselves …

29-08-2022 By SJA Jafri + Agencies KABUL/ ISLAMABAD: The Taliban’s acting defence minister on Sunday claimed Pakistan had allowed American drones to use its airspace to access Afghanistan, a charge Pakistan has recently denied following a US air strike in Kabul. Acting Minister of Defence Mullah Mohammad Yaqoob told reporters …

29-08-2022 BAGHDAD: The Iraqi Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr has announced that he is quitting political life and closing his political offices in a move that could further inflame tensions in the country. “I hereby announce my final withdrawal,” al-Sadr said on Monday. The statement, published on Twitter, comes amid months …

29-08-2022 Bureau Report NEW DELHI: As India’s capital of New Delhi prepares for winter and the accompanying season of acrid smog, the government is promoting a motorcycle helmet fitted with filters and a fan at the back that it claims can remove 80% of pollutants. State agencies have pumped thousands …

29-08-2022 LONDON: The US dollar climbed to a 20-year high against other major currencies on Monday after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell signaled interest rates would be kept higher for longer to bring down soaring inflation. The dollar index, which measures the currency’s value against a basket of peers, scaled …

29-08-2022 JAKARTA: A 6.1-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Indonesia’s Sumatra Island, the third tremor to rattle the area since early Monday, according to the country’s geophysics agency. Indonesia’s meteorology and geophysics agency (BMKG) recorded the shallow quake off the Mentawai islands, off Sumatra’s west coast just before 10.30am …

28-08-2022 Bureau Report NEW DELHI/ NOIDA: Indian authorities demolished two illegally constructed skyscrapers in a wide plume of dust debris on Sunday near the capital New Delhi, razing the tallest structures ever pulled down in the country in less than 10 seconds. Crowds watching the collapse from rooftops on nearby …

27-08-2022 Bureau Report SYDNEY: Australian police said on Friday it had seized some A$1.6 billion ($1.1 billion) worth of crystal meth, also known as “ice”, concealed within marble stones in several sea freight containers, in what it said was the biggest ever haul of the drug in the country. More …

26-08-2022 JERUSALEM/ RAHAT: Israeli archaeologists unveiled a 1,200-year-old mansion on Tuesday, broadening knowledge of the southern desert region where a mosque was recently discovered. Described as a “luxurious rural estate” by the Israel Antiquities Authority, the home boasted a marble-paved hallway and walls decorated with frescoes. The first building of …

26-08-2022 BEIJING: A crippling drought exacerbated by a record heatwave has spread across half of China (country’s 50%) and reached the normally frigid Tibetan Plateau, according to official data released ahead of more searing temperatures on Thursday. The world’s second-largest economy has experienced over 70 days of heatwaves, flash floods, …