 | | | Top News | | Iran said U.S. cyber attacks on its military had been a failure, while also hinting that it could be willing to discuss new concessions with Washington if the United States were to lift sanctions and offer new incentives. “They try hard, but have not carried out a successful attack,” Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi, Iran’s minister for information and communications technology, said on Twitter. | | | | Talk of Middle East peace is in the air again, as politicians are set to gather in Bahrain to launch the latest in a long line of initiatives to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Thousands of words and millions of dollars will likely be expended at the U.S.-led conference on June 25-26 aimed at boosting the Palestinian economy, as the first phase of President Donald Trump's long-delayed peace plan gets under way. Bearing witness to the difficulty of the task are the scars left by wars past across the landscape of Israel, the Palestinian Territories and the Golan Heights.
| | | | More than 100 people blocked a Hong Kong government building in protest against proposed legislation allowing extraditions to mainland China that they want scrapped. The activists, mostly students, are demanding the bill be withdrawn, the government drop all charges against those arrested in recent protests and stop referring to the demonstrations as a riot, which could potentially lead to heavier jail terms. | | | | Australia’s state broadcaster and the media company News Corp said they will challenge the legality of recent police raids on their staff saying the action was unconstitutional and a threat to media freedom. The police and the news organizations said at the time the raids were in connection with reports alleging troop misconduct in Afghanistan and unrealized plans to let Australia’s intelligence forces snoop on Australians’ emails, text messages and bank accounts. | | | | | Turkey | | The Turkish lira, bonds and shares gained after opposition wins Istanbul election. One banker said the outcome had removed a source of political uncertainty and markets were hoping the government would now shift its attention to the economic reforms that Turkey needs. | | | | | |
