BRUSSELS – The European Union has approved the 15.6 billion-euro ($17 billion) acquisition of ailing French telecom company Alcatel-Lucent by Finland’s Nokia Corporation following an investigation into whether the deal broke competition rules. The EU’s executive Commission said Friday that there was enough difference between the two firms to not …
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BAGHDAD – Iraqi officials in Iraq’s western Anbar province say government forces have retaken Anbar University from the Islamic State militant group after hours of fierce clashes. Athal al-Fahdawi, a provincial councilman, says that Iraqi troops are in full control of the university, located 3 miles south of Anbar’s provincial …
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MADRID – The Spanish foreign ministry has summoned the Venezuelan ambassador to once again protest comments by Venezuela’s president against Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy. The ministry said in a statement it had expressed to Ambassador Mario Isea on Monday the government’s “dislike and rejection of the unacceptable insults made …
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CAIRO – Egyptian authorities say gunmen opened fire overnight on security forces out the Niger Embassy, killing a conscript and wounding three. The Interior Ministry statement, released Wednesday, said the shooting happened about 1 a.m. when the embassy in Cairo’s Giza district was closed. It described the attack as a …
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LONDON – A British teenager has been convicted of planning a gun and bomb attack at his former college, buying a semi-automatic handgun and ammunition online to carry out a massacre. A jury found Liam Lyburd guilty of amassing weapons to target northern England’s Newcastle College, which had expelled him …
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BERLIN – Switzerland’s president has hit back at a regional official’s call for less generous treatment of Eritrean asylum-seekers, saying that the European country can’t send them home. An official in Lucerne canton (state), Guido Graf, wrote to President Simonetta Sommaruga this week that three-quarters of applications in his region …
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ANKARA, Turkey – Turkey’s military says Kurdish rebels attacked a military outpost in southeast Turkey, triggering a clash that left a soldier and two militants dead. The military said rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK on Wednesday fired shots and rockets at the post near the mainly Kurdish …
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ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia – The African Union’s top official says Burundi’s recent violence shows there is a risk the country can slide into chaos with catastrophic consequences for the country and the surrounding region. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, chairwoman of the African Union Commission, reacted Sunday to the assassination the day before …
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DAKAR, Senegal – A Gambia union leader says a journalist detained by authorities now faces charges in High Court in the West African nation. Gambia Press Union secretary general Saikou Jammeh says Taranga FM Managing Director Alhagie Abdoulie Ceesay faces seven charges, including false publication with “intent to excite disaffection” …
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GENEVA – U.N. human rights officials say Sudanese security forces that were allegedly involved in killings, sexual violence and other abuses in Darfur last year have largely gone unpunished. The U.N. Human Rights Office, in a critical new report based on information from a joint U.N.-African Union operation in Darfur, …
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