Author: News Desk

UN Security Council members believe India and Pakistan should refrain from taking unilateral action over the disputed region of Jammu and Kashmir, China’s UN envoy said on Friday after the council met on the issue for the first time in decades. The 15-member council met behind closed doors at the request of China and Pakistan after India removed the decades-old autonomy the Muslim-majority territory of Jammu and Kashmir enjoyed under the Indian constitution. China rarely requests Security Council meetings. No statement issued While the council did not agree on a statement, China’s UN Ambassador Zhang Jun summed up the discussions,…

India’s defense minister hinted on Friday that New Delhi might change its “no first use” policy on nuclear weapons, amid heightened tensions with fellow atomic power Pakistan. India committed in 1999 to not be the first to use nuclear weapons in any conflict. Among India’s neighbors, China has a similar doctrine but arch-rival Pakistan does not. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh commented on Twitter after visiting Pokhran, the site of India’s successful nuclear tests in 1998 under then prime minister Atal Vajpayee. “Pokhran is the area which witnessed [Vajpayee’s] firm resolve to make India a nuclear power and yet remain firmly…

A 36-year-old businessman allegedly shot dead his parents, wife and son before killing himself near Bandipur in the south Indian state of Karnataka, police said on Friday. “Omprakash and his four-member family appear to have entered into a suicide pact, unable to bear the harassment of debtors and the burden of mounting losses from his businesses, including a call center, real estate and mining at Mysuru and Bengaluru,” Chamarajanagar Superintendent of Police H.D. Anand Kumar told IANS on phone. Bandipur is 220km southwest of Bengaluru on the way to popular hill station Ooty in Tamil Nadu. Citing a preliminary report…

Among Mumbai’s glitziest society events over the past year were two weddings in the family of Mukesh Ambani, the Indian tycoon who in 2018 became Asia’s richest person. In December, his 27-year-old daughter Isha got married in a Bollywood-style extravaganza attended by global power brokers and titans of finance. Beyonce sang at the festivities, Hillary Clinton flew in and KKR & Co.’s Henry Kravis made an appearance. In March, her twin brother Akash wed in a ceremony attended by the likes of Google Chief Executive Officer Sundar Pichai. The lavish events put Ambani’s eldest children in a very public spotlight…

Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi on Saturday termed Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s statement over a possible change in its “no first use” nuclear policy as a “damning reminder of India’s unbridled thirst for violence”. In a post on Twitter, Rajnath Singh said on Friday that while India had remained firmly committed to the doctrine of “no first use”, what would happen in the future would depend on circumstances. Responding to the remark, Qureshi said in a tweet: “Another damning reminder of India’s unbridled thirst for violence. Contrast to Pakistan’s aggressive efforts to galvanize diplomacy as the UN Security…

A 33-year-old man in India’s Jharkhand state has modified a scrapped motorcycle into a low-cost tractor tiller, using his experience as a two-wheeler mechanic. Mahesh Karmali, a resident of Uncha Ghana village in Hazaribagh, some 40km from the district headquarters town, was employed by the Baja Auto Showroom at Pune in Maharashtra until January this year but financial troubles in the company left him suddenly jobless. The Grade VI dropout returned to his village, hoping to engage in farming as a way of eking out a living for his family. The jobless man, however, was shocked when he was told…

A drone attack launched by Yemen’s Houthi group on an oil field in eastern Saudi Arabia on Saturday caused a “limited” fire at a gas plant but had no impact on oil production, state-run oil company Saudi Aramco said. A Houthi military spokesman said earlier on Saturday that the group had targeted the Shaybah oil field with 10 drones, in what he said was the “biggest attack in the depths” of the kingdom, the world’s top oil exporter, by the Iran-aligned group. But a Saudi industry source told Reuters the attack most probably involved only three drones and caused no…

Sudan’s main opposition coalition and the ruling military council on Saturday signed a final power-sharing agreement, paving the way for a transitional government following the overthrow of longtime leader Omar al-Bashir. Stability in Sudan, which has been grappling with an economic crisis, is seen as crucial for a volatile region struggling with conflict and insurgencies from the Horn of Africa to Egypt and Libya. The Transitional Military Council (TMC) has ruled Sudan since April when the military ousted Bashir following months of protests against his rule during which dozens of demonstrators were killed. Bashir is wanted for war crimes in…

The U.S. Commerce Department is expected to extend a reprieve given to Huawei Technologies that permit the Chinese firm to buy supplies from U.S. companies so that it can service existing customers, two sources familiar with the situation said. The “temporary general license” will be extended for Huawei for 90 days, the sources said. Commerce initially allowed Huawei to purchase some American-made goods in May shortly after blacklisting the company in a move aimed at minimizing disruption for its customers, many of which operate networks in rural America. An extension will renew an agreement set to lapse on August 19,…

The United States has issued a warrant to seize an Iranian oil tanker caught in the standoff between Tehran and the West in the last-ditch effort to prevent the vessel from leaving Gibraltar. The Grace 1 was seized by British Royal Marines at the western mouth of the Mediterranean on July 4 on suspicion of violating European Union sanctions by taking oil to Syria. Gibraltar lifted the detention order on Thursday after the British territory’s chief minister said he had secured written assurances from Tehran that the cargo would not go to Syria. But with the vessel and its 2.1…