Busy morning? Here are five stories that will help you catch up on what's going on in the world right now.
Myanmar refuses to discuss its role in migrant crisis
The thousands of desperate migrants stranded on south-east Asian waters have fled countries with dire economic circumstances and racially discriminatory policies.
But if fixing the problem requires addressing root causes, then a 17-nation conference in Bangkok Friday offered little hope of success. Myanmar, the country at the centre of the ongoing crisis flatly refused to discuss its own role in driving members of its Muslim Rohingya minority to seek better lives elsewhere, Nathan VanderKlippe reports.
FIFA scandal may affect the Palestinian motion to suspend Israel
The corruption allegations rocking FIFA may affect the Palestinian motion to suspend Israel from the world soccer governing body, Patrick Martin reports.
Israeli representatives believe that Sepp Blatter will need votes from Arab countries to remain president of FIFA and will in turn sacrifice Israel in the process. Palestinians worry that the corruption charges might have the opposite effect. With FIFA already shaken by one scandal, its members may want to avoid being roiled by another by suspending the Jewish nation.
UN staffers fear for jobs after ‘leak’ of child sexual abuse claims
The UN’s poor handling of child sexual abuse claims against French soldiers has human rights staffers fearing for their jobs as they struggle with how to respond to highly sensitive allegations in the future, The Associated Press reports.
A year after the UN first heard children as young as 9
describe how they were given cookies or water bottles in
exchange for sodomy or oral sex by French soldiers
protecting their displaced persons camp in conflict-torn
Central African Republic, it seems the only person who has
been punished is the staffer who told the French. France
has not announced any arrests and this week said it was
still investigating.
California takes another look at doctor-assisted suicides
California lawmakers revived a bill that would allow physician-assisted suicide in the most populous U.S. state, Reuters reports.
The bill, which is being fought by numerous religious and medical organizations, would allow adults suffering from incurable illnesses that their doctors say will kill them within six months to request medication to end their lives.
Relentless heat wave across India drives death toll to more than 1,800
Dizzying temperatures have killed hundreds more Indians, driving the death toll from a weeks-long heat wave to at least 1,826, The Associated Press reports.
Meteorological officials called the heat wave “severe” and warned it would continue for at least another two days across a huge swathe of the South Asian country from Tamil Nadu in the south to the Himalayan foothill state of Himachal Pradesh.