DHAKA: Syria threatened to quit peace talks in Geneva by Saturday, criticising the opposition delegation as "not serious," state television said.Foreign Minister Walid "Muallem has told (UN-Arab League peace envoy Lakhdar) Brahimi that should serious sessions fail to take place by

DHAKA: North Korea has sent an open letter to the South calling for reconciliation and an end to "hostile military acts".The letter, published in North Korea`s state media, comes weeks before South Korea is due to hold joint military drills with the US.South Korea dismissed the letter as

DHAKA: A plume of black smoke rose over Cairo early Friday after a powerful explosion hit the city`s police headquarters, killing at least four people and wounding more than 50 others, Egyptian authorities said.The blast struck a key symbol of authority in a country that has been shaken

DHAKA: Interim President Catherine Samba-Panza urged fighters to put down their arms as she took the oath of office, even as looters pillaged Muslim neighbourhoods and sectarian tensions escalated in the anarchic Central African Republic.Samba-Panza, the nation`s first female leader, was

DHAKA: South Sudan`s government and rebels have signed a ceasefire agreement after talks in Ethiopia.Under the deal, signed in a hotel in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, the fighting is due to come to an end within 24 hours.In the past week, government forces have recaptured the two

DHAKA: As many as 31 elderly Canadians are unaccounted for and five are confirmed dead after a fire destroyed an old people`s home in Quebec of Cananda.Prime Minister Stephen Harper said there was little doubt the loss of life at Residence du Havre in L`Isle-Verte would be

DHAKA: Egyptian interim prime minister Hazem el-Beblawi said on Thursday he backed General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi for president, one of the highest-level endorsements for a widely expected presidential bid by the army chief.General Sisi, who deposed Islamist president Mohamed Mursi in July

DHAKA: Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said after international talks in Switzerland that the rival Syrian delegations said they would sit down for direct talks on Friday and that they should start with confidence-building measures.Lavrov, who said he held talks with Syrian foreign

DHAKA: Ukrainian opposition leaders have issued an ultimatum to president Viktor Yanukovych, after talks failed to resolve the political stalemate.Vitali Klitschko said he would lead pro-EU protesters ‘on the attack’ in the capital, Kiev, if the government refused to call snap

DHAKA: Thailand’s Constitutional Court said it would decide on Thursday whether to accept a case against holding February 2 election that would almost certainly extend the government’s shaky grip on power as protesters try to force it from office. The government declared a 60-day

DHAKA: Five policemen have been killed in Egypt in an armed attack on a checkpoint south of Cairo.Egypt interior ministry has said, reports the BBC.Two others were injured, one seriously, in the attack in Beni Suef province, some 100km from the capital.Two men riding motorcycles ‘opened

DHAKA: Police in India`s West Bengal have held 13 people in connection with a gang rape of a woman allegedly on orders of village elders who objected to her relationship with a man.The 20-year-old woman has been admitted to a hospital in a critical condition, reports BBC.Unofficial courts

DHAKA: The biggest union in South Africa`s platinum sector has called a strike over pay, the biggest in the sector since the 2012 Marikana massacre.On that occasion 34 protesting miners taking part in an illegal wage protest were gunned down by police, reports BBC.Thursday`s strike over

DHAKA: UN mediator for Syrian peace talks Lakhdar Brahimi is to hold separate talks with rival delegations to assess their willingness to meet together.The behind-the-scenes negotiations follow the first day of a major peace conference in Switzerland which ended in bitter divisions,

DHAKA: In his final moments, 8-year-old Tyler Doohan managed to rescue six people -- including two younger children -- from a burning mobile home in upstate New York, authorities said.A last-ditch effort, however, to save his disabled grandfather cost the boy his life. His body was found

DHAKA: Washington on Wednesday upped the ante against the Syrian regime, denouncing its ‘inflammatory rhetoric’ at the opening of key peace talks and dismissing claims of improved aid access as ‘laughable’.‘Instead of laying out a positive vision for the future of Syria that is

DHAKA: India union home minister Sushilkumar Shinde on Wednesday called Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal a ‘mad chief minister’, saying he had to cancel the leave of several policemen because of Kejriwal.India TV channels reported, says Hindustan Times.Speaking at an event in

DHAKA: Talks in Switzerland between Syria’s government and its enemies to end the country’s three years of civil war are unlikely to be successful, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday.Iran’s official IRNA news agency reported, says The Jerusalem Post.‘Because of the

DHAKA: Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said it was the main task of the Syria peace conference that opened in Switzerland on Wednesday ‘to achieve an end to the tragic conflict’ and prevent a spillover to other countries in the region. Lavrov, in his opening remarks, called on

DHAKA: New Yorkers awoke Wednesday morning to the sound of plows clearing the streets.In Washington, federal workers got in a few extra zzz’s. And in Boston, parents scrambled to make other arrangements as kids enjoyed a snow day.The heaviest snowfall of the season has blanketed the