Middle East & North Africa

ANKARA; 10 Feb 2019; AA: Saudi Arabia’s efforts to cover up the case of slain journalist Khashoggi case further unraveled this week, according to The New York Times.

The latest demands for a reckoning “have come from American intelligence agencies, a United Nations investigator and a coalition of nongovernmental organizations, sources that in their diversity and breadth should serve notice on [Saudi Crown] Prince Mohammed [bin Salman] that all his oil wealth and powerful friends

RAMALLAH, 10 Feb 2019; AA: Palestinian group Fatah on Sunday decried calls by Israeli settlers for the assassination of President Mahmoud Abbas.

"The Israeli incitement is the result of the policy of hatred practiced by the Israeli government against the Palestinians," Fatah spokesman Osama al-Qawasmi said in a statement.

10 Feb 2019; DW: Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi took up his chairmanship of the 55-member African Union (AU) at its 32nd ordinary session in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on Sunday.  

During his tenure, el-Sissi is expected to concentrate on security and financial reform, but with no great plans to strengthen the AU's multilateral powers.

Instead, the focus is expected to be on combating illegal immigration while Egypt presents itself as a model for hosting refugees.

10 Feb 2019; DW: Turkey's foreign ministry has called on China to end the mass detention of its Muslim Uighur minority and shut down a network of "concentration camps" in the country's northwest.

"The policy of systematic assimilation against the Uighur Turks carried out by the authorities of China is a great shame for humanity," foreign ministry spokesman Hami Aksoy said in a statement on Saturday.

Dubai, Feb 10 (PTI) In a landmark decision, Abu Dhabi has included Hindi as the third official language used in its courts, alongside Arabic and English, as part of a move designed to improve access to justice.

The Abu Dhabi Judicial Department on Saturday said it has extended the adoption of interactive forms of statement of claims filed before courts by including the Hindi language alongside Arabic and English in labour cases.

ANTALYA, 08 Feb 2019; AA: The UN should set up a commission or initiate investigation into the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi who was killed in Istanbul last fall, the foreign minister said Friday.

Speaking to reporters in the Mediterranean province of Antalya, Mevlut Cavusoglu said: "We see it improbable, unfortunately, due to the attitude of some countries."

He urged UN chief Antonio Guterres and UN Human Rights High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet to form a commission to clarify facts.

Dubai, Feb 9 (AFP) Public debt has rapidly increased in many Arab countries since the 2008 global financial crisis, due to persistently high budget deficits, the International Monetary Fund warned Saturday.

"Unfortunately, the region has yet to fully recover from the global financial crisis and other big economic dislocations over the past decade," IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde said.

"Among oil importers, (economic) growth has picked up, but it is still below pre-crisis levels," she told the Arab Fiscal Forum in Dubai.

09 Feb 2019; AFP: A Tunisian court has sentenced seven to life in prison over attacks at a museum and on a beach in 2015 that killed 60 people, many of them British tourists, prosecutors said on Saturday.

Dozens of defendants faced two separate trials over the closely linked shootings, which occurred just months apart in Tunis and Sousse, but many were acquitted.

09 Feb 2019; DW: Palestinian protests along the fence separating Israel and Gaza are in their 46th week. More than 250 Palestinians have been killed and some 6,000 injured by live Israeli fire during this period.

Israeli troops shot and killed two Palestinian teenagers during protests along the fence separating Israel and the Gaza Strip on Friday.

WASHINGTON, Feb. 7 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday met with Saudi Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel al-Jubeir on bilateral ties and the death of Saudi journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, as the congressional deadline for the White House to submit an investigation report on his death was near.