International

15-02-2023 Bureau Report + Agencies NEW DELHI/ MUMBAI: Indian tax authorities have raided the offices of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) in the country in the wake of a documentary that examined Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s role in 2002 anti-Muslim riots, according to the BBC. In a tweet, the BBC …

15-02-2023 UNITED NATIONS/ DAMASCUS: Syria’s government has agreed to allow the UN to use two more border crossings to deliver aid to opposition-held north-western areas devastated by last week’s earthquakes, the UN says. “It’s going to make a big difference. We are now using just one crossing,” a UN spokesman …

15-02-2023 NEW YORK/ LONDON: Most Super Bowl adverts plug things like fizzy drink and cars, but one of the most talked-about commercials the day after the big game was selling Jesus and it upset several very different political tribes. Advertisements for an evangelical Christian website called He Gets Us have …

15-02-2023 Bureau Report + BBC KABUL/ ISLAMABAD: “His children have been crying, they miss him,” said a member of Ismail Mashal’s family. “They keep going to the gate and asking why he’s not coming home.” Professor Mashal, a university lecturer and outspoken campaigner for women’s education in Afghanistan, was arrested …

15-02-2023 JERUSALEM/ WEST BANK: Israel’s military has jailed a soldier for 10 days after he assaulted a Palestinian activist trying to escort a US journalist around Hebron in the occupied West Bank. In a video posted by Lawrence Wright of the New Yorker, the soldier is seen grabbing Issa Amro …

15-02-2023 TEHRAN: When one of the world’s most promising chess players, 25-year-old Sara Khadem, decided to play at an international tournament without her headscarf, in solidarity with the protest movement in Iran, she thought a warning would be the worst that would happen to her. Instead, she can’t return to …

15-02-2023 WASHINGTON: The sensors from the first suspected Chinese spy balloon shot down over the US have been recovered from the Atlantic Ocean, the US military says. Search crews found “significant debris from the site, including all of the priority sensor and electronics pieces identified”, said US Northern Command. The …

15-02-2023 WELLINGTON: New Zealand declared a national state of emergency for only the third time in its history on Tuesday as Cyclone Gabrielle caused widespread flooding, landslides and huge ocean swells, forcing evacuations and stranding people on rooftops. “It has been a big night for New Zealanders across the country, …

15-02-2023 ISTANBUL: Hours after two huge earthquakes and hundreds of aftershocks struck southeastern Turkey and northwestern Syria on February 6, some much-needed rescuers began to arrive in Turkey K9 teams from around the world that had come to lend a hand to GEA, a Turkish volunteer rescue team. K9, a …

15-02-2023 Bureau Report + Agencies CANBERRA/ MELBOURNE/ TEHRAN: Foreign governments responsible for surveillance and interference operations in Australia will be named and shamed publicly, the country’s home affairs minister has said, revealing that Australia’s security agency recently disrupted an operation by Iran. Australian Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil said on …