DHAKA, 30 June 2022, (TON): United States Ambassador in Dhaka Peter Hass said “his country pays tribute to a nation like Bangladesh that has overcome great adversity as the US had also emerged after a bloody war of independence.”

He said "this year, as we celebrate 50 years of bilateral relations with Bangladesh, we pay tribute to another nation that emerged after a bloody war of independence.”

The envoy made the remark while addressing at an event celebrating the US Independence Day at the American International School in the capital.

He said "we look forward to what the future will bring to Bangladesh - and what Bangladesh will bring to the future.”

DHAKA, 30 June 2022, (TON): Ambassadors of two countries to Bangladesh separately presented their credentials to President M Abdul Hamid at Bangabhaban here.

The envoys are ambassador of Austria Katharina Wieser and ambassador of Libya Abdul Mutaleb Suliman Mohammad Suliman.

Welcoming them at Bangabhaban, President Hamid said “Bangladesh maintains excellent relations with Austria and Libya.”

He hoped that this relationship will be further expanded in various fields including, trade and investment in the days to come.

The head of state stressed on high-level communication and exchange of visits between the countries.

JEDDAH, 29 June 2022, (TON): Iran and the US resumed indirect talks aimed at rescuing Tehran’s tattered nuclear deal with world powers.

Tehran’s top nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani met EU official Enrique Mora in Doha, and Mora began passing messages to Rob Malley, the US special representative for Iran.

Qatar’s Foreign Ministry said “the talks aimed to reestablish the deal in a way that supports and enhances security, stability and peace in the region and opens new horizons for broader regional cooperation and dialogue with Iran.”

Iran and world powers agreed in 2015 to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, under which Tehran limited its enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.

In 2018, President Donald Trump withdrew the US from the deal and began reimposing sanctions, raising tensions across the wider Middle East and sparking a series of attacks and incidents.

GENEVA, 29 June 2022, (TON): The UN human rights office said “306,887 civilians had been killed in Syria during the conflict since March 2011 in what it said was the highest estimate yet.”

UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said “this analysis would give a clearer sense of the severity and scale of the conflict.”

The toll included those killed as a direct result of war operations and not those who died from lack of health care or access to food or clean water.

MADRID, 29 June 2022, (TON): Spain’s prime minister is defending the way Moroccan and Spanish police repelled migrants last week as they tried to cross the shared border into the north African enclave of Melilla, depicting the attempt in which at least 23 people died as an attack on Spain’s borders.

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said “we must remember that many of these migrants attacked Spain’s borders with axes and hooks.”

“We are talking about an attempt to assault the fence that was evidently carried out in an aggressive way, and therefore what Spain’s state security forces and Moroccan guards did was defend Spain’s borders.”

Authorities in Morocco have blamed the deaths on a stampede of people that formed early Friday as hundreds attempted to scale or break through the 12-meter iron double fence.

GENEVA, 29 June 2022, (TON): UN said “more than 100 people, including many women, have been murdered in a Syrian camp in just 18 months” demanding countries repatriate their citizens.

Imran Riza, the UN resident coordinator in Syria said “the Al-Hol camp is increasingly unsafe and the child detainees are being condemned to a life with no future.”

Al-Hol, in the Kurdish-controlled northeast, was meant as a temporary detention facility.

However, it still holds about 56,000 people, mostly Syrians and Iraqis, some of whom maintain links with the Daesh group, which seized swathes of Iraq and Syria in 2014.

The rest are citizens of other countries, including children and other relatives of Daesh fighters.

MADRID, 29 June 2022, (TON): The leader of the alliance said “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has sparked a “fundamental shift” in NATO’s approach to defense, and member states will have to boost their military spending in an increasingly unstable world.”

Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg spoke as US President Joe Biden and other NATO leaders began to arrive in Madrid for a summit that will set the course of the alliance for the coming years.

He said “the meeting would chart a blueprint for the alliance in a more dangerous and unpredictable world.”

Stoltenberg said “to be able to defend in a more dangerous world we have to invest more in our defense.”

LONDON, 29 June 2022, (TON): UK Foreign Minister Liz Truss has struggled to reveal the exact number of British detainees still being held in Iran.

During a Foreign Affairs Committee meeting, Truss was asked how many detainees are being held hostage by Tehran and what progress the UK government is making in freeing them.

She claimed “the government is continuing to press Iran on the release of all detainees.”

But concerns have been raised that families of detained individuals may avoid publicizing their cases out of fear of the UK Foreign Office’s reaction.

MUNICH, 29 June 2022, (TON): Prime Minister KISHIDA Fumio said “Japan will host the 2023 Group of Seven summit in Hiroshima on May 19-21.”

Japan will hold the rotating presidency of the G-7 major powers next year. Kishida is a lawmaker elected from a constituency in the western Japan city, hit by a US atomic bomb in August 1945 near the end of World War II.

Kishida told a news conference in the German city of Munich “toward the Hiroshima summit, “we’ll make sure to deepen discussions on realistic measures toward the achievement of a world without nuclear weapons.”

He stressed “we want to show the world a powerful commitment never to repeat the horror of nuclear weapons.”

KREMENCHUK, 29 June 2022, (TON): France's president denounced Russia’s fiery airstrike on a crowded shopping mall in Ukraine as a new war crime and vowed the West's support for Kyiv would not waver, saying Moscow cannot and should not win the war.

The strike, which killed at least 18 people in the central city of Kremenchuk, came as leaders from the Group of Seven nations met in Europe.

It was part of unusually intense barrage of Russian fire across Ukraine, including in the capital of Kyiv, that renewed international attention as the war drags on.

Speaking at the end of the G-7 summit in Germany, French President Emmanuel Macron appeared to address that concern.”