Author: ALJAZEERA

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said that only the expansion of land crossings for aid deliveries into Gaza could help prevent famine in the densely populated Palestinian enclave. “Recent efforts to deliver food by air and sea are welcome, but only the expansion of land crossings will enable large scale deliveries to prevent famine,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Thursday. Children are dying from the effects of malnutrition and disease, and from a lack of adequate water and sanitation, Tedros said. “The future of an entire generation is in serious peril,” he said. “Once again,…

Political parties trade blame for economic slump that follows aggressive interest rate hikes to tame inflation.New Zealand has slipped into its second recession in less than 18 months, according to government figures. New Zealand’s gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by 0.1 percent during the October-December period, following a 0.3 percent contraction in the third quarter, New Zealand’s official statistics agency said on Thursday. On a per capita basis, the economy fared even worse, with GDP shrinking 0.7 in the last quarter of 2023, according to government figures. Economists traditionally define a recession as two consecutive quarters of negative growth. The…

EXCLUSIVEInvestigation draws up a list of those killed in Hamas attack, but also finds certain claims repeated by Israeli politicians untrue.Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit (I-Unit) has carried out a forensic analysis of the events of October 7, when Hamas fighters launched an incursion into Israel that has transformed the politics of the Middle East. October 7 reveals widespread human rights abuses by Hamas fighters and others who followed them through the fence from the Gaza Strip and draws up a comprehensive list of those killed. But the investigation by the I-Unit, which examined hours of footage from CCTV, dashcams, personal…

Taichung, Taiwan – When Hao Pengfei retired last year, it felt nothing like he had expected it would when he was a younger man. “I used to think that retirement is more about relaxation and hobbies and less about stress and concerns,” Hao told Al Jazeera from his home in China’s eastern city of Nanjing. Hao worked as an administrator in a state-owned manufacturing company until he turned 60 last year. Although Hao would have liked to continue working, he was mandated by company policy to retire at 60. But Hao did not stay retired for long. With mortgage payments,…

Amman, Jordan/sky above Gaza – A hulking military cargo plane sits on the tarmac of a Royal Jordanian Air Force base in the early morning light. Two maintenance engineers unlock a compartment in the aircraft’s fuselage and disappear behind a metal hood that shelters a complex nest of wires. The two men, who graduated together from the military academy five years ago, chat with warm familiarity as they perform final preflight checks. Two Jordanian cargo planes will take off for an aid airdrop over Gaza around midday, followed by four other aircraft from Germany, Egypt and the United States. They…

The new environmental regulations fall short of more ambitious goals previously set by the Biden administration.Washington, DC – The United States has released what it calls the “strongest ever” regulations for car tailpipe pollution, as the country looks to accelerate its sales of electric vehicles (EVs) in an effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Still, the rules — released on Wednesday — fall short of more ambitious goals previously set by the administration of President Joe Biden. The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said it projects that the regulations would lead to 30 to 56 percent of new cars being…

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has begun a tour of the Middle East by holding talks in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, hoping to secure a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza. Blinken is set to meet Arab foreign ministers and a senior Palestinian official in Cairo on Thursday, according to an Egyptian foreign ministry note, as he pushes for a truce between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, where hunger is spreading amid growing warnings of a looming famine. The note did not give details on the subject of the meeting, but Egyptian security sources cited by the…

Revenues from Qatar’s LNG fields will provide budget surpluses until the 2030s, Fitch said.Fitch Ratings has upgraded Qatar to AA, its third-highest rating, on the back of revenues expected from its expanded gas fields, the agency has said. Revenues from Qatar’s liquified natural gas (LNG) fields will ensure that the country posts budget surpluses until the 2030s, Fitch said in a release on Wednesday outlining the rating rationale. The upgrade from AA- “reflects Fitch’s greater confidence that debt to GDP will remain in line with or below the ‘AA’ peer median after falling sharply in recent years,” the agency said.…

The UN says a ‘humanitarian travesty’ is playing out in Sudan amid international inattention and inaction.Sudan is suffering one of the worst humanitarian crises in recent history after nearly a year of war, the United Nations has warned. Fighting between the army, headed by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, since last April has killed tens of thousands of people, as the threat of famine looms amid international inaction. “By all measures – the sheer scale of humanitarian needs, the numbers of people displaced and facing hunger – Sudan is…

The measures come as Washington tries to curb the Yemeni group’s attacks on Red Sea shipping lanes amid the war on Gaza.Washington, DC – The United States has imposed sanctions on a shipping company it accused of facilitating the transfer of Iranian commodities linked to a Houthi official to China. The US Department of the Treasury announced the measures against the firm Vishnu Inc, registered in the Marshall Islands, on Wednesday, saying that one of its vessels is involved in “illicit shipments”. It said the cargo was “in support of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force (IRGC-QF) and Houthi financial facilitator…