The Kurdish news service Rudaw reported on Tuesday that elements of the Islamic State (ISIS) are taking advantage of Turkey’s invasion of Syria to increase the tempo of their own attacks on positions held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
Hong Kong’s Legislative Council (LegCo) ejected outspoken pro-communist lawmaker Junius Ho from a meeting on Tuesday after he said pro-democracy colleague Claudia Mo was “used to eating foreign sausage,” a derogatory reference to her British husband.
In the wake of basketball star LeBron James bowing to Communist China and criticizing Houston Rockets Manager Daryl Morey for speaking up on behalf of Hong Kong, protesters there decided to stage a cheeky demonstration on Tuesday night in which they will put on NBA jerseys and play street basketball.
The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) on Sunday reported large demonstrations in western Syria against both “Turkish aggression” and the continuing presence of U.S. troops on Syrian soil, a somewhat ironic set of positions given that the U.S. presence was supposedly the only thing preventing Turkish aggression until now.
Kurdish news service Rudaw on Sunday quoted Kurdish veterans of World War II responding angrily to President Donald Trump’s comment last Wednesday that the Kurds “didn’t help us in the Second World War – they didn’t help us with Normandy, as an example.”
Kurdish officials in northeastern Syria said on Sunday that about 785 foreign prisoners linked to the Islamic State escaped from a “displacement camp” in Ain Issa after “mercenaries” attacked the area with “air cover from Turkish warplanes.”
Hong Kong saw more huge protests over the weekend, many of them explicitly directed at the new emergency law forbidding demonstrators to wear masks. Police fired at protesters in the Mong Kok district, a frequent scene of large protests.
Turkey is a legitimate nation-state with long-standing memberships in major international organizations like the U.N. and NATO. The Kurds are stateless actors, a large ethnic group broken into many factions and spread across several different countries. This is a very important factor in the conflict between Turkey and the Kurds. The world should address it by doing something that should have been done long ago: give the Kurds a state of their own.
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), the semi-autonomous Kurdish provincial leadership in Iraq, expressed solidarity with the Syrian Kurds on Thursday, denounced Turkey’s invasion of northeastern Syria, and criticized the United States for failing to prevent the Turkish operation.
A female student at Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) on Thursday spoke out at a public forum on campus, removing her mask and revealing her name to accuse Hong Kong police officers of sexually molesting her during an arrest.
The Hong Kong Hospital Authority on Friday confirmed that a male police officer forced his way into a maternity ward as a 19-year-old pregnant protester was disrobed for a body search.
Turkey’s invasion of northeastern Syria to drive the Kurds away from the Turkish border is bringing more Western attention to the Kurds than they received during the long and bloody Syrian civil war, where they played a key role in defeating the Islamic State. Here are some important things to know about the Kurds.
Thursday marked Taiwan’s National Day, the 108th anniversary of the founding of the Republic of China (ROC). Hong Kong protesters expressed their fellowship with the Taiwanese by raising the ROC flag, a gesture that will prove enormously irritating to the Communist government, the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
The Turkish government is cracking down hard on internal dissent at the same time it lashes out against foreign criticism of “Operation Peace Spring,” its invasion of Syria to attack the Kurds.
Kurdish officials in Syria on Thursday accused the invading Turkish army of shelling the Chirkin prison, which is filled with captive Islamic State jihadis from 60 different countries. The Turkish government did not immediately respond to the allegation.
In an interview with Breitbart News on Wednesday, Dr. Ali Akram Albayati of the Iraqi High Commission on Human Rights discussed the origins of the protests in Iraq, endorsed the right of the people to be heard, and mourned the loss of life during clashes between protesters and security forces.
The latest target of the Chinese Communist Party’s anger is the Tiffany & Co. jeweller, which was accused of tacitly supporting the Hong Kong protest movement by publishing an advertisement depicting a Chinese model holding a hand over one of her eyes.
The acrimonious relationship between Hong Kong protesters and police took a turn for the worse on Tuesday night when an undercover police officer disguised as a protester was caught on video behaving in a highly belligerent manner toward bystanders.
A group of prominent military veterans wrote a letter on Monday urging all American pension funds to refrain from investing in Chinese companies.
Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam said on Tuesday that she will not rule out asking the mainland Chinese government for help if “limitless and lawless” violence continues in her semi-autonomous city.
The Pentagon stated on Monday that Turkey has been removed from the “air tasking order” employed by members of the anti-Islamic State coalition operating in Syria.
Iraqi President Barham Salih on Monday condemned violence against protesters and journalists during demonstrations across the country and called on the Iraqi military to protect them.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on Tuesday called for the United States to have a role in negotiating between Ukraine and Russia, but the Kremlin immediately ruled out direct American participation.
Nigeria’s Premium Times reported Sunday on an October 3 attack on a military convoy by Boko Haram terrorists in which 11 soldiers were killed and 14 others wounded.
Hong Kong police shot a 14-year-old boy this weekend as protests continued across the city, growing more intense after chief executive Carrie Lam invoked long-dormant emergency powers and banned the wearing of masks in public.
Kurdish militia leaders in Syria called the U.S. withdrawal announced Sunday in the region a “stab in the back” and vowed to defend their positions against Turkey “at all costs.”
The death toll from four days of widespread protests in Iraq climbed to 60 as of Friday afternoon, with a growing number of allegations that security forces are unnecessarily targeting demonstrators with lethal ammunition.
India on Thursday announced new restrictions on universities seeking to cooperate with Chinese institutions. The order came down only a week before Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to meet with Chinese Communist Party chief Xi Jinping.
Officials in Ukraine on Friday reported 41 attacks by Russia-backed separatists against Ukrainian army positions in the war-torn Donbas region have occurred since midnight on Thursday despite a cease-fire agreement. One of the attacks fatally wounded a Ukrainian soldier.
Flash mobs and “wildcat protests” erupted across Hong Kong on Friday after Chief Executive Carrie Lam invoked colonial-era emergency powers and announced a ban on masks.
