• Politics
    Al Jazeera

    Iran's President-elect Raisi addresses ties to mass executions

    Tehran, Iran – Iran’s President-elect Ebrahim Raisi has for the first time addressed his links with the mass execution of political prisoners in 1988 when he was deputy prosecutor of Tehran. Rights groups maintain that, shortly after the eight-year Iran-Iraq war ended, Raisi was one of the members of a so-called “death commission” that ordered the disappearance and execution of thousands of prisoners.

  • Lifestyle
    Al Jazeera

    In Pictures: Tibet's historic sites at risk due to tourism boom

    The biggest challenge for us is the contradiction between the protection and usage of the cultural relics,” Gonggar Tashi, head administrator of Potala Palace, said. At the Potala Palace, the former home of the Dalai Lamas, the number of visitors allowed daily is limited to 5,000. Balancing demand from the millions of visitors who come there every year with the need to minimise wear and tear on the massive hillside structure is a constant challenge, Tashi said.

  • Lifestyle
    Al Jazeera

    Rights group urges UK to probe UAE activist's death near London

    A US-based advocacy group, Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), has called on United Kingdom authorities to investigate the circumstances of a prominent Emirati dissident’s death in a car crash near London. Alaa al-Siddiq, 33, executive director of the UK-based ALQST, a non-profit organisation that advocates greater freedoms and human rights in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the wider Gulf region, died in an automobile collision in Oxfordshire on Saturday.

  • Science
    CNN

    Human-wildlife conflict around the world

    In India, as elephants lose their forest habitats they are increasingly coming face to face with humans. Each year, around 100 elephants are killed by human-related activity in India -- some from being run over by trains, others in retaliation for damage to crops and property. Scroll through the gallery to see more examples of human-wildlife conflict. One of the last strongholds of the Bengal tiger is a huge mangrove forest called the Sundarbans, which crosses India and Bangladesh.

  • News
    Al Jazeera

    Pakistan police: Cleric confessed to sexually assaulting student

    A religious cleric accused of sexually assaulting a student at a religious school in Pakistan’s second-largest city of Lahore has been arrested and has confessed to his crimes, police say, after widespread public outcry following the allegations. Aziz-ur-Rehman, who was arrested from the northwestern town of Mianwali on Saturday, had earlier denied the allegations in a video released on social media. We have been able to arrest this criminal.

  • Politics
    Al Jazeera

    Israeli PM says Raisi win a 'wake up' call over Iran nuclear deal

    Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has condemned the new Iranian president as a “hangman”, describing Ebrahim Raisi’s election win as a final “wake up” call for world powers before returning to a nuclear agreement with Tehran. Bennett made the comments on Sunday as he opened his first cabinet meeting since swearing in his new coalition government last week.

  • Politics
    Al Jazeera

    Italy to lift mandatory masks outdoors as pandemic slows

    People in Italy will no longer have to wear masks outdoors from June 28, the government has said, as COVID-19 cases and hospitalisations decline in one of Europe’s worst-hit countries by the pandemic. Mandatory masks were imposed in October last year, when the country was entering a second wave of infections and authorities were struggling to curb a surging national caseload.