Three grain shipments to leave Ukraine Friday: Turkey

Three more ships filled with grain will sail from Ukraine on Friday under a UN-backed deal lifting Russia’s blockade of the Black Sea, Turkey’s defence minister said. “It is planned that three ships will set sail tomorrow from Ukraine,” the Anadolu sta…

US urges Yemen’s Houthis to release embassy, UN staff

Yemen’s Houthi movement continues to hold 12 current and former employees of the United States and United Nations, a US official said on Thursday, calling on the group to release them in “a demonstration of good faith”. The United States said in Novemb…

More than 200,000 Yazidis still displaced in Iraq: UN

Eight years on since the Islamic State militant group’s massacres of Yazidis, more than 200,000 survivors are still displaced from their homes in Iraq, the United Nations said Thursday. The needs of displaced persons living in and outside camps, and re…

Blue Origin sends first Egyptian national to space

Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin on Thursday launched six people to space, including the first from Egypt and Portugal, on the company’s sixth crewed flight. Mission “N-22” saw the New Shepard suborbital rocket blast off around 8:58 am local time (1358 GMT) fro…

Four US cops charged over Breonna Taylor death

The US Justice Department charged four police officers on Thursday over the death of Breonna Taylor, a Black woman killed in a botched 2020 raid on her home in Louisville, Kentucky. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the officers face federal charge…