Month: January 2017

Relations between the former Yugoslav Balkan states are at their worst in some time. …

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry met Vietnamese leaders Friday during his last trip as the top diplomat for the United States. He held separate meetings with Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and acting Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son. Kerry later left for Ho Chi Minh City to meet a group of Vietnamese youth and …

President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign and Twitter pronouncements on world affairs have won him many foreign policy labels: a non-interventionist, an isolationist, a unilateralist and a realist. As Trump prepares for his inauguration January 20, VOA’s Masood Farivar reports on three forces driving Trump’s foreign policy. …

Retired Marine General James Mattis, president-elect Donald Trump’s pick for secretary of defense, testified at a confirmation hearing by the Senate Armed Services Committee Thursday, as Mike Pompeo, nominee for CIA director, testified in front of the Senate’s Select Committee for Intelligence. As Pentagon correspondent Carla Babb reports, both gave testimony openly independent of some …

The slow return of growth to Russia’s economy this year will not provide much help to people looking for jobs, with unemployment expected to remain elevated, the International Labor Organization said on January 12. …

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden has praised the man who will replace him, saying Vice President-elect Mike Pence knows more about Russia than his running mate, Donald Trump. …

Eight athletes have been disqualified from the 2008 and 2012 Olympics in Beijing and London after drug retests, including two Belarusians and six athletes from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and China. …

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden will fly to Kiev on Sunday on a farewell visit by one of Ukraine’s strongest political supporters, as the country looks forward with apprehension to the new administration of Donald Trump. Biden, whose visit was announced by the office of President Petro Poroshenko, has been the front man for U.S. …

A court in France has ordered former Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj released from custody pending a decision on his possible extradition to Serbia. …

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Department of Defense gets his Senate confirmation hearing Thursday, while the same committee considers legislation necessary to make him even eligible for the job. Retired General James Mattis will testify before the Senate Armed Services Committee, which is expected to give him approval. Mattis would become the …

U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said Wednesday he told President-elect Donald Trump the intelligence community did not create a document featuring claims Russia compiled information to attempt to compromise Trump. CNN, which first reported the unsubstantiated allegations Tuesday, did not give details of the compromising information. But the BuzzFeed digital media site posted …

In a new report, the World Bank has said Russia must diversify its economy, improve its investment climate, and make major infrastructure investments if it hopes to be competitive in the global economy. …

The Tajik Foreign Ministry says that it summoned the Afghan ambassador in Dushanbe late in December and lodged a diplomatic protest over remarks made by the Afghan ambassador to Russia. …

Former U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Thursday he’ll soon announce whether he will run for South Korea’s top job as he returned home and strongly hinted at his political ambitions before hundreds of cheering supporters.   Ban’s return will likely heat up local politics because he’s considered the only major conservative contender in a possible …

Afghanistan’s Taliban has released a video message of two foreign hostages, an American and an Australian, five months after they were seized at gunpoint in Kabul. The captives, Kevin King and Australian Timothy John Weeks, are shown pleading with the United States to negotiate their release with the Taliban to save their lives. The pair …

While North Korea’s recent claim of an imminent intercontinental ballistic missile test is spreading alarm globally, U.S. experts see it as a bid for attention and a gambit to intimidate the incoming U.S. administration. On Sunday, the North’s state-run news agency, KCNA, reported that the country can fire off an ICBM “anytime and anywhere,” reiterating …

Cameroon’s national football team is trying to rebuild as they head to the Africa Cup of Nations tournament in Gabon. Thousands of fans of the Indomitable Lions cheered their team Tuesday in an international friendly between Cameroon and the Mighty Warriors of Zimbabwe. The Lions came from behind to secure a one-all tie after Zimbabwe’s …

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of state says he supports a “full review” of the nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, which the incoming president has previously pledged to renegotiate or scrap altogether. …

The Afghan Taliban has released a video showing an American and an Australian who were kidnapped in August. …

The head of IranAir has taken delivery in France of the first Western airliner under an international sanctions deal. …