International

16-12-2021 RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Hajj and Umrah has announced that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s citizens and foreigners aged 12 and above can avail Umrah permits, as per the new regulations. A statement issued by the official Twitter account for the publication of news related to the Two …

15-12-2021 Bureau Report + Agencies WASHINGTON/ ISLAMABAD: US Ambassador designated to Pakistan, Donald Blome, Tuesday expressed the desire to enhance economic and commercial ties between Islamabad and Washington. Briefing the Senate Committee, Blome expressed his conviction to work for Pakistan’s digital economy and intellectual property protection, besides promoting transparent investment. …

16-12-2021 BERLIN: Police in Germany’s eastern state of Saxony have launched a series of raids after death threats were made against Premier Michael Kretschmer for backing coronavirus measures. Far-right anti-vaccination activists are suspected of plotting violence with crossbows or other “piercing weapons”. Saxony has the lowest Covid vaccine take-up in …

16-12-2021 KUALA LUMPUR/ WASHINGTON/ DUBAI: United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that the US is prepared to move forward with the sale of F-35 fighter jets and drones to the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The statement comes after reports that the UAE intended to suspend discussion of …

15-12-2021 TOKYO/ BEIJING: Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has urged China not to provoke its neighbors or seek territorial expansion, saying that any Chinese military adventure could be “suicidal”. Abe, who stepped down as premier last year but is still influential as head of the largest faction of the …

15-12-2021 CAP-HAITIAN: At least 50 people have been killed after a truck carrying fuel exploded in the Haitian city of Cap-Haitien. The city’s Deputy Mayor Patrick Almonor said he saw “between 50 and 54 people burned alive” on Tuesday and “it is impossible to identify them.” Almonor added that “about …

14-12-2021 Bureau Report NEW DELHI: India reported its lowest tally of active COVID-19 cases in 18 months on Monday, but a sharp drop in the use of protective face masks is causing concern after a rise in the number of infections with the Omicron variant. Many people have been standing …

14-12-2021 JAKARTA: A 7.3-magnitude struck Indonesia Tuesday, with monitors briefly issuing a warning of the possibility of hazardous tsunami waves. However, the threat was later lifted. The epicentre was north of the island of Flores in Indonesia’s East Nusa Tenggara province, where the quake sparked terror after hitting in the …

14-12-2021 PARIS/ WASHINGTON: Six months ago, if asked what they understood by “woke”, most French people would have assumed it had something to do with Chinese cooking. And yet today in Paris, the notion of “le wokisme” is suddenly all the rage. The government warns of a new cultural totalitarianism …

14-12-2021 Bureau Report + BBC NEW DELHI: It’s a frantic time at the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in the western city of Pune, India’s oldest genome sequencing facility. As the country tries to contain the spread of the Omicron variant, laboratories like the NIV are working round the clock …