Pope Leo XIV said he was "deeply saddened" by the loss of life, which a witness said was the result of a tank shell hitting the church. The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem named the dead as Najwa Abu Daoud, Saad Issa Kostandi Salameh and Foumia Issa Latif Ayyad.

Kurdistan has seen a spate of unclaimed drone attacks, which have come as the regional government and the federal authorities in Baghdad wrangle over control of export revenues from the Kurdistan fields.

Singapore, Singapore -- There is a "strong argument" for putting video cameras in airline cockpits to assist in accident investigations, the head of global aviation industry group IATA said Wednesday. The comments by Willie Walsh, director-general of the International Air Transport Association, followed the release of a preliminary report on...

The conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, was originally planned for mid-June to revive work on the long-standing diplomatic effort to find a way for Israeli and Palestinian states to live side-by-side in peace. It was postponed at the last minute after Israel's military campaign against Iran.

Arbil, Iraq -- A drone strike forced a US company to suspend operations at an oil field in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region Tuesday, the latest in a string of attacks targeting the region's energy infrastructure. The Kurdistan Regional Government said the Sarsang oil field in Duhok province was hit, calling...

The indirect negotiations in Qatar appear deadlocked after both sides blamed the other for blocking a deal for the release of hostages and a 60-day ceasefire after 21 months of fighting.

On the ground, civil defense agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said at least 43 people were killed in the latest Israeli strikes, including 11 when a market in Gaza City was hit. Elsewhere, eight children were among the 10 victims of a drone strike at a water point in the Nuseirat...

Dubai, United Arab Emirates -- Police in Dubai said three individuals accused of a litany of crimes, including drugs and human trafficking, were extradited to Belgium, authorities said on Sunday. Officials said the three suspects had been wanted in Belgium in connection with cases of "cross-border organized crime". In December,...

"This deal means more crossings open, aid and food trucks entering Gaza, repair of vital infrastructure and protection of aid workers. We count on Israel to implement every measure agreed," said EU foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas.

Geneva, Switzerland - The purchase of physical assets was eclipsed last year by a surge in investment in intangible items like software, data and AI, the UN said Wednesday, describing a "fundamental shift in how economies grow and compete". Investment in intellectual property-backed assets grew three times faster in 2024...

Geneva, Switzerland -- UN experts decried Tuesday the US resumption of migrant deportations to third countries, including to war-torn South Sudan, stressing Washington's obligation to ensure it is not sending people into harm's way. The experts, who are appointed by the UN Human Rights Council but who do not speak...

While Trump imposed a sweeping 10 percent tariff on goods from almost all trading partners in April, higher rates customized to dozens of economies were unveiled, then halted until July 9. But the president this week again delayed their reimposition, pushing it back to August 1.

Paris, France -- The potential of artificial intelligence is immense -- but its equally vast energy consumption needs curbing, with asking shorter questions one way to achieve, said a UNESCO study unveiled Tuesday. A combination of shorter queries and using more specific models and could cut AI energy consumption by...

Five Israeli soldiers were killed and 14 others injured late Monday night when a roadside bomb exploded during an ongoing ground operation in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced.

US President Donald Trump said Monday the United States will send additional weapons to Ukraine, after the White House announced a halt to some arms shipments for Kyiv the previous week

An armed coalition led by HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa overthrew then-Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in December, ending half a century of brutal rule by the latter's family.

Rice blocks require less cement, which is responsible for approximately eight percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, according to 2023 figures from the World Economic Forum.

BRICS leaders on Sunday described Trump's stop-start tariff wars as "indiscriminate", damaging, and illegal, drawing a quick rebuke from the pugilistic US president.

The BRICS also called for a "full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip and all other parts of the Occupied Palestinian Territories."

"We cannot remain indifferent to the genocide carried out by Israel in Gaza, the indiscriminate killing of innocent civilians and the use of hunger as a weapon of war," President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva told leaders from China, India, and other nations.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil -- BRICS leaders meeting in Rio de Janeiro from Sunday are expected to decry US President Donald Trump's "indiscriminate" trade tariffs, saying they are illegal and risk hurting the global economy. Emerging nations, which represent about half the world's population and 40 percent of global economic...

But Netanyahu, who is due to meet with President Donald Trump in Washington on Monday, said the Palestinian group's proposals for changes to a draft US-backed ceasefire deal were "unacceptable".

The world's richest person -- and Trump's biggest political donor in the 2024 election -- had a bitter falling out with the president after leading the Republican's effort to slash spending and cut federal jobs as head of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Trump pushed Republican lawmakers to get his unpopular "One Big Beautiful Bill" through a reluctant Congress in time for him to sign it into law on the US national holiday -- and they did so with a day to spare Thursday. Ever the showman, Trump will now meld a victory...

The United Nations and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives and violates basic humanitarian principles.

Jerusalem, Undefined -- Israel's opposition leader said Friday he met with the United Arab Emirates foreign minister in Abu Dhabi and discussed efforts for a ceasefire in Gaza. The UAE normalized ties with Israel in 2020 as part of the US-brokered Abraham Accords. Abu Dhabi also has close ties with...

Iran announced Thursday that it has reopened its airspace, including over Tehran, after closing it on June 13 due to the war with Israel, according to state media

Cairo, Egypt -- Mohammed bin Ahmed Al Yamahi, President of the Arab Parliament, has strongly condemned and rejected the dangerous statements issued by Israeli officials, most recently the statements made by the Israeli Minister of Justice, in which he explicitly called for the annexation of the West Bank and the...

Tokyo, Japan -- Japan will from January attempt to extract rare earth minerals from the ocean floor in the deepest trial of its kind, the director of a government innovation programme said Thursday. Earlier this week the country pledged to work with the United States, India and Australia to ensure...

They included 38 people waiting for humanitarian aid at three separate locations in central and southern Gaza and a child killed by a drone in Jabalia in the north.

The Israeli leader had yet to comment on US President Donald Trump's claim that Israel had backed a plan for a 60-day truce in its offensive against Hamas in the war-ravaged territory.

It said it sought "to reach an agreement that guarantees ending the aggression, achieving the withdrawal (of Israel from Gaza) and urgently aiding our people in the Gaza Strip".

Once a bustling seafront spot where young people could hope for a rare respite from war, Gaza City's al-Baqa cafe lay in ruins after an Israeli strike killed 24 people including a journalist and an artist.

Seville, Spain -- Countries including France, Kenya, Barbados and Spain on Monday launched a coalition to push for taxes on wealthy air passengers to help poorer nations respond to climate change, the French presidency said. The coalition, which also brings together Somalia, Benin, Sierra Leone and Antigua and Barbuda, said...

"The action taken by parliament members... is a natural response to the unjustified, unconstructive, and destructive conduct of the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency," Pezeshkian told Macron in a phone call.

His comments lifted hope for a new ceasefire in the devastating conflict in the Palestinian territory, after US President Donald Trump said he hoped a truce could be sealed within days.

"We have serious doubts over the enemy's compliance with its commitments including the ceasefire, we are ready to respond with force" if attacked again," Iranian armed forces chief of staff Abdolrahim Mousavi was quoted as saying.

Iran also writes to the UN chief to recognize the Israeli regime and the United States as the "initiators of the act of aggression and acknowledge their subsequent responsibility, including reparations."

Civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal said 35 people were killed in seven Israeli drone and air strikes in various locations, and two others by Israeli fire while waiting for food aid in the Netzarim zone in central Gaza.

Dubai, UAE -- A planned trade corridor linking the landlocked Sahel to the Atlantic is at the heart of an ambitious Moroccan project to tackle regional instability and consolidate its grip on disputed Western Sahara. The "Atlantic Initiative" promises ocean access to Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger through a new...

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday that Russia and Ukraine's demands for peace were "absolutely contradictory", after two rounds of peace talks have failed to bring the sides closer to an elusive ceasefire.

Washington, United States -- Conflicts and related fatalities have more than tripled since the early 2000s, fueling extreme poverty, the World Bank said Friday. Economies in fragile and conflict-affected regions have become "the epicenter of global poverty and food insecurity, a situation increasingly shaped by the frequency and intensity of...

In a 6-3 ruling stemming from Trump's bid to end birthright citizenship, the court said nationwide injunctions issued by district court judges "likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has granted to federal courts." The top court did not immediately rule on the constitutionality of Trump's executive order seeking to...

Dubai, United Arab Emirates -- The UAE supreme court has jailed 24 people for life after upholding their convictions for "terrorist" links. "The Criminal Chamber of the Federal Supreme Court ruled (on Thursday) to partially overturn the judgment issued by the State Security Chamber at the Abu Dhabi Federal Court...

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Thursday said Gaza was in a "catastrophic situation of genocide" and urged the European Union to immediately suspend its cooperation deal with Israel.

The shipment of supplies, plasma and blood will be distributed among hospitals in the Palestinian territory in the coming days, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

Such regulations are nothing new in Israel, where any written or visual publication deemed potentially harmful to the loosely defined concept of "national security" can be banned by law. Censorship predates the creation of Israel in 1948.

Tehran, Iran -- Iranian lawmakers voted Wednesday in favor of suspending cooperation with the United Nations' atomic energy watchdog, state TV said, after a 12-day war that saw Israeli and US strikes on nuclear sites. "The International Atomic Energy Agency, which refused to even marginally condemn the attack on Iran's...

"I think great progress is being made on Gaza," Trump said, adding that his special envoy Steve Witkoff had told him: "Gaza is very close." He linked his optimism about imminent "very good news" to Israel-Iran ceasefire.

Trump rejected that claim on Tuesday, posting on his Truth Social account that “the nuclear sites in Iran are completely destroyed.”