US President Donald Trump has fired the two witnesses who provided damaging testimony during his impeachment probe.
The two men have been named as Army Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman and Ambassador Gordon Sondland.
Barely two days after President Trump was acquitted by the Senate on impeachment charges, Vindman was escorted out of the office building.
His lawyer, David Pressman, maintains Vindman was asked to leave for telling the truth.
Shortly after Vindman's sacking, Sondland said he too had been fired from his post as US ambassador to the European Union.
The two men were important witnesses during the impeachment investigation last year.
Vindman's twin brother Yevgeny, who worked as a lawyer at the National Security Council, also was escorted out of the White House.
Trump maintains he is still angry with Democrats and government officials involved in the impeachment investigation despite being acquitted on Wednesday.
Pakistan and Afghanistan agreed to a 'temporary ceasefire' on Wednesday, Islamabad said, after an airstrike and ground fighting sent tensions between the South Asian neighbours soaring, killing more than a dozen civilians.
Aid trucks rolled into Gaza on Wednesday and Israel resumed preparations to open the main Rafah crossing after a dispute over the return of the bodies of dead hostages that had threatened to derail the fragile ceasefire deal with Hamas.
Fresh fighting broke out on Wednesday along the volatile Pakistan-Afghanistan border, killing more than a dozen civilians and troops to shatter a fragile peace after weekend clashes that killed dozens.
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Kenya's veteran opposition leader Raila Odinga, who was imprisoned while fighting one-party autocracy and ran five times unsuccessfully for the presidency, has died at the age of 80, sources close to him said on Wednesday.
UAE President His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan has ordered the expansion of nature reserves in Abu Dhabi to cover 20 per cent of the emirate’s total land area.