World Echo

Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney on Wednesday said a US-Iran deal to end the Middle East war could be a "game changer" in the region and beyond. There is "a likelihood that this memorandum of understanding agreement could be a game changer", Carney told reporters on the third day of a G7 leaders' meeting in the French town of Evian. He pointed to encouraging discussions, which included US President Donald Trump, on Ukraine and Lebanon at the summit. The Canadian premier said he noted a US "change in tone with respect to Ukraine" as Kyiv seeks to end more than four years of conflict following Russia's invasion. This included "a more realistic -- in our view -- expectation of where this war was going to go, and the position against Russia, the tightening of sanctions against Russia, the ability to provide additional defensive support for Ukraine". The leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain and the United ...

In the crystalline waters off Kenya's coast, coral reefs are thriving, evidence of a rare good news story in the battle to protect oceans from the ravages of climate change. A new study presented at the Our Ocean Conference in Mombasa on Tuesday finds that 166,000 square kilometres of the world's coral reefs, around a third of the total, are particularly "climate-resilient", meaning they have the potential to survive through major ocean warming events. The study by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and Macquarie University in Australia challenges the findings of the IPCC, the global authority on climate change, which has stated 70 to 90 per cent of coral reefs could die with global warming of 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels, and 99 per cent at 2°C. "Our models are showing a much more hopeful future for coral reefs. We predict that many climate-resilient reefs around the world will persist over time," Stacy Jupiter, executive director...

Iranian National Football Team manager Amir Ghalenoei called his squad the "most repressed team in the whole World Cup," saying they were ordered to leave Los Angeles for their training base in Mexico, shortly after their Monday night opening match against New Zealand. Ghalenoei said the team had expected to remain in the California metropolis overnight and carry out a recovery session the next day, but were instead told immediately after the final whistle that they must return. "We spent so much time in the air commuting, they didn't even give us time to recover," he said through an interpreter, according to US sports outlet ESPN. "After the game today, they said to us: 'You have to leave immediately.'" Read: Iran team arrive in US for World Cup opener as the two nations reach peace deal Ghalenoei did not say who had instructed the team to leave Monday night, although Iran captain Mehdi Taremi said FIFA President Gianni Infantino had ...

Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has canceled a planned family trip to the US amid difficulties in obtaining a visa, according Israeli media on Tuesday. The US Embassy told Ben-Gvir that he would need to appear in person to provide biometric fingerprints as part of the visa process, Haaretz daily reported. The requirement was interpreted in Israeli media reports as a sign of reluctance to grant him a visa. The Israeli minister was reportedly set to travel to Miami to attend the wedding of an Israeli businessman’s daughter. Haaretz previously reported that he initially sought for the businessman to fund the trip, before agreeing to cover the costs himself following criticism from the state comptroller. Ben-Gvir has frequently made headlines for his provocative actions, which have drawn widespread criticism and international condemnation. Israeli analysts say US-Iran deal ‘political victory’ for Tehran Israeli political analysts have...

The stepson of Norway's Crown Prince Haakon was found guilty ​on Monday of rape and domestic violence and sentenced to four years in prison after a seven-week trial that has further dented the ‌royal family's once picture-perfect image. Oslo District Court ruled that 29-year-old Marius Borg Hoiby, who joined the royal family when his mother Mette-Marit married Haakon in 2001, was guilty of two counts of rape, including one in the basement of the crown prince's home. He was acquitted of two other rape charges. During the trial, the court heard evidence of Hoiby's drug addiction, self-made videos of sexual ​encounters, and hundreds of incriminating electronic messages with a former partner. Prosecutors, who had sought seven years and seven months in jail, said that the four ​women accusing him of rape, in both the proven and unproven cases, had each time been too unconscious or too incapacitated ⁠to resist him after attending parties. "The court finds i...

Israeli political analysts have described a US-Iran agreement as a “political victory” for Tehran, accusing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of making Israel “hostage” to US President Donald Trump. Trump announced Sunday that an agreement with Iran had been finalised and said he was authorising the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and the removal of a US naval blockade. In reports released before the deal's announcement and reviewed by Anadolu, Israeli commentators said the agreement would leave key Israeli concerns unresolved, including Iran’s ballistic missile program and Tehran’s support for regional allies. Writing in the Israeli daily Israel Hayom, columnist Ben-Dror Yemini said any possible agreement would effectively amount to US recognition of "a stronger and more radical Iranian regime." Yemini argued that the agreement would be seen in Iran as a “political victory” because it gives the regime inte...