Author: ALJAZEERA

On April 30, the European Union’s eighth annual conference on “Supporting the future of Syria and the region” in Brussels started with a day of dialogue. Members of Syrian civil society, representatives of United Nations agencies and international NGOs, and political leaders from the EU and other stakeholder countries came together to debate and strategise about the most pressing humanitarian issues affecting the region. On Monday, May 27, the conference will continue with a ministerial segment aimed at mobilising financial support for people in need in Syria. Ministers attending this important gathering will need to take urgent action to avert…

Airline says it has adopted ‘more cautious approach’ after incident that killed one person and injured dozens.Singapore Airlines (SIA) has changed its seat belt rules and altered at least one flight route after a bout of extreme turbulence killed one passenger and left dozens of others hospitalised. A 73-year-old British man died of a suspected heart attack and dozens of passengers were injured on Tuesday when their flight from London to Singapore was buffeted by severe turbulence, forcing an emergency landing in Bangkok. Following the incident, Singapore’s flag carrier has adopted “a more cautious approach to managing turbulence in-flight”, SIA…

When Israel started relentlessly bombing Gaza, Rasha Abu Shaban packed a handful of belongings and fled south with her parents and siblings. Her brother stayed behind out of fear that he would never be able to come home again. Abu Shaban was in a displacement camp in Rafah when she learned that an Israeli missile had struck her home. “My brother was killed at the beginning of November. He was there with another family that was displaced in our house,” Abu Shaban, 38, told Al Jazeera. “We heard from [our neighbours] that an ambulance was prevented from reaching them.” Abu…

Geoff Kitchen was on his way to a six-week holiday across South Asia and Australia with his wife Linda. Ten hours into the flight and in the middle of the breakfast service, Singapore Airlines flight SQ321 from London to Singapore plunged 6,000 feet (1,800 metres) in minutes. The Boeing 777-300ER carrying 211 passengers and 18 crew members made an emergency landing in Bangkok. Kitchen went into cardiac arrest and ultimately died. At least 71 others were injured and 20 people are still in intensive care units in Bangkok. But how often do such injuries and deaths happen, what is air…

Source link

Video-sharing app says state-backed accounts will not be recommended or allowed to advertise outside home countries.TikTok, the popular video-sharing app, has announced new curbs on state-affiliated media amid concerns about foreign interference in a major election year. The Chinese-owned platform said on Thursday that state-affiliated media accounts would no longer be recommended in users’ feeds or allowed to advertise to audiences outside their home countries. “This is an additional measure to prevent accounts from attempting to reach wider communities on these topics,” TikTok said in a statement. TikTok said it would also introduce a new dedicated Transparency Report on covert…

US lawmakers are pushing to sanction International Criminal Court over prosecutor’s push to seek Israel arrest warrants.Human rights groups are urging US President Joe Biden’s administration to oppose threats against the International Criminal Court (ICC) after its chief prosecutor’s decision to seek arrest warrants against Israeli officials drew ire in Washington. In a letter to Biden that was made public on Thursday, more than 100 organisations from around the world called on the US government to “oppose any legislative efforts to undermine the ICC”. “The ability of the ICC to provide justice for victims requires full respect for its independence.…

The Department of Justice in the United States has filed a sweeping antitrust lawsuit against Ticketmaster and parent company Live Nation Entertainment, accusing them of running an illegal monopoly and inflating ticket prices for concerts, shows and other events. The lawsuit, filed in US federal court in Manhattan on Thursday, was brought with 30 state and district attorneys general and seeks to break up the monopoly they say is squeezing out smaller promoters and hurting artists. “The live music industry in America is broken because Live Nation-Ticketmaster has an illegal monopoly,” Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter said in a statement.…

Whenever the International Criminal Court (ICC) opens an investigation into an ongoing war, versions of the following question will inevitably be asked: Does the pursuit of accountability risk leaving the warring parties with no incentive but to continue the fight? The same question is again being asked now that ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan has made the landmark decision to request arrest warrants for top Israeli and Hamas leaders. For years, I have tried to get to the bottom of what is often called the “peace versus justice” debate. I wrote a book about how that debate played out with the ICC…

President Ebrahim Raisi died on Sunday, along with the foreign minister, after his helicopter crashed near the Azerbaijan border.Thousands have marched in Iran for the final day of funeral rites for President Ebrahim Raisi, who died in a helicopter crash earlier this week. Raisi, 63, died on Sunday alongside his foreign minister and six others when their helicopter crashed in the country’s mountainous northwest while returning from a dam inauguration. Thousands of people, holding placards of Raisi and waving flags, marched in the eastern city of Birjand on Thursday morning to bid him farewell. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,…