Foreign News
Hamas releases 24 hostages from Gaza after truce comes into effect
The Palestinian armed group Hamas has released 24 hostages held captive by the group in Gaza for almost seven weeks, according to Qatar’s foreign ministry and the International Red Cross, hours after an Israel-Hamas truce mediated by Qatar came into effect.
Among the captives released were 13 Israelis, 10 Thai nationals and one Filipino citizen, Majed al-Ansari, a spokesperson of the Foreign Ministry in Qatar, said on Friday.
The ICRC in Israel and the occupied territories said that it transported the group of hostages from Gaza to the Rafah border crossing with Egypt. “We are relieved to confirm the safe release of 24 hostages,” the ICRC wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “We have facilitated this release by transporting them from Gaza to the Rafah border, marking the real-life impact of our role as a neutral intermediary between the parties.”
The release of the 24 captives — out of the roughly 240 taken hostage by Hamas during an assault on southern Israel on October 7 — comes as a deal between Israel and Hamas, which includes a four-day truce and exchange of captives for Palestinians held in Israeli prisons, takes effect.
Later on Friday, Qatar said 39 Palestinian women and children detained in Israeli jails were released as part of the deal. The ICRC confirmed on Friday that its teams were facilitating the release and transfer of hostages held in Gaza and of Palestinian detainees.
According to the deal mediated by Qatar, Hamas will release 50 women and children, from about 240 people taken captive by the group during its assault on southern Israel on October 7. In exchange, Israel will release a total of 150 Palestinian women and children held in Israeli prisons, whom Palestinians have long characterised as victims of an Israeli occupation that sweeps them into prisons with little pretense of due process.
The captives taken by Hamas on October 7 include Israeli soldiers and civilians, as well as people from dozens of foreign countries. In both Israel and abroad, the families of those held captive have pleaded for their release.
Qatar’s al-Ansari said that the 10 Thai nationals and Filipino citizen were freed outside the framework of the truce deal.
Earlier on Friday, Thailand’s Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said 12 Thai nationals help captive in Gaza had been released.
(Aljazeera)
The chief executive of the Washington Post is stepping down, the newspaper has announced, days after overseeing mass lay-offs.
William Lewis said it was the right time to leave, saying in a message to staff that was shared online that “difficult decisions” had been made to ensure the paper’s future.
On Wednesday the newspaper announced it was cutting a third of its workforce, dramatically scaling back its coverage of sport and international news.
The decision was condemned by many journalists and prompted criticism of the Post’s billionaire owner, Jeff Bezos. Executive editor Matt Murray said the cuts would bring “stability”.
Jeff D’Onofrio, who joined as chief financial officer of the newspaper last year, will serve as acting publisher and CEO, the Post said as it announced Lewis’s departure.
A former Dow Jones chief executive and publisher of the Wall Street Journal, Lewis was appointed to the role at the Washington Post in 2023.
He has faced criticism from subscribers and employees as he tried to reverse financial losses at the daily.
Hundreds protested in front of the paper’s headquarters in Washington DC on Thursday after the mass lay offs, which included the paper’s entire Middle East staff and its Kyiv-based Ukraine correspondent.
Marty Baron, the Post’s executive editor until 2021, said the cuts ranked “among the darkest days in the history of one of the world’s greatest news organisations”.
The departure of Lewis marks the latest upheaval for the leading US newspaper, which has seen a series of staff cuts and controversial editorial decisions in recent years.
Shortly before the 2024 US presidential election, Bezos, the founder of Amazon, broke with decades of tradition by deciding the newspaper would not endorse a presidential candidate.
The newspaper had endorsed a candidate in most presidential elections since the 1970s – all of whom had been Democrats.
The move caused widespread criticism and led to the loss of tens of thousands of subscribers.
Meanwhile, the opinion editor resigned in February last year when Bezos decided to focus the paper’s comment section on “personal liberties and free markets”.
Bezos, who acquired the newspaper in 2013, said pieces opposing those views would not be published.
[BBC]
King Charles III and Queen Camilla will host Nigeria’s president in the country’s first state visit to the UK in 37 years, Buckingham Palace has announced.
Bola Tinubu and First Lady Oluremi Tinubu have accepted an invitation to be guests of the King at Windsor Castle from 18 to 19 March.
State visits are considered a form of soft-power diplomacy, using the pomp of royal hospitality to strengthen relations with important international partners.
The last Nigerian state visit to the UK took place in 1989, when military ruler Gen Ibrahim Babangida travelled to meet the late Queen Elizabeth II for a four-day trip.
Although this will be Tinubu’s first formal state visit to the UK, he has already met the King since taking office following Nigeria’s disputed election in 2023.
Tinubu and his wife were received at Buckingham Palace in September 2024 and also held a bilateral meeting with the King on the sidelines of the COP28 summit in Dubai.
But a state visit allows for ceremonial pageantry aimed at elevating the occasion and demonstrating the importance with which the UK views those visiting.
The visit comes at a time of improving diplomatic and economic links between the UK and Nigeria – with trade between the two worth more than £8bn in the year to October, government figures show. This makes the African nation one of the UK’s most important partners in the continent.
In 2024, the two countries signed a new trade and investment partnership designed to expand opportunities for business.
The agenda for the March visit has not been disclosed, nor details of the events planned for it – but state visits typically include carriage processions and a state banquet, and usually coincide with visiting leaders having political meetings.
In 2025 alone, the King presided over three state visits – those of French President Emmanuel Macron, US President Donald Trump and German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier – the first time the UK had held such a number in a single year since 1988.
The King has longstanding ties to Nigeria, a Commonwealth country, having expressed a love for Pidgin English and Nigerian Afrobeats music.
Before becoming monarch, he visited the country four times as the Prince of Wales – in 1990, 1999, 2006 and 2018. Camilla, then the Duchess of Cornwall, joined him on the latter trip.
In 2023, the King’s Trust International – formerly the Prince’s Trust – officially launched in Nigeria, announcing a project aimed at tackling youth unemployment.
[BBC]
The co-owner of a Colorado funeral home where nearly 200 decaying bodies were found has been sentenced to 40 years in prison for corpse abuse.
Before Jon Hallford was sentenced, he apologised in court and listened to family members describe having nightmares about their loved ones decomposing in his care. They called him a “monster” who should rot in jail.
His ex-wife and co-owner Carie Hallford has pleaded guilty to similar charges and is awaiting sentencing.
The Return to Nature home, in the town of Penrose, Colorado, had given fake ashes to grieving relatives instead of their loved-ones’ remains. Prosecutors said 189 bodies were improperly stored in the building over four years.
Afghanistan to bat first against New Zealand
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Washington Post chief executive steps down after mass lay-offs
Australia’s opposition coalition reunites after row over hate-speech laws
Showers may occur in the Western, Uva and Sabaragamuwa provinces and in Matale, Nuwara-Eliya, Ampara, Batticaloa, Galle, Matara and Polonnaruwa districts
King Charles to host Nigeria’s first UK state visit in 37 years
‘Dates have the highest sugar content to fight Coronavirus’
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