Afghan conflict to intensify in 2018 ´game changer´

KABUL: Fighting in Afghanistan has escalated with US and Afghan officials tipping 2018 to be a "game-changer" as relentless airstrikes pummel militant groups -- but others warn the 16-year war has simply become a more violent stalemate.

A traditional easing in fighting during the freezing winter months has been absent this year as the Taliban and Daesh respond to intensifying US and Afghan air assaults.

Since US President Donald Trump announced his new strategy for Afghanistan in August, giving the US Air Force more leeway to go after militants, American pilots have been bombarding Taliban and Daesh fighters, their training camps and drug-making laboratories.

"The gloves are off," Brigadier General Lance Bunch, who directs future air operations in Afghanistan, told reporters recently.

The new policy has "definitely been a game-changer and the Taliban is definitely feeling it", he added.

The US is deploying more troops and aircraft to Afghanistan, which has become the main theatre of operations for the US Air Force following a drawdown in Syria and Iraq. At the same time it is beefing up Afghanistan´s fledgling air capabilities.

US aircraft dropped 4,361 munitions across the country in 2017 -- including more than 2,300 since August, which exceeded the combined total for 2015 and 2016.

With the help of huge B-52 bombers, the US has expanded its campaign to far northeastern Afghanistan near the China and Tajikistan borders where it is also targeting the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, which neighbouring China blames for launching attacks on its soil.

"The days of old where you had fighting seasons are gone," Major General James Hecker, head of NATO´s Air Command in Afghanistan, told AFP in Kabul last week.

- ´Point of no return´ -

Militants have reacted violently to the increased airstrikes, launching a wave of deadly attacks across the war-torn country, including in Kabul, in a devastating display of defiance.

The Taliban, by far Afghanistan´s biggest militant group, claimed 472 attacks last month alone, the Washington, DC-based terrorism research group TRAC said, describing the number as "unprecedented" for January.

Combined with increased activity by relative newcomers Daesh, which has been expanding beyond its eastern stronghold, the country appeared to be "at a flashpoint almost to the point of no return", TRAC warned in a new report.

The escalation of the conflict foreshadows a "particularly bloody year", Michael Kugelman of the Wilson Center in Washington, DC told AFP, forecasting more Afghan and US casualties.

Afghanistan´s so-called "fighting season" traditionally starts in the spring before easing over the winter when freezing temperatures and heavy snow make combat more difficult.

But in recent years Taliban militants have continued to carry out attacks throughout the colder months.

This winter has been worse than ever, Borhan Osman, a senior analyst with the International Crisis Group, said in a report.

"Afghanistan is suffering more intense violence now than during any other winter... since 2001," Osman said, highlighting last month´s attacks in the Afghan capital that killed more than 130 people in less than 10 days.

- ´Escalating stalemate´ -

Among the worst of the attacks was an assault on Kabul´s luxury Intercontinental Hotel on January 20, a terrifying hours-long ordeal which saw Taliban insurgents armed with Kalashnikovs and suicide vests charge from room to room searching for foreigners.

That was followed a week later by a devastating bombing involving an explosives-packed ambulance in a crowded street that killed more than 100 people, mostly civilians, and also claimed by the Taliban.

"This looks like a mutually escalating stalemate" as both sides adapt to the new tactics of the other, Afghanistan Analysts Network senior analyst Kate Clark told AFP.

The fighting this winter has been fuelled by more Taliban fighters remaining on the frozen battlefield instead of regrouping in Pakistan, which has long been accused of providing safe havens to the militants -- charges Islamabad denies.

Former general and military analyst Attiqullah Amarkhil told AFP that Taliban fighters had been ordered to "move forward instead of going back and forth" across the border.

"I have not been to Pakistan for a year and I will not go there," Mawlawi Ahmad, a Taliban commander in the restive southern province of Helmand, told AFP.

The escalation in fighting has all but dashed hopes for peace negotiations with the Taliban anytime soon.

Trump ruled out talks last month after the spate of attacks, an apparent reversal of the position set out in his Afghanistan strategy.

But Washington is still hoping to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table, Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan said last week following a trip to Kabul.

Sullivan´s comments come as the Afghan capital gears up for the Kabul Process meeting at the end of February, where the central government is under pressure to present a framework for peace talks.

But expectations for progress are low.

"There´s no way Kabul, or Washington for that matter, would agree to extend an olive branch to an outfit that is placing explosives in ambulances," Kugelman said.

South Korea´s Moon watches concert with Kim Jong Un´s sister

SEOUL: South Korean President Moon Jae-in sat next to the powerful sister of the North´s leader Kim Jong Un at a concert in Seoul by musicians from Pyongyang, as conservative protesters burned the North´s national flag outside Sunday.

The show was the final set-piece element of the North Korean delegation´s landmark visit, the diplomatic highlight of the Olympics-driven rapprochement between the two halves of the peninsula.

They have shared kimchi and soju, sat in the same box at the Olympics opening ceremony and cheered a unified women´s ice hockey team.

Kim on Saturday invited Moon to a summit in the North, an offer extended by his sister and special envoy Kim Yo Jong, who made history as the first member of the North´s ruling dynasty to visit the South since the Korean War.

Pictures showed Yo Jong seated between Moon and the North´s ceremonial head of state Kim Yong Nam, who is officially leading the North´s delegation, and applauding at Sunday´s concert.

The show was given by some 140 members of Pyongyang´s Samjiyon Orchestra as part of a cross-border deal in which the isolated nuclear-armed North sent hundreds of athletes, cheerleaders and others to the Pyeongchang Winter Games in the South.

At a dinner beforehand with senior Seoul officials, Yo Jong said she found the two Koreas still had much in common despite decades of separation.

Before flying south, she said, she had expected "things would be very different and unfamiliar", according to a statement from Moon´s office.

"But it turned out that there were many things similar and in common," she went on. "I hope that the day we become one will be brought forward."

But the rapprochement pushed by the dovish Moon has angered conservatives, who accuse him of being a North Korea sympathiser and undermining the security alliance with the US.

"Having these red communists in the heart of Seoul is an utter humilation!" one shouted near the venue as dozens of others waved banners condemning both Moon and Kim Jong Un.

"We are against the ugly political Olympics!" read one banner.

Some set a North Korean flag on fire before police intervened, and others chanted "Let´s tear Kim Jong Un to death!" as they ripped up posters bearing his portrait.

The North´s presence has dominated the headlines in the early days of the Olympics, with all eyes turning to Swiss-educated Kim Yo Jong, believed to be 30, who is among her brother´s closest confidantes.

71 feared dead in Russian passenger plane crash

MOSCOW: A Russian passenger plane carrying 71 people crashed outside Moscow on Sunday after taking off from the capital´s Domodedovo airport, officials and local media said.

The Antonov An-148 plane operated by the domestic Saratov Airlines was flying to Orsk, a city in the Urals, and crashed in the Ramensky district on the outskirts of Moscow. Russian news agencies reported 65 passengers and six crew were on board and all were feared dead.

News agencies said witnesses in the village of Argunovo saw a burning plane falling from the sky.

A source from Russia´s emergency services told Interfax that the 71 people on board "had no chance" of survival.

President Vladimir Putin offered "his profound condolences to those who lost their relatives in the crash," his spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

State television aired a video of the crash site, showing parts of the wreckage in the snow.

Russia has seen record high snowfall in recent days and visibility was reportedly poor.

The Russian-made plane was reportedly seven years old and bought by Saratov Airlines from another Russian airline a year ago.

Russian media reported that the emergency services were unable to reach the crash site by road and that rescue workers walked to the scene on foot. Emergency services said in a statement that more than 150 rescue workers were deployed to the site.

A source at Domodedovo, Moscow´s second largest airport, told agencies that the plane disappeared from radars within two minutes of takeoff.

The Russian transport minister was on his way to the crash site, agencies reported. The transport ministry said several causes for the crash were being considered, including weather conditions and human error.

The governor of the Orenburg region, where the plane was flying to, told Russian media that "more than 60 people" on board the plane were from the region.

Prosecutors opened an investigation into Saratov Airlines following the crash. Russia´s Investigative Committee will consider all possible causes, RIA Novosti news agency reported.

Saratov Airlines was founded in the 1930s and flies to 35 Russian cities. Its hub is Saratov Central Airport in southern Russia.

Local media website Ural56.ru in the Orenburg region showed footage of distressed relatives at Orsk airport, where the plane was due to land.

Andrei Odintsov, the mayor of the city of Orsk, told Russian state television that six psychologists and four ambulances with medics are working with the relatives in the small airport.

Orsk is the second biggest city in the Orenburg region, near Russia´s border with Kazakhstan.

Russia has suffered numerous plane crashes, with airlines often operating ageing aircraft in dangerous flying conditions.

A light aircraft crashed in November in Russia´s far east, killing six people on board.

In December 2016 a military plane carrying Russia´s famed Red Army Choir crashed after taking off from the Black Sea resort of Sochi, killing all 92 people on board.

The choir had been due to give a concert to Russian troops operating in Syria.

Pilot error was blamed for that crash.

In March 2016, all 62 passengers died when a FlyDubai jet crashed in bad weather during an aborted landing at Rostov-on-Don airport.

Bodies of 16 migrants recovered off Morocco coast

NADOR, Morocco: Moroccan rescue services have recovered the bodies of 16 migrants off the coast of Spain´s enclave of Melilla, Moroccan and Spanish officials said Sunday.

Three women were among the dead taken to a morgue in the Moroccan city of Nador, a medical official there told AFP.

All were sub-Saharan Africans apart from one Moroccan, the official said.

A spokeswoman for Melilla´s authorities earlier said "about 20" bodies had been recovered in Moroccan territorial waters.

The bodies of the migrants were spotted Saturday by a Spanish ship, which alerted the rescue services of both countries, she said.

Late Saturday, a Spanish police patrol boat found one more body, which was taken to Melilla, a Spanish enclave bordering Morocco.

Spanish authorities said a Civil Guard helicopter was supporting Moroccan search patrols on Sunday morning.

Migrants are increasingly favouring the so-called western Mediterranean route to reach Europe, which involves making the sea crossing between North Africa and southern mainland Spain.

According to the International Organization for Migration, Spain has been the second most popular point of entry for migrants coming to Europe so far this year, with 1,279 arrivals, after Italy with 4,256.

It said 243 people have died or are missing in the Mediterranean after trying to cross the sea this year, not including those recovered this weekend.

Spain was last year the third point of entry for Europe-bound migrants, after Italy and Greece.

Arrivals by sea tripled in 2017 compared to the previous year, reaching a total of 22,900 migrants, according to the EU border agency Frontex.

According to Omar Naji, of the Moroccan Association of Human Rights, migrants have been making the sea crossing after authorities tightened controls at the Melilla border fence.

"Before more migrants would try to climb the Melilla fence... but now, after stricter controls, they can only cross from the sea," he told AFP.

Naji said that migrants must pay people smugglers 3,000 euros each to undertake the sea crossing "and this traffic is carried out before the eyes of the authorities".

Said Chramti, who heads the Grand Rif Human Rights association, told AFP that Europe is also responsible for the deaths of migrants because it is "tightening the screws on (illegal) migration".

He also criticised the Moroccan authorities for "failing in its battle against illegal migration networks".

UN Council unanimously condemns North Korea missile test

United Nations, United States: The UN Security Council denounced North Korea´s latest missile test Tuesday, unanimously demanding that Pyongyang halt the program after a rocket was fired over Japan into the Pacific.

Following the emergency closed-door session called by the United States and Japan, Tokyo´s envoy at the UN suggested that a new sanctions declaration could be issued.

"Next step starting now. We can´t predict the outcome but I certainly hope it would be a strong resolution following this statement," Koro Bessho said.

The 15-member body maintained its unity after Kim Jong-Un´s latest provocation, with China and Russia agreeing to sign up to a statement condemning his isolated regime´s action.

But the US-drafted statement, while noting that the test contravened several previous Security Council resolutions, will not immediately lead to new or tightened measures against Pyongyang.

Still, diplomatic sources told AFP that the speed with which the members had reacted underlined their determination to remain united.

"The Security Council stresses that these DPRK actions are not just a threat to the region, but to all UN member states," said the statement, issued after closed-door talks at UN headquarters.

"The Security Council expresses its grave concern that the DPRK is, by conducting such a launch over Japan as well as its recent actions and public statements, deliberately undermining regional peace and stability."

The Council demanded that North Korea -- already the target of seven rounds of UN sanctions that have done little to quell Kim´s nuclear missile ambitions -- obey all existing resolutions.

This would mean the North "abandon all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programs in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner, and immediately cease all related activities."

Pyongyang must not "conduct any further nuclear tests or any further provocation; and abandon any other existing weapons of mass destruction in a complete, verifiable and irreversible manner."

Finally, the body "welcomes efforts by Council members, as well as other states, to facilitate a peaceful and comprehensive solution through dialogue."

Mosques stay open as ‘biggest church’ closes its door to Harvey victims

WASHINGTON: The biggest church in Texas closed its doors, however, mosques stayed open to help victims of Hurricane Harvey in Texas, which has caused catastrophic flooding and forced thousands of residents to leave their home.

According to a report by Independent, an announcement on Facebook said Pastor Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church had shut due to the storm and asked people to pray for those affected.

“Lakewood Church is inaccessible due to severe flooding! We want to help make sure you are safe,” the post read, according to the Independent report.

Lakewood Church is run by televangelist Joel Osteen.

Pastor Osteen was criticised for not immediately offering 16,000-seater arena that would make for 'great shelter', while dozens of smaller churches and mosques have done so.

It said that mosques in the region are still open and offering people shelter, including the Islamic Society of Greater Houston’s 21 centres.

Damages from Hurricane Harvey could put it among the top five most costly US storms ever, with failing dams and levees driving up loss forecasts, current data modeling showed Tuesday.

Estimates for total economic costs and damages shot up overnight to $42 billion from $30 billion, as flooding began to spread to Louisiana and flood control measures became overwhelmed, according to Chuck Watson, founder of the disaster modeling firm Enki Research.

While authorities were still focused on rescuing survivors, the question of the storm´s aftermath -- and its long-lasting hit to the Texas and US economies -- was only beginning to come into view.

At least nine people are reported to have died as a result of Harvey, the worst storm to strike the US in 12 years.

China says it hopes India will ´learn lessons´ from standoff

BEIJING: China said Wednesday it hopes India will "learn lessons" following the end of a months-long military stand-off in a strategically important disputed area in the Himalayas.

The two nations resolved the deadlock over the Doklam area claimed by both China and Bhutan, an ally of India, just days before Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to attend a BRICS summit in eastern China.

"Of course we hope the Indian side will learn lessons from this incident and prevent similar things from happening again," Foreign Minister Wang Yi told a news briefing on the upcoming BRICS summit, which includes both nations as well as Brazil, Russia and South Africa.

New Delhi announced Monday that both countries were pulling back their border forces, while Beijing said only that India had withdrawn "all its border personnel and equipment that were illegally on the Chinese territory".

The stand-off began on June 16 and sparked what some analysts said was the worst crisis in decades between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

India does not claim Doklam for itself but is closely allied with Bhutan, which it regards as a buffer against rival China to the north.

India and China have a long history of mistrust and went to war in 1962 over the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh.

Wang said "it´s only natural" for two major countries to have "some problems in our interactions".

"We hope that China and India will join hands and work together for the rejuvenation of Asia," he said. "On the border face-off caused by India´s trespassing, that has been settled."

The foreign minister did not say whether Chinese President Xi Jinping and Modi would hold bilateral talks on the sidelines of the BRICS summit next week in the port city of Xiamen.

"The first thing is whether the leaders have the willingness to meet," Wang said.

"If there´s a willingness from the leaders participating (in BRICS), the Chinese side will try to make it possible if our schedule permits."

Qaeda confirms son-in-law of osama killed in syria

Beirut: al-qaeda has showed that top leader abu khayr al-masri, believed to be the employer´s wide variety , was killed in an air strike with the aid of america-led coalition in syria.

In a announcement two branches of the militant organization, such as the effective al-qaeda inside the arabian peninsula (aqap), known as masri a "hero" and stated he changed into killed "throughout a crusader drone strike" in syria.

"all of al-sham (syria) will endure witness to the present day crime of the united states and the crusader alliance," the assertion dated wednesday said, in reference to the usa-led coalition bombing militants in syria and iraq.

It additionally expressed its condolences to qaeda´s present day chief, ayman al-zawahiri.

Masri is a son-in-regulation of qaeda founder osama bin laden and is believed to be zawahiri´s deputy.

A us respectable stated this week that washington was investigating reviews that masri have been killed in a us strike in or across the metropolis of idlib in northern syria.

The syrian observatory for human rights monitoring group said in advance this week that a february 26 coalition raid in town of mastumah in idlib province had killed masri.

Egypt-born al-masri, fifty nine, changed into one of the maximum outstanding figures in al-qaeda to have roots inside the era before the 9/11, 2001 assaults, in step with the soufan group, a personal security and intelligence consultancy.

His presence in syria´s northwestern idlib province underscores the importance that united states has gained in al-qaeda´s strategy, analysts stated.

King salman urges fight against terrorism on indonesia ride

Jakarta: saudi arabia´s king salman referred to as thursday for a united combat in opposition to terrorism in a speech to indonesia´s parliament for the duration of a landmark kingdom go to to the arena´s most populous muslim-majority united states of america.

The king is making the first visit by means of a saudi monarch to indonesia in nearly 50 years as a part of a tour of asia, accompanied by means of a 1,000-robust delegation and loads of tons of bags.

In a speech to masses of people at the legislature in the capital jakarta, he called for an intensified combat in opposition to terrorism.

"the venture we, mainly muslims, face now's terrorism," he stated. "we need to near ranks in preventing terrorism, radicalism and try to carry international peace for the benefit of all of us."

Saudi arabia is a part of a us-led coalition that has carried out air moves in opposition to the islamic nation (is) organization and different jihadists in syria.

Is is below pressure in iraq and syria, as authorities forces make a pressure to retake regions held by way of the jihadists.

Saudi arabia has witnessed a series of deadly assaults claimed through is due to the fact that overdue 2014, by and large targeting the shiite minority and protection forces, killing dozens of humans.

However, some of the dominion´s companions in the center east have advised the sunni-majority united states of america to do greater to defeat is, or even accused the dominion of assisting the jihadists.

Indonesia, which has long struggled with islamic militancy, is likewise facing a renewed risk due to the enchantment of is, with masses of its citizens heading to the middle east to combat with the jihadists.

A gun and suicide assault in jakarta in january closing year that killed four civilians and 4 attackers become the first attack claimed through is in southeast asia.

On thursday salman also visited jakarta´s istiqlal mosque, the largest in southeast asia, accompanied with the aid of president joko widodo, and the leaders prayed together.

The king and his entourage may be in jakarta till friday, after which they may head to the hindu-majority inn island of bali for a vacation.

Salman´s three-week asian excursion is looking for funding opportunities as the arena´s pinnacle oil exporter looks to diversify its financial system. He began the ride in malaysia earlier this week and is also set to visit japan, china and the maldives.

Egyptian courtroom acquits mubarak over killing of protesters

Cairo: egypt´s top appeals court docket discovered hosni mubarak harmless on thursday of involvement inside the killing of protesters throughout the 2011 uprising that ended his 30-12 months rule, in a very last ruling that might see the previous president walk loose.

After an all-day hearing, decide ahmed abdel qawi announced: "the court docket has discovered the defendant harmless."

The courtroom also rejected demands via lawyers of the victims to reopen civil suits, leaving no last choice for appeal or retrial.