The US supreme court is set to begin action on Donald Trump’s travel ban, leading to a potential final resolution to the defining legal battle of the administration’s early days.The nation’s highest court is considering an appeal by the Trump administration to allow the president’s controversial order restricting travel to the US from six Muslim-majority countries. Two federal appeals courts have temporarily blocked the revised presidential order by Trump that sought to suspend the issuing of visas from the countries and freeze the US refugee resettlement program.

The appeals court rulings upheld decisions by district judges in Maryland and Hawaii who ruled against the federal government in March. The Trump administration appealed these orders to the supreme court, and on Wednesday made its final submissions, calling on the court to temporarily overturn the lower court stays until a full hearing later in the year. The nine justices are set to meet for their final closed-door conference of the court’s term on Thursday morning, meaning the pathway to a resolution of the case could be announced at any point.(guardian)…[+]

At least 30 people have been killed in Helmand province after a car bomb targeted soldiers, government employees and other civilians queueing to collect pay cheques from a bank in the provincial capital. The blast outside New Kabul Bank in Lashkar Gah is the latest in a series of brazen attacks in Afghanistan during the holy month of Ramadan. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack. It has been responsible for similar attacks against the bank, where most government employees have their salaries deposited.

The Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, condemned the attack. The perpetrators “have no respect for any religion or faith. They are enemies of humanity,” he said. Lashkar Gah’s main trauma centre, received 23 bodies and admitted 43 injured patients. Several windows shattered at the hospital, which is close to the bank, but staff were unharmed, said Dejan Panic, a programme coordinator. Omar Zawak, spokesman for the Helmand governor, said 30 people had been killed and more than 60 injured, many critically. He said most of the fatalities were soldiers.(guardian)…[+]

The Iraqi prime minister, Haider al-Abadi, has said the destruction of the Great Mosque of al-Nuri in Mosul is an admission by the militants that they are losing the fight for the country’s second-largest city. One of Islam’s most venerated sites, the mosque has been destroyed by explosions as Iraqi forces battled Islamic State fighters who had holed up nearby. “Daesh’s bombing of the al-Hadba minaret and the al-Nuri mosque is a formal declaration of their defeat,” Abadi said, using the Arabic acronym for Isis.

Iraq’s military blamed Isis for levelling the mosque, almost three years after its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, ascended a pulpit inside to proclaim himself leader of a new Islamic caliphate. “The Daesh [Islamic State] terror gangs committed another historical crime by blowing up the al-Nuri mosque and its historic al-Hadba minaret,” the militarysaid. The terrorist group said US-led airstrikes had caused the damage.

Images showing the mosque area and aerial photographs provided by the US military depicted scenes of widespread damage, with its renowned leaning minaret no longer standing and the compound largely in ruins. The Iraqi military later released video footage, which showed the minaret tumbling to the ground after explosives detonated near its base. The blast was indicative of bombs being deliberately placed to bring it down.(guardian)…[+]