Pakistan airport attacked again
Pakistan airport attacked again
ISLAMABAD — Pakistan’s busiest airport came under attack Tuesday for the second time this week when assailants riding a motorbike sprayed bullets at a camp used by security forces and escaped.
No casualties were reported and the attackers did not breach the gate of the security facility, but the incident underscored the worsening security crisis in Pakistan barely two days after heavily armed militants stormed an auxiliary terminal at the airport and engaged in an hours-long firefight with security forces that resulted in 36 people dead, including 10 attackers.
Sisi vows action after video shows sexual assault
CAIRO — Spurred by a widely shared video said to show a mob sexual assault on a woman in Tahrir Square, President Abdel Fattah Sisi pledged Tuesday to take “all necessary measures” to combat such attacks and ordered vigorous enforcement of a new law that for the first time criminalizes sex harassment.
Rights advocates welcomed the gesture but said the new measures did not go far enough. The failure of successive governments to take the issue seriously pushed sexual violence to endemic levels in Egypt, they said.
Advocacy groups and the prosecutor’s office reported a series of mob assaults took place in the iconic square in recent days as Sisi backers hailed his victory in last month’s presidential election.
Rivlin to succeed Shimon Peres
JERUSALEM — At the end of a tense vote that capped one of the country’s messiest political campaigns, Reuven Rivlin was chosen Tuesday to serve as Israel’s next president.
Rivlin, 74, was elected in Jerusalem by members of Israel’s 120-seat parliament to succeed the iconic Shimon Peres, who will step down next month at the end of his seven-year term, just before his 91st birthday. Rivlin was one of five contenders, the largest number of candidates ever to run for the largely ceremonial yet influential position.
UN rights chief: Xenophobia paves way to violence
GENEVA — The recent rise in xenophobic rhetoric from EU politicians could pave the way for violence and human rights violations, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay warned Tuesday in Geneva.
At the opening of the U.N. Human Rights Council’s summer session, Pillay said the xenophobic, racist and religiously intolerant discourse could undermine the fight against discrimination in Europe.