Bahrein, Al Bilad Press, Árabe – جريدة البلاد | جناحي: خطة للحد من الاعتماد على العقود المؤقتة

Russia launched a combination of cruise and ballistic missiles at Ukraine’s energy infrastructure overnight, Ukrainian officials said on Wednesday.  President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the attack on Christmas was not a “spontaneous decision.” “It is a deliberate choice — not only of targets but also of timing and date,” Zelenskyy wrote online. “Today, Putin deliberately chose Christmas for an attack. What could be more inhumane?” What officials said about the strikes Zelenskyy said that more than 70 missiles, some of them ballistic, had been fired, as well as more than a hundred attack drones.  “The enemy is again massively attacking the energy sector,” Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko wrote on social media platform Telegram in an earlier alert. “The transmission system operator is taking the necessary measures to limit consumption to minimize the negative consequences for the energy system,” he said. Zelenskyy said that missile strikes took days to prepare and the timing was not an...

15 films have now been shortlisted for the 2024 Oscar race for Best International Feature Film, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced on Tuesday. Among them is Germany, which has submitted Mohammad Rasoulof‘s latest film, “The Seed of the Sacred Fig.” The work was inspired by the mass protests in Iran in 2022 that were sparked by the killing of a young woman, Mahsa Amini, by the so-called morality police. Rasoulof heard the demonstrations from his prison cell when he got the idea for a thriller exploring state violence, paranoia and censorship. “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” follows Iman, an investigator for Iran’s Revolutionary Court who is loyal to the regime but has begun to question the arbitrary and summary nature of the death warrants he is asked to sign. At home, his wife and young daughters become caught up in the “Women, Life, Freedom” protests sparked by...

Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan‘s Paktika province killed at least 46 people, most of whom were women and children, the Afghan Taliban said, adding it would retaliate. Six people were also injured in the bombing at four locations in Afghanistan, Taliban deputy spokesman Hamdullah Fitrat said. Afghanistan’s foreign office said it had summoned Pakistan’s head of mission in Kabul to deliver a formal protest note to Islamabad on the bombing, warning the diplomat of consequences of such actions. “Afghanistan considers this brutal act a blatant violation of all international principles and an obvious act of aggression,” Enayatullah Khowrazmi, a spokesman for the Ministry of National Defence, said in a statement. Pakistani soldiers killed in clashes with local Taliban faction Pakistan has yet to officially comment on the apparent airstrikes inside Afghanistan. However, Pakistani security officials anonymously told the AP news agency that the operation was aimed to dismantle a training facility and kill insurgents in...

Today is already KC’s 20th anniversary in heaven. She passed away at a young age of 16 in a fire that gutted our home caused by faulty christmas lights in that fateful evening of Dec 16. Death came like a thief in the night that snatched the life of my youngest child KC. She was so much like me, brave, strong & fought for her convictions. For a while, I lost my will to live because the grief & pain were too numbing. But slowly with the love & prayers of family & friends, I learned to live again. “When God closes the door, He opens a window”. Eventually, I met other mothers like me who lost a child & some even more. We got together, shared our pain & decided to reach out to other orphaned mothers like us. We wanted to turn our mourning into something positive thus...