India has reported weaker-than-expected growth numbers for the first three months of the year. The country’s economy grew by 7.8% in the first quarter compared with the same period last year, the latest government figures showed. For the financial year to March, the economy grew by 8.5%, lower than the […]
Cairo (CNN) — A senior Egyptian general admits that “virginity checks” were performed on women arrested at a demonstration this spring, the first such admission after previous denials by military authorities. The allegations arose in an Amnesty International report, published weeks after the March 9 protest. It claimed female demonstrators were beaten, […]
RAWALPINDI: Former president Pervez Musharraf was declared a fugitive by an anti-terrorism court in Rawalpindi after investigators returned the court’s warrants undelivered. Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) officials told the court that Musharraf lived in Britain and the UK authorities had not received the warrants, saying there was no extradition treaty between […]
The Church has to carry out a soul-searching exercise to understand why people voted for divorce, the Church’s Pro-Vicar Mgr Anton Gouder, has told The Times. He also insisted that the statement issued by the bishops on Saturday was a call for unity to work in favour of the family. Mgr […]
Explosions and heavy gunfire rocked the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, overnight amid renewed fighting between government-backed security forces and protesters loyal to tribal leader Sadek al-Ahmar. Al-Ahmar said in an e-mailed statement that the government violated a truce agreed with his tribe by attacking his house again. The government accused members […]
Editorial: The outcome of Saturday’s referendum, when the majority of voters supported the formal introduction of divorce, and what the bishops had to say in their note issued just as voting stopped show that the Church in Malta is faced with a number of significant and urgent challenges that cannot […]
by Matthew Allen, swissinfo.ch The net is closing on football’s world governing body following corruption claims and bans meted out ahead of Wednesday’s presidential election, campaigners say. The latest fiasco has seen Mohamed bin Hammam suspended and forced to step down as the only challenger to incumbent President Joseph “Sepp” […]
By MAHMOOD RAFIQUE | ARAB NEWS MANAMA: Bahrain has pioneered the modern Islamic finance industry in the region, as its history on Islamic finance goes back to more than 40 years, according to a senior central bank official. “We have continued to play a pioneering role in the Islamic finance […]
By ASSOCIATED PRESS CAIRO: Syrian activists have called for renewed protests in honor of a 13-year-old boy who allegedly was tortured and killed by security forces. The main Facebook page for the protesters said Saturday the boy was “assassinated by treachery.” The image of the child’s body has outraged Syrians […]
By MD HUMAIDAN | ARAB NEWS JEDDAH: A number of judges in Jeddah have started giving alternative punishments instead of imprisonment for crimes on which no clear-cut Shariah rules are available, lawyer Ghazi Al-Sabban, member of the committee to care for prisoners and their families (Tarahum), told Arab News on […]
By Thameen Kheetan AMMAN – Jordanian members of the Greek Orthodox Church have renewed calls for Patriarch Theophilus III to step down and for Arabising the leadership of the Greek-led church. In a protest held outside the Amman archdiocese on Sunday evening, hundreds of Orthodox Christians accused the Greek patriarch […]
Germany on Monday announced plans to become the first major industrialised power to shut down all its nuclear plants in the wake of the disaster in Japan, with a phaseout due to be wrapped up by 2022. Chancellor Angela Merkel said the decision, hammered out by her centre-right coalition overnight, […]
Germany has registered the sunniest and driest spring since records began in 1893, the German Weather Service (DWD) said Monday. But thunderstorms could end a hot start to the week. “Germany enjoyed a summer-like spring in 2011,” said DWD meteorologist Uwe Kirsche in a statement. Read More…
A minister has resigned from the government Sunday to fight allegations of sexual harassment, two weeks after ex-IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s sensational New York arrest on sex crime charges. Civil service minister Georges Tron, accused of sexually harassing two women who worked for him at the town hall where he […]
By RFI Two French lawyers said Monday that they will launch legal proceedings against French President Nicolas Sarkozy for crimes against humanity over the Nato-led military campaign in Libya. Jacques Vergès and Roland Dumas have offered to represent families of victims of the Nato bombing campaign, Libyan justice official Ibrahim Boukhzam […]
Her lawyer says that her release orders had been issued Manama: Saudi police in Al Khobar on Monday evening ordered the release of Manal Al Sharif, the 32-year-old Saudi woman who was arrested on May 21 while driving in the city, a Saudi daily said. read more
Saudi Arabia will soon put a six-year cap on the residency of foreigners in the country Riyadh: A number of prominent Saudi businessmen and academics have objected to the new move by the Ministry of Labour not to renew residency permits (Iqama) of foreign workers after the completion of their […]
JERUSALEM – Underneath the crowded alleys and holy sites of old Jerusalem, hundreds of people are snaking at any given moment through tunnels, vaulted medieval chambers and Roman sewers in a rapidly expanding subterranean city invisible from the streets above. At street level, the walled Old City is an energetic […]
By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor, REUTERS AUBERVILLIERS, France (Reuters) – Four years after they first frightened France, Muslim creationists are back touring the country preaching against evolution and claiming the Koran predicted many modern scientific discoveries. Followers of Harun Yahya, a well-financed Turkish publisher of popular […]
A day of ghastly sight of gristly, gruesome bloodshed of Ahmadis in Lahore Pakistan A year after the terrifying horrendous massacre of 86 Ahmadis of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community in Lahore, Pakistan the world remains deeply in shock, appalled by that act of religious terrorism, cold bloodedly covered up by […]