Middle East & North Africa

NABLUS, West Bank (AP) — Israeli forces raided a stronghold of an armed group in the occupied West Bank’s second largest city, blowing up an explosives lab and engaging in a firefight, the military said Tuesday. Five Palestinians were killed and 20 were wounded, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

The overnight raid in the old city, or kasbah, of Nablus, was one of the deadliest in the West Bank in 2022 and comes at a time of escalating tensions.

Television footage showed flames and smoke rising in the night sky over Nablus.

TEHRAN, Oct 24 (NNN-IRNA) – Iran signed a contract with Russia, to export 40 homegrown gas turbines to the country, Shana News Agency, affiliated to the Iranian oil ministry, reported.

Iran is now capable of meeting 85 percent of its domestic needs for gas equipment and facilities, and its gas production has doubled despite the severe U.S. sanctions, Shana quoted Reza Noshadi, head of Iran Gas Engineering and Development Company, as saying.

Iran and Russia have in recent years expanded their cooperation in different areas.

RIYADH, Oct 24 (NNN-SPA) – Saudi Arabian Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, launched yesterday, the Global Supply Chain Resilience Initiative.

It aims to make Saudi Arabia a preferred location for leading global industrial companies, and to attract 40 billion Saudi riyals (10.64 billion U.S. dollars) of quality, industrial and service investments in global supply chains.

DUBAI, Oct 24 (Reuters) - Iran will not remain indifferent if it is proven that its drones are being used by Russia in the Ukraine war, the Iranian foreign minister said on Monday, amid allegations the Islamic Republic has supplied drones to Moscow to attack Ukraine.

"If it is proven to us that Iranian drones are being used in the Ukraine war against people, we should not remain indifferent," state media cited Hossein Amirabdollahian as saying.

However, Amirabdollahian said defence cooperation between Tehran and Moscow will continue.

ANKARA, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- Turkish prosecutors on Monday issued an arrest warrant for 11 suspects allegedly operating within the ranks of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the umbrella group of the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front, the state-run TRT broadcaster reported.

The Turkish police had detained nine of the suspects and continued to seek the others, the TRT reported.

TEHRAN, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- Major Iranian car manufacturers have seen sales growth over the past months despite U.S. sanctions.

Iran Khodro (IKCO), Saipa Automotive Group and Pars Khodro, three Iranian major automakers, have sold about 536,000 units of various products during the first half of the current Iranian year, which started on March 20, Iranian Donya-e-Eqtesad daily recently reported.

According to the report, the sales of these car manufacturers increased by about 26 percent compared to the same period in the previous year.

Dubai, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES (AP) — In nearly every corner of the globe, people are spending more on food and fuel, rent and transportation.

But inflation isn’t affecting people equally. For migrants with relatives relying on money they send back, higher prices are pinching families twice: at home and abroad.

Bhind, Oct 23 (PTI) The body of a 16-year-old Dalit girl, who was allegedly kidnapped from her village four days back, was found in a field in Madhya Pradesh's Guna district on Sunday, police said.

According to police, the girl died under mysterious circumstances though the exact cause will be known after postmortem.

The class 11 student was allegedly kidnapped when she was returning from school on October 19. Based on a complaint lodged by her grandfather, police had registered a kidnapping case against an unidentified person.

21 October 2022; MEMO: Social media companies are unlikely to fully abide by Turkiye's new law requiring them to remove "disinformation" content and share user data with authorities, analysts say, raising the spectre of possible platform disruptions before elections next year.

23 October 2022; MEMO: A delegation from Finland will visit Turkiye next Tuesday to hold technical talks on the extradition of accused terrorists sought by Ankara, as stipulated in a recent treaty, reports Anadolu Agency.

Finnish Justice Ministry officials will meet in the capital Ankara with a delegation headed by Kasim Cicek, director general of foreign relations and the European Union at the Turkish Justice Ministry.