More evidence of possible water plumes erupting from the surface of Jupiter's icy moon Europa has been spotted using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, the US space agency said today.
	Europa, one of more than 50 moons circling the gas giant, is considered by NASA as a "top candidate" for life elsewhere in the solar system because it is believed to possess a massive, salty, subsurface ocean that is twice the size of Earth's.
	The latest finding has given scientists fresh hope that a robotic spacecraft could one day fly past these potential plumes and learn about their contents without having to drill miles deep into the moon's icy shell.
	"Today, we are presenting new Hubble evidence for water vapor plumes being expelled from the icy surface of Europa," William Sparks, astronomer with the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore told reporters on a conference call.
	Using ultraviolet images taken by Hubble, a space telescope that was launched in 1990, the potential plumes are seen ..

New evidence of water plumes on Jupiter's moon Europa

PTI Automatic

Russia announced today it is dropping a brief import ban on fruits and vegetables from Egypt, after Cairo backed downed on tough restrictions on wheat that had sparked a row.
	Russia's agriculture watchdog said in a statement that following a meeting in Moscow experts from the two countries "came to an agreement to renew the delivery of all vegetables and fruit from Egypt to Russia, except for potatoes".
	A Russian ban against the importation of fruit from Egypt on sanitary grounds came into force on September 22.
	The dispute between the two key trading partners began in August when Egypt, the world's top importer of wheat, refused Russian deliveries due to the presence of ergot, a common fungus that can be dangerous in large quantities, in its imports.
	A day ahead of the start of the ban Egypt's cabinet backed down from tough requirements on wheat imports, saying it would allow up to 0.05 per cent ergot in grain shipments.
	Moscow accused Egypt of using the issue as a "haggling" ...

Russia drops fruit, vegetable ban on Egypt

The Walt Disney Company is evaluating a potential bid for Twitter, Bloomberg reported on today, citing people familiar with the matter.
	Unconfirmed reports that Twitter is interested in selling itself buoyed the San Francisco-based company's shares at the end of last week, and the stock price rose around a percentage point today as talk of Disney's interest spread.
	Twitter co-founder and chief executive Jack Dorsey is on the entertainment colossus's board, which could help the service with its push toward using the messaging platform for streaming live video.
	Twitter will be among the online media broadcasting the first US presidential debate between the Democratic and Republican candidates tonight.
	Disney did not respond to an AFP request for comment.
	Chatter about a possible Twitter sale has intensified amid sputtering efforts to transform the one-to-many messaging platform into a profitable business.
	Google and Salesforce were considered prime suitors. Microsoft and Verizon ..

Disney considering bid for Twitter: report

The Islamic State group could use mustard gas against an Iraqi offensive to retake Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city, the US Defense Department said today.
	"We can fully expect that as this road towards Mosul progresses, ISIL is likely to try to use it again," Pentagon spokesman Jeff Davis told reporters, using another acronym for the IS group.
	Davis said that the jihadists had already used mustard gas "at least a couple dozen" times, packing a "rudimentary" form of the chemical weapon into crude, makeshift munitions.
	According to the spokesman, the IS group's mustard gas is typically a powder bound together with tar.
	It is "not generally in a lethal concentration" and "not anything we would consider significant militarily," he said. "More irritant that anything else."
	Iraqi security forces, backed by US-led coalition air power, are in the final weeks of preparing operations ahead of an assault to recapture Mosul, which the IS group seized in 2014 and which remains the jihadists' 

Pentagon: IS could use mustard gas to defend Mosul

Boris Johnson today made his first visit to Turkey as Britain's foreign secretary, seeking to ease tensions after leading the successful Brexit campaign that played on anti-Turkish sentiments.
	Johnson, who is partly of Turkish ancestry, began his trip with a visit to a camp for Syrian refugees in the southeast, before heading to Ankara for political talks.
	The flamboyant former London mayor may find aspects of his visit awkward after he penned the winning entry in a competition on offensive poetry about President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, published by the conservative British magazine The Spectator.
	The trip is the highest-level visit to Turkey by a British official since the failed coup on July 15 in which a rogue military faction tried to overthrow the Turkish strongman.
	Johnson vowed that London would stand
"shoulder-to-shoulder with Ankara" and said Turkey had a "vital role to play" in the global arena.
	He indicated Britain would still support Turkey's bid to join the EU despite .

UK's Johnson on first Turkey trip since Brexit tensions

Our planet may grow intolerably hot even if greenhouse gases in the atmosphere remain at current levels, according to the first two-million-year reconstruction of surface temperatures, published today.
	"Stabilisation at today's greenhouse gas levels may aready commit Earth to an eventual total warming of five degrees Celsius (nine degrees Fahrenheit) over the next few millennia," said a study in the peer-reviewed science journal Nature.
	This was the middle of a predicted warming range of 3 degrees Celsius, (5.4 F) to 7 degrees Celsius (12.6).
	Even 3 degrees Celsius would, in the long-run, unleash a maelstrom of climate change impacts including storm surges engorged by rising seas, deadly heat waves, and severe flooding, said the study.
	The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has said that current atmospheric concentrations of the main greenhouse gas CO2 - just over 400 parts per million (ppm) - would, over the next century, push average global temperatures 2 to ..

Earth's climate past points to overheated future: study

Oil prices jumped around 3.0 per cent in value today as the dollar weakened before a meeting of crude producing nations in Algeria to discuss a stubborn supply glut.
	Against a backdrop of depressed prices despite today's rally, members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries are meeting this week with key non-OPEC producer Russia on the sidelines of the International Energy Forum in Algiers.
	Pre-forum talks last week between OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia and fellow member Iran resulted in neither willing to commit to trimming overproduction, sending prices plunging more than 3.0 per cent on Friday.
	Around 16.15 GMT today, Brent North Sea crude for delivery in November was up USD 1.47 at USD 47.36 a barrel.
	US benchmark West Texas Intermediate for November rallied USD 1.37 to USD 45.85 compared with Friday's close.
	Oil prices have been hammered by a lingering supply glut since late 2014, sending them to near 13-year lows below USD 30 in January.
	While the market has .

Oil prices rally before Algiers meeting

Audi's head of technical development stepped down "with immediate effect" today, the luxury carmaker announced, after German media accused him of involvement in parent company Volkswagen's "dieselgate" scandal.
	Stefan Knirsch had held the position for barely 10 months, replacing another top engineer who left after being suspended as part of an inquiry into the emissions cheating saga.
	Audi said Knirsch was "leaving in agreement with the supervisory board" but did not elaborate on his reason for quitting.
	The unexpected departure comes after Bild am Sonntag newspaper last week reported that an internal investigation by US law firm Jones Day had found that Knirsch knew that Audi's 3.0-liter diesel engines were equipped with cheating software before the scandal erupted.
	He is also reportedly suspected of having made false declarations about his knowledge of the matter.
	Volkswagen was plunged into crisis last September when it admitted to installing "defeat devices" in 11 million ...

Audi tech chief leaves after reports link him to 'dieselgate'

Israel's attorney general has said he would approve a criminal probe of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if "reasonable" grounds were found, countering charges that the two men are too close.
	In July, the attorney general, Avichai Mandelblit, said he had given the go-ahead for inquiries into a "matter" involving Netanyahu, defining the case as "an examination and not a criminal investigation into the prime minister".
	Israeli media said it concerned suspicions of fraud and money laundering against Netanyahu's former chief of staff, Ari Harrow.
	Mandelblit, who was appointed attorney general in February after serving for three years as Netanyahu's cabinet secretary, has been accused by some media of dragging his feet over the case.
	Yediot Aharonot newspaper today quoted extensively from an interview given by Mandelblit for a coming edition of the Israel Bar Association's magazine in which he says his actions are strictly professional.
	"No one has an interest in delaying the probe. .

Israel prosecutor general denies going easy on PM

Portugal's former prime minister Antonio Guterres maintained his lead in the race to become the next UN secretary-general following a fifth straw poll by the Security Council today, diplomats said.
	Guterres, who served as UN refugee chief for 10 years and was prime minister from 1995 to 2002, picked up 12 votes of encouragement, two "discourage" votes and one "no opinion", the same result as the previous informal vote.
	It was the fifth time that the 67-year-old has taken the number-one spot in the contest to succeed Ban Ki-moon, the former South Korean foreign minister who steps down on December 31 after 10 years as the world's top diplomat.
	Serbia's ex-foreign minister Vuk Jeremic came in second with eight positive votes, six negative and one "no opinion", followed by Slovakia's foreign minister Miroslav Lajcak, who took the second place in the last round.
	The 15 ambassadors, including those from the powerful five permanent members - Britain, China, France, Russia and the United .

Portugal's Guterres still leads in UN chief race

The European Union has decided to "suspend" Colombia's FARC rebel group from its terror group list, EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said.
	"This decision will take effect upon the signature of the Peace Agreement," due to happen at 2000 GMT today in Colombia, she added in a statement.
	The suspension will allow the temporary lifting of sanctions linked to FARC's presence on the list - including the freezing of assets.

EU to 'suspend' Colombia's FARC from terror list: official

Colombia's government and the leftist FARC rebels prepared to sign a historic peace accord today to end a half-century civil war that has killed hundreds of thousands.
	A solemn ceremony on the Caribbean coast witnessed by international dignitaries will set the seal on a four-year process to end Latin America's last major armed conflict.
	"Today we are experiencing the happiness of a new dawn for Colombia," President Juan Manuel Santos said on Twitter.
	He called it "a new stage in our history - one of a country in peace!"
	He will sign the accord at 5:00 pm (2200 GMT) with his former enemy, FARC leader Timoleon Jimenez, at a ceremony in the colorful colonial city of Cartagena, the government said.
	Santos opened the day's events with a tribute to the Colombian military and police.
	A prayer service for peace and reconciliation was scheduled later at an 18th-century Catholic church in Cartagena's old town, led by the Vatican's Secretary of State Pietro Parolin.
	The guests at the ...

Colombian, FARC leaders to sign historic peace deal

A Mexican judge mulled on today whether Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman can be extradited to the United States, but the drug kingpin's lawyers vowed to appeal if he loses.
	One of Guzman's lawyers, Jose Refugio Rodriguez, told AFP that the Sinaloa drug cartel leader was "very serene" as he waits for the decision by a court in Mexico City.
	The foreign ministry gave the green light to Guzman's extradition in May, but the former most wanted man won a temporary injunction in June, which the judge must decide whether to make permanent or strike down.
	The hearing began before midday today, an official at the court told AFP.
	"We hope that the result will be favorable," Refugio Rodriguez said, adding that if the judge rules today, Guzman's defense team would only be notified the next day.
	If the judge approves the extradition, Guzman would have 10 days to appeal to a higher court of appeals, which would then take several weeks to rule, the lawyer said, warning that he would take the case to the 

Drug lord Guzman 'serene' as extradition ruling looms

The sister of a jihadist killed in a terror raid in Belgium last year has been arrested and charged with terrorist activity, a prosecutor said today.
	Chaimaa Amghar, 20, was arrested in the Brussels district of Molenbeek on September 21 after police traced social media messages indicating she was attempting to "commit acts of terror-linked crimes in a conflict zone", the source said.
	The suspect is the sister of Sofiane Amghar, one of two suspected Islamic State members killed in a raid in the eastern city of Verviers in January 2015.
	Prosecutors later said the group was was under the orders of Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the ringleader of the terror cell that attacked Paris on November 13, 2015.
	The two men killed in the Verviers raid, Sofiane Amghar and Khalid Ben Larbi, went to Syria to join IS in April 2014.
	Theu then slipped back into Belgium to the Verviers hideout.
	Authorities have said the November Paris and March Brussels attacks were the work of the same cross-border jihadist .

Sister of killed jihadist arrested in Belgium

Protesters called today for Jordan's government to resign over its failure to prevent the murder of Christian writer Nahed Hattar, as the killing was condemned internationally.
	A bearded assailant yesterday shot dead Hattar, 56, on the steps of a court in central Amman where he was facing trial for sharing an anti-Islam cartoon on social media.
	His family has so far refused to collect his body for burial, charging that authorities were warned of threats to Hattar's life and had failed to act.
	Hundreds of sympathisers and members of the writer's tribe protested outside the premier's office today.
	"The people want the fall of the government... No security, they killed Nahed in Amman!" they chanted.
	Carrying his portrait, they called for the resignation of both Prime Minister Hani al-Malki and Interior Minister Salama Hammad.
	"We handed over 200 names (of people who had threatened the writer) to the governor (of Amman), including that of the assassin, and demanded protection," said 

Anti-govt protest in Jordan over murder of writer

Three people were missing after a South Korean naval helicopter crashed into the sea off the country's east coast tonight during a joint military drill with the US, the defence ministry said.
	The Lynx helicopter sent out a distress signal and disappeared from radar shortly after taking off from a warship on the East Sea (Sea of Japan) at around 12.00 GMT, a ministry spokesman said.
	The aircraft apparently crashed into the sea, he said, adding search efforts were underway to find the three who were on board, including the pilot.
	Today's joint naval exercise was the latest display of military might in reponse to North Korea's fifth nuclear test earlier this month, which raised tension on the peninsula.
	It involved US guided-missile destroyer USS Spruance and South Korean warships, and simulated attacks on the North's troops as well as  submarine detention, Yonhap news agency said.

Three missing after S Korea helicopter crashes at sea

An Omani court today upheld a government order to permanently close a national newspaper and jailed three of its journalists for undermining the state, judicial sources said.
	Authorities shut down Azamn daily in August, drawing condemnation from international rights groups.
	During today's hearing, the court sentenced editor-in-chief Ibrahim al-Maamari and his deputy Yousef al-Haj to three years in prison, the sources said.
	The pair were also ordered to pay a fine of 3,000 rials (USD 7,800) each and were banned from working in journalism for one year.
	The court also jailed their colleague Zaher al-Abri for one year. He was also fined 1,000 rials (USD 2,600).
	Based on the charge sheet read out in court, the journalists were convicted of disturbing public order, undermining the prestige of the state and misusing the internet, the sources said.
	Haj was convicted of publishing an interview with a senior judiciary official even after being ordered not to do so.
	Maamari was the first .

Oman court jails three journalists, orders daily shut

The US-led consortium leading the development of Israel's offshore gas reserves today announced a first deal to sell natural gas from its Leviathan field to neighbouring Jordan.
	US firm Noble Energy, the lead partner, said in a statement that the contract signed today with the National Electric Power Company of Jordan (NEPCO) was for "300 million cubic feet per day over a 15-year term".
	It includes an option to purchase a further 50 million cubic feet up to a total of 350 million daily.
	"Gross contract revenues are estimated to be approximately USD 10 billion," it said.
	Delivery to NEPCO is expected to begin at the same time as the estimated 22 trillion cubic foot field goes online to domestic clients in 2019 "subject to regulatory approvals from Israel and Jordan", Noble said.
	Israel's government only ratified the consortium's plans for Leviathan on May 22, after long legal and political wrangling.
	Noble is in partnership with Israeli energy firms Delek Drilling, Avner Oil ...

Israel-US consortium signs USD 10 bn gas deal with Jordan

Hundreds of Pakistani construction workers are to fly home from Saudi Arabia this week but without the salaries they have waited months to receive, embassy officials said.
	A total of 405 Pakistanis owed wages by once-mighty Saudi Oger will fly home from Wednesday courtesy of the Saudi government, Abdul Shakoor Shaikh, the Pakistani embassy's community welfare attache, told AFP.
	They are among more than 6,500 Pakistanis who, he said, have not been paid by the construction giant for that past eight or nine months.
	Large contingents of Filipinos and Indians have also gone months without pay from Saudi Oger, which is led by Lebanon's billionaire former premier Saad Hariri.
	In all, more than 30,000 Saudi Oger workers are affected.
	Employees of Oger and other construction companies, which are dependent on state contracts, have suffered because of delayed receipts from a Saudi government whose oil revenues have collapsed over the past two years.
	Shaikh said 275 Pakistanis have already .

Unpaid Pakistani workers to fly home from Saudi

FIFA's decision to disband a racism task force came under fire today despite reassurances offered by their new secretary-general Fatma Samoura.
     The 54-year-old Senegalese -- the first woman and non-European to serve on the FIFA executive -- said the world body could live with the perception held by many that it was too soon to end the task force's work.
     However, two-time former FIFA presidential candidate Prince Ali bin Hussein slammed the decision as 'ridiculous'.
     And the British anti-discrimination body 'Kick It Out' -- one of three nominees for the inaugural FIFA Diversity award which Samoura is due to present later today --  condemned the timing of the decision ahead of the 2018 World Cup in Russia, known for racist hooligans.
     But Samoura, recruited to some surprise from the United Nations in May, stood by the decision when she spoke earlier on Monday.
     "We can live with perception but we are taking very seriously our role as football's governing body to ...

FIFA slammed over disbandment of racism task force

Ten members of the Turkish security forces were killed today in two separate attacks in southeastern Turkey blamed on the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), local media reported.
	Two soldiers and two village guards - locals employed to combat Kurdish militants - were killed and six others wounded in a roadside bomb attack in Mardin province, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
	The bomb, planted by the PKK, exploded when a vehicle carrying the forces passed by, it said. The authorities have launched an operation to hunt down the "terrorists" who fled, it added.
	In a separate incident, six Turkish soldiers were killed in clashes with the PKK on a highway by the town of Uludere near the Iraqi border, the private Dogan news agency reported.
	Another soldier was wounded in clashes that erupted at a checkpoint near a prison on the highway, according to Dogan.
	The PKK, designated as a terror group by Turkey and its Western allies, has waged a bloody campaign against the ...

AFP

AFP

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