Weekly News Wrap: Monday, July 14, 2014

Your weekly selection of international law and international relations headlines from around the world:

Africa

• In Nigeria, Boko Haram-style violence radiates southwards.
• Ebola continues to spread in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, with a combined 44 new cases and 21 deaths between July 6 and 8, the World Health Organisation has said.

Asia

• North Korea has fired artillery shells into waters near its sea border with South Korea, Seoul’s military said, a day after the country test-launched two ballistic missiles in the latest of a series of weapon tests.
• China and the United States must avoid a “new cold war” in their international relations, China’s top newspaper said on Saturday, in the wake of high level talks in Beijing between senior leaders of the world’s two largest economies.

Europe

• Russia has promised to respond with “irreversible consequences” to a “dangerous escalation” of violence near its border, after a Russian man was killed and two women injured by shells fired across the Ukraine border.
• Russia will most probably extend former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden’s temporary asylum on the grounds that “his life is endangered”, an official close to the country’s Federal Migration Service (FMS) was quoted as saying on Friday.
• Germany has taken the unusual step of asking the CIA station chief in Berlin to leave the country, after two reported cases of suspected US spying. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, says new allegations of US spying show Berlin and Washington are completely at odds over how they view the role of intelligence, and she hopes German action will persuade the US not to spy on partners.
• Crucial logs revealing flights to a British overseas territory, Diego Garcia, when it was allegedly used as a secret US prison are in the possession of the police. The Guardian provides 7 things to know about Diego Garcia and renditions.

Middle East and Northern Africa

• U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Sunday major differences persist between Iran and six world powers negotiating on Tehran’s nuclear program, with a week to go before a deadline for a deal. 
• Heavy fighting between rival militias vying for control of Libya’s main airport in Tripoli has left at least seven people dead and halted all flights.
• Reuters has an exclusive: Egyptians fear Islamist militants are gathering on Libyan border.
• Israel said it shot down a drone from Gaza a week into its offensive on Monday, the first reported deployment of an unmanned aircraft by Palestinian militants whose rocket attacks have been regularly intercepted.
• Iraqi security forces and government affiliated militias appear to have unlawfully executed at least 255 prisoners over the past month in apparent revenge for killings by Islamic State fighters, according to Human Rights Watch.

Americas

• In Brazil, Germany has been crowned the champions of the World Cup. After a month of football in a country where the sport is regarded a religion, Al Jazeera takes a look at how the World Cup has affected the volatile political situation in Brazil and what will happen now that the tournament has come to an end. IntLawGrrls has a look at how human rights situations can affect host country selection of major sporting events like the World Cup. Hundreds of Ghanaian Muslims who entered Brazil as tourists for the World Cup have asked for asylum on religious grounds, police have said.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin begins a six-day tour of Latin America on Friday, seeking greater influence in the backyard of the United States while under pressure from the West to help restrain pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine.
• President Dilma Rousseff said the Obama administration was not directly responsible for U.S. spying on Brazil and has taken steps toward smoothing over the diplomatic tensions set off by espionage disclosures last year.

UN/Other

• Iraqi soldiers backed by Shi’ite militias fought Sunni rebels for control of a military base northeast of Baghdad on Saturday as a U.N. envoy warned of chaos if divided lawmakers did not make progress on Sunday towards naming a government.
• Europe must open its doors to more Syrian refugees, having welcomed only a “miniscule” number while Syria’s neighbors have reached “saturation point”, the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR said on Friday.
• United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday appointed veteran U.N. official Staffan de Mistura, a former U.N. special envoy to Afghanistan and Iraq, to replace Lakhdar Brahimi as the international mediator seeking an end to Syria’s civil war.