Weekly News Wrap: Monday, February 29, 2016

Here’s your weekly selection of international law and international relations headlines from around the world:

Africa

• Angola said on Friday it has proposed that the United Nations Security Council impose an arms embargo on South Sudan, where more than 10,000 people have been killed in a two year civil war sparked by a political dispute between the country’s leaders.
• Cameroon’s army has killed at least 92 members of the Boko Haram armed group and freed 850 villagers in a joint operation with Nigerian forces, Cameroon’s government said.
• Six cases of the mutilation and murder of children as “good luck” sacrifices were reported during the recent Ugandan elections, a children’s charity said.
• Somalia’s al-Shabab says it has bombed a busy traffic junction and a nearby restaurant in the city of Baidoa, killing at least 17 people.

Middle East and Northern Africa

• The United Nations Security Council on Friday unanimously demanded that all parties to the civil war in Syria comply with the terms of a U.S.-Russian deal on a “cessation of hostilities” due to take effect at midnight local time (5.00 p.m. ET).
• Guns mostly fell silent in Syria and Russian air raids stopped on Saturday, the first day of a cessation of hostilities that the United Nations has described as the best hope for peace in five years of civil war, but the Syrian opposition warned on Sunday that attacks by the army, backed by Russian warplanes, threatened a U.S.-Russian deal for a cessation of hostilities with collapse and endangered future peace talks.
• The Arab coalition fighting Houthi rebels in Yemen has denied targeting civilians after air strikes hit a market northeast of the capital Sanaa, reportedly killing at least 40 people.
• The United States and its allies conducted 24 strikes against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria on Saturday, the coalition leading the operations said in a statement on Sunday.
• Turkish security forces have foiled 18 suicide attacks since the start of the year, three of them by intercepting vehicles planned for use as car bombs, Interior Minister Efkan Ala said in an interview with the Kanal 7 television station on Sunday.
• Armed forces from 20 countries have begun manoeuvres in northeastern Saudi Arabia that the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) has described as one of the world’s biggest military exercises.

Asia

• An American student held in North Korea since early January was detained for trying to steal a propaganda slogan from his Pyongyang hotel and has confessed to “severe crimes” against the state, the North’s official media said on Monday.
• India and the United States are closing in on an agreement to share military logistics after 12 years of talks, officials said, a sign of strengthening defence ties between the countries as China becomes increasingly assertive.

Europe

• Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban condemned on Sunday the European Union’s failure to get to grips with its migrant crisis and vowed to resist pressure to take in more migrants, saying they would bring crime, terrorism and other problems.
• More than 1,000 refugees, migrants and activists met in Hamburg for a conference focusing on the challenges refugees face in Europe and on migration routes.

Americas

• Senior U.S. defense officials voiced concern about North Korea’s nuclear ambitions on Friday as they toured American missile defense sites a day after watching the military test-fire its second intercontinental ballistic missile in a week.

Oceania

• Human Rights Watch said last week that Australia is no longer a human rights leader.

UN/World

• The UN is warning of a growing humanitarian challenge along Macedonia’s border with Greece as thousands fleeing war in the Middle East and beyond remain stuck in limbo.
• A senior U.N. official has urged Pakistan to resolve the status of more than 2.5 million Afghan refugees living in Pakistan whose registration cards have expired or who remain unregistered.