ANKARA
Here are the main stories that The Anadolu Agency's English News Desk will cover on Thursday, Feb. 5, 2015:
TURKEY
ANKARA - President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu to separately receive head of National Intelligence Organization Hakan Fidan and secretary-general of National Security Council Seyfullah Hacimuftuoglu.
ANKARA - Economy Minister Nihat Zeybekci will meet with Azerbaijani Deputy Prime Minister Abid Sharifov and Minister of Economy and Industry Shahin Mustafayev during his visit in Baku.
ANKARA - Minister of Environment and Urbanization Idris Gulluce and Minister of Forestry & Water Affairs Veysel Eroglu will meet with Finland's Minister for European Affairs and Foreign Trade Lenita Toivakka in Ankara.
SPECIAL REPORT
Social media 'threatening' fragile marriages in Turkey
- The ubiquity of smartphones and social media could be one of the reasons behind an increasing number of Turkish divorces, experts tell AA.
By Nilay Kar Onum
ISTANBUL (AA) – “My husband was always in front of the computer. He was neglecting me,” says Sinem a 30-year-old a fashion designer from Istanbul. "It was making me crazy."
UNITED STATES
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Minister for EU Affairs Volkan Bozkir visits U.S. to participate in “National Prayer Breakfast” event in Washington, DC, after which he will speak at German Marshall Fund at a panel: "Unknown Frontier: Turkey , TTIP, and the EU Custom Union" and then hold a press conference at the Turkish Embassy.
WASHINGTON, D.C. - US President Barack Obama deliver remarks at National Prayer Breakfast.
WASHINGTON, D.C. - US Senate Finance Committee holds hearing to receive testimony from US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew about the 2016 budget.
WASHINGTON, D.C. - US Senate Armed Services Chairman John McCain, R-Ariz. holds a news conference to discuss arming the Ukrainians against Russia.
NEW YORK - UN Security Council to hold consultations on Syria, as well as sanctions against Sudan.
EUROPE
BELGIUM
BRUSSELS - NATO Defence Ministers, including Turkey's Defense Minister Ismet Yilmaz, are expected to take decisions on the implementation of the Readiness Action Plan, agreed at the NATO Wales Summit last year, at their one-day meeting in Brussels.
FRANCE
PARIS - French President Francois Hollande to give his fifth semestrial press conference of his five year term.
BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
SARAJEVO - Commemorations will be held on anniversary of Markale massacre in Bosnia's capital where 68 people lost their lives and 144 people were injured.
MIDDLE EAST & AFRICA
NIGERIA - National Council of State expected to meet and discuss proposals to delay elections.
TANZANIA - German President Gauck visits the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights. Germany is one of the main donors to the African court. Tanzanian FM Membe meets visiting Iranian counterpart.
UGANDA - American Ryan Andrew Gustafson expected in court on charges of counterfeiting acts committed outside the U.S.
SPECIAL REPORTS
Zambians decry political retribution
By Francis Maingaila
LUSAKA (AA) – Fifty-year-old Melves Mweene's only crime was to vote for the opposition candidate in Zambia's presidential by-election last month. Like many others, she has since been attacked by supporters of the ruling Patriotic Front (PF), whose candidate, Edger Lungu, won the poll.
Xenophobic S. Africans threat to ruling ANC: Expert
By Rebecca Fasselt
JOHANNESBURG (AA) – Recent looting of shops owned by African and Asian immigrants poses an ideological threat to the party that has ruled South Africa since the end of apartheid, a prominent scholar has suggested. "The violence is an effort by individuals, or a group, to achieve…economic advancement, political power or recognition, or a sense of social or criminal justice," Professor Loren Landau, the director of the African Centre for Migration and Society (ACMS) at the University of the Witwatersrand, told The Anadolu Agency.
SOUTH ASIA
INDIA
NEW DELHI – With state elections approaching for Indian capital Delhi, populist anti-corruption Aam Aadmi Party has had a spotlight turned onto its own finances.
SPECIAL REPORT
BANGLADESH
Blockade means one month, no pay for Bangladesh bus drivers.
By Mainul Islam Khan
DHAKA – Bangladeh’s month-long transport blockade has left the country’s transport workers, who earn only when their buses run, without any income.
SE ASIA-PACIFIC
CHINA
BEIJING - Chinese mainland residents reported to make up 16 of the 31 confirmed deaths from the TransAsia Airways Flight GE235 crash in Taipei – as well as the 12 victims who remain missing.
HONG KONG
HONG KONG - Top Beijing official in Hong Kong warns against raising the idea of independence for the territory and against resisting central government's authority.
THAILAND
BANGKOK - Thailand’s National Human Rights Commission expresses opposition to proposal – condemned by Human Rights Watch – to merge agency with the ombudsman’s office.
BANGKOK - 'Red Shirt' musician arrested on suspicions of spreading fake royal palace statement.
