DHAKA: Former US National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden will not answer questions from foreign special services regarding the NSA’s secret surveillance of leaders of countries that are the US` allies.Snowden’s Russian lawyer Anatoly Kucherena says, reports The Voice

DHAKA: Typhoon ‘Krosa’ hit the northern end of the main Philippine island of Luzon on Thursday forcing around 60 families to flee.A Philippine civil defence official said, reports The Straits Times.The typhoon, packing maximum winds of 160 kilometres per hour, struck the coastal

DHAKA: A jury has been given an insight into the inner workings of tabloid phone hacking at the trial of two former editors of Rupert Murdoch`s defunct News of the World.Former editors Rebekah Brooks and Andrew Coulson are on trial, along with six others, on a range of charges related to

DHAKA: Syria has destroyed all its declared chemical weapons production and mixing facilities, meeting a major deadline in an ambitious disarmament programme, the international chemical weapons watchdog said in a document obtained by Reuters.The Organisation for the Prohibition of

DHAKA: The last county in China to be accessible by modern land transport was finally linked up to the rest of the country Thursday with a new road that has taken decades to build, state media said.The 19,000 people of deeply isolated Medog in southeastern Tibet, where the mighty

DHAKA: Construction is set to begin in India on Thursday for the world’s tallest statue, which will stand twice the size of the Statue of Liberty and be made out of melted-down metal and farming equipment.The tribute to Sadar Patel, the first home minister of independent India who was

DHAKA: Bangladesh Power Development Board (PDB) has signed an agreement with Lakthanavi Power Ltd, a Sri Lankan firm, to set up a 52 MW dual-fuel power plant in Jangalia under Comilla district within next 15 months.According to the agreement, the Sri Lankan firm will set up the power

DHAKA: Rescue workers in Niger say they have found the bodies of 87 people who died of thirst after their vehicles broke down as they tried to cross the Sahara.Rescue worker Almoustapha Alhacen said the corpses were in a severe state of decomposition and had been partly eaten, probably by

DHAKA: The Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, has said he is open to peace talks but insisted that they would not go ahead unless foreign nations stopped supporting rebel fighters.The comments came during a meeting on Wednesday with peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi in Damascus, reports Al

DHAKA: Workers across Indonesia have begun a two-day strike demanding higher salaries, the latest industrial action to hit the South East Asian economy.The workers say their cost of living has gone up amid rising inflation and a hike in fuel prices, reports the BBC.According to unions’

DHAKA: Former Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea has denied all charges against him on the last day of a trial for leaders of the Cambodian regime widely blamed for the deaths of some 1.7 million people.The ailing 87-year-old Nuon Chea, the Khmer Rouge’s chief ideologist, and 82-year-old

DHAKA: The political uproar over alleged US eavesdropping on close European allies has produced an unusual defence from the National Security Agency.NSA says it was the Europeans themselves who did the spying, and then handed data to the Americans, reports The Jerusalem Post.It is rare

DHAKA: UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon blasted an Israeli announcement made earlier in the day to advance settlement construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.Ban condemned as ‘contrary to international law’ the move announced by Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu in

DHAKA: The New York City Council voted to raise the minimum age for buying tobacco to 21, the highest in the country, in hopes of reducing smoking among the city’s young adults.The council voted 35 to 10 on Wednesday to raise the age requirement from 18, The Straits Times publishes this

DHAKA: Three suspected militants have been killed in a US drone strike in Miramshah Bazaar of North Waziristan Agency in Pakistan on Wednesday night.Sources said that three people were also injured and that the number of casualties is likely to increase.This is the first drone strike

DHAKA: Switzerland’s state-controlled energy company BKW said Wednesday its Muehleberg nuclear plant would go offline in 2019, as the country seeks to exit nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima disaster.BKW said it had ‘now decided to continue operating (the plant) until 2019, in

DHAKA: Police have detained a Saudi columnist who supported ending his country’s ban on women driving.Activists said Wednesday, reports TDS.The activists, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, said Tariq al-Mubarak was called by investigators concerning a stolen car

DHAKA: Iran’s nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi said Tehran has never stopped 20 percent uranium enrichment, denying earlier claims of a temporarily halt.Iran parliament’s website reported Wednesday, says france24.com.‘Twenty percent uranium and nuclear plates are being produced inside

DHAKA: International powers are unlikely to meet their goal of convening peace talks on Syria in Geneva next month as differences emerge between Washington and Moscow over opposition representation.Arab and Western officials said, reports Turkish daily Hurriyet.Failure of the main Syrian

DHAKA: Iranian intelligence minister Mahmoud Alavi said on Wednesday that four people accused of sabotaging one of the country’s sensitive nuclear sites were only thieves.Iran’s Mehr news agency reported, says Turkish daily Hurriyet.‘These four people were not saboteurs. They cut