Category: 2. Middle East

Tehran is keen to increase inspections of its nuclear facilities as well as to provide more assurances regarding its nuclear programme, but will not accept US demands that it halt uranium enrichment, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said yesterday.

In a press conference, Baghaei said Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi had repeatedly and clearly spoken about the uranium enrichment issue, and made clear that halting it is not a simple matter for…

Algeria’s Foreign Ministry yesterday criticised France for its “flagrant breach” of a 2013 agreement exempting diplomatic passport holders from visa requirements, warning of a reciprocal response, Anadolu reported.

The condemnation followed reports on Saturday from right-leaning French media citing unnamed sources claiming that Paris had imposed visa requirements on Algerian officials with diplomatic passports.

The ministry expressed “great…

Israeli occupation forces launched air strikes on shelters housing displaced Palestinians and residential homes across the Gaza Strip early this morning.

Israeli warplanes struck Musa Bin Nusair School, which was sheltering displaced people in Al-Daraj neighbourhood, east of Gaza City, resulting in fatalities and injuries, according to Palestinian media reports.

Two drone strikes set fire to the bodies of displaced people inside the school, killing at least eight…

Three civilians were injured in an Israeli drone strike in southern Lebanon today, in the latest violation of a ceasefire agreement, the Health Ministry said.

A statement by the ministry’s Emergency Operations Centre said the injuries occurred when an Israeli drone hit a motorcycle on Mansouri-Majdal Zoun road in the Tyre district.

A fragile ceasefire had been in place in Lebanon since November, ending months of cross-border warfare between Israel and…

Karim Khan, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, has been placed on leave until an investigation conducted by the UN’s Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) is completed.

“The investigation into alleged misconduct by the Prosecutor is conducted by the OIOS upon request by the Presidency of the Assembly, after having consulted the Bureau of the Assembly,” the Presidency of the Assembly of States Parties of the…

Hungary’s parliament today approved a bill that will start the country’s year-long withdrawal process from the International Criminal Court (ICC), which Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s government said has become “political”, Reuters reports.

Orban’s government announced the move on 3 April, shortly after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrived in Hungary for a state visit in defiance of an ICC arrest warrant. The ICC’s Presidency of the…

Twin Gazan filmmakers Arab and Tarzan Nasser said they never thought the title of their new film “Once Upon A Time In Gaza” would have such heartbreaking resonance.

“Right now there is nothing left of Gaza,” said Tarzan when it premiered on Monday at the Cannes film festival.

Since militants from Palestinian group Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, more than 18 months of Israeli bombardment has ravaged large swathes of the Palestinian territory and killed tens of thousands of…

Dozens of unidentified bodies have been discovered in Tripoli, according to the Libyan Ministry of Interior.

At least 58 bodies were found yesterday inside the morgue of the Accident Hospital in the Abu Selim district of the capital, an area that had been under the control of an armed group until the recent killing of its leader, Abdel Ghani Al-Kikli, also known as Gheniwa.

In an official statement, the ministry said the bodies were found inside the morgue’s…

Or Sinai didn’t have to go far to find the subject of her acclaimed debut film about the secret lives of the millions of women who support their families back home by being domestic workers abroad.

She was chatting to the “wonderful Ukrainian woman” who looks at her mother, who has Parkinson’s Disease, when the housekeeper started telling her about the lover she had taken.

“I realised that our view of migrant women is so wrong,” she told AFP at the Cannes film festival, where “Mama” is being…