Author: Steven Sahiounie

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has congratulated Pakistani newly-elected president, Asif Ali Zardari, who assumed office on Sunday.  According to Türkiye’s Communications Directorate, during a phone conversation with Zardari on Tuesday, Erdogan said he expects relations between the two countries to develop in every field, and voiced his hope that the new term will be auspicious for Pakistan. The Turkish president also condemned terrorist attacks in Pakistan during the election period, saying Türkiye will continue to support Islamabad in combating terrorism. Zardari, 68, co-chairman of the center-left Pakistani People’s Party, was elected as the country’s 14th president for a five-year…

Minister of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates in the caretaker government, Riyad Al-Malki, briefed his Canadian counterpart, Mélanie Joly, on the latest political developments during a meeting held in the city of Ramallah. Malki thanked his Canadian counterpart for her country’s positive decision to fund the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) again, reflecting Canada’s keenness on the essential presence of UNRWA and the important services it provides to Palestinian refugees, particularly in such a difficult situation. The foreign minister demanded urgent intervention to protect civilians and ensure the delivery of humanitarian needs to the Gaza Strip,…

Israel’s war in Gaza has been “a slow motion, mass murder of children, five months in the making,” Jordan’s Queen Rania said on Monday in a CNN interview with Christiane Amanpour. Speaking about the ongoing crisis in the region, the queen said: “Since the beginning of this war, Israel has cut off everything that is required to sustain a human life — food, fuel, shelter, medicine, water — and it has been going on now for four or five months, and allowed the people of Gaza to completely rely on outside assistance. “And actually it has systematically denied and delayed…

Israel’s police force said it will deploy thousands of officers across Jerusalem’s Old City for Ramadan’s first Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa mosque, with tensions high amid the Gaza war.“We are prepared for Friday prayers with more police officers. Thousands of them will be in the area of Temple Mount,” police spokeswoman Mirit ben Mayor told reporters, using the Jewish name for the Al-Aqsa mosque site.Hundreds of police officers had already been deployed in the Old City in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem since Ramadan began on Monday, she said.Ben Mayor said up to 25,000 worshippers had already visited the mosque for…

Ukraine’s President Vladimir Zelensky looks like a clown, a brute, and a loser when he attacks Pope Francis for urging a negotiated peace with Russia, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said during a television program on Monday. The Latin American leader was rebuking his Ukrainian counterpart’s rejection of the Pope’s call last week for Kiev to consider making concessions for the sake of peace negotiations. Pope Francis is a great man who has high moral authority and Zelensky is in no position to speak poorly about him, Maduro said. The Ukrainian leader’s attitude makes him similar to Juan Guaido, he added,…

The Russian Foreign Ministry has published a list of Baltic politicians “most hostile to Russia,” who have been banned from entering the country. The list includes the prime ministers of Latvia and Estonia Evika Silina and Kaja Kallas, as well as a number of government ministers. The blacklist includes Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian foreign ministers Krisjanis Karins, Gabrielius Landsbergis and Margus Tsahkna, Latvian Defense Minister Andris Spruds, Latvian Interior Minister Rihards Kozlovskis, Lithuanian Army Commander General Valdemaras Rupsis and former national leaders: former Latvian presidents Vaira Vike-Freiberga and Egils Levits and former Estonian President Kersti Kaljulaid. Earlier, the Russian Foreign…

The US will fail to attain the aim of containing China by providing assistance to Ukraine, Wang Wen, the executive dean of the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at the Renmin University of China, has told TASS. Wang was commenting on a statement by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director William Burns on assistance to Ukraine. “This statement reveals the true purpose of the US in Ukraine. The US is not protecting Ukraine and its people. It has other strategic goals. For the US to deceive Ukraine is a very shameful policy, especially since it will not be possible…

Japanese Foreign Minister Kamikawa Yoko on Tuesday said the violence by extremist Israeli settlers, is ‘absolutely unacceptable’.“Japan is deeply concerned over the violence by settlers in the West bank,” Kamikawa stated in a press conference. “On various occasions, Japan has explained our position that Israeli settlement activities are in violation of international law and undermine the viability of a two-state solution. Based upon this position we have been strongly urging the Israeli government to completely freeze settlement activities.”Kamikawa cited a March 8 press statement by Foreign Ministry Press Secretary Kobayashi Maki that stated, “The Government of Japan remains seriously concerned…

A second Palestinian youth has been shot and killed by Israeli forces, north of Tulkarm, medical sources confirmed. The sources said that Tawfiq Aed Fawaz Hussein, 25, was killed after he was shot by Israeli forces last night. Medical sources said that Hussein was transferred from the Arab Specialized Hospital in Nablus to the Thabet Thabet Governmental Hospital in Tulkarm. WAFA correspondent said that Hussein is a Jordanian resident, holds a Palestinian identity, and currently resides in the village of Kafirat, west of Jenin. Last night, a young Palestinian man, identified as Mohammad Jaafar Mustafa Jabr, was shot dead by undercover…

Iran’s Vice President for Women and Family Affairs Ensiyeh Khazali has called upon the United Nations to remove Israel from the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) over the occupying regime’s decades-old atrocities against Palestinian women and violations of their rights. In her address to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in New York on Monday, Khazali said Palestinian women are struggling for survival amid an ongoing and well-documented genocide in Gaza, noting that more than 22,000 women and children have lost their lives as a result, while nearly 3,000 others have become widowed. She cited a UN Women…