A prominent rebel group in eastern Myanmar yesterday appealed to other ethnic armies to unite against the military, as the country enters its fourth month under a junta regime.

“Eta Banglar joi. Banglar manusher joi. Bangla gota Bharat-ke Baanchiyechey,” West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee declared today after her party’s landslide victory in the state assembly elections.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik of the eastern Indian state of Odisha today announced working journalists of the state as “frontline Covid-19 warriors”.

West Bengal’s Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee looks set to win a third term, the DMK is heading for victory in Tamil Nadu, the BJP is leading in Assam and the LDF in Kerala in the counting of votes for state polls, according to NDTV.

A sense of anguish, hopelessness and anger has settled over India, which is going through a second wave that has devastated families and is overwhelming the health infrastructure around the country.

India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has discussed cooperation in emergency medical supplies with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi yesterday.

Half of Myanmar’s population could be living in poverty next year, driven by the combination of the pandemic and the political crisis sparked by the military coup, the UN said yesterday.

Russia yesterday added Alexei Navalny’s political network to its database of terrorist and extremist organisations, as Moscow moves closer to shutting down the jailed opposition politician’s movement against President Vladimir Putin.

Nearly three-quarters of female journalists say they have been victims of harassment online and for 20 percent this has transferred into offline attacks, according to a UNESCO study published yesterday.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday postponed planned parliamentary elections amid a dispute over voting in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem and splits in his Fatah party.

A massive stampede at a densely packed Jewish pilgrimage site killed at least 44 people in Israel yesterday, blackening the country’s largest Covid-era gathering.

President Joe Biden marked his 100th day in office Thursday with a trip to the crucial electoral state of Georgia to promote multi-trillion dollar spending plans that he says can transform the United States.

Iran welcomed a “change of tone” from Saudi Arabia that could clear the way to a new era of cooperation between the rival regional powers.

At least 44 people were crushed to death at an over-crowded religious bonfire festival in Israel on Friday, medics said, in what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described as a "heavy disaster".

Alexei Navalny’s political network yesterday said it is disbanding, as the jailed Kremlin critic appeared in court, gaunt and shaven headed, for the first time since ending his hunger strike.

Two Myanmar air force bases came under rocket attack yesterday, the military said, as the country grapples with violence in the wake of the February 1 coup.

China yesterday warned the United States against imposing its democratic ideals, while criticising trade sanctions and military moves in Beijing’s backyard just hours after President Biden’s speech on American geopolitical priorities.

Nearly all of the world’s glaciers are losing mass at an ever increasing pace, contributing to more than a fifth of global sea level rise this century, according to unprecedented research released Wednesday.

Scientists have backed Brazil’s drug regulator’s decision to stop the import of Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine on the basis that batches they tested carried a live version of a common cold-causing virus.

President Joe Biden triumphantly declared that the United States is “on the move again” in a rousing speech to Congress yesterday, calling for trillions of dollars to rebuild the post-pandemic US middle class and give new life to “forgotten” workers.