Germany’s upper house of parliament approved a new reform that would relax strict rules on family names, including allowing parents to give their children hyphenated last names, the Associated Press reported over the weekend. Current naming rules require parents to give their children one of their...
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Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, the hard-line protégé of the country’s supreme leader who cracked down on anti-government protests and dissent over the country’s morality laws, died after a helicopter carrying Raisi, the foreign minister and other officials crashed Sunday in northwestern Iran, the Associated Press...
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Israeli opposition leader Benny Gantz threatened to resign from Israel’s war cabinet if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not come up with a long-term plan for the war with Hamas or the future of the Gaza Strip by next month, an announcement that underscored the...
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Security forces in the Democratic Republic of the Congo said they thwarted an attempted coup Sunday, an incident that came amid an ongoing political crisis five months after the country’s presidential elections, Al Jazeera reported. Authorities said the coup began early Sunday near the residence of...
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Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico was in a “stable” condition but “not out of the woods yet”, officials said late Thursday, after an assassination attempt that shocked the nation and prompted concerns about divisions in the country, following officials’ remarks that the attack was politically...
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The French Government on Wednesday declared a state of emergency in the Pacific overseas territory of New Caledonia, ordered French troops to the islands and banned TikTok, amid violent clashes over a controversial electoral reform bill that have killed three indigenous activists and two law...
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The Netherlands is set to get its most right-wing government in its history after four right-wing parties reached a preliminary deal this week to form a government, following an election six months ago that saw the party of populist firebrand Geert Wilders secure the most...
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Switzerland’s top criminal court on Wednesday sentenced a former Gambian interior minister to 20 years in prison for crimes against humanity, a trial that human rights groups hailed as a watershed application of “universal jurisdiction” – a principle that allows the local prosecution of serious...
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Georgian lawmakers this week approved a law targeting foreign-funded organizations and media amid massive ongoing protests, with analysts saying the move could suppress anti-corruption advocates and jeopardize the country’s bid to join the European Union (EU), Politico reported. Protesters have called the bill the “Russian law”...
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South Africa will launch a new investigation into the mysterious 1967 death of Nobel Peace Prize winner Chief Albert Luthuli, an inquest that comes decades after the then-white-minority government ruled that the anti-apartheid leader died in an accident, the BBC reported. Justice Minister Ronald Lamola announced...
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Four people died and at least 100 were injured after days of violent protests in the Pakistani-administered province of Kashmir, officials said Tuesday, demonstrations that were ignited over the rising price of flour and electricity, the BBC reported. Over the weekend, thousands of people, led by...
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Authorities in the French South Pacific territory of New Caledonia imposed a curfew on Tuesday after a series of protests wreaked havoc in the archipelago over a bill to change election rules, an initiative from President Emmanuel Macron’s government that opponents say is intended to...
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A Kazakh court sentenced a former economy minister to 24 years in prison this week for murdering his wife, in a case that rocked the Central Asian nation over the issues of domestic violence and the impunity of high-ranking officials, Reuters reported. Kuandyk Bishimbayev, 44, was...
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A high court ruled Monday that Germany’s domestic intelligence service can continue to spy on the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party after the agency labeled the far-right movement as a “suspected extremist case,” the Washington Post reported. The case began in 2021 when the AfD sued...
Read full story →Malaysia unveiled plans this month for “orangutan diplomacy,” intending to gift the critically endangered apes to countries purchasing its palm oil, a proposal that drew criticism from conservation groups, CNN reported. Last week, Johari Abdul Ghani, Malaysia’s minister for plantations and commodities, announced the plan during...
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Spain’s Socialist Party of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez won the most votes in Sunday’s regional elections in Catalonia, a victory that dealt a blow to the separatist and pro-independence parties that previously dominated the territory, the BBC reported. Results showed that the Catalan Socialist Party (PSC)...
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Tens of thousands of Armenians protested in the capital Yerevan demanding Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s resignation because of his proposal to bring peace with neighboring rival Azerbaijan, Politico reported. Riot police established barriers between protesters and government buildings as more demonstrators poured into the capital over...
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Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Meshal Al Ahmad Al Jaber dissolved parliament over the weekend, citing ongoing political deadlock that has led to four elections in four years in the oil-rich Gulf country, the New York Times reported. On Friday, the emir said parliament would be suspended for...
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Participants in Mali’s national dialogue proposed extending the rule of the military junta for three more years, prolonging the country’s lagging transition to democracy since the army’s 2020 coup, Reuters reported. The military has governed Mali since the takeover, but tensions have risen in recent months...
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Ukraine’s parliament on Wednesday passed a bill allowing convicts to voluntarily trade jail time for military service, part of an effort by the government to mobilize more soldiers in its fight against Russia – which includes an unpopular lowering of the draft age, Politico reported. The...
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