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The world-renowned BAPS Hindu Temple in Abu Dhabi celebrated Ram Navami and Swaminarayan Jayanti with immense devotion and grandeur, marking a landmark moment for cultural and spiritual harmony in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). A statement mentioned that devotees from across the region gathered at the temple to participate in a series of devotional and cultural events. According to Pujya Brahmavihari Swami, the head priest of the temple, a full day of celebrations was organized, beginning with Ram Bhajans from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m., followed by the Shri Ram Janmotsav Aarti at 12 noon. "The celebrations witnessed a massive turnout of devotees and visitors, united in devotion to Lord Ram and Bhagwan Swaminarayan. This spiritual gathering served as a beacon of peace, unity, and eternal Hindu values, echoing across borders," the statement read. One of the highlights of the event was a special cultural presentation by the BAPS on a stage designed to resemble the sacred confluence...

Three US aid workers were laid off while in Myanmar helping the rescue and recovery from the country's massive earthquake, a former senior staffer said, as the Trump administration's dismantling of foreign aid affects its disaster response. After travelling to the Southeast Asian nation, the three officials were told late this week they would be let go, Marcia Wong, a former official at the US Agency for International Development, told Reuters. "This team is working incredibly hard, focused on getting humanitarian aid to those in need. To get news of your imminent termination - how can that not be demoralising?" said Wong, former deputy administrator of USAID's Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance, which oversees Washington's disease response efforts overseas. President Donald Trump's government has pledged at least $9 million to Myanmar after the magnitude-7.7 quake, which has killed more than 3,300. But his administration's massive cuts to USAID hav...

China's state-run media has taken to the internet with AI-generated videos, featuring dancing robots and fraught consumers, to chide US.President Donald Trump and tariffs they say threaten high inflation and economic distress for Americans. "'Liberation Day', you promised us the stars. But tariffs killed our cheap Chinese cars," an automated female voice sings in a video on the website of China's CGTN, a state-run English-language broadcaster, over a shot of a woman at a kitchen table staring at an empty fork. The two-minute, 42-second clip, referring to Trump's use of "Liberation Day" for the day of his tariff announcement, was captioned with a warning: "Track is AI-generated. The debt crisis? 100 percent human-made." Another video posted on the X.com page of state-run news agency Xinhua, also generated by artificial intelligence, shows a robot named TARIFF that chooses to self-destruct rather than follow its creator's orders fo...

A Russian ballistic missile strike on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's home city of Kryvyi Rig killed 12 people on Friday, including three children, authorities said. Oleksandr Vilkul, the head of the city's military administration, said more than 50 people were wounded in the evening attack. "Twelve people were killed in Kryvyi Rig," regional governor Sergiy Lysak said on Telegram. He added later that this included "three children". "The number of wounded is constantly increasing. This information will come later. A car and garages are on fire," he said. Unverified video on social media taken from a distance showed a plume of smoke rising into the evening sky. Kryvyi Rig, in Ukraine's central Dnipropetrovsk region, is about 60 kilometres (37 miles) from the front line but has regularly been targeted by Russian drones and missiles. A Russian ballistic attack on the city on Wednesday killed at least four people and wounded more th...

The first week of April was always going to be a big one for Donald Trump with his much-hyped announcement on global tariffs -- but that was just one part of another frenetic seven days at the White House. Tariffs and penguin memes Unveiling the new tariffs in the White House garden, Donald Trump held up a table of figures that the world strained to read. Alongside China, India and EU were unexpected names such as the Heard and McDonald Islands, a barren sub-Antarctic Australian territory inhabited by penguins but no humans. One widely shared meme image showed a penguin in place of Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office during his recent spat with the US president and Vice President JD Vance. Trump-branded golden visa Donald Trump unveiled the first "gold card," a residency permit to be sold for $5 million each to attract investors and employers to the United States. Flying on Air Force One, he showed off a prototype that bore his face and an inscriptio...

India will soon send relics of the Buddha, discovered in Devni Mori in northern Gujarat, to Thailand for an exposition. Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced this after bilateral talks with Thailand Prime Minister Paentongtran Shinawatra at the Government House here. "I am extremely happy to announce that the Holy Relics found in Aravali, Gujarat in 1960 will also be sent to Thailand for an exposition," Modi said after he received a copy of the 108 volumes of Tipitaka, the revered collection of Buddhist scriptures, in Pali language, from Paetongtarn. The Prime Minister noted that the Holy Relics of Lord Buddha were sent from India to Thailand last year. "It is a matter of great pleasure that more than four million devotees got the opportunity to pay their tributes," he said. The Devni Mori relics were found during excavations at the mound known as 'Bhoja Raja No Terkro' or the courtyard of King Bhoja in 1960. The dig suggested this was the location of...

US President Donald Trump's worldwide tariff salvo could lead to an overall contraction of around 1 percent in global merchandise trade volumes this year, the WTO chief warned Thursday. After Trump on Wednesday unveiled a blitz of harsher-than-expected levies aimed at countries around the globe, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala warned the measures would "have substantial implications for global trade and economic growth prospects". Trump slapped 10 percent import duties on all nations and far higher levies on imports from dozens of specific countries -- including top trade partners China and the European Union -- adding to tariffs already imposed since his return to power in January. "While the situation is rapidly evolving, our initial estimates suggest that these measures, coupled with those introduced since the beginning of the year, could lead to an overall contraction of around 1 percent in global merchandise trade volumes this year," the World Trade Organization di...