AP, Beirut
A Syrian war monitoring group says an Israeli airstrike the night before killed seven Iranian and Iranian-backed fighters in northern Syria.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Thursday that the airstrike targeted an Iranian weapons depot and also wounded several other fighters.
Syrian state media said the country’s air defenses responded to an “Israeli air aggression” targeting positions in an industrial area northeast of the city of Aleppo city, causing material damage only.
10 die from drinking tainted alcohol in Azarbaijan
AP, Tehran
Iran’s state-run news agency says 10 people have died from tainted alcohol in northwestern Azarbaijan province while 240 were hospitalized. IRNA says the alcohol poisoning took place over the past six weeks in the city of Tabriz.
Hodjat Pourfathi, an official with the Health Ministry, is quoted as saying three of the victims were blinded and several were in a coma. He says the fatalities are likely to rise.
EU parliament approves ban on single use plastics
AFP, Brussels
European lawmakers voted overwhelmingly Wednesday for an EU-wide ban on single-use plastic products such as the straws, cutlery and cotton buds that are clogging the world’s oceans.
The text had already been approved in negotiations with member states and EU officials and it will now be rapidly approved into law. The ban comes into effect from 2021. EU Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans said Europe was not the worst source of plastic pollution, but that the pioneering measure could serve as an example to the world.
Maltese military seizes tanker hijacked by migrants
AFP, Valletta
A tanker that was hijacked by migrants off Libya docked in Malta on Thursday after the Maltese armed forces took control of the vessel. The Palau-flagged tanker Elhiblu I had picked up the 108 migrants including women and children on Tuesday evening and then headed back to Tripoli. But six nautical miles from port the ship suddenly changed course and headed north toward Europe.
Outsider activist tipped to win Slovak presidency
AFP, Bratislava
An environmental lawyer and anti-corruption campaigner is poised to win Slovakia’s presidential run-off Saturday, one year after the murder of an investigative journalist plunged the EU member state into crisis.
Political novice Zuzana Caputova could command 60 percent of the vote to become the first woman to hold the presidency in the eurozone member of 5.4 million people, according to two recent opinion polls.
