GENEVA — The U.N. human rights office reports Iraqi civilians are increasingly being used as pawns by Islamic State militants in their battle for Mosul. The agency says it has received credible reports of hundreds of executions, mass abductions, and the use of civilians as human shields. The agency reports Islamic State militants have been forcing […]
CAPITOL HILL—The Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives voted Thursday to suspend President Barack Obama’s plan to resettle 10,000 Iraqi and Syrian refugees in the United States in the next year, but he is promising to veto the measure if it passes the Senate. Obama signaled that he anticipates his resettlement plan will go forward. “My […]
GAZIANTEP, TURKEY—Thousands of Syrian villagers are fleeing homes in the countryside south of Aleppo in the face of a government ground assault backed by Russian airstrikes, one of four major offensives mounted since Russia’s military intervention in the long-running Syrian civil war. The three other offensives are focused mainly on rural areas in the provinces […]
Aid agencies and the Irish Navy are reporting that a fishing vessel carrying about 600 migrants capsized in the Mediterranean and a distress call was issued, about 24 kilometers north of Libya. The navy reports say hundreds of people were in the sea and a rescue effort was under way. The Associated Press cited Irish […]