The Saudi-led coalition battling rebels in Yemen sent a "limited" force to the city of Aden today, Yemeni sources said, in what would be its first ground deployment inside the country.
	A spokesman for the coalition denied that a major ground force has landed, refusing to comment on "ongoing operations".
	But Yemeni government and militia forces said the several dozen troops had landed in the main southern city, with some sources saying they were engaged in fighting for its international airport.
	An AFP journalist saw several men in the vicinity of the airport dressed in clean military-style clothing, wearing helmets and carrying sophisticated weaponry.
	"A limited coalition force entered Aden and another force is on its way" to the port city, a Yemeni government official there told AFP, requesting anonymity.
	The coalition launched air strikes against the Iran-backed Huthi rebels and their allies on March 26 after they seized control of large parts of the country and advanced on ...

Saudi-led troops in 'limited' first Yemen deployment

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Maldives authorities have detained 175 supporters of jailed former president Mohamed Nasheed for two weeks, according to court documents today, after the US warned that democracy was in danger on the honeymoon islands.
	Police fired tear gas and baton-charged protesters demanding Nasheed's release at a demonstration in the tiny capital island of Male on Friday night, arresting 193 people.
	The opposition described it as the biggest anti-government protest since Nasheed was imprisoned for 13 years in March on a terrorism charge for ordering the arrest of an allegedly corrupt judge in 2012.
	Today, a list at the Maldives' criminal court showed that 18 demonstrators had been released and 175 would be held in custody for two weeks.
	Nasheed's opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) said one of its top officials, chairman Ali Waheed, was among those being held, along with leaders of two other opposition parties.
	"Our chairman has been accused of encouraging violence, vandalism and ...

Maldives detains 175 supporters of ex-president Nasheed

Bangladeshi all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan and Pakistani paceman Wahab Riaz were fined Sunday for a heated on pitch argument during the final day of the drawn first Test between the sides.
     Hasan and Riaz had 30 percent of their match wages docked for breaching the International Cricket Council's code of conduct during the Test in Khulna, the ICC said in a press release on its website.
     The ICC didn't say how much that percentage represented but it is thought to be around $1,000 each.
     "Posturing and finger pointing in each other's face is not what we expect from two senior international players and has no place in cricket,"  the ICC quoted match-referee Jeff Crowe as saying.
     "International cricketers should always remember that they are being watched and followed by millions and, therefore, need to always control their emotions and demonstrate respect," he added.
     The incident happened in the 118th over of Bangladesh's second innings on Saturday when the two players 

ICC fines Bangladesh, Pakistan players

Italy's coastguard attempted to rescue more migrants in the Mediterranean Sunday after nearly 3,700 were picked up trying to reach Europe on Saturday alone.
	Although it was not a record, the number saved was one of the highest ever recorded in a single day, and raised fears that the tide of desperate people trying to reach Europe has not been slowed by recent disasters.
	Italian coastguards said 3,690 migrants were rescued on Saturday without giving details of today's ongoing operations.
	The rescue of a record 3,791 migrants was coordinated on April 12 and another 2,850 the following day.
	Video released by the coastguard showed migrants crammed onto a small boat that was intercepted on Saturday. The migrants are later seen clambering aboard a rescue vessel.
	Coastguards are seen wearing protective white suits and face masks.
	Saturday's operations in the Mediterranean involved four Italian coastguard vessels, two Italian navy ships and two customs boats, as well as four cargo ships 

New migrant rescues in Med as nearly 3,700 taken to Italy

Nigerian troops have raided communities suspected of harbouring militiamen in central Plateau state, killing several people, a military spokesman said today.
	"Following frequent attacks on communities around the Plateau-Taraba border by some militiamen, we carried out an operation to flush out members of these murderous gangs," Captain Ikedichi Iweha of the special task force told AFP.
	He said the soldiers engaged the gunmen in a fierce battle, leaving several people dead.
	"I don't have any information on the exact death toll. But several people were killed during the gun duel," he said.
	Iweha denied civilians were killed after local media said at least 30 people died when soldiers stormed into Kadarko, Kurmi and Wadata areas on Friday and yesterday in 40 trucks, burning houses and shooting indiscriminately.
	"We did not kill any civilian as our mandate was to flush out the bandits," he said.
	Media reports said the soldiers stormed the communities to avenge the death of four ...

Several killed as soldiers raid Nigerian communities

A "limited" number of Saudi-led ground troops deployed in Yemen's second city Aden today to support loyalist militia fighting rebels, a government official and a militia commander said.
	"A limited coalition force entered Aden and another force is on its way" to the southern port city, said the official who requested anonymity.
	The Saudi-led coalition has been conducting an air war against the Huthi rebels and their allies since March 26 but this is the first reported ground deployment inside the country.
	A leading member of the popular committees, a locally recruited militia loyal to exiled President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, told AFP that the force "will start helping us in fighting the (Shiite) Huthis and (former president Ali Abdullah) Saleh's forces".
	He said the troops will mainly back pro-Hadi fighters around the rebel-held international airport, which was the focus of renewed heavy fighting overnight.
	Other militia commanders confirmed that a few dozen coalition soldiers, ...

'Limited' coalition force on ground in Aden: Yemeni official

Tunisians have unfurled a national flag the size of 19 football pitches in a bid to set a Guinness world record and promote patriotism in the face of Islamist extremism.
	Hundreds of people turned out for the event at Ong Jmel in the southern desert yesterday, an AFP correspondent reported.
	An honour guard of troops saluted the red and white banner as it was unfurled on the sand to the strains of the national anthem.
	Organisers said that it took 80 kilometres of fabric to make the 104,544 square metre flag which weighed in at 12.6 tonnes.
	Spokeswoman Raya Ben Guiza said the project was the brainchild of a local textile manufacturer who had been shocked by a 2012 incident at Manouba arts faculty outside Tunis in which a hardline student tore down the national emblem and replaced it with a black Islamist flag.
	When fellow student Khaoula Rachidi attempted to put the national flag back up, he assaulted her and she narrowly escaped serious injury. She became a national hero for her ...

Tunisians unfurl world's 'largest' flag

A barrel bomb killed at least seven civilians, including a teacher and four children, when it hit a school in Syria's northern city of Aleppo today, a monitor said.
	"The primary school students were playing in the courtyard when the barrel bomb hit," said Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
	He said the school is in Saif al-Dawla, a district where control is split between the regime and opposition.
	"The children were taking a test there today because they were afraid their own school would be bombarded," Abdel Rahman said.
	The centre's director and other civilians are in critical condition after the attack, he added.
	An AFP correspondent described buildings in ruins and small bulldozers working to clear the rubble.
	Classroom walls had completely collapsed, exposing mangled chairs and desks, and men carried whatever books they could save out of the building.
	Barrel bombs are crude weapons made of old barrels or containers that are ..

Syria regime air raid kills four children: monitor

German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned today that society must "never close its eyes" to anti-Semitism as she joined Holocaust survivors to mark 70 years since the liberation of the former Nazi concentration camp at Dachau.
	"We are all forever called upon, to never close our eyes and ears to those who today accost, threaten and attack people when they identify themselves somehow as Jews or also when they side with the state of Israel," Merkel told a solemn ceremony.
	After laying a wreath with a former French deportee, Merkel thanked ageing survivors of the death camp who had travelled to Dachau, northwest of Munich, for sharing their life stories, saying she was "greatly moved" so many had made the journey.
	"We all are forever called upon to make unmistakably clear that Jewish life is part of our identity," Merkel added.
	American forces liberated the Dachau camp on April 29, 1945 and discovered on arrival the unspeakable horror that had led to the death of around 43,000 people ...

Merkel in anti-Semitism warning, marks Nazi camp's liberation

A Ukrainian soldier and a civilian were killed in the past 24 hours in Ukraine's separatist-held east amid a marked increase in fighting despite a fragile ceasefire, authorities said today.
	"A Ukrainian soldier was killed and six others wounded over the last 24 hours," Ukraine military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told a press conference.
	Rebel shelling of a Ukrainian army checkpoint left one civilian dead Saturday in Marinka, six kilometres (nearly four miles) west of the separatists' stronghold Donetsk, said regional police Chief Vyacheslav Abroskin.
	Army positions have been shelled 16 times in the last 24 hours by guns of a calibre of at least 100mm, Lysenko said.
	Such weapons were to have been pulled back from the front lines under the February ceasefire hammered out in Minsk.
	For the first time in weeks the town hall in Donetsk has reported shelling of the city, especially in neighbourhoods not far from the ruins of the airport, a frequent flashpoint.
	At least six rebels have ..

Soldier and civilian killed in intensifying Ukraine clashes

Singapore today ordered a local man and an Australian woman facing jail time for articles seen as hostile to foreigners to shut their website down, saying it threatens "public order and national harmony".
	The Media Development Authority (MDA) said it has ordered Yang Kaiheng, 26, and Japanese-Australian Ai Takagi, 22, to take down the The Real Singapore (TRS) website as well as its associated online and social media accounts by 1200 GMT.
	The media regulator said in a statement it had suspended the pair's "statutory class licence" to operate the website, which in general is automatically granted without a need for application to people who operate websites inside and from Singapore.
	The MDA said Yang and Takagi published material that is "objectionable on the grounds of public interest, public order and national harmony".
	The website went offline on Sunday evening, while its widely followed Facebook and Twitter accounts were also shut down.
	"The Real Singapore has been ordered to .

Singapore orders shutdown of 'anti-foreigner' portal

Security forces today arrested a Lebanese man accused of being a cleric and recruiting agent for the extremist Islamic State jihadist group, a security source said.
	"Ibrahim al-Barakat was arrested early on Sunday and is accused of being a religious jurist for Daesh in the northern city of Tripoli," the security official told AFP, using the Arabic acronym for IS.
	Barakat, who is in his 40s, was arrested while trying to flee northern Lebanon to Turkey using a fake passport.
	He is accused of recruiting young men from Tripoli to fight with IS in Syria and Iraq and of attacking Lebanese army units in the Sunni-majority city last year.
	The army launched a security plan in April 2014 in an effort to stabilise Tripoli, which has seen deadly rounds of fighting between Sunnis who support the Syrian uprising and pro-Damascus regime Alawite residents.
	Sunni gunmen in the city have often also clashed with the army.
	In October 2014, 11 soldiers were killed when clashes erupted following the .

Lebanon forces arrest IS-linked cleric: security source

Britain's former two-time light-welterweight world champion Amir Khan has said he wants to be the next opponent for Floyd Mayweather after watching ringside as the American outpointed Manny Pacquiao in the Las Vegas superfight on Saturday.
     Mayweather kept his unbeaten record with a unanimous points victory over Pacquiao in a welterweight unification showdown that failed to live up to all the pre-match hype, but fully highlighted the winner's superb defensive skills.
     Mayweather said after the fight that he would only get in the ring once more - in September - and Khan, 10 years younger at 28, believes he is ideally placed to be the American's final opponent.
     "I think the fight is there," Khan told BBC Radio Five Live's Sportsweek programme.
     "I spoke to Len Ellerbe, his manager, I saw him in the media room and he came over to say 'hi...He's ready when you are'.
     "I think Mayweather's team are wanting the fight. But then - on the other hand - I've even spoken to ..

Amir Khan wants Mayweather fight

Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) has claimed responsibility for the murder of an American atheist blogger in Bangladesh over two months ago, according to SITE Intelligence Group.
	Avijit Roy was hacked to death by two assailants with machetes on the streets of the capital Dhaka in February as he returned from a book fair with his wife.
	AQIS leader Asim Umar said his organisation was responsible for the attack in a video posted on jihadist forums yesterday, according to SITE, a US website that monitors extremist groups.
	He also claimed the murders of other "blasphemers".
	A spokesman for Bangladesh's Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) force, which is tasked with tackling militancy in the Muslim- majority nation, said it couldn't be certain the claim was correct.
	"We are not sure," Mufti Mahmud told AFP when asked if Al Qaeda was behind the deaths of Roy and anti-Islam writers Ahmed Rajib Haider and Washiqur Rahman.
	Haider and Rahman were also killed by machete-wielding ...

Al Qaeda branch claims murder of Bangladesh-born US blogger

Solutions will be hard to find Tuesday when Gulf monarchs hold their annual summit in a region threatened by jihadists and a war in Yemen that has raised tensions with Iran.
	"You go down that list, it's very complex," Anthony Cordesman, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said of the challenges facing leaders of the oil- and gas-rich region.
	The six Sunni-dominated Gulf Cooperation Council states will gather in the Saudi capital, still worried that Shiite Iran might be able to develop an atomic bomb.
	Their concerns persist despite assurances from Washington and Paris that an international accord being drafted aims to prevent that.
	A framework agreement between Tehran and the United States, France and other major powers limits Iran's nuclear capabilities in return for a lifting of international sanctions.
	French President Francois Hollande will attend the GCC summit, making him the first Western leader to do so since the bloc's creation in ...

Region threatened as Gulf leaders hold summit

France's defence minister has urged soldiers "to give themselves up" if they are guilty of sexually assaulting hungry Central African kids, as questions remain on why the probe into the alleged crimes is taking so long.
	In an interview published today, Jean-Yves Le Drian said he felt "disgust" and "betrayal" when he received a leaked UN report in July last year alleging soldiers dispatched to the country to restore order after a 2013 coup had sexually assaulted kids in exchange for food.
	"When a French soldier is on a mission, he is France," the minister told the JDD weekly.
	"If one of them has committed such acts, they must immediately give themselves in."
	The abuse reportedly took place at a centre for displaced people near the airport of the Central African capital Bangui between December 2013 -- when the French operation began -- and June 2014.
	UN rights investigators conducted a probe into the allegations in the spring of 2014, and a UN employee later turned the report over .

France to soldiers: come forward if guilty of child sex abuse

Residents of Azerbaijan's separatist region of Nagorny Karabakh went to the polls today to elect a new parliament in a vote denounced as illegitimate by Baku and the European Union.
	For over two decades, the Armenia-Azerbaijan dispute over the territory -- which no country recognises as independent -- is a major source of tension in the strategic South Caucasus region wedged between Iran, Russia and Turkey.
	"All polling stations opened at 8:00 am (GMT 0400). Elections are under way," Leonid Martirosyan, spokesman for Karabakh's central elections commission, told AFP.
	Oil-rich Azerbaijan, which has threatened to retake the region by force, condemned the polls as illegal.
	"The so-called 'elections' in Armenian-occupied Karabakh have no legal force, they contradict Azerbaijan's constitution and international law," the spokesman of Azerbaijan's foreign ministry, Hikmat Hajiyev, told AFP.
	"Armenia stages a provocation called 'elections' which harms the ongoing negotiations."
	The ...

Breakaway Nagorny Karabakh elects new parliament

The Saudi-led coalition has been using US-supplied cluster bombs in its air campaign against Yemeni rebels, Human Rights Watch said today, warning of the long-term dangers to civilians.
	The widely banned munitions contain dozens of submunitions, which sometimes do not explode, becoming de facto landmines that can kill or maim long after they were dropped.
	HRW said it had gathered photographs, video and other evidence indicating that cluster munitions had been used in coalition air strikes against the Huthi rebel stronghold of Saada province in Yemen's northern mountains.
	It said that analysis of satellite imagery suggested that the weapons had landed on a cultivated plateau, within 600 metres of populated areas.
	Cluster munitions are prohibited by a 2008 treaty adopted by 116 countries, but not by Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners or the United States.
	"Saudi-led cluster munition air strikes have been hitting areas near villages, putting local people in danger," said HRW ...

Saudi-led coalition using cluster bombs in Yemen: HRW

Floyd Mayweather cemented his status as the best pound-for-pound boxer in the world with a unanimous decision over Manny Pacquiao as the "Fight of the Century" failed to live up to the hype here.
     Scattered boos rang out around the crowd of 17,000 in the MGM Grand after Mayweather comfortably outboxed his Filipino rival to frustrate hopes of a full-blooded slugfest last night.
     The 38-year-old Mayweather (48-0, 26 KOs) retained his WBC and WBA welterweight titles and seized Pacquiao's WBO belt by winning the fight on all three of the judges' scorecards.
     Mayweather received scores of 116-112 from two judges. The third judge scored it 118-110.
     But when the results were announced the pro-Pacquiao crowd booed lustily and tried to drown out Mayweather's post-fight comments over the public address system.
     Filipino star Pacquiao suffered the sixth loss of his career to go with 57 victories and two draws.
     The fight is widely believed to be the most lucrative in ...

Mayweather beats Pacquiao to unify welterweight titles

James Anderson wrecked the West Indies but England were tottering at 39 for five in their second innings, a lead of 107 runs, on the second day of the third and final Test.
     On a pitch that is rapidly deteriorating, 18 wickets fell in the three sessions yesterday, the most in a single day's play in the 85 years of Test cricket at the venue.
     After being the last wicket to fall in the tourists' seemingly modest first innings total of 257 in the morning, the irrepressible Anderson claimed six for 42 -- his 17th five-wicket innings haul -- to mastermind the demolition of the home side for 189.
     Only Jermaine Blackwood offered any substantial resistance with a counter-attacking innings of 85 before he was last out off Anderson, who is now just four away from becoming the first Englishman to take 400 Test wickets.
     In 21 overs to the close, England lost half their side and will resume on the third morning with the pair of Gary Ballance and Ben Stokes at the crease.
     ...

Anderson takes six before England collapse

A Cristiano Ronaldo hat-trick maintained Real Madrid's La Liga title aspirations as they ended Sevilla's 34-game unbeaten run at home with a 3-2 win.
     Victory kept the European champions just two points behind Barcelona with three games to play after Luis Suarez scored his first hat-trick for the Catalans in a 8-0 humiliation of relegated Cordoba yesterday.
     Sevilla 'keeper Sergio Rico made an incredible save from point-blank range to prevent Ronaldo opening the scoring early on from Marcelo's fine cross.
     Iker Casillas then had to be quick off his line at the other end to prevent Aleix Vidal putting Sevilla in front.
     However, the game swung massively in Madrid's favour in the space of two minutes whilst Sevilla were down to 10 men as Grzegorz Krychowiak was off the field receiving treatment for a facial injury.
     The World Player of the Year headed home expertly from Isco's cross and then prodded in from Javier Hernandez's flick-on moments later.
     Sevilla were 

AFP

AFP

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