Browsing: International

China’s navy commissioned 17 new warships last year, the most of any nation. In a little more than a decade, it’s expected to have three aircraft carriers, giving it more clout than ever in a region of contested seas and festering territorial disputes.

Ukraine’s interim authorities on Thursday accused fugitive President Viktor Yanukovych of ordering snipers to open fire on protesters and getting help from Russian security agents to battle his own people, but they provided no evidence directly linking him to the bloodbath in Kiev that left more than 100 people dead.

NATO foreign ministers moved Tuesday to beef up the defenses of front-line alliance members feeling menaced by a more assertive Russia, with Secretary of State John Kerry proclaiming the U.S. commitment to their security is “unwavering.”

Relatives shrieked and sobbed uncontrollably. Men and women nearly collapsed, held up by loved ones. Their grief came pouring out after 17 days of waiting for definitive word on the fate of the passengers and crew of the missing Malaysia Airlines jet.

The plane must be somewhere. But the same can be said for Amelia Earhart’s. Ten days after Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared with 239 people aboard, an exhaustive international search has produced no sign of the Boeing 777, raising an unsettling question: What if the airplane is never found?

Meteor showers, terrorism, pilot suicide, alien invasion — countless theories have surfaced surrounding the Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 that lost contact with air traffic controllers on March 8. The unexplained disappearance of this Boeing 777 aircraft, which was headed to Beijing, has dumbfounded both airline officials and the rest of the world.

In a gilded Kremlin hall used by czars, Vladimir Putin redrew Russia’s borders Tuesday by declaring the Crimean Peninsula part of the motherland — provoking a surge of emotion among Russians who lament the loss of empire and denunciations from Western leaders who called Putin a threat to the world.

MOSCOW — Stepping back from the brink of war, Vladimir Putin talked tough but cooled tensions in the Ukraine crisis Tuesday, saying Russia has no intention “to fight the Ukrainian people” but reserves the right to use force.

Dr. Sergiy Kudelia of Ukraine is an assistant professor in the political science department. Kudelia has done research in political regimes, revolutions, insurgency and counterinsurgency. He also teaches a class on the government and politics of Russia. He shared some of his thoughts on the Ukrainian conflict.

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration signaled Monday it no longer recognizes Viktor Yanukovych as Ukraine’s president. The shift of support for opposition leaders in Kiev came even as U.S. officials sought to assure Russia that it does not have to be shut out of a future relationship with a new Ukrainian government.

President Barack Obama on Wednesday urged Ukraine to avoid violence against peaceful protesters or face consequences, as the United States considered joining European partners to impose sanctions aimed at ending deadly street clashes that are sparking fears of civil war.

The winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia has been creating a lot of buzz lately – seemingly about anything but the Olympic events. From terrorist threats and government spending to the Sochi Problems Twitter account, the amount of media coverage on the Olympics can be confusing. Assistant professor for the political science department in the school of arts and sciences, Dr. Sergiy Kudelia teaches a class on terrorism and will teach a government and politics of Russia class in the fall.

WASHINGTON — The weather is warm at this year’s Winter Olympics in Sochi, yet U.S.-Russian relations are still in the deep freeze. Back in 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton gave Russia’s top diplomat a red button labeled “reset” to
symbolize how U.S. relations had thawed — even though it was mistranslated into Russian.

Protesters in cities around the world targeted major Olympic sponsors Wednesday, just ahead of the Winter Games in Sochi, urging them to speak out against Russia’s law restricting gay-rights activities. Two more sponsors of the U.S. Olympic team condemned the law, but leading global sponsors did not join them.

CAIRO — Al-Qaida’s central leadership broke with one of its most powerful branch commanders in an apparent attempt to stem the deadly infighting that has erupted in Syria among the militant Islamic factions trying to bring down President Bashar Assad.

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Gaza’s tiny movie industry may struggle with amateur actors and power outages, but at least it has a winning formula of which the producers never seem to tire: the heroics, from a Palestinian perspective, of those fighting Israeli occupation.

President Ken Starr and Tom Farr of Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs met the pope with about 60 scholars and journalists participating in a two-day conference on Christianity and freedom in Rome last month.

South Africa’s first black president spent nearly a third of his life as a prisoner of apartheid, yet he sought to win over its defeated guardians in a relatively peaceful transition of power that inspired the world.

As head of state, the former boxer, lawyer and inmate lunched with the prosecutor who argued successfully for his incarceration.

Nelson Mandela, who became one of the world’s most beloved statesmen and a colossus of the 20th century when he emerged from 27 years in prison to negotiate an end to white minority rule in South Africa, has died. He was 95.

South African President Jacob Zuma made the announcement at a news conference late Thursday, saying “we’ve lost our greatest son.”

Thousands of typhoon survivors swarmed the airport here on Tuesday seeking a flight out, but only a few hundred made it, leaving behind a shattered, rain-lashed city short of food and water and littered with countless bodies.

Four days after Typhoon Haiyan struck the eastern Philippines, assistance is only just beginning to arrive. Authorities estimated the storm killed 10,000 or more across a vast swath of the country, and displaced around 660,000 others.

There’s a definite something about that time of year for last harvests. When the greens are all gold, save the winter grass at pasture. And heartier vegetables, namely of the squash variety, grace the kitchen in pies and casseroles. The time of year signifies a bounty unique to its own. It’s not at all like the first harvest in mid- to late June — plump and sweet and bright.

Mulenga Chella said it was God’s plan for him to go prison.

In 2006, Chella, a master of divinity student at George W. Truett Theological Seminary, was imprisoned in Tanzania, directly north of his home country in Zambia. He spent two years in prison and was released in October 2008.