Kuwait announced the resumption of flights with 12 countries on Thursday after a year-long suspension because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The resumption of flights will include Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Britain, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Kyrgyzstan, Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland and the US, according to the official news agency, KUNA.

"As of Aug. 1, non-Kuwaitis will be allowed to enter the country, provided they receive the coronavirus vaccine," spokesman for the General Administration of Civil Aviation, Saad Al-Otaibi, was quoted. "Kuwaiti citizens will not be allowed to travel abroad unless they have received two doses of the vaccine.”

"The groups who are not subject to vaccination due to their age, and those who have a certificate proving they are unable to obtain the vaccine for health reasons along with pregnant women are excluded from the decision," he added.

In August 2020, Kuwait announced a suspension of air travel with several countries to limit the spread of the virus.

As of late Wednesday, Kuwait recorded 356,687 cases, including 1,969 deaths, and 336,122 recoveries./aa

The first export of the Turkish armored vehicle Vuran, manufactured in collaboration with leading Turkish defense firms, was made to Kosovo.

According to information obtained by Anadolu Agency, Kosovo will be the first overseas user of the Vuran 4x4 multi-purpose armored vehicle.

At the first stage, two units of the vehicle will be produced and delivered to Kosovo.


Vuran is manufactured by Turkey’s commercial and military vehicle manufacturer BMC Otomotiv in cooperation with the country’s largest defense electronics firm Aselsan.


The multi-purpose armored vehicle has been in the inventory of Turkish security forces for some time.

With its high mobility and survivability, the vehicle can operate in harsh climatic and geographical conditions./aa

The Turkish minority living in Greece on Thursday spoke out against a new court ruling denying them of their rights under Greek and international law.

On Wednesday, an application by the Xanthi Turkish Union – one of the oldest Turkish minority associations in Greece – to reregister was rejected by Greece’s Court of Cassation, denying for a third time the group’s nearly four-decade struggle to simply include the word “Turkish” in their name.

The ruling caused deep frustration among the Turkish minority, said a statement by the Western Thrace Turkish Minority Consultation Council (BTTADK).

Stressing that the council expects Greek courts to act in line with a 2008 European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) 2008 ruling on such matters, the statement said Wednesday’s ruling reflects Greece’s denial of the presence of its Turkish minority in the country.

“We, as the Turkish-Muslim minority in Western Thrace, want to express our discomfort in the face of the ongoing anti-democratic and rejectionist attitude,” the statement said.

The ruling proved, once again, that democracy and equality, as well as international law and human and minority rights, were damaged in Greece in recent years, the statement added.

The Friendship, Equality and Peace Party (DEB) – a party popular among Greece’s Turkish minority – said the court ruling contradicts the concept of human rights, democracy, and minority rights.

“We once again would like to emphasize that complying with the ECHR verdict would contribute to democracy in our country,” said a party statement.

The party stressed that it will continue to support the Xanthi Turkish Union’s justified struggle.

The Western Thrace Turkish Teachers Union (BTTOB), another prominent Turkish minority group, said the court ruling was troubling and unacceptable for the Turkish minority’s future and reiterated its support for the Xanthi Turkish Union’s struggle for Turkish minority rights.

Long struggle for rights

Wednesday’s Greek court ruling denying an application by the Xanthi Turkish Union to reregister came in response to an ECHR ruling from over a decade ago that Greece has never carried out.

Under the 2008 ECHR ruling, the right of Turks in Western Thrace to use the word "Turkish" in the name of associations was guaranteed, but Athens has failed to carry out the ruling, effectively banning the Turkish group identity.

Greece’s Western Thrace region is home to a Muslim Turkish community of around 150,000.

In 1983, the nameplate of the Xanthi Turkish Union (Iskece Turk Birligi) was taken down, and the group was completely banned in 1986, on the pretext that the word “Turkish” was in its name.

To apply the ECHR decision, in 2017 the Greek parliament passed a law enabling the banned associations to apply for re-registration, but the legislation included major exceptions that complicated the applications.

Turkey has long decried Greek violations of the rights of its Muslim and Turkish minority, from closing down mosques and shutting down schools to not letting Muslim Turks elect their own religious leaders.

These measures violate the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne as well as ECHR verdicts, making Greece a state that flouts the law, say Turkish officials./aa

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed on Thursday a law obliging international tech giants to open offices in Russia.

From Jan. 1, 2022, internet companies, whose daily audience exceeds 500,000 Russian users, will have to create branches, open representative offices, or establish legal entities in Russia, which will "fully represent the interests of the head companies."

The preliminary list includes 20 platforms: Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube, Twitch, messengers WhatsApp, Telegram, Viber, email service Gmail, search engines Google and Bing, hosting providers Amazon, Digital Ocean, Cloudflare, GoDaddy, online stores AliExpress, Ikea, Iherb, and the free online encyclopedia Wikipedia.

Separately, the Russian president ratified the agreement of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) on cooperation in cybersecurity.

Putin also granted the right to the National Guard of the Russian Federation (Rosgvardia) to make a cordon when they stop attempts to illegally enter "the territories and water areas of protected objects," which includes the Crimean Bridge, the electric energy bridge between Russia and Crimea, and the Kerch Strait.

Besides, he signed laws prohibiting public demonstration of images of Nazi leaders, organizations, and movements recognized as criminal in accordance with the verdict of the Nuremberg trials, and also prohibiting the public identification of the goals and actions of the USSR and Nazi Germany in World War II, as well as denying the decisive role of the Soviets in the victory over fascism./aa

The S&P 500 closed at a new record high Wednesday with a steep decline in volatility. 

The index finished up 0.1% at 4,297 after hitting an all-time high of 4,301 during trading hours.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average soared 210 points or 0.6% to 34,502. The Nasdaq, on the other hand, was down 24 or 0.2% at 14,502.

The fresh record in the S&P 500 came as the VIX volatility index showed a steep decline. The fear index was as high as 17.31 during the day but fell to 15.83 at the market close for a 1.2% daily loss.

The dollar index, on the other hand, was up 0.3% at 92.35 at the time. The yield on 10-year US Treasurys was down 0.6% at 1.471%.

Investors will be closely watching nonfarm payrolls data for June which will be released Friday before the market open. The market estimate is an increase of 700,000.

US private payrolls increased 692,000 in June, beating market expectations of 600,000, according to ADP Research Institute’s national employment report released earlier./aa

Iran's basketball team has landed in trouble weeks ahead of the Summer Olympics in Tokyo after being held at Tehran's international airport for allegedly possessing banned substances, according to reports.  

Upon arriving on Tuesday at Imam Khomeini International Airport after playing three friendly games in Japan in preparation for the Summer Olympics, the team members were apprehended by airport security staff for possessing "unauthorized food items,” local media reported. 

According to reports, at least 46 items of unauthorized goods were found in their luggage, which they had distributed amongst themselves. 

Following the security check, all members of the team were taken in preventive police custody, reports said. 

They were released a few hours later after the intervention of Iran's National Olympic Committee except for three unnamed players and one support staff member who later walked out on bail of 20 million tomans ($475). 

While details of the incident have not yet been divulged by the country's basketball association, Deputy Sports Minister Mehdi Alinejad was quoted as saying Wednesday that a disciplinary committee has been constituted to look into the matter. 

This is not the first time that Iran's basketball team has landed in troubled waters. On one previous occasion, they had been stopped at the airport for bringing a number of mobile phones from abroad.

Interestingly, the captain of the national basketball team, Samad Nikkhah Bahrami, has been nominated to be the country's flag-bearer at the opening ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics on July 23. 

Bahrami, 38, had previously been Iran's flag-bearer at the 2008 Beijing Olympics as well as the 2010 Asian Games in Guangzhou, China. 

The Tokyo Olympic Games, which had been set to kick off on July 24 last year, were postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic./aa