More than a third of about 2,800 planned new dams are in protected areas, threatening rivers and biodiversity   Hydropower constructions have rocketed by 300% across the western Balkans in the last two years, according to a new analysis, sparking fears of disappearing mountain rivers and biodiversity loss. About 2,800 ...

Global brands suspend YouTube and Google advertising after it was placed alongside videos paedophiles exploited   Big brands are pulling advertising from YouTube and Google after their ads were found to be displayed against content being exploited by paedophiles. Despite YouTube promising to take an “even more aggressive stance” against ...

Pontiff’s arrival follows days after US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson accused state of carrying out ‘ethnic cleansing’ of persecuted minority   Pope Francis had landed in Yangon, the start of a delicate visit for the world’s most prominent Christian to majority-Buddhist Burma, which the United States has accused of “ethnic ...

President Sisi pledges extreme force in revenge for Egypt’s worst atrocity Egypt was reeling on Saturday from the worst atrocity it has suffered in recent years, with officials putting the death toll from the bomb and gun assault on a Sinai mosque at 305. The figure includes 27 children. A ...

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s three top leaders gathered Wednesday to celebrate the country’s 74th Independence Day, meeting for the first time since Prime Minister Saad Hariri announced his resignation earlier in the month. President Michel Aoun, Speaker Nabih Berri and Hariri assembled at Shafiq Wazzan Avenue in Beirut’s Central District, where military ...

BEIRUT: Pope Francis prayed for the stability of Lebanon during a mass held at the Vatican Sunday, the state-run National News Agency reported. As many as 6,000 people attended the mass at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican, during which Francis renewed his “appeal from the heart to the international ...

Zimbabwe’s ongoing crisis descended into outright chaos on Sunday after president Robert Mugabe failed to announce his resignation as widely expected in a national address on live television. Instead, in a rambling 30 minute address, Mugabe offered no concessions to his critics, the tens of thousands who marched calling for ...

  Soldiers and armoured cars block roads to government offices in Harare Zimbabwe’s military said it had seized power in a targeted assault on “criminals” around President Robert Mugabe who were causing social and economic suffering, but gave assurances the 93-year-old leader and his family were “safe and sound”. Zimbabwean ...

  NORTH Korea has warned that “nuclear war may break out at any moment” due to “reckless moves of aggression” from the US, the hermit kingdom has stated.   KCNA, Kim Jong-un’s state-controlled media mouthpiece, has launched a renewed threat of annihilation to the world in response to joint military ...

Rescuers battle to find survivors trapped under collapsed buildings after the 7.3 magnitude quake   More than 200 people have been killed in Iran and Iraq after a magnitude 7.3 earthquake hit the border region between the two countries, state media said. Iranian state television said that at least 200 ...