Category: Foreign

Four men aged 19 to 23 have been arrested in southern Italy in connection with the rape of two British girls, police said on Friday.

Police said the girls called officers at 03:30 on Tuesday, 8 September and said they were attacked by a group of men just after midnight.

The alleged incident happened in Marconia di Pisticci during a party in a villa. The girls went to hospital.

There was “extreme brutality and cruelty” in the attack, officers said.

Four other men are also being investigated by officers in connection with the incident.

Police said the girls say they were initially approached by two of the men under investigation, whom they did not know.

They were then approached by other men at the party who “took advantage” of the fact the girls had been drinking, the statement said.

Our Reporter

A Pakistani court sentenced a Christian man to death after finding him guilty of blasphemy for insulting Islam’s Prophet Muhammad in text messages he sent to a Muslim co-worker in 2013, a defense lawyer said Thursday.

Saiful Malook said his client, 37-year-old Asif Pervaiz, was convicted and sentenced this week in the eastern city of Lahore. It was the latest example of the Islamic nation’s strict upholding of blasphemy laws.

Malook said the court rejected Pervaiz’s denial of the charges and he plans to appeal.

Pervaiz was accused of blasphemy by Muhammad Saeed Khokher, a supervisor in a hosiery factory where Pervaiz worked. During his trial, Pervaiz claimed he was accused after he refused to convert to Islam.

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Prosecutors, however, submitted evidence that Pervaiz sent text messages to Khokher that contain insulting remarks against Islam’s Prophet, according to a court document. Khokher in his testimony denied pressuring Pervaiz to change his religion.

Under Pakistan’s blasphemy laws, anyone accused of insulting Islam or other religious figures can be sentenced to death if found guilty. While authorities have yet to carry out a death sentence for blasphemy, just the accusation of blasphemy can cause riots in Pakistan.

The latest development comes weeks after a Pakistani man killed an American, Tahir Naseem, inside a courtroom in the city of Peshawar where he was on trial for blasphemy. Naseem had been arrested two years ago after he allegedly declared himself Islam’s prophet.

Domestic and international human rights groups say blasphemy allegations have often been used to intimidate religious minorities and to settle personal scores. A Punjab governor was killed by his own guard in 2011 after he defended a Christian woman, Aasia Bibi, who was accused of blasphemy. She was acquitted after spending eight years on death row and left Pakistan for Canada to join her family after receiving threats.

(www.newsnow.co.uk)

Our Reporter

Britain and the European Union will hold emergency talks on Thursday over Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s plan to undercut parts of the Brexit divorce treaty, with Brussels exploring possible legal action against London.

After Britain explicitly said it would act outside international law by breaching the divorce treaty, EU negotiators are trying to gauge how to deal with London.

Britain signed the treaty and formally left the EU in January, but remains a member in all but name until the end of this year under a status quo agreement.

European Commission Vice President Maros Sefcovic will meet British counterpart Michael Gove in London at 1200 GMT alongside scheduled trade talks between chief negotiators Michel Barnier and David Frost.

If the EU is unhappy with what London says, it could use a part of the Withdrawal Agreement to take legal action against Britain, though there would be no resolution before the end-of-year deadline for Britain’s full exit.

“The dispute-settling mechanism under the Withdrawal Agreement is there,” an EU diplomat dealing with Brexit told Reuters.

Two EU officials also involved in the talks said the Commission would analyse Britain’s proposed Internal Market Bill – which would override parts of the Withdrawal Agreement – once it is passed to take into account any amendments before making a final decision on the legal case.

“I think some of the more extreme interpretation of this is totally wrong,” British transport minister Grant Shapps told BBC radio. The British government says its planned law is merely clarifying ambiguities in the withdrawal agreement.

Britain has urged Brussels to accept the breach of the treaty or prepare for a messy divorce.

Talks on a new trade deal have snagged on state aid rules and fishing. Without an agreement, nearly $1 trillion in trade between the EU and Britain could be thrown into confusion at the beginning of 2021, a further economic blow as they try to limit damage from the coronavirus pandemic.

The latest dispute is over the British-ruled region of Northern Ireland, which shares a land border with EU member Ireland. Under the 1998 Good Friday peace agreement that ended decades of violence there, the border must stay open.

To ensure that, Britain’s EU divorce agreement calls for some EU rules to continue to apply in Northern Ireland. But Britain now wants power to override them, acknowledging this would violate international law.

U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said any potential U.S.-UK trade deal would not pass the U.S. Congress if Britain undermined the Good Friday peace agreement.

“If the U.K. violates that international treaty and Brexit undermines the Good Friday accord, there will be absolutely no chance of a U.S.-U.K. trade agreement passing the Congress,” Pelosi said.

She said the accord would be “proudly defended in the United States Congress.”

European diplomats said Britain was playing a game of Brexit “chicken” by threatening to wreck the process and challenging Brussels to change course. Some fear Johnson may view a no-deal exit as a useful distraction from the coronavirus crisis.

Irish Prime Minister Micheal Martin urged Britain to drop its plan to breach the divorce deal, telling the Financial Times it was not clear now whether Johnson wanted a trade deal.

“The British government needs to move to restore trust and to give meaningful reassurance to the European negotiators,” Martin told the newspaper in an interview.

“Our colleagues in Europe, in particular those conducting the negotiations, are now wondering whether the will is there or not to arrive at a conclusion and get an agreement — and that is a very serious issue.”

(www.newsnow.co.uk)

Agency Reporter

Lebanese Foreign Minister Charbel Wehbe has tested positive for the coronavirus disease and been placed under a two-week quarantine regime, the Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.

“The result of a PCR test, taken by Foreign Minister Charbel Wehbe, is positive.

“It came after the first one, which he took the day before yesterday (Monday), needed to be confirmed.
“Since then, the minister has placed under quarantine for a two-week period,” the ministry said in a statement.
Wehbe was appointed as the country’s foreign minister on Aug. 3.

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On Monday, Wehbe met with the new ambassadors of Canada and Greece to Lebanon at a protocol ceremony to deliver copies of his credentials.

To date, the Lebanese health officials have confirmed 21,324 cases of COVID-19, with 207 fatalities and 6,722 recoveries.

The Indian government on Wednesday said it would reopen schools for students in upper grades after more than five months of closure amid a daily rise of 89,706 coronavirus infections.

According to India’s Health Ministry in its daily update, this figure takes its second-highest tally globally to more than 4.3 million cases.

At least 1,115 deaths linked to the virus were reported in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of fatalities to 73,890, the Health Ministry said in its daily update.

India is the second-most infected country globally, with 4,370,128 cases, behind only the United States, which has a total of 6,327,793 cases, according to the US-based Johns Hopkins University.

The ministry announced late Tuesday the partial reopening of schools from September 21 for students between 9th and 12th grade.

The final decision has been left to parents, who will have to provide a written permission for their children to go to school, the ministry said.

Online learning will still be permitted. There was no word on opening schools for younger students.

The guidelines were released as part of the fourth phase of easing lockdown restrictions.

India imposed a strict lockdown on March 25 and began lifting curbs since mid-May, in spite of a surge in infections, to revive a virus-battered economy that has seen a loss of millions of jobs.

Among new relaxations, metro services in Indian cities, including New Delhi and Bengaluru, resumed operations on Monday.

India’s top tourist attraction, the Taj Mahal, is also due to reopen from Sept. 21 with strict safety and distancing measures. (dpa/NAN)

Agency Reporter

 

In 2019, Spain’s organ transplantation rate was 117.4 per one million population and was only behind that of the U.S. (123.4).

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At the same time, Spain carried out more organ transplants from deceased patients than the U.S.

The number of operations on organ transplants worldwide increased by six percent last year and reached 146,840.

The operations on kidney transplants were the most common, followed by liver transplants. (Sputnik/NAN)