Suwayda is well-equipped for protests. The central square of the city, home to one of Syria’s larger minority communities, hosts the crowds of weekly – or sometimes even daily – demonstrators calling for the representation and public services they have demanded for years. Long before the fall last month of the regime of Bashar al-Assad,…
An avalanche in the French Alps has killed four Norwegian skiers who were swept away by an off-piste torrent of snow and ice in the southeastern Savoie region. Also on Wednesday, a separate avalanche near Chamonix, in the Haute-Savoie region, killed a Swiss skier, according to the public prosecutor’s office in Bonneville. The Norwegian victims…
Rescue workers in Japan are battling water leaks, gas pipes and unstable ground as they attempt to reach a man whose truck fell into a sinkhole near Tokyo two days ago. The hole, which is reportedly 10 metres across and 10 metres deep, opened up at an intersection in Yashio, Saitama prefecture, on Tuesday morning,…
The head of the NHS in England is under fresh fire after a second influential group of MPs in barely 12 hours accused her of lacking the “drive and dynamism” to radically reform the service. The cross-party Commons health and social care committee criticised Amanda Pritchard, the chief executive of NHS England, after taking detailed…
At least 30 people have been killed and scores injured in crowd crushes at the Kumbh Mela festival, Indian police have confirmed, as vast numbers of people went to bathe at one of the holiest sites of the Hindu gathering. Tens of millions of people flocked to the northern state of Uttar Pradesh to immerse…
The former leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Islamist rebel group which led the military operation to topple the former president of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, last month, has been appointed president of Syria for a “transitional period”. The appointment of Ahmed al-Sharaa, who has been acting as the de-facto leader of the country since…