WORLD

Seoul, South Korea | AFP | A train carrying South Korean engineers and officials crossed into the North on Friday to begin a landmark joint survey to reconnect railway tracks between the two Koreas. Linking up the railway systems was one of the agreements made earlier this year in a key …

Shanghai, China | AFP | Facial recognition will be deployed at a marathon on Sunday in China to crack down on cheating, state media said, after a half-marathon was blighted by widescale flouting of the rules. Running and marathons are fast becoming popular in China, with participants sporting the latest …

Shanghai, China | AFP | Chinese national squads and a top league team have packed young footballers off to military camps for drills and Marxist-style “thought education” as a campaign to promote Communist Party values spreads even into the sporting world. Chinese fans have watched the militarisation of football with a …

Tokyo, Japan | AFP | Boxing is fighting for its Olympic future amid serious concerns over the governing body AIBA, threatening the participation of the sport at the Tokyo 2020 Games. The so-called “Sport of Kings” has a proud Olympic history and can chart its involvement back to the Ancient Games …

Tokyo, Japan | AFP | Boxing was fighting for its Olympic future Friday as top officials decide whether to punish the sport’s governing body, which is on the ropes over finances, judging and its controversial leader. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has made clear that boxing’s future at the Tokyo …

Soweto, South Africa | AFP |  US television celebrity Oprah Winfrey on Thursday paid emotional tribute to Nelson Mandela as she prepared to host a star-studded concert in Johannesburg to cap celebrations marking 100 years since his birth. Winfrey will co-host the Global Citizen festival on Sunday, where artists including …

Port Louis, Mauritius | AFP | Jamaican reggae, the music of the oppressed which Bob Marley catapulted onto the global stage, won a coveted spot on the United Nations’ list of global cultural treasures Thursday. UNESCO, the world body’s cultural and scientific agency, added reggae to its collection of “intangible …

Geneva, Switzerland | AFP |  Measles cases worldwide jumped more than 30 percent last year compared to 2016, with increases recorded in wealthy European countries like Germany where vaccination coverage has historically been high, the UN said Thursday. The World Health Organization said the worrying trend of resurgent measles cases …

Washington, United States | AFP |  President Donald Trump’s intensifying attacks this week against the Russia collusion investigation underscore a growing nervousness over the how much evidence investigators may have accumulated on the 2016 Trump campaign’s ties to Moscow. In new charges unveiled Thursday by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, former …

Buenos Aires, Argentina | AFP |  US President Donald Trump headed to Argentina Thursday for a fractious weekend of G20 summitry, cancelling planned talks with the Russian leader and boasting that his trade war with China was paying off. Rumblings of resistance to Trump’s assault on the international order were …