World briefs

MALAYSIA-THAILAND Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad met yesterday with Thailand’s leader and discussed peace talks in Thailand’s southern border provinces where a Muslim separatist insurgency has been raging for over a decade.

CAMBODIA A former prison chief for Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime who has been sentenced to life in prison has been hospitalized with serious respiratory problems.

NORTH KOREA Leader Kim Jong Un’s summits with the presidents of South Korea and the United States have not changed his country’s abysmal human rights record, the U.N. independent investigator on human rights in the isolated Asian nation said.

INDIA Government forces killed two rebels during a gunbattle on the outskirts of disputed Kashmir’s main city yesterday, sparking violent anti-India protests by residents, police said.

PAKISTAN has negotiated a USD6 billion assistance package of loans and deferred payments from Saudi Arabia in hopes of resuscitating its flagging economy, struggling under the weight of a whopping $18 billion deficit.

RUSSIA President Vladimir Putin and Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte (pictured) vowed yesterday to expand economic ties between their two countries despite European Union sanctions against Russia. Conte, on his first trip to Russia, invited Putin to visit Italy in the near future.

CYPRUS Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says he believes prospects for a comprehensive settlement that will reunify Cyprus “remain alive” and he will prepare the way for negotiations between Greek and Turkish Cypriots to resume.

GERMANY The government is putting pressure on the country’s automakers to fix their diesel cars that have excessive emissions, in a bid to placate drivers angered by the prospect of diesel driving bans in major cities.

BRITAIN Smugglers and other organized criminals are likely to exploit gaps in border enforcement if Britain leaves the European Union without an agreement, a government watchdog cautioned yesterday amid widening warnings about the disruptive impact of a “no-deal” Brexit.

MEXICO Hurricane Willa swept onto Mexico’s Pacific mainland with 120 mph winds, hitting an area of beach towns, fishing villages and farms after roaring over an offshore penal colony.

VENEZUELA Hollywood actress Angelina Jolie said the exodus of hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans from their country has led to a “shocking” migrant crisis in South America that was “predictable and preventable.”