Gunmen attacked a position held by Syrian security forces in Damascus overnight, a war monitor said Monday, raising fears that the deadly violence sweeping Syria’s coastal region could spread to other parts of the country. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which has monitored the Syrian conflict since 2011, said that unidentified gunmen threw … Read more
Iran has signaled that it is open to talks about its nuclear program with the United States if they are restricted to military concerns, a day after the country’s supreme leader had appeared to reject an overture from President Trump to hold discussions. “If the objective of negotiations is to address concerns vis-à-vis any potential … Read more
A century after the original golden era of railroads, trains are once again the talk of travel. In Europe, especially, train travel is surging as an environmental alternative to short-haul flights, with more night trains, high-speed routes and transnational collaboration between rail companies. Political ties between European countries may be jittery, but the cities are … Read more
Last year, the hit West End musical “Operation Mincemeat” embarked on a mischievous publicity campaign. “Are we too British for Broadway?” it asked, inviting Americans on its email list and via social media to fill out an online questionnaire about whether, for instance, they had trouble understanding British accents. (“No,” 90.2 percent of the respondents … Read more
The air inside the community hall in Greenland’s capital was thick with warmth, a welcome contrast to the icy streets outside. As voters brushed snow from their coats, candidates from most of Greenland’s major parties sat down in the front of the room, ready for questions. Every seat was filled, two dozen international journalists lined … Read more
Ukrainian forces have stalled the Russian offensive in the eastern Donetsk region in recent months and have started to win back small patches of land, according to Ukrainian soldiers and military analysts. Russia still holds the initiative, and conducts dozens of assaults across the eastern front every day, the soldiers and analysts say. But after … Read more
Calin Georgescu, an ultranationalist candidate who won the first round of Romania’s abruptly aborted presidential election last year, has been barred from competing in a do-over vote scheduled for May, sparking a small but violent protest by his supporters in Bucharest, the Romanian capital. The Central Electoral Bureau issued a statement late Sunday saying that … Read more
In 301 AD, the Emperor Diocletian made a bold but ultimately unsuccessful bid to address the inflation that was rampaging across the eastern half of the divided Roman Empire. Prices of everything from purple thread and feathers to slaves and cattle were dictated by his Edict on Maximum Prices. Violators faced the death penalty. Diocletian … Read more
The airport in Hamburg, Germany’s second largest city, said it had canceled all flights on Sunday because of a one-day strike over pay by ground staff called by a labor union that started its action earlier than expected without warning. The airport had been expected to carry more than 40,000 passengers on Sunday, with 144 … Read more
