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Baghdad, Sep 19 (IANS) Seven Islamic State (IS) militants and a member of government-backed paramilitary Hashd Shaabi forces were killed on Sunday in a clash in Iraq's northern province of Nineveh, the media office of Hashd Shaabi forces said in a statement.

Hashd Shaabi fighters clashed with IS militants hiding in a tunnel in the al-Hatra desert southwest of Mosul, capital of Nineveh Province, Xinhua news agency reported, citing the statement.

The clash resulted in the killing of seven IS militants inside the tunnel, the statement said, adding a Hashd Shaabi member was also killed and eight others wounded after two suicide bombers blew up their explosive belts in an attempt to storm the tunnel.

Meanwhile, Yahia Rasoul, spokesman of the commander-in-chief of the Iraqi forces, said in a statement that the army's helicopter gunships destroyed a vehicle and killed three IS militants aboard during reconnaissance and search operations in Nineveh.

Over the past months, Iraqi security forces have conducted operations against extremist militants to crack down on their intensified activities.

The security situation in Iraq has been improving since the defeat of the IS in 2017. However, its remnants have since melted into urban centers, deserts, and rugged areas, carrying out frequent guerilla attacks against security forces and civilians.

--IANS
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Budapest, Sep 19 (IANS) The Hungarian government is committed to fulfilling its promises made to the European Commission (EC) in order to gain access to billions of euros of European Union (EU) funds, Tibor Navracsics, Minister of Regional Development and Utilization of EU Funds, told a press conference on Sunday.

"The government has no intention of failing to fulfill the commitments it has made," Navracsics said, following the EC's earlier decision on Sunday, Xinhua news agency reported.

Earlier on Sunday, the EC proposed suspending 7.5 billion euros in financing for Hungary, until the implementation of anti-corruption reforms from the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban. The Hungarian government is expected to inform the committee by November 19 about the implementation of the promised changes.

At the press conference, Navracsics explained that the negotiations phase of the conditionality procedure with the EC have been concluded, and the organization has accepted the anti-corruption commitments of the Hungarian government.

"This means that new aspects and new expectations cannot arise from the EC, now we have to execute what we have vowed to do," he told journalists.

"The commission has doubts about whether the Hungarian cabinet will implement its commitments, but it is absolutely certain that we will implement them, so I will not focus on the possible financial sanctions," he said.

Navracsics added that the EC would monitor closely the implementation of the Hungarian government's undertakings, in order to avoid a situation like the one that arose between Poland and the EC regarding the withdrawal of funds.

"So we will continue to consult with the commission in the future, I will fly out to Brussels on Wednesday for instance," he underlined.

The Hungarian government promised the setting up of an independent anti-corruption institution to monitor the use of EU funds as well as steps to make the legislative process more transparent.

"The government made a total of 17 promises, and some bills have already been submitted to the parliament, while others will follow next Monday and Friday," Navracsics said.

Earlier Sunday, Justice Minister Judit Varga reacted to the commission's proposal by saying that "we still have work to do" to end the dispute, while insisting that "we are moving in the right direction."

"We are working to ensure that the Hungarian people receive the resources they are entitled to!" Varga posted on her Facebook page.

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Jerusalem, Sep 19 (IANS) Israel's cabinet has approved the establishment of an annual gathering of senior officials from the US and five Middle Eastern countries, namely Israel, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, Morocco and Egypt.

The decision "institutionalises" the work of the Negev Forum, a six-party meeting held in Sde Boker in southern Israel's Negev Desert in March 2022, said a statement issued by Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid's office.

The Negev Forum will act on the basis of six working multilateral groups in the fields of food security and water, energy, tourism, health, education and tolerance, and regional security, the office was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency reported.

Among the four Arab countries in the forum, the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco normalised ties with Israel in 2020, while Egypt was the first Arab country to sign a peace accord with Israel in 1979.

--IANS
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Abuja, Sep 19 (IANS) The death toll of Lassa fever in Nigeria this year has risen to 171, despite measures by the government to reduce infections across the country, the Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC) said on Sunday.

In its latest Lassa fever situation report, the NCDC said there have been a total of 917 confirmed cases, with 6,660 suspected cases recorded since the beginning of the year. In the week from September 5 to 11 alone, eight new confirmed cases and one death were recorded, Xinhua news agency reported.

So far, 25 states have recorded at least one confirmed case across 102 out of the 774 local government areas in the most populous African country, the public health agency said.

With the death toll rising to 171, the NCDC said the case fatality rate was 18.6 percent, lower than that for the same period last year, which was 23.3 per cent.

The disease control center said the predominant age group affected is 21-30 years, with the male-to-female ratio for confirmed cases being 1:0.8.

According to the World Health Organization, Lassa fever is an acute viral hemorrhagic illness caused by the Lassa virus, a member of the arenavirus family of viruses. Humans usually become infected with the Lassa virus through exposure to food or household items contaminated with urine or feces of infected Mastomys rats. The disease is endemic in the rodent population in parts of West Africa.

In some cases, Lassa fever has similar symptoms to malaria, appearing between one and three weeks after exposure to the virus. In mild cases, the disease causes fever, fatigue, weakness, and headache.

The NCDC said it remained committed to supporting state public health teams to achieve the goal of reducing the Lassa fever case fatality rate to a single digit.

The disease control agency said it is currently distributing medical response commodities to states and treatment centers as part of measures to control the spread of the disease.

--IANS
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Madrid, Sep 18 (IANS) China is carrying out illegal, transnational policing operations across five continents, targeting overseas critics of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) with harassment, threats against their families back home and "persuasion" techniques to get them to go back, according to a recent report.

Chinese police are currently running at least 54 "overseas police service centers" in foreign countries, some of which work with law enforcement back home to run operations on foreign soil, the report from Safeguard Defenders said, RFA reported.

Initially started as a pilot scheme by police in Qingtian county, Zhejiang province, in 2019, the overseas stations were ostensibly set up to help Chinese nationals overseas with administrative tasks, the report said.

"But they also serve a far more sinister and wholly illegal purpose. Some official anecdotes of official operations explicitly cite the active involvement of Hometown Associations on the ground in tracking and pursuing targets indicated by [police or public prosecutors in China]," the report said.

Hometown Associations are community based groups of people from the same town in China, and are connected to the hierarchy of the CCP's United Front Work Department, which runs outreach and influence operations both in China and overseas, RFA reported.

One of the key operations the service centers are involved in is the "persuasion to return" process, in which pressure is brought to bear on activists overseas using threats and retaliation against their loved ones back in China.

"In the mere 15 months between April 2021 and July 2022 alone, a staggering 230,000 Chinese nationals were returned to face potential criminal charges in China through these methods, which often include threats and harassment to family members back home or directly to the target abroad either through online or physical means," Safeguard Defenders said.

The "persuasion to return" campaign was rolled out as a pilot project across 10 provinces in 2018, and official guidelines include denying targets' children the right to education in China, or targeting their family members for harassment.

"The combination of an absolute absence of minimal judicial safeguards for the target and the association by guilt methods employed on their families, as well as the illegal methods adopted to circumvent official international cooperation mechanisms and the use of United Front Work-related organizations abroad to aid in such efforts, pose a most grave risk to the international rule of law and territorial sovereignty," the report found, RFA reported.

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London, Sep 18 (IANS) Pakistan Defence Minister Khawaja Asif has said that the Defence Ministry and the General Headquarters (GHQ) will consult on the appointment of the next chief of army staff (COAS) by October end and the decision will be made soon, media reports said.

Asif was speaking at Nawaz Sharif's London residence where he arrived accompanying Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Samaa TV reported.

The ruling PML-N leadership at a party meeting is expected to hold a consultation over the key appointment as Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa is set to retire on November 29, according to the report.

Asif said that the appointment of the next Chief of Army Staff (COAS) is a routine matter and it is the first time in history that Imran Khan is raising a ‘hue and cry' over the issue.

Imran Khan has proposed to postpone the appointment until after the general elections and grant an extension [to Gen Bajwa], Asif said.

The date of appointment is over two months away, he said, adding that only Imran Khan is worried about the appointment and raising a hue and cry.

Shehbaz Sharif, who is enroute New York for the UN General Assembly session, has arrived in London where the ruling PML-N is holding a party meeting to finalise some key decisions, including the one on the appointment of the next COAS, Samaa TV reported.

The Prime Minister and his entourage landed at the Luton airport where he was received by Pakistan Ambassador to the UK, Moazam Ali Khan. He then left for London accompanied by federal ministers Marriyum Aurangzeb and Khawaja Asif.

During the PML-N meeting under Nawaz Sharif, consultations will be held on the key November decision while the no-confidence motion in Punjab will also be discussed, Samaa TV reported.

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Beirut, Sep 18 (IANS) Lebanon has started implementing its plan to return 15,000 Syrian refugees monthly to their homeland, Elnashra news website reported.

Syrian refugees wishing to return home will be transported by the buses sent by the Syrian government, according to Elnashra on Saturday.

The process will take place in cooperation with the Lebanese General Security Directorate and the Lebanese Red Cross, which will escort them to the Masna'a crossing between Lebanon and Syria under the supervision of the UN Refugee Agency, Xinhua news agency reported.

The first convoy plans to depart in 10 days, according to Elnashra.

"If no obstacles rise, the Lebanese General Security Directorate can organise the return of 200,000 Syrians within approximately a year," it added.

On July 4, Lebanese Minister of the Displaced, Issam Charafeddine announced that the Lebanese government would secure the return of 15,000 displaced Syrians monthly to their homeland.

Lebanese authorities said Lebanon would implement its plan regardless of the international position on this matter as the presence of a significant number of refugees weighs heavily on the country's economy which is already mired in an unprecedented crisis.

Lebanon hosts the world's largest number of refugees per capita, with a government estimate of the Syrian refugees in the country at 1.5 million.

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Damascus, Sep 18 (IANS) Israel has carried out 25 missile strikes inside Syria in 2022, killing 27 government soldiers and injuring 23 civilians, a war monitor reported.

The Israeli attacks destroyed about 73 targets, including buildings, warehouses, headquarters and vehicles, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Saturday.

The injured include a girl and at least three women, the Britain-based watchdog added.

The report comes just hours after an Israeli midnight missile strike on the airport of the capital Damascus and military sites south of the capital, killing five soldiers, Xinhua news agency reported.

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Johannesburg, Sep 18 (IANS) Four cases of avian flu or bird flu were confirmed among the endangered penguins at Boulders Penguin Colony in Cape Town, News24, a local news website reported, citing a clinical veterinarian.

As of Friday, there had been four confirmed cases and another seven suspected cases, said Table Mountain National Park (TMNP) management.

Once seabirds show symptoms of bird flu, they usually die soon afterward, News24 reported on Saturday, quoting David Roberts, a clinical veterinarian at the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (Sanccob) as saying.

The flu strain is the same as the one detected in seabirds in the Western Cape last year. That outbreak saw thousands of birds die in vulnerable colonies. Now, conservationists worry the same fate could await the endangered penguins, if no quick action is taken.

Roberts said that it could also pose a significant risk to breeding colonies if there is an outbreak in endangered species like the African Penguin, Cape Cormorant and Cape Gannet, Xinhua news agency reported.

The outbreak of bird flu in 2021 killed an estimated 230 African penguins, he added.

"At the peak of the outbreak, more than 500 affected birds were collected per day. The population-level effect was of an unprecedented scale, and nearly 15 per cent of the South African population of Cape cormorants died from avian influenza in less than four months," he said.

The outbreak devastated the endangered Cape cormorant population in the Western Cape, resulting in the deaths of 24,000 birds. The worst-affected area was Dyer Island off Gansbaai, home to a Cape cormorant breeding colony.

According to Roberts, the actual number of deaths was likely to be far higher. Before the outbreak, there were an estimated 57,000 Cape cormorant breeding pairs in South Africa. However, the population had dropped by 50 per cent over the last 30 years.

Bird flu refers to the disease caused by infection with avian (bird) influenza virus. Strains of the influenza virus primarily infect birds.

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Dakar, Sep 18 (IANS) Senegalese President Macky Sall appointed a new Prime Minister, a position he abolished in 2019 and reinstated in 2021.

According to a presidential decree, the Inspector of taxes and domains Amadou Ba was appointed the Prime Minister and he received instructions to form a cabinet during Saturday.

Aged 61, the new Prime Minister was Minister of Economy and Finance (2013-2019) under the regime of Macky Sall, then Minister of Foreign Affairs and Senegalese Abroad (2019-2020), Xinhua news agency reported.

In place since November 2020, the outgoing government had 33 Ministers and four Secretaries of State.

--IANS
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