Jihadists aligned to the Islamic State group have released a video claiming to show the execution of 11 Christians in restive northeast Nigeria.
The footage posted online late Thursday by IS-linked propaganda arm Amaq showed 11 blindfolded men being shot and stabbed by jihadists from the Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP) at an undisclosed location.
"This is a message to Christians all over the world," said a masked man in the one-minute video.
He claimed the killings were in reprisal for the death of IS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and his spokesman.
IS leader Baghdadi committed suicide in October to avoid capture during a US special forces raid on his hideout in the province of Idlib in northwest Syria.
In recent months, ISWAP has intensified its attacks on Christians, security personnel and aid staff, setting up roadblocks on highways and conducting searches.
The United Nations on Tuesday condemned the "increasing practice by armed groups to set up checkpoints targeting ...

IS claims execution of 11 Christians in Nigeria

PTI Automatic

More than 235,000 people have fled the Idlib region over the past two weeks, the UN said Friday, amid heightened regime and Russian attacks on Syria's last major opposition bastion.
The mass displacement between 12 and 25 December within Idlib has left the violence-plagued Maaret al-Numan region "almost empty", the UN said in a statement.

More than 235,000 flee northwest Syria flare-up: UN

Russia on Friday formally contested its ban from major sporting events over doping violations, the head of its RUSADA anti-doping agency said.
"In accordance with established procedure, today we have sent a package of documents to WADA," RUSADA director general Yury Ganus told reporters in Moscow.
"The package contains a notice about disagreement with WADA sanctions."
Ganus also said he had sent a letter to WADA informing the anti-doping of his personal stance.
"I regret to inform you that all my attempts including attempts to introduce changes to the RUSADA notice have failed," said the letter.
Ganus, who has long argued for a major crackdown by Russia against doping cheats, told AFP on Thursday that "it is practically impossible" to contest the WADA ban.
WADA this month banned Russia for four years from major global events, including the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, over manipulated doping data.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has called the sanctions ...

Russia challenges WADA doping ban

A woman was killed by a crocodile, and another remains missing, after the fifth fatal attack in an Indonesian province this year, disaster mitigation agency officials said Friday.
The two separate incidents took place in neighbouring rivers in North Konawe regency, Southeast Sulawesi province, on Thursday and Friday.
The local disaster mitigation agency said a woman was attacked by a crocodile on Thursday evening, and her body was found later that day in Lalindu river.
On Friday the agency was called again after another woman was mauled by a crocodile in Lasolo river.
The two waterways are connected and are only 20 kilometres apart.
The head of emergency division at North Konawe Disaster mitigation agency, Djasmidin, who goes by one name like many other Indonesians, said on Friday a rescue team was searching the Lasolo river to find the second woman.
"Yes, there was another attack on Friday and we are still searching for the victim," Djasmidin said.
On Thursday, 48-year-old Nurgaya, ..

Indonesian woman killed by crocodile, another missing

Vernon Philander and Kagiso Rabada took a wicket apiece as England's top-order batsmen were put under pressure on the second day of the first Test at SuperSport Park on Friday.
England were 60 for two at lunch in reply to South Africa's 284 all out.
England's openers fell cheaply, both caught behind by Quinton de Kock off balls which bounced steeply.
Rory Burns fell to Philander after making nine, which included two edged boundaries off Rabada. He had been given out caught behind off Rabada's first ball of the innings but a review showed his bat had made contact with his pad but not the ball.  Dom Sibley was dismissed by Rabada for four.
Philander bowled an immaculate opening spell and did not concede a run in five overs.
Joe Denly faced most of Philander's bowling and had still not scored when he edged the 25th ball of his innings low to first slip where Rassie van der Dussen put down the chance, perhaps put off by De Kock diving in front of him. Denly scored his first run in the ...

England openers fall cheaply

The Russian Orthodox Church said Thursday it has cut ties with the leader of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria and all Africa, Patriarch Theodore II, after he recognised Ukraine's independent Church.
The Russian Church's Holy Synod ruled at a meeting that it was "impossible" to mention the name of Theodore in prayers and liturgical procedures, the Orthodox Church's website said.
In January, the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, based in Istanbul, signed a decree formally creating an independent Ukrainian Church.
This ended more than 300 years of Moscow's control over Orthodox churches in Ukraine and affected millions of believers.
The Moscow Patriarchate condemned the move and cut ties with Constantinople.
Theodore recognised the Ukrainian Church during a service in Egypt in November this year, the Moscow Church said.
The statement said the Church felt "deep grief" at Theodore's actions, saying he had allied himself with "schismatics".
Russian Orthodox Church ...

Russian Church cuts ties with Patriarch of Alexandria over Ukraine

The US Coast Guard was Friday searching for a tour helicopter with seven people on board that went missing off the coast of Hawaii in "challenging" weather conditions.
The chopper was on a tour of the coast of the northwestern island of Kauai. A boat and a helicopter were sent to scour the area when its owner raised the alarm around 40 minutes after it was due back on Thursday evening, the US Coast Guard said.
There is an electronic locator on board but no signals have been received, it said.  A pilot and six passengers were said to be in the helicopter -- two of them reportedly minors.
"The weather conditions are challenging," said Petty Officer 1st Class Robert Cox according to local media. Visibility was low and there were blustery winds, he added.
"We have trained crews responding and on scene searching for any signs of the helicopter and those aboard.

Tour helicopter missing off Hawaii with seven on board

At least 15 natural disasters linked to climate change this year caused damage of over $1 billion and seven of them cost at least $10 billion, British charity Christian Aid said Friday.
This year is set to be the second hottest year in history and each of the disasters in the report has a link with climate change, Christian Aid said.
"Extreme weather, fuelled by climate change, struck every corner of the globe in 2019. From Southern Africa to North America and from Australia and Asia to Europe, floods, storms and fires brought chaos and destruction," it said.
Assembling its report from official figures, estimates by NGOs and aid bodies, scientific studies and media reports, the British charity said the disasters displaced millions and caused widespread deaths.
Seven of them caused damage of more than $10 billion (9 billion euros).
These included the floods that ravaged north India, typhoon Lekima in China, Hurricane Dorian in the United States, floods in China, floods in the Midwest ..

Climate change caused 15 disasters costing over $1 bn this year: charity

Barcelona forward Luis Suarez and wife Sofia Balbi have renewed their wedding vows at a star-studded gathering in Uruguay attended by Lionel Messi among others.
The celebration to mark 10 years of marriage took place in a luxury tourist complex near the coastal city of Maldonado, about 130 km (80 miles) east of the capital Montevideo.
A crowd of football fans, including many wearing the Barcelona strip, gathered near the entrance as Suarez's clubmates Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba arrived along with Ballon d'Or winner Messi and his wife, Antonella Roccuzzo.
Brazilian star Neymar was also there, local media said.
Uruguay striker Suarez and Balbi exchanged "rings inscribed with their respective names, made from white gold and diamonds", according to a statement.
The couple met when Suarez was 14 and started seeing each other soon afterwards. They were married in 2009 and have three children.

Barcelona's Suarez renews wedding vows, with Messi on guest list

Australia captain Tim Paine blasted cricket's Decision Review System Friday, saying it left him "disappointed and angry" after he was dismissed controversially in the second Test against New Zealand.
Paine played one of his best innings and was on track to score a maiden Test century when he was removed lbw by Neil Wagner for 79 after New Zealand reviewed the umpire's original not out decision.
He was asked about the DRS by broadcaster ABC afterwards and replied: "Don't start."
"I thought from the length that it pitched, and the bloke bowling around the wicket, it's pretty difficult to hit you in line, and hit the stumps," he said of the delivery.
Some commentators agreed that it was hard to see how Wagner's ball could have cut back into Paine so much, struck him in line and gone on to hit middle stump.
Paine's disappointment was compounded by New Zealand's Ross Taylor surviving a review late in the day after initially being given out lbw. The ball looked to be hitting the stumps but .

Paine blasts DRS technology after controversial dismissal

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen has expressed "serious concern" over whether the bloc could conclude a  post-Brexit trade deal with Britain within the 2020 deadline.
Britain is due to leave the European Union on January 31, but will remain in a transitional arrangement until the end of next year while negotiators debate future trade ties.
"I am very worried given the little time we have," von der Leyen told France's Les Echos newspaper in an interview published Friday.
"It's not only about negotiating a free trade deal but many other subjects. It seems to me that on both sides we must ask ourselves seriously if all these negotiations are feasible in such a short time," she said.
"I believe that it would be reasonable to review things in the middle of the year, if necessary to see if an extension is needed." Under the withdrawal agreement which Prime Minister Boris Johnson has agreed with Europe but not yet pushed through parliament, the UK could ask for a one or two ...

EU chief doubts securing post-Brexit trade deal in 2020

China denied on Friday that detained Uighur academic Tashpolat Tiyip was secretly tried and sentenced to death, after UN experts demanded answers from Beijing.
The foreign ministry said former Xinjiang University president Tiyip's case was still ongoing and his rights had been "protected in accordance with the law".
Tiyip was "suspected of corruption and bribery," foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said at a regular briefing Friday.
Amnesty International said in September that it feared Tiyip, a prominent geographer, faced imminent execution after being "convicted in a secret and grossly unfair trial".
Tiyip was believed to have been convicted of "separatism" after being "forcibly disappeared" in 2017, although little information was available about his detention, according to Amnesty International.
A group of United Nations special rapporteurs said Thursday in an article published by the UN that they were concerned by the uncertainty surrounding Tiyip's trial and the charges he ..

China denies detained Uighur academic was sentenced to death

Twelve people died and dozens were injured on Friday when a passenger plane carrying 100 people crashed shortly after takeoff from Kazakhstan's largest city and slammed into a house, officials said.
A video released by the Central Asian country's emergencies committee showed the plane operated by budget carrier Bek Air split into pieces with its nose crushed into a partially collapsed house, as rescue crews worked to pull people from the wreckage.
Rescue workers could be seen reaching into the windows of the shattered cockpit, as scores of emergency staff rushed to the site.
The plane disappeared from the radar, minutes after it took off from Almaty airport at 7.05 am (01:05 GMT) on its way to the capital Nur-Sultan with 95 passengers and five crew members, the airport authority said in a statement.
It hit a concrete barrier and then slammed into a two-storey building near the city's boundary northeast of the airport.
Kazakhstan responded to the crash by grounding the model, which ...

12 killed, dozens injured as plane crashes in Kazakhstan

Scoreboard at the end of day two of the second Test between Australia and New Zealand at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Friday:
Australia 1st innings (overnight 257-4)
J Burns
b Boult
0
D Warner
c Southee b Wagner
41
M Labuschagne
b de Grandhomme
63
S Smith
c Nicholls b Wagner
85
M Wade
c Watling b de Grandhomme  38
T Head
c Snatner b Wagner
114
T Paine
lbw Wagner
79
M Starc
c Williamson b Southee
1
J Pattinson
not out
14
P Cummins
c Latham b Southee
0
N Lyon
c Wagner b Southee
1
Extras (LB-22, B-5, W-4)
31
Total (all out in 155.1 overs)
467
Fall of wickets: 1-1, 2-61, 3-144, 4-216, 5-284, 6-434, 7-435, 8-458, 9-463, 10-467.
Bowling: Boult 31-3-91-1, Southee 33.1-6-103-1, de Grandhomme 30-5-68-2, Wagner 38-11-83-4, Santner 20-1-82-0, Blundell 3-0-13-0.
New Zealand 1st innings:
T Latham
not out
9
T Blundell
c Paine b Cummins
15
K Williamson c Paine b Pattinson
9
R Taylor
not out
2
Extras (LB-3, B-4, W-1, NB-1)
9
Total (two wickets in 18 overs)
44
Fall of wickets: 1-23, 2-39.
Bowling: .

Melbourne, Dec 27 (AFP) Scoreboard at the end of day two of the second Test between Australia and New Zealand at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Friday:

More than a dozen Montenegrin opposition MPs were detained in parliament on Friday after they violently protested a controversial law on religious freedom, which was passed after the group was taken away.
The law has raised tensions in recent weeks between the government and a pro-Serb opposition which is close to the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC), Montenegro's main religious body.
Under the legislation, religious communities need to prove ownership of property from before 1918, when Montenegro lost its independence, in order to keep it.
The SPC, which runs hundreds of monasteries in the tiny country, accuses the government of trying to appropriate church heritage and purloin its assets.
The government denies this, saying it only wants to sort out ownership rights.
During the parliamentary debate that started on Thursday, opposition MPs from the Democratic Front called on supporters to block roads around Montenegro and threatened to take up arms if the law was passed.
After amendments 

Montenegro MPs held after violent protest over religion law

At least 15 people died and dozens were injured on Friday when a passenger plane carrying 100 people crashed shortly after takeoff from Kazakhstan's largest city and slammed into a house, state media reported.
The Fokker 100 Bek Air plane disappeared from the radar minutes after it took off from Almaty airport at 7.05 am (01:05 GMT) on its way to the capital Nur-Sultan with 95 passengers and five crew members, the airport authority said in a statement.
It hit a concrete barrier and then slammed into a two-storey building. The reason for the crash, which took place near the city's boundary northeast of the airport, was not immediately known.
A video released by the Central Asian country's emergencies committee showed the plane split into pieces with its nose crushed into a partially collapsed house, as rescue crews worked to pull people from the wreckage.
Rescue workers could be seen reaching into the windows of the shattered cockpit, as scores of emergency staff rushed to the ...

15 killed, dozens injured as plane crashes in Kazakhstan

Former South Korea coach Shin Tae-yong has been tapped to take over Indonesia's struggling national team, the country's football association said on Friday.
Shin, who led South Korea at last year's World Cup in Russia -- where they famously ousted defending champions Germany -- is expected to be formally unveiled on Saturday.
"We have invited Shin to finalise the contract. After that he will be introduced later on Saturday," Mochamad Iriawan, chairman of the Football Association of Indonesia (PSSI), said in a statement Friday.
"Hopefully all the process will run well."
The expected appointment of Shin, 50, comes after the PSSI sacked Scotsman Simon McMenemy in November with Indonesia bottom of their 2022 World Cup qualifying group on zero points from five games.
Indonesia also floundered in last year's Southeast Asian championship, the Suzuki Cup, where they finished fourth out of five teams in their group.
Indonesia have had significant problems off the pitch, with the two former ...

Ex-South Korea coach Shin to take over struggling Indonesia

Australia snatched two early wickets to leave New Zealand facing an uphill battle to stay in the second Test Friday as they chase the home team's 467, built on the back of a gritty 114 from Travis Head.
At the close on day two, the Black Caps were 44 for two with Tom Latham not out nine and Ross Taylor on two as a series defeat looms.
Captain Kane Williamson lasted only 14 balls, skying a James Pattinson delivery to wicketkeeper Tim Paine on nine while Tom Blundell, called up for the out-of-form Jeet Raval, was out to Pat Cummins for 15.
The visitors need to win to square the three-match series after crashing by 296 runs in the opening day-night clash in Perth.
Australia looked in complete control at tea on 431 for five, but they then collapsed to be all out for 467 within nine overs of the restart.
Skipper Paine departed for 79 seven balls after tea, with Mitchell Starc gone soon after for one. Head, Cummins and Nathan Lyon rapidly followed with Neil Wagner (4-83) and Tim Southee ...

NZealand lose early wickets as Australia take charge of second Test

A South Korean construction firm on Friday signed a deal to acquire Asiana, the country's second-largest airline, which has long been plagued by financial problems.
The HDC Hyundai Development Company said its consortium closed on a 2.5 trillion won ($2.2 billion) controlling stake in the troubled airline, which currently owes some 3 trillion won to financial institutions.
Kumho Industrial, the carrier's biggest shareholder, put its 31 percent stake up for sale earlier this year under pressure from its creditors.
The deal also includes Asiana's affiliates, including low-cost carriers Air Seoul and Air Busan.
"We will immediately get into the process of taking over Asiana Airlines to (financially) stabilise the company," Chung Mong-gyu, HDC Hyundai Development chairman, said in a statement.
Kumho, Asiana's parent company for more than 30 years, has struggled in recent years and was hit especially hard by the global financial crisis.
Last year, Asiana's then-chairman offered an apology .

S. Korean builder takes control of Asiana Airlines for $2.2 bn

Embattled Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared a "huge" victory Friday, after winning a leadership primary that ensures he will lead his right-wing Likud party into a March general election.
Israel's longest-serving premier, who faces a corruption indictment and a third general election in 12 months, was expected to beat rival Gideon Saar but the convincing margin of victory strengthened his position in the party he has dominated for 20 years.
With all votes counted, the Likud announced that Netanyahu had secured 72.5 percent, with Saar winning 27.5 percent.
"A huge win! Thank you to Likud members for their trust, support and love," Netanyahu tweeted.
"With God's and your help, I will lead the Likud to a big victory in the upcoming election and we will continue to lead the State of Israel to unprecedented achievements," he added.
Most media commentators had predicted a Netanyahu victory but its scale made banner headlines.
"Netanyahu, big time," said Yediot Aharonot, ...

Israel's Netanyahu wins ruling party leadership vote

An earthquake struck Iran on Friday less than 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the country's only nuclear power plant, monitors said. There were no immediate reports of any damage.
The US Geological Survey said the 5.1 magnitude quake struck 44 kilometres (27 miles) southeast of Borazjan city and at a depth of 38 kilometres.  Its reported epicentre is 45 kilometres east of the Bushehr nuclear power plant, on the southwest Gulf coast.
The Iranian Seismological Center said in a preliminary report on its website that the strength of the quake was 4.9 magnitude and that its depth was 10 kilometres.
The quake jolted villages near Kalameh city, semi-official news agency ISNA said, adding there were no immediate reports of any damage.
"Based on assessments by the Red Crescent, and regional (authorities), we're yet to hear of any damage," it quoted the head of the province's crisis centre, Jahangir Dehghani, as saying.
"We might have roads blocked in parts of the mountain due to the quake's ...

AFP

AFP

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