Indonesia said no further action could be taken on US request because there was no consensus on 15-nation body
The US has suffered another humiliating diplomatic setback after the president of the UN security council rejected the Trump administration’s attempt to extend economic sanctions on Iran.
Related: Iran sanctions: nearly all UN security council unites against 'unpleasant' US
Continue reading...Exclusive: Thomas Young used cut-up method to treat translation of Egyptian relic as mathematical problem, papers show
Nobody knew how to read hieroglyphs when two 19th-century scholars set out to decipher the inscribed texts on the ancient Egyptian Rosetta Stone, one of the British Museum’s most famous treasures.
Now notes have been discovered among one of the scholars’ papers in the British Library that reveal the extent to which the translation was treated as though it was a mathematical problem.
Continue reading...Many Lebanese people had hoped for a silver lining to this tragedy of an independent government and new elections
The tremendous blast that shook Lebanon on 4 August will be recorded as a major turning point in the country’s history, no less so than the much less powerful explosion that killed former prime minister Rafik Hariri on 14 February 2005. Judging from the 15 years it took before a UN-appointed tribunal basically admitted its impotence on the latter event, there won’t be any official certainty about the circumstances of the terrible explosion at Beirut’s port in the foreseeable future. A few conclusions can, however. be drawn about this highly traumatic tragedy.
Related: 'Our stitches ran out': Beirut's struggle to deal with injuries from port blast
Continue reading...Teenage volunteers on archaeological dig unearth 425 coins dating back to 9th century
Israeli teenagers volunteering at an archaeological dig have unearthed hundreds of gold coins that were stashed away in a clay vessel for more than a millennium.
The 425 24-carat pure gold coins date back to the 9th-century Abbasid caliphate period and would have been a significant amount of money at the time, said Robert Kool, a coin expert at the Israel Antiquities Authority.
Continue reading...From panic buying to lack of freedom, the pandemic is an opportunity to understand the lives of those forced to flee
Covid-19 has transformed the world beyond imagination, affecting almost everyone in some way.
Yet for me the changes have felt familiar – from movement restrictions to quarantines, every measure taken to prevent the spread of the virus reminds me of what it means to live as a refugee in a camp.
Continue reading...State news agency reports oil minister as saying the blast could be a terrorist act
An explosion on the Arab gas pipeline has caused a total blackout in Syria, the state news agency SANA reported on Monday, quoting the nation’s electricity minister.
The minister said the explosion occurred between the Ad Dumayr and Adra areas in Syria.
Continue reading...Officials say security investigations confirmed sabotage, with further details to be released later
Iran’s Atomic Energy Organisation said on Sunday that “sabotage” was the cause of an explosion that damaged the Natanz nuclear facility last month.
“Security investigations confirm this was sabotage and what is certain is that an explosion took place in Natanz,” spokesman Behrouz Kamalvandi was quoted as saying by state news agency IRNA. “But how this explosion took place and with what materials ... will be announced by security officials in due course.”
Continue reading...Artwork at Tel Aviv beach painted over after outrage over assault on teenage girl
Israeli authorities have removed a “peeping toms” mural that had long been a fixture of a Tel Aviv beach in response to public outrage over the suspected gang rape of a 16-year-old girl in the southern resort of Eilat.
Painted 18 years ago and often criticised as sexist, the mural on the wall of a women’s changing room was painted over by a municipal worker on Sunday. It had depicted two young men in bathing suits peering inside.
Continue reading...Netanyahu-Gantz coalition could collapse as deadline for new financial plan looms
Israel risks being thrust into a fourth round of elections and further financial strife as coalition rivals clash over meeting a Monday deadline to pass the country’s budget.
The veteran prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, secured his political survival earlier this year by clinching a coalition deal with his rival Benny Gantz. But the unhappy alliance faces imminent collapse if the two cannot agree on money matters.
Continue reading...A notorious ‘friendly fire’ incident during the Iraq war is picked apart in this meticulous 5 Live podcast
On the Ground (BBC 5 Live) | BBC Sounds
Audrey Gillan is known to radio lovers as the Scottish reporter who befriended two rough sleepers in Spitalfields, London, and made a six-part series about them. Tara and George was broadcast on Radio 4, and won radio programme of the year at the 2019 Broadcasting Press Guild awards. It was a tender and affecting series, with Gillan, if not at the forefront, decidedly involved: she was honest about her feelings around homelessness, her worries about Tara and George and how they were living. It was this relationship – as well as the one between Tara and George themselves – that gave the series its flavour and heart.
Continue reading...Al-Fatih Hamdallah relives Darfur conflict and neglect that blighted many lives and exodus that led to the death of Abdulfatah
The Sudanese village that Abdulfatah Hamdallah came from is so small that it is not actually on the map.
Himdey is in Kordofan State, which borders the war-torn areas of Darfur and the Nuba mountains. It has a population of about 2,000 and two wells for drinking water, according to Hamdallah’s older brother Al-Fatih.
Continue reading...Letters from 13 of 15 members underscore US isolation as it seeks to ‘snap back’ measures against Tehran
The extent of US isolation at the UN has been driven home by formal letters from 13 of the 15 security council members opposing Trump administration attempts to extend the economic embargo on Iran.
The letters by the council members were all issued in the 24 hours since the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, came to the UN’s New York headquarters to declare Iran in non-compliance with a 2015 nuclear deal.
Continue reading...Development raises hopes of political solution as both sides call for end to oil blockade
Libya’s UN-supported government has announced a ceasefire across the oil-rich country and called for the demilitarisation of the strategic city of Sirte, which is controlled by rival forces.
In a separate statement Aguila Saleh, the speaker of the rival House of Representatives in the east, also called for a ceasefire. The announcements came amid fears of an escalation in the more than nine-year-old conflict.
Continue reading...Photographs of works go on display in Manger Square to celebrate British street artist’s contribution to diversifying tourism
Photographs of 20 pieces of Banksy’s artwork in Palestine have been displayed in the centre of Bethlehem as a thank you to the anonymous British street artist for helping diversify tourism in the city.
The images were collated by Palestinian photographers for the surprise exhibition in Manger Square.
Continue reading...Two refugees’ efforts to reach Dover reflect persecution in Sudan and rising tensions over migrants in Europe
On the night he attempted to cross the Channel, Abdulfatah Hamdallah left his blanket and bicycle behind at the camp in Calais.
They were the only possessions he would leave behind: his backpack was lost at sea when he drowned attempting to make the perilous crossing over the Dover Strait to England in a dinghy, with shovels for oars.
Continue reading...Cargo from the MV Rhosus caused the explosion in Lebanon’s main port – its crew say they were stranded aboard for a year
The problems began the moment Captain Boris Prokoshev set sail aboard the MV Rhosus in 2013.
He discovered that the ageing Russian-owned cargo ship, bound for Mozambique, was in “terrible” condition, including having a defunct generator. Then he learned that the previous crew had mutinied over unpaid wages. So it was no surprise when the owner told Prokoshev there was no money to pay for fees for the Suez canal, either.
Continue reading...US to activate controversial ‘snapback’ procedure, which Britain, France and Germany say it doesn’t have the right to do
President Donald Trump has announced that secretary of state Mike Pompeo will activate a controversial mechanism aimed at reimposing UN sanctions on Iran, escalating a row with European allies that has huge repercussions for the Iranian nuclear deal.
Pompeo will travel to New York on Thursday to notify the UN security council that the US is triggering the so-called “snapback” procedure, which Britain, France and Germany say it doesn’t have the right to do.
Continue reading...Assurances on Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh dependent on UK handing over evidence
The US has promised not to pursue the death penalty against two British Isis members accused of taking part in the beheadings of western hostages, in return for UK cooperation with the prosecution.
The pledge was given in a letter from the US attorney general, William Barr, in the case of Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh, members of the “Beatles” group of British Isis members, who were captured by Syrian Kurds and then handed over to US custody last October.
Continue reading...Ability to carry out humanitarian work in most dangerous conflict-hit regions threatened by local NGO staff being caught in crossfire
There has been a sharp rise in the number of aid staff killed in the first six months of this year with Syria at the top of the list of the deadliest places to be a humanitarian worker.
A total of 74 fatalities have been recorded globally since January, a 30% rise on the same period last year. Syria accounted for more than a quarter of the deaths.
Continue reading...Coronavirus laws used to quash protests after country’s largest independent union suspended
He spent 17 days on the run, moving surreptitiously, sleeping in different homes. When Sharaf Obeidat saw security forces surrounding his building, he knew it was over. “They’ve arrested me,” he managed to write on Facebook, before he was hooded, handcuffed and led away.
Neither a violent criminal, nor a political dissident, Obeidat is one of what lawyers estimate is about 1,000 teachers arrested across Jordan in the past few weeks as part of a crackdown on the kingdom’s largest independent trade union, the Jordan Teachers’ Syndicate.
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