The US state department has ordered the departure of “non-emergency employees” from Iraq, amid rising tensions between the US and Iraq’s neighbour Iran. Staff at the embassy in Baghdad and the consulate in Irbil must leave as soon as possible on commercial transport.

Germany has meanwhile suspended its training of soldiers in Iraq. The US military said on Tuesday that the threat level in the Middle East had been raised in response to intelligence about Iran-backed forces in the region. It contradicted a British general who had said there was no increased threat.

Chris Ghika, deputy commander of the global coalition against the Islamic State group, told reporters that measures in place to protect US forces and their allies from Iran-backed militias in Iraq and Syria were “completely satisfactory”. “We are aware of their presence clearly and we monitor them along with a whole range of others because that is the environment we are in,” he added.(BBC)…[+]

Police have found the getaway car used by gunmen who attempted to kill Rachael Sukhdeo—the widow of murdered real estate and car dealer Sheron Sukhdeo, on Mother’s Day. The car, a Nissan Tiida suspected to have been stolen, was found abandoned not far from the shooting scene.Police were told that around 3.15 a.m. yesterday Sukhdeo, a mother of two, was leaving Hanggers Extreme restaurant and bar in Heartland Plaza, Chaguanas, when gunmen began firing toward her.

Sukhdeo was not hit and was able to escape the scene and ­report the attack to Chaguanas Police Station. She was with a male companion at the time of the attack.

Police said no one else was shot in the incident. However, several people were injured and taken to hospital for treatment.(Trinidad Express)…[+]

The international community must cut off all support to Myanmar’s military as part of efforts to hold army commanders to account for crimes against humanity and genocide, UN investigators have said following a fact-finding mission in the country. In a statement, the UN said there had been no progress in protecting the Rohingya minority, more than a million of whom have fled military “clearance operations” in the Rakhine region.

“The situation is at a total standstill,” said Marzuki Darusman, chair of the UN independent international fact-finding mission. Myanmar authorities in the Buddhist-majority country have razed empty Rohingya villages, destroying criminal evidence of abuses. About 120,000 people remain in displacement camps in fear of military reprisals. The authorities should focus on the “real betterment of the remaining Rohingya community in Myanmar,” Darusman said.

Myanmar security forces are accused of killing, gang-rape and arson during a campaign of violence that drove 730,000 Rohingya people from Rakhine in 2017. More than a million Rohingya have now been forced into exile. Myanmar has persistently denied allegations of human rights abuses, saying its security forces have not targeted civilians, and rejected a report in September last year by the UN panel, which said top military officers who conducted the campaign against the Rohingya should be prosecuted for war crimes.(theguardian)…[+]

Military experts were reportedly sent to investigate the incident and found a large hole in each of the tankers. No evidence has emerged to show that Iran was involved. The affected countries are yet to assign blame. The incident has increased tensions between Iran, which borders the nearby Strait of Hormuz, and the US.

About a fifth of oil that is consumed globally passes through the strait. Last month, Iran threatened to “close” it if it was prevented from using the waterway. This followed a US decision to end exemptions from sanctions for major importers of Iranian oil. The team of US military investigators discovered large holes in all four of the affected ships and believe they were caused by explosive charges, the Associated Press reports, quoting an unnamed official. They did not explain how the damage was linked to Iran.

Few details have been released about the incident, which is said to have taken place at about 06:00 (02:00 GMT) on Sunday within UAE territorial waters in the Gulf of Oman, east of the emirate of Fujairah.The UAE foreign ministry said four commercial ships had been targeted in a “sabotage attack” near Fujairah port, just outside the Strait of Hormuz.

There were no casualties but Saudi Arabia said two of its ships had suffered “significant damage”.The country’s energy minister, Khalid al-Falih, said one of the tankers had been on its way to be loaded with Saudi oil which was to be delivered to customers in the US.(BBC)…[+]

What was supposed to be a day of celebration for Bridgette “Tutty Gran Rosie” Bailey quickly turned to mourning yesterday morning when her son Danekey Bailey was shot and killed. The younger Bailey, otherwise called Coco, was seeking treatment for a previously inflicted gunshot wound at Maxfield Park Health Centre in Kingston when the incident occurred, some time near 9:30. A female was also shot and injured in the incident. The health centre was subsequently closed for the day.

When the Jamaica Observer arrived on the scene just after midday, the mother was seen sitting in a police service vehicle outside the medical facility before policemen assigned to St Andrew South Division escorted her to view her son’s body. “Mek mi kiss him nuh, please? Mek mi kiss him nuh, please?!” she wailed before exiting the compound. Bailey, 46, became popular in 2013, when a clip of a television interview she gave demanding government compensation for her flooded house on Sunlight Street in west Kingston went viral.(Jamaica Observer)…[+]

An anti-gay US Christian fundamentalist pastor who has been accused of Holocaust denial has become the first person to be barred from entering Ireland under a 20-year-old immigration law. Steven Anderson was due to travel to Dublin on 26 May to preach in the city, but the Irish justice minister, Charlie Flanagan, took the unusual step to ban him from coming into the country.

More than 14,000 people signed an online petition set up by the Christian gay rights campaign group Changing Attitude Ireland calling on the Irish government to block Anderson’s trip to the country. The organisation claimed that in the past he had “advocated exterminating LGBT+ people”.Confirming the barring order under the 1999 Immigration Act, Flanagan said: “I have signed the exclusion order under my executive powers in the interest of public policy.”

It is the first time the Irish government has used the legislation to bar anyone from the country. The US preacher has said he prays at night for Barack Obama to die. He also posted praise online for the gunman who murdered 49 people at an LGBT nightclub in Florida in 2016. In the same year Anderson was deported from Botswana after saying in an interview with a local radio station that gay people should be killed.(TheGuardian)…[+]

A 25-year-old woman who lured her boyfriend to be murdered by a gang in London, England, a decade ago has been deported to Trinidad & Tobago. Samantha Joseph was deported after serving the minimum ten years of a life sentence for her part in the killing of 16-year-old Shakilus Townsend 11 years ago. According to several ­media outlets in the UK, including www.mirror.co.uk, Joseph was 15 when she led Townsend into an ambush in a quiet cul-de-sac.

It was said that she laughed as she walked away from the scene in a see-through dress, while the gang battered Townsend and stabbed him six times. The teenager was found bleeding to death and crying out: “Mummy, Mummy, I don’t want to die.”According to the Mirror, the case was turned into a BBC Three drama, My Murder, in 2012, starring Star Wars actor John Boyega.(Trinidad Express)…[+]

A Myanmar pilot safely landed a jet without front wheels after the landing gear failed to deploy. The Myanmar National Airlines plane skidded down the runway at Mandalay airport before grinding to a stop. The pilot of the Embraer 190 was praised for the landing, in which none of the 89 passengers was hurt.

Captain Myat Moe Aung circled the airport twice to allow air traffic controllers to determine if the landing gear was down, the airline said. The aircraft had departed from Yangon and was approaching Mandalay when the pilot was unable to extend the front landing gear. He followed emergency procedures and burned excess fuel to reduce the aircraft’s weight, the airline said.

A video of the landing showed the plane landing on its rear wheels before the nose touched down on the runway. The plane skidded for about 25 seconds before it stopped. “The pilot did a great job,” Win Khant, Myanmar’s transport minister, told the Reuters news agency.(BBC)…[+]

HAVANA– Cuban gay rights activists held an unauthorized independent pride parade in Havana yesterday despite the Communist government warning against it and calling it subversive, an unprecedented show of civil society in the one-party state.

More than a hundred Cubans chanting “long live a diverse Cuba” and carrying rainbow flags joyfully marched nearly one kilometer (0.6 mile) from Havana’s Central Park down to the seafront boulevard before being stopped by dozens of security officials. At least three activists were arrested by plainclothes policemen while others were ordered to disperse given the activity did not have an official permit.

“This moment marks a before and an after for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community but also for Cuban civil society more generally,” said independent journalist and LGBT activist Maykel Gonzalez Vivero. “Social media is playing its role and civil society demonstrated it has strength, and can go out onto the streets if necessary, and from now on the government will have to take that into account.”(Reuters)…[+]

Amid mounting public condemnation for abuse of power and human-rights breaches and a multiagency investigation, the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) has denied a reggae singer’s allegations that the police trimmed his Rastafarian children and fed them meat.

But the brouhaha appears to have been the result of a simmering family spat that boiled over at the Gordon Town Police Station more than a week ago. The JCF said that its officers were not responsible for trimming the stepsons of reggae artiste JahDore, given name Sean McDonald, nor did they cause the acts to happen.

The force’s communications arm said that the boys were taken to the police station in the company of relatives and were taken to the barber and for lunch by an aunt, who had reportedly accompanied the mother. The initial report about concerns for the children’s welfare appears to have triggered the police’s action. Melesha Welsh, a woman claiming to be the aunt of the two boys, commented on The Gleaner’s Instagram post, contradicting McDonald’s claim.(Jamaica Gleaner)…[+]