Requirements not met
Your browser does not meet the minimum requirements of this website. Though you can continue browsing, some features may not be available to you.
Browser unsupported
Please note that our site has been optimized for a modern browser environment. You are using »an unsupported or outdated software«. We recommend that you perform a free upgrade to any of the following alternatives:
Using a browser that does not meet the minimum requirements for this site will likely cause portions of the site not to function properly.
Your browser either has JavaScript turned off or does not support JavaScript.
If you are unsure how to enable JavaScript in your browser, please visit wikiHow's »How to Turn on Javascript in Internet Browsers«.
Language / ভাষা:
International News
Lights out for Cuban students as blockade bites
- Details
HAVANA, May 19, 2026 (BSS/AFP) - It's the middle of the night in Havana, but Alejandro Benitez is just getting down to work.
The power is back on for the first time in 15 hours and Benitez, a fourth-year architecture student, needs to get his assignment in fast before the electricity cuts out again.
Desperate times call for desperate measures in crisis-hit Cuba, where a US fuel blockade -- part of a pressure campaign which Havana fears will culminate in a military intervention -- has aggravated an energy crisis, leaving people without power for up to 20 hours a day.
In February, the government moved university classes online, part of a raft of measures aimed at conserving electricity.
But distance learning has proven challenging in a country with patchy internet and dwindling power supplies.
Students struggle in fields like architecture, which require regular feedback and direction from insructors.
"Having direct contact with the teacher is really important," said 28-year-old Benitez, who has to ask all of his questions via WhatsApp or Telegram.
With only one oil tanker mooring in Cuba in the last four months, the situation is rapidly deteriorating.
The government announced that it had run out of diesel and fuel oil needed to power the generators that supplement the output of its seven dilapidated power plants.
And as public transport grinds to a halt, so too have students' social lives.
Benitez, who cooks over an open charcoal fire, hasn't left his neighborhood of Punta Brava since February.
- Self-starters required -
Shalia Garcia, a 19-year-old second-year industrial design student, is also struggling to adapt.
Some courses which are central to her degree have been suspended or pared back.
Teachers send around agendas, course material and submission dates for assignments.
Then the responsibility is on the students in a system that requires them to be self-starters.
"This type of teaching puts the onus on the student, which I find hard to manage," Garcia said.
Even the most zealous pupils face multiple hurdles.
The discounted mobile data packages available to students do not have the capacity to download large folders, and it can take time for teachers to respond to questions.
Teachers, too, say they feel hamstrung by the lack of face time with students.
Benitez's partner, Alfredo Rodriguez, a 34-year-old industrial design professor, told AFP there were entire sections of the syllabus that his students "simply have not seen" because they need to be taught in person.
He also has to regularly extend students' deadlines.
"We cannot make the same demands when we know that some students have no electricity or internet connection," he explained.
Garcia's mother, a doctor, worries that her daughter's education is suffering as a result.
"I'm very concerned but I have no choice but to face the situation," Luisa Odalys Destrade said with a sigh.
Benitez, for his part, feels his future is being held hostage by Havana's standoff with Washington.
"What sort of architect will I become?" he wondered.
Three killed in San Diego mosque shooting, both suspects dead
- Details
SAN DIEGO, May 19, 2026 (BSS/AFP) - A shooting Monday at a mosque complex in southern California killed three people, with two suspected teenage gunmen later found dead in a car from apparent self-inflicted gunshot wounds, police said.
Police said emergency response teams found the victims outside the sprawling Islamic Center of San Diego, before later finding the shooters, aged 18 and 17, also dead.
TV footage from a helicopter showed armed response teams gathered outside a building, with one unidentified person lying in a pool of blood.
"We are actively investigating this as a hate crime," San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl told reporters. "There was definitely hate rhetoric that was involved."
The Islamic center describes itself on its website as the largest mosque in San Diego county, which lies in southern California.
After a short period of lockdown when authorities advised area residents to stay inside, San Diego police announced that the threat at the center had been "neutralized."
"We received a call of an active shooter at the Islamic Center. Within four minutes, officers arrived on scene and observed immediately three deceased victims out in front," Wahl said.
"We immediately began to deploy with an active shooter response into the mosque and adjacent school," he said, adding that police had received calls about more gunfire nearby, where a landscaper had been shot at but not hit.
- Place of worship targeted -
A few blocks from the center, police found a vehicle in the middle of the street with the shooters dead inside.
"The suspects at this point appear to have died from self-inflicted gunshot wounds. There were no officers involved in firing their weapons," Wahl said.
He said a security guard at the Islamic center was among the three victims killed and his response had helped prevent a deadlier attack.
"His actions were heroic and he undoubtedly saved lives today," Wahl said.
The identities of the other two victims were not immediately clear.
Wahl said that the mother of one of the suspects had contacted police two hours before the attack and reported that her son was "suicidal" and that several weapons and her vehicle were missing.
Initially, police deployed to an area around a high school with which the suspect was associated, until they received a call of an active shooter at the Islamic Center.
The imam at the mosque, Taha Hassane, said that all the staff, teachers and children at the mosque's school were safe.
"We have never experienced tragedy like this before. And at this moment all that I can say is, sending our prayers and standing in solidarity with all the families in our community here," he said.
"It is extremely outrageous to target a place of worship," the imam added.
President Donald Trump said the shooting was a "terrible situation," while New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, the first Muslim mayor of a major American city, described the attack as "an apparent act of anti-Muslim violence."
"Islamophobia endangers Muslim communities across this country," he posted on X, adding that New York police are boosting deployments to mosques "out of an abundance of caution."
Wahl, the police chief, said that given the location of the attack, investigators were "considering this a hate crime until it's not."
State Governor Gavin Newsom expressed horror at the attack, saying: "Worshippers anywhere should not have to fear for their lives."
"Hate has no place in California, and we will not tolerate acts of terror or intimidation against communities of faith," he said on X, adding, "To the San Diego Muslim community: California stands with you."
lanet trapped record heat in 2025: UN
- Details
GENEVA, March 23, 2026 (BSS/AFP) - The amount of heat trapped by the Earth reached record levels in 2025, with the consequences of such warming feared to last for thousands of years, the UN warned Monday.
The 11 hottest years ever recorded were all between 2015 and 2025, the United Nations' WMO weather and climate agency confirmed in its flagship State of the Global Climate annual report.
Last year was the second or third hottest year on record, at about 1.43 Celsius above the 1850-1900 average, the World Meteorological Organization said.
"The global climate is in a state of emergency. Planet Earth is being pushed beyond its limits. Every key climate indicator is flashing red," said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
"Humanity has just endured the 11 hottest years on record. When history repeats itself 11 times, it is no longer a coincidence. It is a call to act."
For the first time, the WMO climate report includes the planet's energy imbalance: the rate at which energy enters and leaves the Earth system.
Under a stable climate, incoming energy from the Sun is about the same as the amount of outgoing energy, the Geneva-based agency said.
However the increase in concentrations of heat-trapping greenhouse gases -- carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide -- "to their highest level in at least 800,000 years" has "upset this equilibrium", the WMO said.
"The Earth's energy imbalance has increased since its observational record began in 1960, particularly in the past 20 years. It reached a new high in 2025."
- Ocean heat record -
WMO chief Celeste Saulo said scientific advances had improved understanding of the energy imbalance and its implications for the climate.
"Human activities are increasingly disrupting the natural equilibrium and we will live with these consequences for hundreds and thousands of years," she said.
More than 91 percent of the excess heat is stored in the ocean.
"Ocean heat content reached a new record high in 2025 and its rate of warming more than doubled from 1960-2005 to 2005-2025," the WMO said.
Ocean warming has far-reaching consequences, such as degradation of marine ecosystems, biodiversity loss and reduction of the ocean carbon sink, the agency said.
"It fuels tropical and subtropical storms and exacerbates ongoing sea-ice loss in the polar regions."
The Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets have both lost considerable mass, and the annual average extent of Arctic sea ice in 2025 was the lowest or second-lowest ever recorded in the satellite era.
Last year, the global mean sea level was around 11 centimetres higher than when satellite altimetry records began in 1993.
Ocean warming and sea level rise are projected to continue for centuries.
- 'Dire picture' -
WMO scientific officer John Kennedy said global weather is still under the influence of La Nina, a naturally occurring climate phenomenon that cools surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean. It brings changes in winds, pressure and rainfall patterns.
Conditions oscillate between La Nina and its warming opposite El Nino, with neutral conditions in between.
The warmest year on record, 2024, was around 1.55C above the 1850-1900 average, and started in a strong El Nino.
Forecasts indicate neutral conditions by the middle of 2026 with a possible El Nino developing before the end of the year, said Kennedy.
If so, "then we're likely to see maybe elevated temperatures again in 2027", he told a press conference.
The World Meteorological Organization's deputy chief, Ko Barrett, said the outlook was a "dire picture".
She said the WMO provided the evidence it sees, hoping that the information "will encourage people to take action".
But there was "no denying" that "these indicators are not moving in a direction that provides for a lot of hope", she said.
With war gripping the Middle East and fuel prices soaring, Guterres said the world should heed the alarm call.
"In this age of war, climate stress is also exposing another truth: our addiction to fossil fuels is destabilising both the climate and global security," he said.
"Today's report should come with a warning label: climate chaos is accelerating and delay is deadly," he said.
WTI crude oil prices up following Trump ultimatum on Iran
- Details
TOKYO, March 23, 2026 (BSS/AFP) - Benchmark US oil contract WTI was up Monday after US President Donald Trump gave Iran a 48-hour ultimatum to open the Strait of Hormuz or face decimation of its energy infrastructure and Israel warned the war would continue for several more weeks.
At 0015 GMT, the price of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) was up 0.44 percent to $98.66 per barrel. It had climbed to just over $100 a barrel earlier Monday.
South Korea's benchmark Kospi index and Japan's Nikkei sharply dropped in early trade.
The Kospi was down 4.69 percent at 5,509.88 points. The Nikkei 225 was down 3.54 percent at 51,483.91 points.
The price of North Sea Brent crude, the global market benchmark, was down 0.02 at $112.17 per barrel.
On February 27, the day before the US-Israeli attacks began on Iran, WTI had stood at $67.02 and Brent was at $72.48 per barrel.
Trump and Tehran have issued tit-for-tat threats as the war entered its fourth week, with the US president demanding the Islamic republic reopen the blocked Strait of Hormuz, through which around 20 percent of the world's oil and gas shipments transit.
The bottleneck has nearly halted all petroleum shipments through the narrow waterway, and oil prices have spiked.
Trump posted late Saturday on Truth Social that US forces would "hit and obliterate" Iranian power plants -- "starting with the biggest one first" -- if Tehran did not fully reopen the strait within 48 hours, or 23:44 GMT on Monday, according to the time of his post.
In response, Iran's army said it will target energy and desalination infrastructure "belonging to the US and the regime in the region," according to the Fars news agency.
Meanwhile Israel's military chief, Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir, said Sunday his forces were expanding their ground campaign against Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, and warned of a lengthy operation.
"We are now preparing to advance the targeted ground operations and strikes according to an organised plan," he said.
In retaliation for the US and Israeli military operation, Iran is carrying out missile and drone strikes against infrastructure -- particularly energy targets -- as well as against ships in the Gulf, specifically threatening those venturing into the strait.
- Additional Resources:
- Additional Resources:
- Agro-Ocean
- Asian News and Views
- Bangabandhu Development and Research Institute
- Bangladesh North American Journalists Network
- Bangladesh Heritage and Ethnic Society of Alberta (BHESA)
- Coastal 19
- Delwar Jahid's Biography
- Diverse Edmonton
- Dr. Anwar Zahid
- Edmonton Oaths
- Mahinur Jahid Memorial Foundation (MJMF)
- Motherlanguage Day in Canada
- Samajkantha News
- Step to Humanity Bangladesh