Kerry to Visit Kenya, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and other top stories.

• Kerry to Visit Kenya, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia

  Secretary of State John Kerry is due to arrive in Kenya Monday to discuss terrorism in neighboring countries before traveling on to Nigeria and Saudi Arabia. Kerry will first meet with Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta to discuss regional issues, including the conflict in neighboring South Sudan and ongoing violence in Somalia. He will then travel to Nigeria to meet with President Muhammahu Buhari on the country's worsening economy and corruption issues, as well as the looming threat of terror gr..

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• Aerial close encounter between US, Syrian jets

  

  The close encounter comes only a day after two Syrian warplanes attacked the Kurds, a key US ally, forcing US special operations forces to be withdrawn from their position in northern Syria.The American aircraft are part of the beefed-up US air combat patrols in the area that the Pentagon had announced following Thursday's attack.The pilots of the F-22 Raptors tried to call the Syrian aircraft cockpit-to-cockpit but got no response, the US official added. US defense officials had told CNN earlie..

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• Why are the burqa and burkini being banned?

  

  What makes burqas, full-face veils and burkinis so controversial and why are efforts being made to ban them?Meanwhile, Sisco's mayor, Ange-Pierre Vivoni, told CNN the ban "has nothing to do with racism." "It is to bring calm to the commune," he added."I'm not against maghrebins (French word for people from Northwest Africa) or Arabs. I'm not an anti-Semite or anti-Arab, it is part of a battle for unity, for unity of people." "I protect Corsican Muslims," he added.Sundas Ali, who is a lecturer in..

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• Exclusive: US withdraws staff from Saudi Arabia dedicated to Yemen plann...

  

  By Phil Stewart | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The U.S. military has withdrawn from Saudi Arabia its personnel who were coordinating with the Saudi-led air campaign in Yemen, and sharply reduced the number of staff elsewhere who were assisting in that planning, U.S. officials told Reuters.Fewer than five U.S. service people are now assigned full-time to the "Joint Combined Planning Cell," which was established last year to coordinate U.S. support, including air-to-air refueling of coalition jets an..

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• AP EXPLAINS: How South Sudan Rebel's Flight Adds to Turmoil

  

  KAMPALA, Uganda — South Sudan, the world's newest country, is in political limbo after rebel leader and former vice president Riek Machar fled earlier this week. His whereabouts remained unclear Saturday after a spokesman for Machar and the United Nations both said he was in neighboring Congo but Congo's government said it had no knowledge of him being there. His departure puts South Sudan's peace deal, reached a year ago under international pressure, into disarray while the country's humani..

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• What Life is Like for the Children of War-Torn Aleppo

  

  The bloodied, dust-covered face of Omran Daqneesh, the five-year-old Syrian boy recovered from the rubble left by an airstrike this week, has shocked the world. Omran has become a symbol of the ongoing civil war in Syria, but he is just one of an estimated 75,000 children fighting to survive in eastern Aleppo, the divided and once-great city at the heart of the struggle between the regime of Bashar Assad and the rebels attempting to oust him. The seizure in June of the Castello Road, the las..

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• Ukraine at a Crossroads: Could Putin Lose His Job Over Mishandling the Crisis?

  

  Anti-government protestors in Euromaidan Square, Kiev February 21, 2014 One of the unintended consequences of Great Britain's Brexit vote is that the European Community has put any future expansion of its membership on hold. Kiev had signed the Ukraine-European Union Association Agreement on June 27, 2014, with high hopes that it would eventually lead to a full application to join the European community by 2020. Petro Poroshenko, Ukraine's then newly elected president, had described the 2014..

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• North Korea Calls Diplomat Defector 'Human Scum'

  

  SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea said Saturday that a senior North Korean diplomat who recently defected to South Korea is a criminal and "human scum," in its first official response to the defection.The official Korean Central News Agency also accused Seoul of using the defection of Thae Yong Ho, formerly a minister at the North Korean Embassy in London, for propaganda aimed at insulting the North Korean leadership. It also denounced the British government for ignoring international protoco..

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• Turkish parliament approves deal ending rift with Israel

  

  ISTANBUL Turkey's parliament approved a reconciliation agreement signed with Israel in June which has brought to an end a six-year rift between the two regional powers, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Saturday.Relations between the two countries crumbled after Israeli marines stormed a Turkish ship in May 2010 to enforce a naval blockade of the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, killing 10 Turks on board.Israel, which had already offered its apologies for the raid, agreed under the deal to pay out $..

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