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AFP

  • India cricket ends $43.6 mn sponsorship after online gambling ban: report

    India cricket ends $43.6 mn sponsorship after online gambling ban: report

    NEW DELHI: Indian cricket is looking for a new main sponsor after a fantasy sports gaming platform pulled out of a deal worth $43.6 million following a government ban on online gambling, reports said Monday.

    Dream11, the biggest online gaming platform in the country, became the lead sponsor of the men’s and women’s national teams after signing a three-year deal in July 2023.

    The Dream11 logo is printed on the jerseys of the Indian players.

    It is also the sponsor of several Indian Premier League franchises.

    Last week, the Indian parliament passed the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Bill, criminalising the offering and financing of such games, with offenders facing up to five years in prison.

    The Indian Express newspaper said Monday that representatives of Dream11 visited the office of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and informed its chief executive, Hemang Amin, that they won’t be able to continue.

    “As a result, they won’t be the team’s sponsors for the Asia Cup. The BCCI will float a new tender soon,” the daily said, quoting a BCCI official.

    The T20 Asia Cup starts on September 9 in the United Arab Emirates.

    “There’s not much time left for the Asia Cup, but we are exploring options,” a board official was quoted as saying by Sportstar website.

    Dream11 is also the official partner of the Caribbean Premier League and sponsors Australia’s Big Bash League.

    The gaming ban impacts platforms for card games, poker and fantasy sports, including India’s wildly popular homegrown fantasy cricket apps.

    The government said the rapid spread of gambling platforms had caused widespread financial distress, addiction and even suicide among the youth.

    It also said it was linked to fraud, money laundering and terrorism financing.

  • Kneecap defy critics with ‘Free Palestine’ chant at Paris gig

    Kneecap defy critics with ‘Free Palestine’ chant at Paris gig

    Paris: Irish rap group Kneecap repeated their criticism of Israel’s war in Gaza during a performance outside Paris on Sunday, despite objections from French Jewish groups and government officials.

    The concert, which began shortly before 6.30 pm (1630 GMT) in front of several thousand people in the Paris suburb of Saint-Cloud, went ahead despite complaints from the Belfast trio’s critics.

    “Free, free Palestine!,” the group shouted at the start of their show, rallying an enthusiastic crowd where keffiyehs and Irish jerseys were visible, before insisting they were not against Israel.

    Ahead of the show, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said the authorities would be vigilant for “any comments of an antisemitic nature, apology for terrorism or incitement to hatred” at the event.

    During their performance, the band displayed a backdrop in French that said: “The French government is complicit”, accusing it of facilitating the sale of weapons to Israel. They posted a photo of the message on social media.

    The performance was briefly interrupted as several individuals whistled in protest, until security removed protesters from the crowd.

    After organisers kept the politically outspoken band on the programme, local authorities withdrew their subsidies for the music festival where the gig took place — the annual Rock en Seine festival.

    The group from Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK, have made a habit of using their concerts to canvas for the Palestinian cause and criticise Israel.

    – Politically outspoken –

    Liam O’Hanna, 27, who performs under the stage name Mo Chara, was charged in England in May accused of displaying a flag of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah during a London concert in November.

    They played a closely scrutinised concert at the Glastonbury Festival in June, where Chara declared: “Israel are war criminals.”

    The group later missed playing at the Sziget Festival in Budapest after being barred from entering the country by the Hungarian authorities, a close ally of Israel.

    Kneecap, who also support Irish republicanism and criticise British imperialism, have sparked widespread debate in the UK and Ireland, more than two-and-a-half decades after the peace agreement that aimed to end the conflict over the status of Northern Ireland.

    The group takes its name from the deliberate shooting of the limbs, known as “kneecapping”, carried out by Irish republicans as punishment attacks during the decades of unrest.

    – Concern over antisemitism –

    The municipality of Saint-Cloud for the first time withdrew its 40,000-euro ($47,000) subsidy from Rock en Seine.

    The wider Ile-de-France region, which includes Paris, also cancelled its funding for the 2025 edition.

    However, such moves do not jeopardise the viability of the festival, whose budget was between 16 million and 17 million euros this year.

    The group has already played twice in France this summer — at the Eurockeennes festival in Belfort and the Cabaret Vert in Charleville-Mezieres — both times without incident.

    Sunday’s concert came against a background of concerns about alleged high levels of antisemitism in France in the wake of Palestinian group Hamas October 7, 2023 attack, and Israel’s devastating retaliatory assault on Gaza.

    On Sunday Charles Kushner, the US ambassador to Paris, sparked a diplomatic row after a letter he wrote to French President Emmanuel Macron criticised what he said was France’s insufficient action against antisemitism.

  • Four journalists among 20 killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza hospital

    Four journalists among 20 killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza hospital

    GAZA CITY, Palestine: Gaza’s civil defence agency said four journalists were among at least 20 people killed Monday when Israeli strikes hit Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis.

    Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said, “the death toll is 15, including four journalists and one civil defence member”, after strikes hit Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis.

    According to media watchdogs, around 200 journalists have been killed in nearly two years of war between Israel and Hamas.

    When asked by AFP about strikes targeting a building at the medical complex, the Israeli military said it was checking the reports.

    The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate said a group of reporters had “been martyred in the line of journalistic duty, as a result of the Israeli bombing that targeted them at Nasser Hospital”.

    In a statement, it named the reporters as photojournalists Hossam Al-Masri, Mohammad Salama and Mariam Dagga, and journalist Moaz Abu Taha.

    A spokesperson for Qatar-based TV network Al Jazeera on Monday confirmed its photojournalist and cameraman Mohammad Salama was killed in the attack on the medical complex.

    The three others worked with some Palestinian and international outlets, according to AFP journalists.

    Associated Press said Mariam Dagga was a freelancer for the news agency but was not on an assignment with the media outlet when she was killed.

    Reuters said that one of the journalists killed and one of those injured were contractors for the news agency.

    The civil defence’s Bassal said an Israeli explosive drone targeted a building at Nasser Hospital, followed by an air strike as the wounded were being evacuated.

    Smoke, bloodied bodies

    Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency or the Israeli military.

    AFP footage from the immediate aftermath of the attack showed smoke filling the air and debris from the blast on the floor outside the hospital.

    Palestinians rushed to help the victims, carrying bloodied bodies and severed body parts into the medical complex. One body could be seen dangling from the top floor of the targeted building as a man screamed below.

    A woman wearing medical scrubs and a white coat was among the injured, carried into the hospital on a stretcher with a heavily bandaged leg and blood all over her clothes.

    Before the latest killings, media advocacy groups the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and Reporters Without Borders said around 200 journalists had been killed in the Gaza war.

    Earlier this month, four Al Jazeera staff and two freelancers were killed in an Israeli air strike outside Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, prompting widespread condemnation.

    The CPJ slammed that strike, saying journalists should never be targeted in war.

    “Journalists are civilians. They must never be targeted in war. And to do so is a war crime,” Jodie Ginsberg, chief executive of the CPJ, told AFP at the time.

    Israel’s offensive has killed at least 62,686 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the United Nations considers reliable.

  • Iran nuclear talks with European powers to be held in Geneva

    Iran nuclear talks with European powers to be held in Geneva

    TEHRAN: Nuclear talks scheduled for Tuesday between Iran and Britain, France and Germany will be held in Geneva, Iranian state media reported.

    “On Tuesday, Iran and the three European parties to the 2015 nuclear deal, along with the European Union, will hold a new round of talks at the level of deputy foreign ministers in Geneva,” state television said on Monday.

    The meeting will be the second since Israel’s 12-day war on Iran in mid-June, during which the United States also carried out strikes against Tehran’s nuclear facilities. The previous round of talks was held in Istanbul on July 25.

    It comes after Iran suspended cooperation with the United Nations nuclear watchdog following the Israel war, as Tehran pointing to the International Atomic Energy Agency’s failure to condemn Israeli and US strikes on its nuclear facilities.

    The unprecedented bombing by Israel and the United States on Iran derailed Tehran’s nuclear negotiations with Washington.

    The European trio have threatened to trigger a “snapback mechanism” under the 2015 nuclear deal which would reimpose UN sanctions that were lifted under the agreement, unless Iran agrees to curb its uranium enrichment and restore cooperation with IAEA inspectors.

    Iran disputes the legality of invoking the clause, accusing the Europeans of not honouring their commitments under the accord.

    Britain, France and Germany, along with China, Russia, and the United States, reached an agreement with Iran in 2015 under a deal formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA.

    The deal provided Iran with sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme to guarantee that Tehran could not develop a nuclear weapon — something it has always denied wanting to do.

    But Washington’s unilateral withdrawal from the accord in 2018 during President Donald Trump’s first term in office, and the reimposition of biting economic sanctions prompted Iran to begin rolling back on its commitments, particularly on uranium enrichment.

    At the time of the US withdrawal, London, Paris and Berlin reaffirmed their commitment to the agreement and said they intended to continue trading with Iran. As a result, UN and European sanctions were not reinstated, though Trump restored US sanctions.

    But the mechanism envisaged by European countries to compensate for the return of US sanctions has struggled to materialise, and many Western companies have been forced to leave Iran, which is facing high inflation and an economic crisis.

    The deadline for activating the snapback mechanism ends in October, but according to the Financial Times, the Europeans have offered to extend the deadline if Iran resumes nuclear talks with Washington and re-engages with the IAEA.

    Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said that the Europeans have no right to do so.

  • Cambodia MPs pass law allowing stripping of citizenship

    Cambodia MPs pass law allowing stripping of citizenship

    PHNOM PENH, Cambodia: Cambodian parliamentarians passed on Monday legislation allowing people who collude with foreign countries to be stripped of citizenship, a law rights groups fear will be used to banish dissent.

    All 120 lawmakers in attendance at the National Assembly session, including Prime Minister Hun Manet, voted unanimously to approve the bill.

    Rights monitors have long accused Cambodia’s government of using draconian laws to stifle opposition and legitimate political debate.

    A coalition of 50 rights groups issued a statement on Sunday warning the law “will have a disastrously chilling effect on the freedom of speech of all Cambodian citizens”.

    “The potential for abuse in the implementation of this vaguely worded law to target people on the basis of their ethnicity, political opinions, speech, and activism is simply too high to accept,” it added.

    “The government has many powers, but they should not have the power to arbitrarily decide who is and is not a Cambodian.”

    The legislation must still be passed by Cambodia’s upper house before being enacted by the head of state, but both are considered rubber-stamp steps.

    ‘Determined by law’

    Citizenship can be revoked on grounds of treason or disloyalty in 15 European Union countries, and only for naturalised citizens in eight of those, according to a European Parliament briefing in February.

    The unconditional right to citizenship was enshrined in Cambodia’s constitution, but lawmakers last month amended it to say “receiving, losing and revoking Khmer nationality shall be determined by law”.

    “If you betray the nation, the nation will not keep you,” Justice Minister Koeut Rith told reporters after the amendment was passed.

    Last month, Amnesty International called the legislation a “heinous violation of international law”.

    “It comes against a backdrop where the Cambodian authorities have completely failed to safeguard the independence and integrity of the country’s courts,” said regional research director Montse Ferrer.

    “This has enabled the government’s authoritarian practices to continue unchecked, such as its persecution of opposition leaders, activists and independent journalists.”

    Scores of opposition activists have been jailed or face legal cases filed by Cambodian authorities.

    Opposition leader Kem Sokha was sentenced in 2023 to 27 years in prison for treason — a charge he has repeatedly denied — and was immediately placed under house arrest.

  • Vietnam evacuates tens of thousands ahead of Typhoon Kajiki

    Vietnam evacuates tens of thousands ahead of Typhoon Kajiki

    VINH, Vietnam: Tens of thousands of residents were being evacuated from coastal Vietnam on Monday, as Typhoon Kajiki barrelled towards landfall expected to lash the country’s central belt with gales of around 160 kmh.

    The typhoon — the fifth to affect Vietnam this year — is currently at sea, roiling the Gulf of Tonkin with waves of up to 9.5 metres (31 feet).

    More than 325,500 residents in five coastal provinces have been slated for evacuation to schools and public buildings converted into temporary shelters, authorities said.

    The waterfront city of Vinh was deluged overnight, its streets largely deserted by morning with most shops and restaurants closed as residents and business-owners sandbagged their property entrances.

    By dawn nearly 30,000 people had been evacuated from the region, two domestic airports were shut and all fishing ships in the typhoon’s path called back to harbour.

    It is expected to make landfall around 1:00 pm (0600 GMT) with winds of 157 kilometres per hour (98 miles per hour), Vietnam’s National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting said.

    However, its power is due to dramatically dissipate thereafter.

    The Joint Typhoon Warning Center said conditions suggested “an approaching weakening trend as the system approaches the continental shelf of the Gulf of Tonkin where there is less ocean heat content”.

    Over a dozen domestic Vietnamese flights were cancelled on Sunday, while China’s tropical resort of Hainan evacuated around 20,000 residents as the typhoon passed its south.

    The island’s main city, Sanya, closed scenic areas and halted business operations.

    In Vietnam, more than 100 people have been killed or left missing from natural disasters in the first seven months of 2025, according to the agriculture ministry.

    Economic losses have been estimated at more than $21 million.

    Vietnam suffered $3.3 billion in economic losses last September as a result of Typhoon Yagi, which swept across the country’s north and caused hundreds of fatalities.

    Scientists say human-caused climate change is driving more intense and unpredictable weather patterns that can make destructive floods and storms more likely, particularly in the tropics.

  • Three tons as record-breaking Australia crush South Africa

    Three tons as record-breaking Australia crush South Africa

    Cameron Green slapped a 47-ball century with Travis Head and Mitchell Marsh also blasting tons as Australia crushed South Africa by 276 runs in a record-breaking third and final one-day international on Sunday in Mackay.

    The hosts were playing for pride, down 2-0 in the series, and responded magnificently, posting an ominous 431-2 after opting to bat — their highest ODI total on home soil.

    They then dismissed the Proteas for 155 in the 25th over, with spinner Cooper Connolly taking 5-22.

    Travis Head was supreme in blazing 142 off 103 balls, ably supported by skipper Marsh (100 from 106).

    Their 250-run platform at Great Barrier Reef Arena was Australia’s highest ever opening partnership against the Proteas, bettering the 170 by Matthew Hayden and Adam Gilchrist in Durban in 2002.

    Cameron Green then took over with a whirlwind 118 not out to mark the first time Australia’s top three have all scored centuries. Alex Carey was unbeaten on 50, with the 18 sixes slogged between them also a record  at home.

    Read more: Australia’s Connolly scripts history with five-for against South Africa

    “A pretty crazy day, a full performance by the lads,” said Mitchell Marsh.

    “But full credit to South Africa, they played outstandingly well in the first two games and were too good for us.”

    South Africa did themselves no favours by resting quicks Nandre Burger and Lungi Ngidi, with their second-string attack outplayed.

    After Marsh won the toss, the openers made an aggressive start, driving Australia to 86 after the 10-over powerplay.

    Travis Head was in ominous touch, crunching boundaries with ease to reach his half-century off 32 deliveries.

    At the other end, Mitchell Marsh slammed two big sixes as he also got in the groove, going after the Proteas’ fresh new-ball pairing of Kwena Maphaka and Wiaan Mulder.

    – Batted beautifully –

    With the bowlers running out of ideas, Head cruised to a seventh ODI century, pushing Senuran Muthusamy for an easy single.

    He then really let rip with a series of big hits before being caught in the deep by Dewald Brevis off Keshav Maharaj after crunching 17 fours and five sixes.

    Marsh battled to three figures soon after but was out next ball, taken on the run by wicketkeeper Ryan Rickelton after he skied Muthusamy.

    But the onslaught was far from over with Cameron Green producing a sizzling display of power-hitting, including three giant sixes in a row off Muthusamy to post his maiden ODI century.

    Only Glenn Maxwell (40 balls) has scored a faster hundred for Australia.

    “The two openers, they batted beautifully so me and ‘Kez’ (Carey) could just bat with a lot of freedom,” said Green.

    South Africa’s chase started badly with four wickets down for 50 inside nine overs.

    Sean Abbott accounted for Aiden Markram (two) and skipper Temba Bavuma (19) while Xavier Bartlett took care of Rickelton (11) and Tristan Stubbs (one).

    The visitors’ big hope was Brevis and he produced some fireworks in his 49 before Green caught him on the ropes off Connolly, who then cleaned up the tail.

    “We were under the pump from the first ball and didn’t really pitch up today,” said Bavuma. “They put us under pressure and we didn’t have the answers.”

  • Former presidents back Sri Lanka’s jailed ex-leader

    Former presidents back Sri Lanka’s jailed ex-leader

    COLOMBO: Three former presidents of Sri Lanka expressed solidarity with jailed ex-leader Ranil Wickremesinghe on Sunday and condemned his incarceration as a “calculated assault” on democracy.

    The trio, former political rivals of Wickremesinghe -— president between July 2022 and September 2024 -— said the charges against him were frivolous.

    He has been accused of using $55,000 in state funds for a stopover in Britain while returning home after a G77 summit in Havana and the UN General Assembly in New York in September 2023.

    Wickremesinghe, 76, was rushed to the intensive care unit of the main state-run hospital in Colombo on Saturday, a day after being remanded in custody.

    Doctors said he was suffering from severe dehydration on top of acute diabetes and high blood pressure.

    “What we are witnessing is a calculated onslaught on the very essence of our democratic values,” former president Chandrika Kumaratunga said in a statement.

    The 80-year-old Kumaratunga said the consequences of Wickremesinghe’s jailing would go beyond the fate of an individual and could affect the rights of all citizens.

    “I join wholeheartedly in expressing my unreserved opposition to these initiatives, which all political leaders are duty-bound to resist,” Kumaratunga added.

    Her successor Mahinda Rajapaksa, 79, also expressed solidarity with Wickremesinghe and visited him in prison on Saturday, shortly before he was moved to intensive care.

    Maithripala Sirisena, 73, who sacked Wickremesinghe from the prime minister’s post in October 2018 before being forced by the Supreme Court to reinstate him 52 days later, described the jailing as a witch hunt.

    “What we are seeing is a systematic campaign to silence opponents of the new government,” Sirisena said. “They are polishing the lid of a coffin to bury democracy.”

    Wickremesinghe’s own United National Party (UNP) said on Saturday it believed he was being prosecuted out of fear that he could stage a comeback.

    He lost the presidential election in September to Anura Kumara Dissanayake, but has remained politically active despite holding no elected office.

    Wickremesinghe was arrested as part of Dissanayake’s campaign against endemic corruption in the island nation, which is emerging from its worst economic meltdown in 2022.

    He has maintained that his wife’s travel expenses in Britain were met by her personally and that no state funds were used.

    Wickremesinghe became president in July 2022 after then-leader Gotabaya Rajapaksa stepped down following months of street protests fuelled by the economic crisis.

  • Kneecap to play Paris concert in defiance of objections

    Kneecap to play Paris concert in defiance of objections

    PARIS: Irish rap group Kneecap, one of whose members faces a British terror charge for allegedly supporting Hezbollah, are to perform outside Paris on Sunday, despite objections from French Jewish groups and government officials.

    The local authorities have also withdrawn their subsidies for the music festival where the trio will play — the annual Rock en Seine festival, held in the Paris suburb of Saint-Cloud — after organisers kept the controversial band on the programme for their slot from 1630 GMT.

    Strongly backing the Palestinian cause and bitterly criticising Israel, the group from Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK, have turned concerts into political events.

    Liam O’Hanna, 27, who performs under the stage name Mo Chara, was charged in England in May accused of displaying a flag of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah during a London concert in November.

    They played a closely scrutinised concert at the Glastonbury Festival in June, where Chara declared: “Israel are war criminals.”

    The group later missed playing at the Sziget Festival in Budapest after being barred from entering the country by the Hungarian authorities, a close ally of Israel.

    Kneecap, who also focus on Irish republicanism, are controversial within the UK and Ireland, more than two-and-a-half-decades after the peace agreement that aimed to end the conflict over the status of Northern Ireland.

    The group takes its name from the deliberate shooting of the limbs, known as “kneecapping”, carried out by Irish Republicans as punishment attacks during the decades of unrest.

    ‘Confident’

    “We are confident that the group will perform in the correct manner,” Matthieu Ducos, director of Rock en Seine, told AFP ahead of the festival.

    The municipality of Saint-Cloud for the first time withdrew its 40,000-euro ($47,000) subsidy from Rock en Seine.

    The wider Ile-de-France region that includes Paris also cancelled its funding for the 2025 edition.

    However, such moves do not jeopardise the viability of the festival, whose budget was between 16 million and 17 million euros this year.

    The group has already played twice in France this summer — at the Eurockeennes festival in Belfort and the Cabaret Vert in Charleville-Mezieres — both times without incident.

    But the concert comes against a background of concerns about alleged high levels of antisemitism in France in the wake of the October 7, 2023 attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel and the devastating assault on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip that Israel launched in response.

    “They are desecrating the memory of the 50 French victims of Hamas on October 7, as well as all the French victims of Hezbollah,” said Yonathan Arfi, president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF), calling for the concert to be cancelled.

    Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said vigilance would be required against “any comments of an antisemitic nature, apology for terrorism or incitement to hatred” at the event.

  • N. Korea test-fires two air defence missiles: KCNA

    N. Korea test-fires two air defence missiles: KCNA

    SEOUL, South Korea: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has overseen the test-firing of two “new” air defence missiles, state media said Sunday, after Pyongyang accused Seoul of fomenting tensions at the border.

    The test-firing, which took place Saturday, showed that the two “improved” missile weapon systems had “superior combat capability”, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.

    The KCNA report did not explain the new missiles in any detail, only that their “operation and reaction mode is based on unique and special technology”. It also did not say where the test had been carried out.

    “The firing particularly proved that the technological features of two types of projectiles are very suitable for destroying various aerial targets,” KCNA said.

    On the same day, Kim also communicated an “important task” for the defence science sector to carry out before a key party meeting, the report said.

    South Korea’s military said Saturday it had fired warning shots at several North Korean soldiers who briefly crossed the heavily militarised border separating the two countries on Tuesday.

    UN Command put the number of North Korean troops that crossed the border at 30, Yonhap news agency reported Sunday.

    Pyongyang’s state media quoted Army Lieutenant General Ko Jong Chol as saying the incident was a “premeditated and deliberate provocation”.

    “This is a very serious prelude that would inevitably drive the situation in the southern border area where a huge number of forces are stationing in confrontation with each other to the uncontrollable phase,” Ko said.

    South Korea’s new leader Lee Jae Myung has sought warmer ties with the nuclear-armed North and vowed to build “military trust”, but Pyongyang has said it has no interest in improving relations with Seoul.

    The missile tests also come as the South and the United States conduct extensive joint military drills.