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30-11-2021 WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden on Monday told Americans not to “panic” over the newly identified COVID variant Omicron and said he does not foresee new lockdowns or extending travel restrictions for now. The virus variant, first detected in South Africa but already appearing in multiple countries, “is a cause …

30-11-2021 STOCKHOLM: Sweden’s first female prime minister has been reappointed to the top job after political turmoil forced her to resign within hours of taking the post last week. MPs backed Social Democratic Party leader Magdalena Andersson by a narrow margin in a new vote on Monday. She will attempt …

30-11-2021 Roadblocks were set up by demonstrators across much of cash-strapped Lebanon after the currency plummeted to a historic low. Protesters across Beirut, Tripoli, Saida, and other cities closed highways and intersections on Monday morning with their vehicles, and put tyres and rubbish dumpsters on fire. They called on the …

30-11-2021 VIENNA/ TEHRAN: Iran and the world powers party to its 2015 nuclear deal have begun long-awaited talks in Vienna to restore the pact, which the United States abandoned three years ago. Representatives of Iran, China, France, Germany, Russia, and the United Kingdom convened in the Austrian capital on Monday. …

30-11-2021 Bureau Report MELBOURNE: Nineteen cases of COVID-19 have emerged from mass protests in Melbourne CBD, with one person unwell in hospital. Thousands of protesters have rallied in Melbourne’s CBD and camped outside State Parliament in recent weeks to oppose the state’s proposed pandemic bill. The Department of Health confirmed …

29-11-2021 By SJA Jafri + Bureau Report KABUL/ ISLAMABAD: The Taliban co-founder and now prime minister of Afghanistan Mullah Mohammad Hassan Akhund pledged Saturday that his government will “not interfere” in other countries’ internal affairs, and urged international charities to continue offering aid to the war-ravaged country. Hassan’s audio speech …

29-11-2021 BAGHDAD: Dozens Peshmerga fighters were killed in an attack by the ISIL (ISIS) armed group in northern Iraq, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) said on Sunday. The attack which also wounded several Peshmerga took place in Diyala province on Saturday night. A Peshmerga source, speaking on condition of anonymity, …

29-11-2021 Bureau Report QUEENSLAND; MELBOURNE: A 31-year-old woman in Australia has been charged with arson after a fire destroyed part of a COVID-19 quarantine hotel in Cairns, Queensland. It is alleged she lit a fire under a bed in the room she had been sharing with two children on Sunday …

29-11-2021 KHARTOUM/ ADDIS ABABA: Sudan’s military says several Sudanese soldiers were killed in an attack by Ethiopian forces in a disputed border region. In a statement on Saturday, Sudan’s military said “our forces tasked with securing the harvest in Al-Fashaqa… were attacked by groups of Ethiopian army forces and militias, …

29-11-2021 BAGHDAD: A court has resumed hearing a case in which a judge was asked to formalize a religious wedding between a 12-year-old girl and a 25-year-old man, raising concerns across Iraq. It was not clear whether a verdict would be given on Sunday. The court, located in Baghdad’s Kadhamiya …