AFP, BEIRUT: The Islamic State jihadist group executed three people in Syria's ancient city of Palmyra by binding them to three historic columns and blowing them up, a monitoring group said Monday. Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said IS on Sunday "tied three…

AFP, BEIJING: The United States defied China Tuesday by sending a warship close to artificial islands the rising Asian power is building in disputed waters, prompting Beijing to furiously denounce what it called a threat to its sovereignty. The USS Lassen passed within 12 nautical miles -- the normal…

AFP, LONDON: Hundreds of British academics said Tuesday they would boycott contact with Israeli universities over the state's "intolerable human rights violations" towards Palestinians. The announcement, entitled "A commitment by UK scholars to the rights of Palestinians", was…

BBC, Chennai: The canteen of a Delhi guesthouse belonging to the southern Indian state of Kerala was visited by police after a rightwing Hindu group complained it had beef on its menu. Staff told police that beef items on their menu were buffalo, not cow, meat. Police said they only went to Kerala House…

PTI, Washington:  Scien­tists have discovered a novel phase of matter characterised by an unusual ordering of electrons, that offers possibilities for new electronic device functionalities. This phase could hold the solution to a long-standing mystery in condensed matter physics  having…