RABAT: Moroccan police said Wednesday they had broken up a people smuggling gang in a northern town near the site of a deadly border tragedy in June.
The DGSN security service said it had arrested 23 suspected smugglers during morning raids in Nador and surrounding areas.
Nador is near the border with the Spanish enclave of Melilla, one of two main European Union territories on African soil and a magnet for migrants fleeing violence across the continent and seeking refuge in Europe.

BEIRUT: The UN has procured tens of millions of dollars in contracts with companies linked to Syrian government-backed individuals sanctioned for human rights abuses, according to a report by two non-governmental groups.
Syria’s uprising turned civil war that started in 2011 has killed hundreds of thousands and displaced half the country’s pre-war population of 23 million. More than 80 percent of Syrians now live in poverty, leaving much of the population dependent on humanitarian assistance.

LONDON: Protests engulfing Iran have reached a point of “no return” as demonstrators demand wide reforms beyond the end of mandatory hijab rules, said British-Iranian charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who spent six years detained in Tehran.
She said the Islamic government’s crackdown on the popular revolt and shutdown of the Internet showed it was scared of losing control.

ABU DHABI: A webinar with the goal of fostering closer ties on climate change issues between the EU and the Gulf Cooperation Council has been held ahead of COP27, the Emirates News Agency has reported.

The event was called EU-GCC Webinar on Energy Efficiency in the Building Sector: A Key Driver for Net-Decarbonization, and drew about 100 European and Gulf policymakers and private sector representatives. 

PARIS: Iranian students protested on Tuesday at multiple universities, defying a bloody crackdown as tensions mount on the eve of planned ceremonies marking 40 days since Mahsa Amini’s death.

“A student may die but will not accept humiliation,” they chanted at Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, in the southwestern province of Khuzestan, in an online video verified by AFP.

Young women and schoolgirls have been at the forefront of protests sparked by Amini’s death last month, after her arrest for an alleged breach of the country’s strict dress code for women.