Author: Steven Sahiounie

Tech titans Google and Facebook employ “surveillance-based business models” that threaten human rights and erode privacy worldwide, Amnesty International said in a new report, calling for an end to the data-grabs. Published on Wednesday, Amnesty’s “Surveillance Giants” report outlined how Facebook and Google, and their many affiliated platforms, operate in ways that are simply incompatible with the right to privacy and pose a “systemic threat” to free expression on the internet, World News reported. “Despite the real value of the services they provide, Google and Facebook’s platforms come at a systemic cost,” the report added.“The companies’ surveillance-based business model forces…

Sa’ada, Yemen – At least 10 African refugees have been killed and 35 others wounded after mortar shells fired by Saudi-backed militiamen targeted a district in Manba border town in Yemen’s northern province of Sa’ada. According to the Yemeni Al-Masirah television network, the shells hit the al-Raqo district on Wednesday. Last month, Saudi forces fired artillery rounds at al-Maton district in the northern Yemeni province of al-Jawf, killing at least one African refugee and injuring three others. Despite the ongoing Saudi-led military campaign and escalating humanitarian crisis in Yemen, this year has seen a spike in the number of arrivals of…

With national expertise and through Syrian cadres, WDRVM company for renewable energy and heavy industries has succeeded in manufacturing, assembling, installing and operating a wind turbine with all of its components for the first time in Syria, the Middle East, the Gulf and North Africa. Syrian experts of engineers, technicians and workers have overcome all obstacles encountered in the current circumstances, unilateral coercive measures and the economic siege imposed on the Syrian people as they were able to complete the manufacturing of the turbine with all its components from the tower and blades and control devices with high accuracy. The…

Syria’s Permanent Representative at the UN Bashar al-Jaafari affirmed the need for lifting unilateral coercive economic measures imposed by some countries on the Syrian people. Al-Jaafari remarks came during a meeting of the Second Committee of the United Nations General Assembly entitled “Unilateral economic measures as a means of political and economic coercion against developing countries” on Thursday. He said that the Syrian people have been suffering for decades to date the serious repercussions of the unilateral coercive economic measures imposed on them by some governments and these repercussions have reached an unprecedented level in the recent years. He added…

Algerians marched through Algiers on Friday to protest against an election scheduled for December, rejecting a vote they say is still fraught with former regime officials. Many marched through the streets waving flags, carrying banners, and chanting against the ruling elite, the military and the recent wave of arrests on demonstrators. Algerians are expected to vote in less than a month, with five candidates in the race, but protesters say there “will not be a vote,” not with many demonstrators still in jail for expressing their opinion. The mass protests that erupted in February, and unseated veteran president Abdelaziz Bouteflika in…

Turkey has detained in Syria a member of the Daesh terror group* who has organised terror attacks in Russia and Germany, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said on Friday, as quoted by Turkish Hurriyet newspaper. “We have captured in Syria’s A’zaz one of the key Daesh terrorists, a member of the top leadership of the group, nicknamed Yusuf Huba. He used to produce bombs and to teach other people to do it, including through the Internet, he used to recruit militants, and he has created a network of suicide attackers, he used to stage terror attacks and murders with use of…

Iran’s armed forces have improved over the past 20 to 30 years, but their equipment and technology remain well behind those of other significant military powers in the region, a new report by the Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA), published on Tuesday, says. Head of the agency Lt. Gen. Robert Ashley said in the forward to the report that “although still technologically inferior to most of its competitors, the Iranian military has progressed substantially over the past few decades”. Ashley also pointed out that 21st-century developments in the Middle East had allowed Iran to increase its relative influence and leverage it…

Despite scaling down the US military presence in Syria, US President Donald Trump has repeatedly stated that the country intends to retain control of the oil fields in northeastern Syria. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Oleg Syromolotov on Friday slammed US actions in Syria as “destructive, inconsistent”, especially those regarding the country’s oil fields. On Elimination of Former Daesh Leader Al-Baghdadi According to the senior official, the Russian military does not possess any reliable information about the results of an American operation aimed at eliminating Daesh* leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. “Our military working on the ground does not have reliable information about the conduct…

Cyprus police said on Thursday that 120 Syrian migrants have been housed at a reception center after arriving from Turkey on board a boat. Police said that the 97 men, 20 children – including 14 unaccompanied minors – and three women told authorities they’d each paid people-traffickers $4,000 for a spot on the boat. The vessel was spotted on Wednesday sailing off Cape Greco on the southeastern tip of the island nation and was escorted to an area harbor. The migrants said they’d set sail from Turkey’s southern port city of Mersin after crossing the Syrian-Turkish border on separate dates. Cyprus officials…

by Tim Korso The indictment comes at a difficult time for Netanyahu and his Likud party. The party, for the second time in a row this year, has failed to form a coalition government and now, with another snap election looming, the embattled prime minister will have to run both an election campaign and any number of court defenses. Israeli Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit announced on 21 November that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was charged on three criminal cases, involving bribery, fraud, and breach of trust. Known as Cases 1000, 2000, and 4000, Netanyahu faces the prospect of defending his innocence in…