ISIL 'using thousands as human shields' in Iraq's Mosul
Fears grow for Iraqi civilians held hostage near Mosul after mass execution of more than 200 people.
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant appears to be using tens of thousands of people as "human shields" in and around Mosul, where Iraqi forces are waging an offensive aimed at retaking the country's second biggest city.
The UN human rights office also said on Friday it received reports of more than 200 people being killed for refusing to follow orders from ISIL, also known as ISIS, or previously belonging to Iraqi security forces.
It said "credible reports" suggested ISIL had been forcing tens of thousands from their homes in districts around Mosul.
South Korea: president orders 10 staff members to resign amid worsening crisis
Park Geun-hye under investigation over claims she let an old friend and daughter of a religious cult leader interfere in important state affairsSaturday 29 October 2016 06.20 BST
South Korean President Park Geun-hye has ordered 10 of her senior secretaries to resign after she admitted letting an old friend and daughter of a religious cult leader to interfere in important state affairs.
The announcement by Park’s office came on the eve of large anti-government protests planned in Seoul on Saturday over the scandal that is likely to deepen the president’s lame duck status ahead of next year’s elections.
Park has been facing calls to reshuffle her office after she admitted on Tuesday that she provided longtime friend Choi Soon-sil drafts of her speeches for editing. Her televised apology sparked huge criticism about her mismanagement of national information and heavy-handed leadership style many see as lacking in transparency.Massacre of innocents: As Syria and Russia bombard eastern Aleppo children are also dying in the west of the city
As the world rightly decries the savagery committed in eastern Aleppo, in the west of the city there is also suffering as 'rebel' shells rain down, writes Robert Fisk
There is a problem with the story I am about to tell you. It is bloody. It is about the massacre of innocents – six of them, the youngest a little girl of two – blasted to death by shell fire in Aleppo.
Three of them were killed in their junior school, a teenage boy blown clean off the roof next to his classroom four stories down into the street where he lay in a pool of blood. The shrapnel tore into his friends and when I reached the school, I was walking across floors swamped with crimson liquid.
But reader, bare with me. For the problem with my grim – some might say gruesome – but certainly tragic report is that the victims were slaughtered by the guns of the ‘rebels’ of eastern Aleppo. These children were killed in western Aleppo, in the sector of the city held by the Syrian regime and its army. And that is why you will not know their names. The suffering of the survivors, one of the wounded child survivors, groaning in agony as a doctor picked a piece of metal from his face with a scalpel in the Al-Razi Hospital, will be quite unknown to you.
'Tired' of war, young South Sudanese artists form 'Ana Taban' movement
OBSERVERS
For much of its five-year existence, South Sudan has been torn apart by conflict and civil war. A group of young artists and creatives are tired of the situation. They’ve banded together to spread grassroots messages of peace, often in artistic ways.
Last summer, a group of South Sudanese people who work in creative fields planned a collaborative workshop to be held in July. Their country had achieved a fragile peace under a deal signed in August 2015 after three years of civil war between forces loyal to current President Salva Kiir and his former vice-president, Riek Machar, whom Kiir accused of plotting a coup. The artists were full of hope and eager to both exchange and create. However, to their horror, as the date grew closer, the situation in the country began to deteriorate. In July, violence between forces loyal to Machar and those loyal to the president broke out across the capital, Juba.
The artists had to move their workshop to Kenya, where they were welcomed by the Pawa 254, a hub for artists and activists.
Rohingya women raped, homes destroyed as Myanmar cracks down on militants
Bangkok: Myanmar security forces have shot scores of people, raped women, burnt the Koran and looted and burnt shops and houses in western Rakhine state in the biggest upsurge in violence against Rohingya Muslims in four years, according to multiple reports.
The United States and United Nations have voiced their concern and human rights groups are demanding a prompt impartial investigation into the escalating violence almost one year after the party of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi won power in the country also known as Burma.
The Myanmar Times has cited credible reports that dozens of Muslim women have been raped by security forces, including 30 in a single village. Some were as young as 16.Arrest of iconic “Afghan girl” highlights the never-ending suffering of Afghans
Updated by
Life doesn’t always have a happy ending. For the millions of Afghans who have suffered through more than four decades of war in their country, happy endings are rarer still.
The story of Sharbat Gula, the young Afghan refugee whose stunning green eyes and unforgiving gaze glared out at readers from the cover of the June 1985 issue of National Geographic, is a tragic case in point.
On Wednesday, Pakistani authorities arrested Gula, now in her 40s, on charges of fraudulently claiming Pakistani citizenship to obtain national identity cards for herself and two men who claimed to be her sons. She faces up to 14 years in prison if convicted.
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