Aizawl, Aug 2 (PTI) Security forces seized 217 kg of gold and arrested five Myanmarese nationals from near the Mizoram-Myanmar border in Champai district, police said today.

The five Myanmarese nationals were arrested yesterday from Vaphai village in the district for allegedly smuggling gold bars worth around Rs 927 lakh, they said.

The gold and the arrested persons were handed over to the officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence in Champhai town, the police added.

2 Aug 2018; AFP; Kurdish refugee turned Cambridge University math professor Caucher Birkar was among four winners Wednesday in Rio de Janeiro of the prestigious Fields prize, dubbed the Nobel for mathematics, but had his gold medal stolen minutes later.

It was an embarrassing debut for crime-ridden Rio, the first Latin American city ever to host the Fields ceremony, which takes place every four years.

1 Aug 2018; DW; Humanity has already used up more resources this year than our planet can regenerate. Each year, Earth Overshoot Day comes earlier. Many say it's time to radically rethink our consumption patterns and economic system.

As of Wednesday, August 1, 2018, we have officially used up all of the Earth's resources for the year — and there are still five months left to go.

2 Aug 2018; AFP; Israel reimposed a blockade on fuel deliveries to Gaza on Thursday citing a resurgence in kites carrying firebombs over the border and signalling a brief pause in tensions may be ending.

After two deadly military flare-ups in the Gaza Strip and a ceasefire brokered by Egypt and UN officials last month, the number of firebombs being launched over the border to burn Israeli farmland had diminished.

London, Aug 1 (AFP) British former far-right leader Tommy Robinson was freed from prison today after winning a legal challenge in a case that has galvanised his supporters worldwide.

Robinson, who founded a street-level Islamophobic fringe group called the English Defence League, was serving a 13-month jail sentence.

He was jailed for contempt of court and breaching a previous suspended sentence, having used social media to live-stream outside a court in Leeds in northern England in breach of reporting restrictions around a trial.

By Muhammet Emin Avundukluoglu

ANKARA; 2 Aug 2018; AA; The head of Turkish parliament's constitutional committee has described the U.S. decision to impose sanctions on two Turkish ministers as an "abdication of reason".

"The U.S. administration's decision is far from good sense, an abdication of reason, a lack of foresight," Bekir Bozdag said on his official Twitter account on Thursday.

"The U.S. cannot take what it wants from Turkey with a method that is against international law, unlawful and presuming," Bozdag, a lawmaker from Yozgat province, added.

New Delhi, Aug 1 (PTI) The Kerala government today told the Supreme Court that the custom of barring entry of women between the age group of 10 to 50 years into the Sabarimala temple in Kerala is not permissible under the Constitution.

It said that celibate status of deity cannot be a ground for barring entry of women as it is a Hindu temple and not a temple of a particular denomination.

By Elena Teslova

2 Aug 2018; AA; MOSCOW; Russian lawmakers have criticized a U.S. move to impose sanctions on two Turkish Cabinet members as "counterproductive and destructive".

Alexay Chepa, the deputy head of the International Committee of the State Duma, said in an interview with Anadolu Agency on Wednesday that imposing sanctions had become "kind of a U.S. routine".

"Every day we hear some news that the U.S. either impose sanctions or announces a trade war against those who do not want to act as the U.S. wants," Chepa said.

2 Aug 2018; AFP; The United States on Wednesday hit two top Turkish officials with sanctions over the ongoing detention of an American pastor facing terror charges, heaping pressure on Ankara to release the prisoner fueling a bitter diplomatic feud.

1 Aug 2018; AA; ANKARA; A new rail gun made by a leading Turkish contractor has shot through previous speed records, the firm announced on Wednesday.

Previous tests carried out on Aselsan's TUFAN electromagnetic rail gun system showed it hitting a speed of 2,000-2,500 meters per second -- more than six times the speed of sound.

But new tests with the TUFAN prototype in Karapinar in Turkey’s central Konya province did 50 percent better, racking up an ultrasonic speed topping nine times the speed of sound.

New Delhi, Aug 2 (PTI) Congress President Rahul Gandhi today attacked External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj over the Doklam issue, alleging that she had "buckled and prostrated herself in front of Chinese power".

His assertion came a day after Swaraj told Parliament that the India-China face-off over Doklam was resolved through "diplomatic maturity without losing any ground" and status quo has been maintained.

KINSHASA, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- A new Ebola outbreak has been confirmed in the eastern North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Health Minister Oly Ilunga said on Wednesday.

"Just one week after announcing the end of the ninth epidemic of Ebola in Equateur province, the Democratic Republic of the Congo is facing a new epidemic, and there is no indication at this stage that two epidemics, separated by more than 2,500 km, are linked," said Ilunga in a statement.