Protests against India’s new military recruitment system turn violent
Lucknow, India Reuters Police in northern India fired shots in the air on Thursday to push back stone-throwing crowds and authorities shut off mobile internet in at least one district to forestall further chaos, as protests widened against a new military recruitment system. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government this week announced an overhaul of recruitment […]
ICC prosecutor aims to show war criminals can’t escape justice
Kyiv, Ukraine Reuters The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court said on Thursday he hoped his war crimes investigation in Ukraine would show there can be no escape from justice during conflicts. Visiting Ukraine as part of the investigation into alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity since Russian forces invaded on 24th February, […]
European leaders visit Ukraine, dangling hope of EU membership; UK sanctions Patriarch Kirill
Kyiv/Irpin, Ukraine Reuters The leaders of Germany, France and Italy, all criticised in the past by Kyiv for support viewed as too cautious, visited Ukraine on Thursday and offered the hope of EU membership to a country pleading for weapons to fend off Russia’s invasion. Air raid sirens blared in Kyiv as the visit by […]
Australia raises emissions cutting target for 2030
Melbourne, AustraliaReuters Australia, under a new Labor government, on Thursday raised its 2030 target for cutting carbon emissions, bringing the country more in line with other developed economies’ Paris climate accord commitments. Australia, one of the world’s highest per capita carbon emitters, pledged to the United Nations that it would cut carbon emissions by 43 […]
Vatican discloses uses of Pope’s fund, hoping to reverse sagging trust
Vatican City Reuters The Vatican, in an apparent attempt to boost the confidence of the faithful in how their charitable contributions to the Pope are used, on Thursday issued the first detailed disclosure of his main fund. The Peter’s Pence fund, whose aim is to help the Pope run the church, is made up of income […]
Top producer Russia thwarts move to redefine “conflict diamonds”
Johannesburg, South Africa Reuters Russia has torpedoed a Western-backed proposal to discuss whether its diamonds are funding war ahead of an international conflict diamond meeting in Botswana, letters seen by Reuters show. The rift in the Kimberley Process, which certifies rough diamond exports, risks paralysing the body which makes decisions by consensus. A view shows […]
Canada and Denmark divide small Arctic island, ending ownership dispute
Copenhagen, Denmark Reuters Denmark and Canada will divide small, uninhabited Hans Island in the Arctic, eding an almost 50-year ownership spat, in a largely symbolic act of diplomacy designed to avoid tensions in the high North. The NATO allies have been engaged in a mostly good-natured squabble over the island, situated at equal distance between Greenland […]
Battered by economic crisis, Sri Lankans seek passport to a better life
Colombo, Sri LankaReuters RMR Lenora stood in a snaking queue outside Sri Lanka’s Immigration and Emigration Department headquarters for two days last week, hoping to get a passport and, with it, a chance to leave a country wilting under an economic crisis. A garment worker, 33-year-old Lenora decided to apply for a job as a […]
Table Talk: The Biblical practice of feasting
EMMA WATSON looks at the importance of feasts in the Christian life…
North America’s Christian Reformed Church codifies homosexual sex as sin in its declaration of faith
United StatesRNS The Christian Reformed Church, a small evangelical denomination of US and Canadian churches, voted Wednesday at its annual synod to codify its opposition to homosexual sex by elevating it to the status of confession, or declaration of faith. The 123 to 53 vote at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Michigan, caps a process […]