Exclusive: Assad allies profit from Syria’s lucrative food trade
LONDON (Reuters) – As food begins to flow into Bashar al-Assad’s Syria after several months of disruption, some of the president’s close allies stand to make substantial profits from the secretive trade, according to trade and opposition sources with k…
France studies giving more counter-terrorism aid to Libya
RABAT (Reuters) – French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said on Thursday France was considering giving Libya more aid in counter-terrorism, including training more police.
Faced with protests, Albania seeks rewards for destroying Syrian weapons
TIRANA (Reuters) – Albania’s government faced a growing chorus of opposition on Thursday to a U.S. request that it take on the job of dismantling Syria’s chemical weapons, despite a vow by Prime Minister Edi Rama that the poor Adriatic nation would be …
Balkan tycoon, once seen as untouchable, stands trial in Serbia
BELGRADE (Reuters) – One of the Balkans’ richest men went on trial on Thursday in a high-profile case that the Serbian government says is a long-overdue drive to end more than two decades of lawlessness.
Hezbollah will stay in Syria as long as needed: Nasrallah
BEIRUT (Reuters) – Shi’ite militants from Hezbollah will keep fighting in Syria’s civil war alongside President Bashar al-Assad’s forces as long as necessary, the group’s leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Thursday.
Disgraced German ex-president on trial on corruption charges
HANOVER, Germany (Reuters) – Christian Wulff on Thursday became Germany’s first post-war president to go on trial, charged with corruption for accepting some 700 euros for a hotel stay and meals during an Oktoberfest beer festival when he was a state p…
Love, money and power in Britain’s phone hacking drama
LONDON (Reuters) – In a reversal of fortune fit for one of their own front pages, two British former tabloid editors have witnessed the dissection of their private and professional lives in the full glare of the media at a trial in London’s most famous…
French priest kidnapped by gunmen in northern Cameroon
YAOUNDE/PARIS (Reuters) – Gunmen have kidnapped a French priest working in the lawless region of northern Cameroon, authorities said on Thursday, nine months after Nigerian Islamist sect Boko Haram seized a French family in the same area.
Israel strikes Gaza after Palestinian rocket fire
GAZA (Reuters) – Israeli aircraft bombed two rocket launchers in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, the military said, hours after Palestinian militants had fired mortars into Israel.
Libya has lost $6 billion from oil protests: minister
TRIPOLI (Reuters) – Libya has lost some $6 billion due to protests at ports and oil fields that have reduced the North African country’s crude exports to a trickle, its economy minister said on Thursday.
