Middle East & North Africa

TUNIS, Feb. 19 (Xinhua) -- Tunisian Prime Minister-designate Elyes Fakhfakh has just announced on Wednesday evening the final lineup of his proposed government, said the Tunisian presidency.

The new cabinet is composed of 30 ministers and two secretaries of state.

Fakhfakh's government included 17 independents between ministers and secretaries of state while the rest is divided between six political parties, obviously represented in parliament.

TEHRAN, Feb. 19 (Xinhua) -- Nearly 58 million Iranians are eligible to vote in the parliamentary elections scheduled for Friday, the head of the election headquarters said Wednesday.

"A total of 57,918,000 Iranians are eligible to vote in the upcoming election, of whom 28.8 million are women," Jamal Orf said at a press conference.

And 2.9 million are potential first-time voters, he added.

Only those aged 18 and over are eligible to vote in Iran since January 2007.

ANKARA, February 19. /TASS/: Turkey’s new military operation in the Syrian province of Idlib is only a matter of time, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said, addressing the members of his party in the country’s parliament on Wednesday.

"Turkey has completed preparations for the implementation of its plan on Idlib, just like we did with previous operations. Frankly speaking, an operation in Idlib is only a matter of time. Turkey won’t leave Idlib to the devices of the [Assad] regime," Erdogan pointed out.

19 Feb 2020; MEMO: Tunisian President Kais Saied announced yesterday, Monday, that he would call for early elections and dissolve parliament if the deputies rejected the government of Prime Minister-designate Elyes Fakhfakh after Ennahdha party refused to recognise it.

Fakhfakh revealed on Saturday his government’s components, which quickly collided with the obstacle of Ennahdha’s announcement that it rejected it and withdrew from it.

19 Feb 2020; MEMO: A UN report stated that 45,000 displaced children in Iraq lack personal identification documents and that many of them do not receive education two years after the defeat of Daesh.

The report issued by the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) indicated that about 45,000 displaced children are living in the camps, who lack personal identification documents, reported the Anadolu Agency.

19 Feb 2020; MEMO: The Israeli parliament, the Knesset, granted immunity on Monday to former Labour, Social Affairs and Social Services Minister Haim Katz who is facing a trial over corruption charges, Quds Press has reported.

Katz is a member of the Likud, the party led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has himself been indicted on fraud and corruption charges.

19 Feb 2020; MEMO: The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights revealed on Tuesday that Russian jet fighters have carried out more than 120 air strikes against Aleppo in just one week, Egypt’s Youm 7 newspaper has reported.

The rights group also said that Syrian regime forces have widened their operations in the rural areas surrounding the city. The regime forces, the group explained, fired rockets towards several areas targeted by the Russian jets.

19 Feb 2020; MEMO: Turkey’s foreign minister on Sunday said China should not label all Muslim ethnic Uyghurs as terrorists, following talks with his Chinese counterpart in Germany, AFP reported.

19 Feb 2020; MEMO: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is confident he can block the International Criminal Court (ICC) from launching an investigation into alleged war crimes committed by his country against the Palestinians in the occupied territories.

While Israel is not a signatory to the ICC, it has sought to undermine the efforts of the international body by lobbying governments friendly to the Zionist state to support its campaign to disrupt the court’s investigation.

ANKARA, Feb 19 (NNN-ANADOLU) – Turkish authorities issued detention orders for more than 700 suspects, linked to the group that is blamed by the Turkish government for the failed 2016 coup, local NTV reported.

There are 766 detention orders, along with operations for Gulen movement linked structures, in the Ministry of Justice and the Turkish Armed forces, NTV reported.