Middle East & North Africa

CAIRO, July 18 (Xinhua) -- The Egyptian parliament is expected to hold a meeting this week to discuss the political and military situation in neighboring war-torn Libya, state-run Ahram Online news website reported.

The discussion is to be followed by a vote to mandate President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi to intervene militarily in Libya to help defend the western neighbor against Turkish interventions.

On Thursday, President Sisi vowed that his country will not stand idle in the face of any direct threats to the security of Egypt and Libya.

19 July 2020; MEMO: Member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Washington and Baghdad, renewed their full support for the project to link GCC and Iraqi power grids, and invited participants of the International Conference for Reconstruction of Iraq to fulfil their pledg

Iran has sent the black boxes from a Ukrainian airliner that it had accidentally downed in January to France for analysis, a Foreign Ministry official said on Saturday.

Some 176 people were killed when the Revolutionary Guards, Iran’s most powerful military force, fired missiles at the Ukraine International Airlines mistaking it for a hostile target while on high alert during a confrontation with the United States.

DAMASCUS, July 18 (Xinhua) -- One person was killed and another wounded in an explosion in Syrian capital Damascus on Saturday evening, state news agency SANA reported.

The explosion was caused by two explosive devices that went off in the Nahr Aisha area in Damascus.

The bombings happened as the country is bracing for parliamentary elections due on Sunday.

The capital has remained relatively calm since the army dislodged rebels from the eastern countryside of Damascus in 2018.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A United Nations agency acknowledged Sunday that a U.S.-sought oil tanker “hijacked” off the coast of the United Arab Emirates after allegedly smuggling Iranian crude oil is back in Iranian waters.

The International Labor Organization said that the MT Gulf Sky was hijacked July 5, citing its captain. That mirrors earlier reporting by The Associated Press.

“The vessel was taken to Iran,” the ILO said.

19 July 2020; MEMO: Yemen’s Houthi rebel group on Saturday accused UN envoy Martin Griffiths of prolonging the conflict in war-torn Yemen, reports Anadolu Agency.

"From his recent speech, it has become clear that the UN envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths has broken away from neutrality and fairness that his mission requires. Griffiths became involved with the forces of aggression against Yemen, adopting their position completely,"

19 July 2020; MEMO: Iranian health officials sought on Sunday to play down the president’s estimate that some 25 million people have been infected with the coronavirus, saying it was based on serological blood tests that measure exposure to the illness and that cannot be relied on to show the current state of disease, reports Reuters.

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Syrians headed to polling stations in government-held parts of the war-torn country on Sunday to elect a new parliament amid strict health measures to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

The vote is the third to take place in Syria since the conflict began in March 2011. It has killed more than 400,000, displaced half the country’s population and sent more than five million as refugees mostly into neighboring countries.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s corruption trial will resume in earnest in January, with thrice-weekly evidentiary hearings set to begin then, a Jerusalem court decided Sunday.

RIYADH, July 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) — G20 finance ministers and central bankers are set to hold talks Saturday aimed at spurring global economic recovery from a coronavirus-triggered recession amid growing calls to widen debt relief for crisis-hit poor countries.

The virtual talks, hosted by Saudi Arabia, come as the surging pandemic continues to batter the global economy and campaigners warn of a looming debt crisis across poverty-wracked developing nations.