17 May 2023; MEMO: The deputy chair of the Republican People's Party (CHP), Turkiye's main opposition party, announced his resignation yesterday.

"In order not to harm the election process, our chairperson and presidential candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu, with whom I have been honoured to walk side by side, I am resigning from my post as the deputy chair of CHP's information and communication technologies department due to negative public opinion," Onursal Adiguzel said in a tweet.

17 May 2023; MEMO: Turkiye decried, on Tuesday, a report by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) election observation mission on Sunday's elections, Anadolu News Agency reports.

"Some political and accusatory statements in the report that went beyond the election process and inconsistent with the principles of independent and impartial observation were met with regret," the Turkish Foreign Ministry said in a written statement.

May 17 (Reuters) - The swift growth of artificial intelligence technology could put the future of humanity at risk, according to most Americans surveyed in a Reuters/Ipsos poll published on Wednesday.

More than two-thirds of Americans are concerned about the negative effects of AI and 61% believe it could threaten civilization.

17 May 2023; MEMO: Libya's eastern-based Parliament voted on Tuesday to replace Fathi Bashagha as Prime Minister, its spokesperson said, Reuters reports.

According to the report, Bashagha failed to take office in Tripoli where the incumbent Abdulhamid Al-Dbeibah has refused to cede power.

The Parliament assigned Bashagha's Finance Minister, Osama Hamad, to take over his duties, Parliament spokesperson, Abdullah Belhaiq said, the report says.

BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Dozens of Serbian schools on Wednesday received bomb threats, the education ministry said, amid security concerns following two mass shootings early this month, including one in an elementary school.

The education ministry said 78 elementary schools and 37 high schools in Belgrade received warnings by email early on Wednesday that explosive devices had allegedly been planted.

Classes were postponed and students evacuated as police checked the buildings.

QUITO, May 17 (Reuters) - Ecuador's President Guillermo Lasso dissolved the National Assembly in a decree on Wednesday, bringing forward legislative and presidential elections, a day after he presented his defense in an impeachment process against him.

Lasso denies the accusation, saying his administration made changes to the contract signed years before he took office, in order to benefit the state, on advice from Ecuador's comptroller.

ROME (AP) — With the help of a high-leaping dog with a fine nose for cocaine, Italian police seized more than 2,700 kilos (about 3 tons) of the drug hidden in 70 tons of boxed bananas shipped from Ecuador, authorities said Tuesday.

Police estimated that the cocaine, which they described as of the finest quality, could have brought traffickers more than 800 million euros ($900 million) in street sales if it had reached its ultimate destination in Armenia.

17 May 2023; MEMO: Jordanian authorities have handed over a wanted man to the UAE, the Emirates News Agency (WAM) reported today.

Dual Emirati-Turkish citizen, Khalaf Abdul Rahman Al-Romaithi was detained at Amman's Queen Alia International Airport on 7 May, having arrived from Turkiye where he had been living in exile following a 2013 court ruling sentencing him in absentia to 15 years in prison.

KABUL, May 17 (NNN-ANA) – Three kidnappers were killed, after personnel of General Directorate of Intelligence (GDI) or the country’s counter-intelligence agency, busted a group of abductors in Kabul, capital of Afghanistan, the agency said in a statement, today.

The GDI personnel rescued a hostage, who was abducted a month ago, from the kidnappers’ control, following an operation targeting the hideout of the kidnappers’ gang in Kabul, last night.

16 May 2023; MEMO: French prosecutors have issued an international arrest warrant for Lebanon's Central Bank Governor, Riad Salameh, after he failed to appear at a court hearing amid a series of legal cases against him.

According to the news agency, Reuters, which cited anonymous sources close to the case, Salameh failed to show up at a hearing in the French capital, Paris, where an investigative magistrate was reportedly set to indict him over charges involving fraud and money laundering.

MOSCOW, May 16 (Xinhua) -- Russia's lower house of parliament, the State Duma, has formally denounced the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE), according to a statement published on its website Tuesday.

"Deputies of the State Duma, guided by the interests of our citizens, decided to denounce the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe to ensure the security of the Russian Federation," said Chairman of the Russian State Duma Vyacheslav Volodin.

BERLIN, May 17. /TASS/: Germany doesn’t have the planes and other capabilities required to be part of a coalition for the supply of fighter jets to Ukraine, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said on Wednesday.

"We can’t play an active role in this alliance, this coalition because we don’t have training capabilities, expertise or planes," he said at a joint news conference with his UK counterpart Ben Wallace in Berlin.