World briefs

SYRIA A security consultancy says at least 5,600 people from 33 countries have returned home after spending time in territory controlled by militant groups in Syria and Iraq. The Soufan Group said in a report released yesterday that the potential return of unknown numbers of foreign fighters represents a huge challenge for law enforcement agencies.

PHILIPPINES The Islamic State group sent at least USD1.5 million to finance the recently ended siege of the southern Philippine city of Marawi, with the assault leaders using the 2014 IS seizure of the Iraqi city of Mosul as a blueprint, the Philippine military chief said. 

PAPUA NEW GUINEA More than 600 asylum seekers are refusing to leave an immigration camp on Papua New Guinea that Australia wants to close next week, Australian officials said.

INDONESIA’s parliament yesterday endorsed a presidential decree that gives officials sweeping powers to ban organizations deemed as threats to national unity. The decree has already been used to ban Hizbut Tahrir, an Islamic organization that advocates for a global caliphate. It required parliamentary approval to become permanent law.

NEW ZEALAND’s incoming government is hoping to make the nation greener by planting 100 million trees each year, ensuring the electricity grid runs entirely from renewable energy, and spending more money on cycle ways and rail transport. 

INDIA Hundreds of young men — armed with knives, cricket bats and iron rods — patrol the nighttime streets of India-controlled Kashmir these days, hoping their ad-hoc vigilante groups will deter the mysterious bandits reportedly chopping off women’s long, woven hair.

SAUDI ARABIA’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has defended his bold reform plans, including the kingdom’s decision to lift the ban on women driving, saying that “we were not like this in the past.”

SPAIN Catalonia’s political leaders plan to bring a legal challenge to prevent the Spanish government from removing them from office and taking over running the region to stop its push for independence.

PORTUGAL Women’s rights groups in Portugal have reacted angrily to a court decision that quoted the Bible and a 19th-century law in justifying a suspended sentence for a man convicted of assaulting his ex-wife with a bat because she allegedly committed adultery.   

VENEZUELA Four of the five opposition governors recently elected in Venezuela took an oath Monday before leaders of the all-powerful, pro-government constitutional assembly, reversing an earlier refusal and underlining fractures in the opposition.