Author: Selleco

Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe was feted as an African liberation hero and champion of racial reconciliation when he first came to power in a nation divided by nearly a century of white colonial rule. Nearly four decades later, many at home and abroad denounced him as a power-obsessed autocrat willing to unleash death squads, rig elections and trash the economy in the relentless pursuit of control. Former Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe Dies Mugabe died in Singapore, where he has often received medical treatment in recent years Mugabe, was ultimately ousted by his own armed forces in November 2017. He demonstrated his tenacity — some might say stubbornness — to the last, refusing to accept his expulsion from his own ZANU-PF party and clinging on for a week until parliament started to impeach him after the de facto coup. His resignation triggered wild celebrations across the country of 13 million. For Mugabe, it was an “unconstitutional and humiliating” act of betrayal by his party and people, and left him a broken man. Confined for the remaining years of his life between Singapore where he was receiving medical treatment and his sprawling “Blue Roof” mansion in Harare, an ailing Mugabe could only observe from afar the political stage where he once strode tall. He was bitter to the end over the manner of his exit. On the eve of the July 2018 election, the first without him, he told reporters he would vote for the opposition, something unthinkable only a few months before. …

Robert Mugabe, the guerrilla leader who led Zimbabwe to independence in 1980 and ruled with an iron fist until his own army ended his almost four decade rule, has died. He was 95. Mugabe died in Singapore, where he has often received medical treatment in recent years, a source with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters. His death was confirmed by Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa. It is with the utmost sadness that I announce the passing on of Zimbabwe’s founding father and former President, Cde Robert Mugabe (1/2) — President of Zimbabwe (@edmnangagwa) September 6, 2019 On leading Zimbabwe to independence from Britain in 1980, Mugabe was feted as an African liberation hero and champion of racial reconciliation. But later, many at home and abroad denounced him as a power-obsessed autocrat willing to unleash death squads, rig elections and trash the economy in the relentless pursuit of control. Mugabe was forced to resign in November 2017 after an army coup. His resignation triggered wild celebrations across the country of 13 million. Mugabe denounced his removal as an “unconstitutional and humiliating” act of betrayal by his party and people, and it left him a broken man. In November, Mnangagwa said Mugabe was no longer able to walk when he had been admitted to a hospital in Singapore, without saying what treatment Mugabe had been undergoing. Officials often said he was being treated for a cataract, denying frequent private media reports that he had prostate cancer. …

Hurricane Dorian has hit the Southeastern U.S. states of North and South Carolina, bringing tornadoes and flooded roads. “We know we’re in for a long night and we’ll be eager to see the sunshine in the morning,” North Carolina’s Governor Roy Cooper told the Atlanta-based cable news network, CNN. Dorian weakened to a Category 1 hurricane early Friday, with  maximum sustained winds of 150 kilometers per hour (90 mph). The National Hurricane Center says “slow weakening” is expected of Dorian “during the next few days.” The center says Dorian is expected to remain “a powerful hurricane as its center moves near the coasts of South and North Carolina.” Forecasters do not expect Dorian to make a direct landfall Friday but will instead skirt the North Carolina coast, bringing life-threatening storm surges to North Carolina and southern Virginia before moving away from land. A couple embraces on a road destroyed by Hurricane Dorian, as they walk to the town of High Rock to try to find their relatives in the aftermath of Hurricane Dorian, in Grand Bahama, Bahamas, Sept. 5, 2019. A potent storm Dorian will remain a potent storm straight into the weekend, however, with tropical storm warnings posted as far north as Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, according to the National Hurricane Center. The Canadian Hurricane Center has issued a hurricane watch for all of Nova Scotia. Thousands of people in the Bahamas have begun the long, painful struggle to rebuild their lives following Hurricane Dorian. International search-and-rescue teams are spreading across Abaco …

An American woman who attempted to carry a 6-day-old baby out of the Philippines hidden inside a sling bag has been arrested at Manila’s airport and charged with human trafficking, officials said Thursday. They said Jennifer Erin Talbot was able to pass through the airport immigration counter on Wednesday without declaring the baby boy but was intercepted at the boarding gate by airline personnel. Talbot, from Ohio, was unable to produce any passport, boarding pass or government permits for the baby, airport officials said. Clad in an orange detainee shirt and in handcuffs, Talbot, 43, was presented to reporters in Manila on Thursday. She kept her head low and appeared at times to be on the verge of tears. She did not issue any statement. Talbot had planned to board a Delta Air Lines flight to the United States with the baby, airport officials said. “There was really an intention to hide the baby,” immigration official Grifton Medina said by telephone. After discovering the baby, airline staff called immigration personnel, who arrested Talbot at the airport. She was later turned over to the National Bureau of Investigation and the baby was given to government welfare personnel. The investigation bureau said Talbot presented an affidavit at the airport, allegedly from the baby’s mother, giving consent for the baby to travel to the U.S., but it had not been signed by the mother. Officials said no government travel approval had been issued for the baby, prompting them to file human trafficking charges …

Prominent Washington lawyer Greg Craig was found not guilty of lying to the Justice Department about work he did for the government of Ukraine in a case that arose from the special counsel’s Russia investigation and that centered on the lucrative world of foreign lobbying. The jury deliberated for less than a day before clearing Craig, a White House counsel in the Obama administration, of a single count of making false statements to federal investigators. The swift verdict on Wednesday was a setback to the Justice Department’s crackdown on lobbyists who do unregistered work for foreign governments and came as prosecutors have been ramping up enforcement of a decades-old law meant to police foreign influence and promote transparency. U.S. officials hoped a conviction would demonstrate an aggressive approach to lobbyists who fail to register their foreign work or who give false information to the Justice Department to avoid identifying themselves as a foreign agent, as Craig was alleged to have done. But the jury rejected the theory of the case in a matter of hours. One juror told reporters that while some members found some of Craig’s actions unseemly, all agreed he hadn’t broken the law. Craig hugged his attorneys after the verdict was read and, outside the courthouse, thanked the jury for “doing justice in this case.” His attorney, William Taylor, said the jury reached the only possible verdict it could have reached and called the case a tragedy and a disgrace. “The question that you need to ask …

Like whisperers in a tempest, conservative-minded officials across the breadth of Donald Trump’s government are letting it be known what they think of him, and some of it isn’t pretty. But they are speaking oh so softly, in a kind of code, to a country that may only hear shouting. Jim Mattis is just the latest in a string of leading lights from the conservative establishment to throw shade at Trump. As with others — the chief justice, a special counsel, various Republican lawmakers who hope to have a political future — the ex-Pentagon chief’s words are subtle, filtered through notions of duty, decorum, deference to history, the greater good. Crack the code and you can sometimes see deep discomfort with Trump, the contours of a searing repudiation. In the view of many institutionalists of the right as well as the left, he is bulldozing values that America holds dear. Yet the negativity is couched in words of moderation and caution. What effect does that have in Trump’s America? These are sober, restrained players in a fracas produced, directed and dominated by an in-your-face president. “The well-informed public understands what they’re saying and how deeply concerned they are,” said Cal Jillson, a political science professor and historian at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. “The rest of the public might not get it.” Says Eric Dezenhall, a crisis-management specialist who has studied Trump’s rise in business and politics: “In a fight between crassness and discretion in the new millennium, crassness will …

Arguments over a Texas law requiring that health care clinics bury or cremate fetal remains from abortions and miscarriages are set for a federal appeals court in New Orleans. A Texas judge blocked the law last year. U.S. District Judge David Ezra ruled that many clinics would be unable to meet the law’s requirements, thus creating unconstitutional obstacles for women seeking abortions. He also found that violated constitutional equal protection requirements by exempting in-vitro fertilization clinics and some laboratories.   A three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals hears arguments Thursday.   The Supreme Court has upheld similar law in Indiana. But opponents of the Texas law note that the Indiana ruling case did not address the issue of whether the law created an unconstitutional burden on abortion rights.     …

Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg (BOO’-tuh-juhj) says Republicans will face “a reckoning” over a policy agenda he says is out of sync with Christian values.   Speaking on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” Thursday, Buttigieg kicked off a day of television appearances in which he highlighted his Christian faith.   Republicans, he asserted, are “known for beating people on the head” with their faith while following a policy agenda aimed at reducing assistance for the poor and other policies he said were at odds with that message.    Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, said “there’s going to be a reckoning over that.” …

Britain’s political turmoil is again making headlines across the English Channel, with a number of European commentators criticizing Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s handling of Brexit. But others, like conservative French lawmaker Nicolas Bay, saluted Johnson for standing firm, and honoring Britain’s 2016 referendum to leave the European Union. In Brussels, European Commission spokeswoman Mina Andreeva said the EU’s position toward Brexit has not changed. “There may be twists and turns in political developments in London right now, but our position is stable,” she said. “We are willing to work constructively with Prime Minister Johnson and to look at any concrete proposals as long as they’re compatible with the withdrawal agreement.” The commission is freeing up millions of dollars in disaster funds for farmers, workers and companies to cope with a potentially chaotic or hard Brexit — although governments and the EU parliament must sign off on the plan. It also published a checklist for European businesses trading with Britain to prepare for Brexit — and a citizens’ hotline. Europeans have been preparing for months for a potentially chaotic Brexit. In France, where roughly 20,000 businesses export to Britain, the key port city of Calais is conducting simulations to prepare for both deal and no-deal scenarios. France, along with Belgium and the Netherlands, has hired hundreds more customs agents to cope with expected backlogs. Experts predict Brexit will deal an economic blow to the EU as well as Britain — at a time when countries like Germany and Italy are braced …

Illegal drug use is on the rise around the world according to a new UN report. How bad is it and what is being done to stop the spread of dangerous and increasingly deadly drugs? Former US “Drug Czar” Gil Kerlikowske and Ben Westhoff, author of “Fentanyl Inc.” weigh in with Greta Van Susteren. Recorded September 4, 2019    …

The U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Burundi said Wednesday that the country, following years of political turmoil, was primed for a genocide.     The commission’s warning, contained in its latest report on human rights in Burundi, was based on an analysis developed by the U.N. Office for the Prevention of Genocide and the Responsibility to Protect.      The three-member panel found that eight common risk factors for criminal atrocities leading to a possible genocide were present in Burundi.    Factors included an unstable political, economic and social environment; a climate of impunity for human rights violations; a weak judicial system; and the absence of an independent press and freedom of expression.    Commission member Francoise Hampson said the criteria identified by the Genocide Prevention Committee indicated that in countries where these factors were present, there was a risk the situation could deteriorate.     “On top of that, our own report shows the continuation of violations of human rights law based on human security,” she said. “So, things like arbitrary killings, torture, arbitrary detention.  And this year, a deterioration … freedom of expression, freedom of association.  Now that is actually already getting worse compared to last year.”  Nkurunziza campaign   Burundi has been in turmoil since President Pierre Nkurunziza ran for a third term in 2015, defying critics who said he was violating constitutional term limits. Violence prompted more than 300,000 to flee the country.    Hampson said the crisis in Burundi was essentially a political one.  She noted that targeting people because of their political affiliation does not come within the definition of genocide, according to the Genocide Conventions.  However, she said, “There are elements on occasion …

In Turkey, sweeping powers have come into force to control internet broadcasting, exposing emerging independent news outlets and entertainment giants like Netflix to government censors. Under a new law taking effect this week, online broadcasters will be regulated by state broadcasting watchdog RTUK, which is controlled by allies of conservative President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Critics predicted more government censorship under the law to catch up with the increasing number of media outlets moving operations online. “They will target radio and TV broadcasting over the internet,” said law professor Yaman Akdeniz of Istanbul’s Bilgi University. “As well as video-on-demand services under a dubious licensing regime, which will, in reality, become yet another censorship tool for the government.” International media watchdogs say Erdogan already has an iron grip on terrestrial broadcasting. In response, Turkey has witnessed a surge of independent digital news, with many prominent Turkish journalists who have been purged from mainstream TV and newspapers moving to online news outlets. “Erdogan realizes the media he controls is no longer watched or read in Turkey,” said analyst Atilla Yesilada of the consulting firm Global Source Partners. “Eighty-five percent of Turkish households are now connected to the internet, and 70 percent of youth generation get their entire, entire information from social media and the internet,” Yesilada said. An official for RTUK, left, takes notes in the master control room of IMC TV in Istanbul, Turkey, Oct. 4, 2016. Content controls Online broadcasters now will need an RTUK license, at an annual cost of …

Argentine economists sharply hiked 2019 inflation forecasts and cut their gross domestic product outlook for the year, according to a central bank poll released on Tuesday, following a wave of  political uncertainty that beat the local peso down 26% in August. The survey came two days after the government announced capital controls in a bid to halt a run on the peso currency. The controls, which followed an announcement that Argentina would extend the maturities of about $100 billion in debt, were a massive setback for the government’s free-markets reform effort. Inflation was seen at 55% for the year, according to the survey of 39 analysts, up from 40% in the same central bank poll a month earlier. The new weakness in the peso, which fell 50.5% against the U.S. dollar last year, is expected to lead to rising consumer prices over the months ahead. Gross domestic product was forecast to shrink 2.5% this year, the poll said, versus the previous month’s survey, which saw 2019 GDP shrinking by 1.4%. The poll was conducted after the Aug. 11 primary election, which triggered a sharp fall in the value of the peso currency when business-friendly President Mauricio Macri was soundly trounced by his populist-leaning rival Alberto Fernandez. Peronist Fernandez is now the front-runner ahead of the Oct. 27 general election. Macri is running for a second term, but his popularity has been beaten down by the poor economy. “Capital controls imply a full reversal of Macri’s reforms,” said Alberto Bernal, chief …

Hurricane Dorian will likely avoid landfall in Florida, but that does not mean residents of the Sunshine State or anywhere else along southeastern U.S. coast can relax. Forecasters say Dorian is getting bigger and will move “dangerously close” to Florida and Georgia Tuesday through Wednesday night, then threaten North and South Carolina with massive rainfall and powerful winds. Potential rainfall from Hurricane Dorian, through Sunday, Sept. 8 As of late Tuesday, Dorian was a Category 2 storm, about 200 kilometers east of Cape Canaveral, Florida, with top sustained winds of 175 kilometers per hour. Tropical storm warnings are in effect for an area from near the Savannah River along the Georgia-South Carolina border north to Surf City, North Carolina. Even if it stays offshore, Dorian’s winds and rain extend 95 kilometers from the center and is expected to remain a powerhouse the rest of the week. The National Hurricane Center in Miami cautions everyone along the Mid-Atlantic coast — from Maryland to New York City — to keep a close eye on Dorian. Dorian finally drifted away from the Bahamas Tuesday, leaving behind devastation described as “apocalyptic,” “total,” and looking as if a bomb had gone off. Cars sit submerged in water from Hurricane Dorian in Freeport, Grand Bahama. Dorian is beginning to inch northwestward after being stationary over the Bahamas, where its relentless winds have caused catastrophic damage and flooding. The lack of wind currents in the atmosphere kept Dorian parked on top of Abaco and Grand Bahama Island …

Facebook said Tuesday that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security would be violating the company’s rules if agents create fake profiles to monitor the social media of foreigners seeking to enter the country. “Law enforcement authorities, like everyone else, are required to use their real names on Facebook and we make this policy clear,” Facebook spokeswoman Sarah Pollack told The Associated Press in a statement Tuesday. “Operating fake accounts is not allowed, and we will act on any violating accounts.” Pollack said the company has communicated its concerns and its policies on the use of fake accounts to DHS. She said the company will shut down fake accounts, including those belonging to undercover law enforcement, when they are reported. The company’s statement followed the AP’s report Friday that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services had authorized its officers to use fake social media accounts in a reversal of a previous ban on the practice. Homeland Security explained the change to the AP in a statement Friday, stating that fake accounts would make it easier for agents reviewing visa, green card and citizenship applications to search for fraud or security threats. The department didn’t provide comment when asked Tuesday. The plan would also be a violation of Twitter’s rules. Twitter said Friday that it’s still reviewing the new Homeland Security practice. It did not provide further comment. The change in policy was preceded by other steps taken by the State Department, which began requiring applicants for U.S. visas to submit their social …

U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren on Tuesday challenged her rivals for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination to commit to transition the United States fully to clean energy over the next decade for electricity, vehicles and buildings. Warren, one of 20 Democrats vying to take on President Donald Trump in November 2020, issued the challenge in a comprehensive clean energy plan released ahead of a 7-hour CNN Town Hall on Wednesday at which 10 candidates will discuss how they would tackle climate change. Her climate strategy weaves together several policies she has sprinkled into other proposals she has rolled out, from agriculture to tribal lands to manufacturing. It also incorporates a clean energy plan she adopted from Washington Governor Jay Inslee, who made climate change the centerpiece of his White House bid before dropping out of the race late last month. Inslee’s clean energy strategy — which had been billed as the gold standard by environmental advocates — set a 10-year plan to achieve 100% clean energy by slashing carbon emissions from U.S. electricity generation, vehicles and buildings. “While his presidential campaign may be over, his ideas should remain at the center of the agenda,” Warren wrote in a post for the website Medium. “Today I’m embracing that goal by committing to adopt and build on Governor Inslee’s 10-year action plan to achieve 100% clean energy …  and I’m challenging every other candidate for President to do the same,” she wrote. All of Warren’s Democratic rivals who will participate in the climate …

“Harry Potter” actor David Thewlis plays a father desperate to understand his adult daughter’s choices in “Guest of Honour,” an exploration of a family relationship with hidden secrets. The movie, directed by Atom Egoyan, begins with Veronica, a former high school music teacher recently released from jail, meeting a priest to discuss her father’s funeral. Over the course of the meeting, the priest (Luke Wilson), asks Veronica (Laysla De Oliveira) to describe her father Jim and she looks back on his life. A widowed restaurant inspector with particular attention to detail, Thewlis’s Jim is frustrated by Veronica’s decision to go to jail after a failed hoax sees her falsely convicted of abusing her position towards a student. The young teacher, however, feels the need to be punished for an earlier crime from her past. Her determination to stay in jail soon begins to impact Jim’s work. The drama, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival on Tuesday, sees both father and daughter conduct their own investigations about each other at different times. “There is the investigation that his daughter is conducting in the present day but there are several investigations that are happening at different points that he’s conducting while he was alive, that she’s conducting as she remembered it and that he’s positioning it as it actually happened,” Egoyan said. “It sounds complicated … even though there is five different periods I think it’s very clear at all times where you are in the film,” he added, speaking at …

People in the Bahamas experienced another hellish night as the center of powerful Hurricane Dorian sat stationary on the northern edge of Grand Bahama Island and pounded the area with fierce winds and the flooding effects of heavy rains and storm surge. Dorian made landfall on the island late Sunday night and barely moved throughout the day Monday. Forecasters expect the storm to finally move away during the day Tuesday and threaten the U.S. state of Florida. “We are in the midst of a historic tragedy in parts of northern Bahamas,” said Prime Minister Hubert Minnis. “Our mission and focus now is search, rescue, and recovery. I ask for your prayers in those in affected areas and for our first responders.” He told reporters at a Monday news conference there were five confirmed deaths on Abaco Island, where Dorian struck before moving to Grand Bahama. Minnis said initial reports from Abaco were of devastation that is “unprecedented and extensive.” What the storm did to Grand Bahama will become more clear as it moves away and authorities are able to survey the island. Strong winds from Hurricane Dorian blow the tops of trees and brush while whisking up water from the surface of a canal that leads to the sea, in Freeport, Grand Bahama, Bahamas, Sept. 2, 2019. “We know that there are a number of people in Grand Bahama who are in serious distress and we will provide relief and assistance as soon as possible after the Met (Meteorology) Department …

East Timor is marking the 20th anniversary of a referendum that ended 24 years of Indonesian occupation and delivered independence, but that also sparked a bloody rampage by pro-Jakarta militias who killed 1,500 people and pushed another half-a-million out of their homes. The capital has been sprucing up with freshly painted structures, newly paved streets and manicured gardens for the arrival of foreign dignitaries for celebrations that will last until the end of the month. But beneath the cheery facade is a lingering anger. Joao Borras, now 37, was forced to flee as militias rampaged through the capital, Dili, shot dead his two best friends, and razed his home. He said the killings were not just in the open but also behind closed doors by a government apparatus backed by militias that watched every move. “It’s a horrible life actually,” Borras said. “There’s a lot of people killed, but you didn’t see because they took you in the night time. They said ‘let’s go for interviews’ – and you will not come back the next morning.” The struggle since independence United Nations peacekeepers landed three weeks after the August 30, 1999 referendum and restored order. Independence followed on May 20, 2002, with the election of resistance leader Xanana Gusmao as president. But East Timor has struggled to develop its democracy and rebuild an economy shattered by conflict and ongoing internal fighting, which hampered its ability to attract much needed investment dollars. In 2006, the United Nations sent in security forces …

Peru plans to beef up security at its border with Ecuador to prevent illegal immigration, after stricter entry requirements for Venezuelans led to a 90% drop in legal crossings, a government official said on Monday. More than 850,000 Venezuelans have fled their homeland for Peru in recent years, part of a mass exodus from the Caribbean nation as it faces a crippling economic crisis. But in June, Peru started requiring Venezuelans who arrive to already have visas, part of stricter policies for Venezuelans in some South American nations. “The entry of Venezuelan migrants to our country has dropped dramatically and today it’s 90% less than what we saw in June,” Foreign Minister Nestor Popolizio told journalists. Popolizio said his ministry was working with the interior ministry and police to make sure Venezuelan migrants were not evading the new requirements by crossing illegally. “We’re engaged in a very direct coordination … to ensure more protection all along our border and to avoid illegal entries,” Popolizio said. Popolizio said Peru was one of 11 countries in the region trying to coordinate their policies on handling immigration from Venezuela. After Peru started requiring visas of Venezuelans, Chile and Ecuador implemented similar measures. All three countries also now require Venezuelans to have passports, a document that is hard to obtain for the growing ranks of poor Venezuelans. …

The new U.S. ambassador to Mexico has taken aim at Mexican icon Frida Kahlo for her support of Marxism, stirring up a fierce social media debate with a tweet asking if the painter had not been aware of atrocities committed in the name of that ideology. Few Mexicans have enjoyed greater global recognition than Kahlo, who spent long periods bedridden after a traffic accident in her youth, attained international fame following her death in 1954 and became a feminist symbol in the 1970s. She created some 200 paintings, sketches and drawings – mainly self-portraits – in which she transformed her misfortune into works of bold color. U.S. Ambassador Christopher Landau, who was appointed by President Donald Trump and sworn in last month, must navigate a volatile bilateral relationship. Trump frequently berates Mexico over trade and immigration. Not shying away from controversy himself, Landau took to Twitter on Sunday during a visit to Kahlo’s house, now a museum in the colonial-era Mexico City neighborhood of Coyoacan. “I admire her free and bohemian spirit, and she rightly became an icon of Mexico around the whole world. What I do not understand is her obvious passion for Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism. Didn’t she know about the horrors committed in the name of that ideology?” he wrote in Spanish. Irish urban artist Fin Dac (2-R) and his assistant work on his mural “Magdalena,” in honor of Mexican painter Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo in the month of her birth, in Guadalajara, Jalisco state, July 9, 2019. …

Saudi Arabia is struggling to hold together a military coalition fighting Iran-aligned Houthis in Yemen after local allies turned on each other in a power struggle that has strained Riyadh’s alliance with its main regional partner, the United Arab Emirates. The UAE, the second power in the coalition, has openly intervened on behalf of southern separatists battling the Saudi-backed government for control of the south, launching air strikes on government forces trying to regain their interim seat of power in Aden port. The escalation risks further fracturing the Saudi-UAE alliance and emboldening the Houthi movement, which the coalition was formed to fight. The United Nations is trying to restart talks to end the 4-1/2 year conflict, largely seen as a proxy war between rival powers Saudi Arabia and Iran. What’s happening in Southern Yemen? UAE-backed separatists, who seek self-rule in the south, seized Aden, base of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s government, in early August after they accused a party allied to Hadi of complicity in a Houthi assault on their forces. The two sides were nominal allies under the Western-backed, Sunni Muslim coalition that intervened in Yemen in March 2015 against the Houthi group, which ousted Hadi from power in the capital Sanaa in 2014. But they have rival agendas. Saudi Arabia and the UAE called for talks to resolve the crisis. Hadi’s government insisted that separatists first cede control and that the UAE stop supporting southern fighters it has armed and trained. The separatist Southern Transitional Council (STC) said …

Iran is for the first time acknowledging that a rocket explosion took place at its Imam Khomeini Space Center, with an official saying a technical malfunction caused the blast.   Government spokesman Ali Rabiei made the statement on Monday in comments broadcast by Iranian state television.   He said the explosion caused no fatalities and also that officials had found no sign that sabotage was involved in the explosion.   Satellite photos showed a rocket on a launch pad at the space center had exploded Thursday. The space center is located about 240 kilometers, or 150 miles, southeast of the capital, Tehran.   President Donald Trump on Friday tweeted a surveillance photo likely taken of the site by an American spy satellite. He wrote that the U.S. had nothing to do with the blast. …

A senior U.S. naval officer has underlined Washington’s commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific as the United States launched its first joint naval exercise with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations …