News In Brief
AP, New Delhi
India and China are holding border talks with focus on ways to prevent a repeat of a recent face-off between their armed forces at a Himalayan plateau where China, India and Bhutan meet.
The Indian side at Friday’s talks is led by National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and the Chinese delegation by Special Representative Yang Jiechi. The two had met in Beijing in July on the sidelines of a meeting of the BRICS nations.
US must immediately scrap Jerusalem
decision: Erdogan
AFP, Ankara
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday asked US President Donald Trump to reverse his decision recognising Jerusalem as Israel’s capital after a UN vote overwhelming rejected the move.
Erdogan had earlier called on UN member states not to be swayed by Trump’s threat to cut funding for countries that backed the motion at the UN General Assembly.
UK priest jailed for child sex abuse
AFP, London
A priest was jailed for 18 years today for sexually abusing boys at a top British Catholic school in crimes dating back to the 1970s. Andrew Soper, 74, fled to Kosovo in 2011 to avoid prosecution over charges that he molested boys while headmaster at St Benedict’s School in London. He was extradited in 2016 to face 19 counts of indecent assault and buggery against 10 former pupils in the 1970s and 1980s.
Pence makes unannounced Afghan visit
AFP, Kabul
US Vice President Mike Pence arrived on an unannounced pre-Christmas visit to Afghanistan Thursday, becoming the most senior Trump administration official to visit troops fighting a 17-year-old conflict that has largely receded from US public view. Flying secretly through the day and night on a standard unmarked US Air Force C-17, Pence corkscrewed into Bagram Airforce Base, where he thanked some of the roughly 15,000 US personnel still hoping to turn the tide of America’s longest-ever war.
