No fewer than 50 people died and 185 others injured in road accidents during the four-day Eid el Fitr holiday
across Afghanistan.

The country’s General Directorate of Traffic Police on Monday said a total of 102 road accidents occurred across Afghanistan in the period, killing 50 commuters, including eight women and 13 children, and injuring 185 others.

Herat, Ghazni, and Paktika were among 34 provinces of the country where most of the road accidents took place, the department said.

Overspeeding, reckless driving, non-compliance to traffic rules, and lack of traffic signals on highways were the main causes of the deadly accidents, the government agency said.

The United States expects an attack by Iran against Israel but one that would not be big enough to draw Washington into war, a U.S. official said late on Thursday.

The White House said earlier that Washington did not want conflict to spread in the Middle East and the U.S. had told Iran it was not involved in an air strike against a top Iranian military commander in Damascus.

The White House added it warned Iran to not use that attack as a pretext to escalate further in the region.

Suspected Israeli warplanes bombed Iran’s embassy in Damascus on Monday in a strike for which Iran has vowed revenge and in which a top Iranian general and six other Iranian military officers were killed, ratcheting up tension in a region already strained by the Gaza war.

Iranian sources told Reuters that Tehran has signalled to Washington that it will respond to Israel’s attack on its Syrian embassy in a way that aims to avoid major escalation and it will not act hastily, as Tehran presses demands including a Gaza truce.

The United States has been on high alert about possible retaliatory strikes from Iran and U.S. envoys have been working to lower tensions.

Palestinian Islamist group Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel’s military assault on Hamas-governed Gaza has since killed more than 33,000 people according to the local health ministry, displaced nearly all of Gaza’s 2.3 million population, caused a humanitarian crisis, and led to genocide allegations that Israel denies.

Iran-backed groups have declared support for Palestinians, waging attacks from Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq.

Tehran has avoided direct confrontation with Israel or the United States, while declaring support for its allies. (Reuters/NAN)

 Russia has sent an air defence system and 100 military trainers to Niger Republic in West Africa.

Military personnel from the Russian Ministry of Defence are to install the system and train Niger’s soldiers in its use, the Nigerien state broadcaster RTN reported late on Thursday.

This was preceded by a telephone conversation between the head of the military junta, Abdourahamane Tchiani, and Russian President Vladimir Putin at the end of March.

Until the military coup last July, Niger was the last democratic ally of the U.

In March, the junta ended its military cooperation with the U.S. in the fight against terrorism.

The German Armed Forces operate an air base in Niamey, the future of which is still unclear.

State television showed images of a Russian Ilyushin-76 aircraft that had landed at Niamey airport on Wednesday.

“We are here to train the Niger army using the military equipment that has arrived here,” a masked, fair-skinned man in military uniform said in heavily accented French in the broadcast.

Since the military seized power on July 26, Niger has embarked on a new path leading to the diversification of its partners in order to assert its sovereignty vis-à-vis the world, the report continued.

Putin and Tchiani had discussed “strengthening cross-sectoral and comprehensive strategic cooperation between Niger and Russia to deal with current threats, especially in the security field.”

Like its neighbours Mali and Burkina Faso before it, Niger is turning away from its Western partners, in particular ex-colonial power France, and towards Russia.

All three countries have been ruled by the military following coups.  (dpa/NAN)