AFP, RAMALLAH: Palestinian prime minister Rami Hamdallah on Tuesday dismissed an Israeli proposal for direct negotiations instead of a French multilateral peace initiative, calling it an attempt to “buy time”. Hamdallah made the comments as he met French Prime Minister Manuel Valls, who…

AFP, BEIRUT: The death toll from a wave of bombings claimed by the Islamic State group in the heartland of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has risen to 154, a monitor said on Tuesday. More than 300 people were also wounded in the Monday attacks in the Mediterranean coastal cities of…

AFP, LONDON: Former Maldives president Mohamed Nasheed says he has been granted refugee status in Britain, after being toppled from power and jailed in a “slide towards authoritarianism” that has forced him into exile. Nasheed, the country’s first democratically elected leader, was…

AFP, DAVAO, Philippines: Explosive incoming Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte has launched a series of obscenity-filled attacks on the Catholic Church, branding local bishops corrupt “sons of whores” who are to be blamed for the nation’s fast-growing population. Duterte also warned…

AFP, TEHRAN: Iran’s Assembly of Experts chose ultraconservative Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati on Tuesday to head the key body which oversees the work of the country’s supreme leader and will elect his successor, state television reported. The 89-year-old cleric is one of the few hardliners who…

AFP, HANOI: US President Barack Obama told communist Vietnam on Tuesday that basic human rights would not jeopardise its stability, in an impassioned appeal for the one-party state to abandon authoritarianism. In a sweeping speech, which harked back to the bloody war that defined both nations but also…