A state of emergency was declared in Australia's most populated region on Thursday as an unprecedented heatwave fanned out-of-control bushfires, destroying homes and smothering huge areas with a toxic smoke.
As thousands of firefighters battled blazes, temperatures neared 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit) in some places and authorities warned the extreme weather conditions could get even worse.
Australia endures bushfires every year but the early and intense start to this season, along with the record temperatures, has fuelled concerns about global warming.
In New South Wales, Australia's most populated state with Sydney as its capital, more than 100 bushfires were burning on Thursday, many of them out of control.
New South Wales premier Gladys Berejiklian declared a seven-day state of emergency, the second since the bushfire season began early in September, due to "catastrophic weather conditions".
At Buxton, about 100 kilometres (62 miles) southwest of Sydney, longtime ...

State of emergency as bushfires rage in Australia

PTI Automatic

A court in Spain ruled Thursday that Catalonia's president Quim Torra was unfit to hold public office for 18 months because he failed to remove separatist symbols from public buildings during an election campaign.
The ruling will only come into effect if it is confirmed by Spain's Supreme Court, which could take months, and it could trigger an early election in the wealthy northeastern region.

Spain court says Catalan president unfit to hold public office for 18 months

Tens of thousands of pigs have died from African swine fever in Indonesia's North Sumatra province, officials said on Thursday, the first time the virus has been detected in the country.
The disease has devastated swine herds in China and elsewhere in Asia, and initially Indonesia authorities put the death of 27,000 pigs down to hog cholera -- a different virus with similar symptoms.
But Fadjar Sumping Tjatur Rasa, an official at Indonesia's Ministry of Agriculture, told AFP that laboratory tests had recorded evidence of African swine fever in 16 regencies and cities in North Sumatra.
"It had never (before) occurred in Indonesia," he added.
While the virus cannot be transmitted to humans, it is almost 100 percent fatal in pigs.
Although Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim nation -- and eating pork is forbidden by the Koran -- the country also boasts a small Christian majority in North Sumatra, and Bali is a Hindu island whose signature dish is roast pig.
The UN's Food and ...

African swine fever kills nearly 30,000 pigs in Indonesia

Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon on Thursday outlined plans for a new independence referendum, arguing there was now a clear "constitutional and democratic case" for a fresh vote.
Her Scottish National Party won a landslide north of the border with England in last week's UK-wide election, securing 47 of the 59 seats and nearly half the vote.
That result, and previous SNP majorities at previous general elections in 2015 and 2017, made the case for another referendum "unarguable", she told a news conference in Edinburgh.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservatives won a sweeping majority countrywide but lost more than half their seats in Scotland after campaigning against a new independence vote.
"Scotland made it very clear last week it does not want a Tory government led by Boris Johnson, taking us out of the European Union," Sturgeon told reporters.
"That is the future we face if we do not have the opportunity to consider the alternative of independence." Scots voted ...

New Scottish independence vote 'unarguable': first minister

The president of sanctions-hit Iran called Thursday for Muslim countries to cooperate in fighting US "economic terrorism" at the opening of a summit aimed at tackling the Islamic world's woes.
Hundreds of delegates are attending the gathering in Malaysia -- including heads of state and religious leaders -- but the meeting has been snubbed by Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's holiest shrines.
The summit has also been criticised for undermining the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC), the Saudi-based global body representing Muslim nations and organisations.
Issues including the plight of Myanmar's Rohingya and China's mostly Muslim Uighur minority could be discussed, although, with massive Chinese infrastructure in many Islamic nations, criticism may be muted.
In opening remarks, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani slammed Washington's global clout.
"The American economic regime, and dollarisation of national and global economies, have provided the United States with the possibility of ...

Iran urges Muslim world to fight US 'economic terrorism'

Former prime minister Abdelmadjid Tebboune was sworn in as the new president of protest-hit Algeria on Thursday, a week after winning a widely boycotted election.
He succeeds veteran president Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who was forced from office in April in the face of mass demonstrations.
Tebboune must now address the grievances of the protesters, who have remained on the streets to prevent what they see as a ploy by the political elite to retain its hold on power.
The 74-year-old is seen as close to the armed forces chief, Ahmed Gaid Salah, who has been the North African country's effective ruler since Bouteflika quit.
He and other top brass attended the swearing-in ceremony alongside Tebboune's defeated rivals for the presidency.
While Tebboune's period as prime minister ended with his sacking by Bouteflika, protesters see the longtime regime insider as part of the same corrupt system that has ruled Algeria since independence in 1962 -- a system they want dismantled.
Following his ...

New president sworn in to lead protest-hit Algeria

Rumours of plans to build a crematorium triggered a violent protest in southern China this week, with protesters tossing petrol bombs, according to local authorities.
Such scenes are seldom seen in China, where authorities tightly control information and swiftly quell demonstrations, but the incident comes weeks after riot police reportedly used tear gas on angry demonstrators in the same region.
The fresh protests happened on Monday in Boyang town in southwestern Guangdong province, where police said "criminals threw petrol bombs and conducted the illegal offence of smashing and deliberately hurting national staff".
In a statement, police said the city's public security bureau was investigating and urged those involved with spreading the rumours to turn themselves in.
The clashes come just weeks after reports of riot police being called out to break up angry protests in the neighbouring town of Wenlou, around 27 kilometres (17 miles) from Boyang.
The plan to build the crematorium in .

Protesters in China throw petrol bombs over crematorium rumour

Burns suffered when a cup of hot coffee spilled on a plane passenger were the result of an accident for which the airline is liable, Europe's top court said Thursday.
In 2015, a six-year-old girl flying from Palma de Mallorca to Vienna was badly scalded when her father's coffee fell into her lap for unknown reasons.
The family demanded 8,500 euros ($9,465) from the now defunct Austrian carrier Niki Luftfahrt, which argued that a spill was not a "hazard typically associated with flight".
As such, it said, it was not covered as an accident under the Montreal Convention on international air transport.
But the court found otherwise.
"The concept of  'accident' at issue covers all situations occurring on board an aircraft in which an object used when serving passengers has caused bodily injury to a passenger, without it being necessary to examine whether those situations stem from a hazard typically associated with aviation," it ruled.

Airline liable for hot coffee spill, EU court rules

Three small explosions went off in a southern Rakhine town in Myanmar Thursday just before civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi landed there in a rare visit to the conflict-ridden state, a local official said.
The blasts happened in the normally quiet town of Manaung on an island off Myanmar's western coast where Suu Kyi was due to open a solar power plant.
"There were three explosions, but no casualties," Win Myint, spokesperson for Rakhine's regional government, told AFP.
He said it happened before Suu Kyi arrived, but since they were on the other side of town the event went ahead as planned and she had since left safely on a flight to Yangon.
"This has never happened in Manaung before." No group has yet claimed responsibility for planting the small bombs, which detonated at the side of a road, photos from local media showed.
The area has remained largely unscathed by unrest further north, where Myanmar's military is locked in an increasingly vicious conflict with the Arakan Army ...

Small blasts hit Rakhine town as Myanmar's Suu Kyi visits

The president of sanctions-hit Iran called Thursday for Muslim countries to cooperate in fighting US "economic terrorism" at the opening of a summit aimed at tackling the Islamic world's woes.
Hundreds of delegates are attending the gathering in Malaysia -- including heads of state and religious leaders -- but the meeting has been snubbed by Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's holiest shrines.
The summit has also been criticised for undermining the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC), the Saudi-based global body representing Muslim nations and organisations.
Issues including the plight of Myanmar's Rohingya and China's mostly Muslim Uighur minority could be discussed, although, with massive Chinese infrastructure in many Islamic nations, criticism may be muted.
In opening remarks, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani slammed Washington's global clout.
"American economic regime, and dollarisation of national and global economies, have provided the United States with the possibility of ...

Iran urges fight against US 'economic terrorism' at Muslim summit

President Vladimir Putin on Thursday insisted Russia's athletes should be allowed to compete under the Russian flag, despite a four-year ban handed down by the World Anti-Doping Agency from major sporting events over systematic violations.
"If WADA does not have any issues with our national Olympic committee our team must compete under its flag," Putin said during an annual end-of-year news conference, insisting that most of Russia's athletes were clean.
"Any punishment should be individual," he added.
"If a majority of our athletes are clean how is it possible to slap sanctions against them for someone else's actions?"
He reiterated his opinion that the WADA ban was politically motivated.
"The WADA decision contradicts the Olympic Charter," Putin added.
WADA this month banned Russia for four years from major global sporting events, including the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, over manipulated doping data.
Russia's anti-doping agency was set on Thursday to decide 

Putin says Russia must compete under flag at sports events

Sri Lanka's pace and spin attack restricted Pakistan to 171 for five at tea Thursday after dismissing the dangerous Babar Azam on the opening day of the second Test in Karachi.
Azam was well set after scoring his 13th half-century before left-arm spinner Lasith Embuldeniya had him stumped off a well-disguised delivery for 60.
Ebbuldeniya then removed Haris Sohail leg-before for nine at the stroke of tea to further hit Pakistan, who will now look to experienced batsman Asad Shafiq, unbeaten on 49, to better the score.
Mohammad Rizwan was the other batsman, on four.
Earlier, Sri Lanka left-arm pacer Vishwa Fernando dismissed opener Shan Masood for five and skipper Azhar Ali for a duck to rattle Pakistan, who won the toss on a greenish-brown National Stadium pitch.
Fernando's new-ball partner Lahiru Kumara dismissed first Test centurion Abid Ali for 38 to end a third-wicket partnership of 55, which had lifted Pakistan from a precarious 10 for two.
Fernando thought he had Azam leg-before .

Sri Lanka have Pakistan at 171-5 at tea in second Test

At a sprawling rehabilitation centre on the outskirts of Kabul, dozens of dazed-looking drug addicts clamber out of police buses and shuffle toward the facility.
The men, arrested on the streets of the Afghan capital, have been sent to a compulsory detox programme established to tackle an explosion in the use and production of highly addictive methamphetamine.
Almost unheard of in Afghanistan until a few years ago, meth's sudden appearance has blindsided authorities in a country already suffering from a crisis in opium and heroin addiction.
"My life has been ruined by addiction," said 25-year-old Sulaiman, one of the 40 or so men arriving at the treatment centre.
The physical impact of the drug -- known locally as "shisha", or glass -- is evident: Sulaiman's sunken eyes and hollow cheeks paint a picture of meth addiction familiar in many Western nations.
He says he got hooked while living in Iran several years ago. "I would do whatever it takes to get the drug, from labouring to ...

Meth boom adds to Afghanistan's opium and heroin woes

Japanese international Takumi Minamino signed for Champions League holders Liverpool on Thursday for a reported fee of 7.25 million pound from Austrian outfit Red Bull Salzburg, the Premier League leaders announced.
The 24-year-old forward -- who impressed Liverpool in their two Champions League group matches this season with the Austrian side -- is believed to have signed a four-and-a-half-year contract.
"Liverpool Football Club can confirm an agreement has been reached with Red Bull Salzburg for the transfer of Takumi Minamino," the club said in a statement on their website.
Minamino -- who scored in the 4-3 defeat by Liverpool at Anfield in October -- said it fulfilled a dream.
"It has been a dream, my dream to become a Liverpool player," he told Liverpool.com.
"And I'm so excited that the moment has come true.
"To play in the Premier League was one of my targets.
"I think this is the top-class league in the world; I was thinking if my career as a footballer progressed smoothly, ...

Japanese star Minamino signs for Liverpool

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday said "nobody knows" what causes climate change, appearing to cast doubt over whether global warming was of man-made origin and stating it may be due to cosmological processes.
"Nobody knows the origins of global climate change," Putin told reporters at the start of his marathon end-of-year news conference.
"We know that in the history of our Earth there have been periods of warming and cooling and it could depend on processes in the universe," he added.

Putin says 'nobody knows' causes of global climate change

Israeli warplanes attacked an arms plant in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip early Thursday, after Palestinian militants in the enclave fired a rocket at Israel,the army said.
"Overnight, a rocket was launched from the Gaza Strip at Israeli territory," an English-language army statement said.
"In response... fighter jets struck a Hamas weapons manufacturing site in the northern Gaza Strip." There were no immediate reports of casualties in the overnight rocket attack or the air strike that followed.
Later on Thursday, Israeli authorities announced a punitive reduction in the fishing zone off Gaza.
COGAT, a unit of Israel's defence ministry, said that in response to the latest rocket fire, "the Gaza Strip fishing zone has been reduced to 10 nautical miles until further notice." Israel constantly adjusts the fishing zone according to the level of tension around Gaza, sometimes allowing boats to fish up to 15 nautical miles offshore and at others restricting them to six or banning fishing .

Israel strikes Gaza after rocket attack: military

China's ambassador to Australia held a rare press conference Thursday to defend his government against charges of human rights abuses, espionage and political meddling which have frayed relations between the major trade partners.
Cheng Jingye held a rare press conference at Beijing's embassy in Canberra where he rejected reports that China has detained more than a million mostly Muslim Uighurs in northwest Xinjiang region as "utterly fake news".
He also denied recent allegations from current and former security officials that China has been involved in a vast campaign of espionage and political influence in Australia, saying such charges were "not well-founded".
Australia is reliant on China for trade, by far its biggest market for critical resource and commodities exports.
Cheng pushed back on international charges that China has detained more than a million Uighurs and other mostly Muslim ethnic minorities in reeducation camps in a drive to erase their culture.
"Uighurs in detention 

China envoy to Australia defends Uighur treatment

The masterminds of the Philippines' worst political massacre were found guilty Thursday of murdering 57 people, a rare conviction of powerful personalities in a country notorious for its culture of impunity.
Officials said the gunmen slaughtered 58 people a decade ago and dumped their bodies in pits as part of a mass killing, though only 57 bodies were recovered.
Leaders of the Ampatuan family, a powerful political dynasty, had been accused of orchestrating the killings in a bid to quash an election challenge from a rival clan.
Some 32 journalists were among those murdered on November 23, 2009, making the massacre also one of the worst ever of media workers.
A Manila court on Thursday found 43 people guilty as principals or accessories to 57 murders led by Andal Ampatuan Jnr, who had been planning to run for provincial governor against the rival.
As principal suspects, Ampatuan and 27 others -- including seven of his relatives -- were each sentenced to 30 years in jail without parole, 

Masterminds of Philippines' worst political massacre jailed

Sri Lanka pace bowler Vishwa Fernando took two wickets in three balls to leave Pakistan struggling at 72-3 on the opening day of the second Test in Karachi on Thursday.
The left-armer removed opener Shan Masood for five and skipper Azhar Ali without scoring in the seventh over after Pakistan won the toss and batted on a greenish-brown National Stadium pitch.
Fernando's new-ball partner Lahiru Kumara dismissed first Test centurion Abid Ali for 38 to end a third-wicket partnership of 55 which had lifted Pakistan from a precarious 10-2.
At the break, Babar Azam was not out 27 and Asad Shafiq on one.
Fernando gave Sri Lanka an early breakthrough as he angled one from Masood to hit his off stump before clean bowling skipper Azhar with a full-length delivery.
That left Azhar without a fifty in 13 innings, including nine scores of under 10.
Pakistan brought in leg-spinner Yasir Shah for paceman Usman Shinwari who has typhoid while left-arm spinner Lasith Embuldeniya came in for unfit medium .

Fernando's quickfire double reduces Pakistan to 72-3 at lunch

Australia set a record for its hottest day ever for a second straight day, with an average national temperature of 41.9 degrees Celsius (107.4 Fahrenheit), a full degree higher than the previous mark, officials said Thursday.
The Bureau of Meteorology said the new nationally averaged maximum was reached Wednesday, topping the 40.9 degrees hit Tuesday, which beat the previous record of 40.3 C in January 2013.
The heatwave has exacerbated an unprecedented, drought-fuelled series of bushfires ravaging large areas of Australia.

Australia beats hottest day record by full degree

Chinese, Japanese and South Korean leaders will discuss a potential free-trade deal and tensions over the North Korean nuclear issue when they meet in southern China next week, officials said Thursday.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang will host South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for the meeting in Chengdu on Tuesday.
The visiting leaders will also hold separate talks with President Xi Jinping, Chinese vice foreign minister Luo Zhaohui told reporters at a briefing.
The meeting of regional powers comes as tensions have risen between Washington and Pyongyang after North Korea carried out a series of rocket launches.
Nuclear talks between the North and the United States have been largely stalled since the collapse of a February summit in Hanoi between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Pyongyang has issued a year-end ultimatum, promising an ominous "Christmas gift" if Washington does not come up with some concessions.
China, an old 

AFP

AFP

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