International news

At least four people died, including a four-month-old baby, and scores were injured in Oklahoma this weekend after dozens of twisters swept the US Southern Plains, while weather alerts on Sunday put more than 7 million Americans under tornado warnings.

Pope Francis offered encouragement to prisoners, artists and young people in Venice on Sunday, with his first trip of the year testing his mobility and resilience after a number of health scares in recent months.

Disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein was taken to hospital in poor health his lawyer confirmed, just days after his 2020 conviction in New York was overturned.

A gold pocket watch, which was recovered from the body of the richest man on the Titanic, has sold for over 4.1m dirham at auction, along with other items recovered from the sunken ship.

An Arab ministerial coordination meeting in Riyadh emphasised the necessity of ending the conflict on the Gaza Strip and the lifting of all restrictions that hinder the entry of humanitarian aid.

Lebanon has moved towards accepting the International Criminal Court's jurisdiction to prosecute violations on Lebanese territory since October, in what Human Rights Watch said on Saturday was a "landmark step" towards justice for war crimes.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy issued a new appeal for air defences and fast weapons deliveries after the latest Russian strike on the Ukrainian energy sector on Saturday.

Russia will look for ways to overcome what it regards as any illegal sanctions the European Union imposes on its liquified natural gas (LNG) operations, the Kremlin said on Saturday, saying any measures would backfire on European industry.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and several international officials will be in Riyadh this week for talks aimed at pushing for a peace agreement in Gaza to be held on the sidelines of a World Economic Forum meeting, the WEF's president said on Saturday.

The Ukrainian capital Kyiv evacuated two civilian hospitals on Friday after the head of the Belarusian KGB security service said they were housing soldiers, sparking fears of an airstrike.

Britain's King Charles will return to public duties next week for the first time since being diagnosed with cancer as he makes good progress following treatment and a period of recuperation, Buckingham Palace said on Friday.

India's Supreme Court has declined to order any change to the vote-counting process, rejecting petitions seeking a return to the ballot system or to tally all paper slips generated as proof of voting for votes recorded by electronic machines.

At least 10 people died and 11 were injured in the early hours of Friday morning in a major fire at a guesthouse in Brazil's southern city of Porto Alegre.

A baby, who was delivered from her dying mother's womb in a Gaza hospital following an Israeli airstrike, has died after just a few days of life, the doctor who was caring for her said on Friday.

India began voting on Friday in the second phase of the world's biggest election, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeks a record-equalling third straight term.

The northern Gaza Strip is still heading toward a famine, the deputy UN food chief said on Thursday, appealing for a greater volume and diversity of aid to be allowed into the enclave and for Israel to allow direct access from its Ashdod port through Erez crossing.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing on Friday for talks across a range of complex issues

New York's highest court has overturned the 2020 conviction of former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, in the case that helped trigger the #MeToo movement.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on Thursday inspected the test-firing of 240 mm multiple launch rockets manufactured by a newly established defence industry unit, the North's KCNA news agency reported on Friday.

GlaxoSmithKline sued Pfizer and BioNTech in Delaware federal court on Thursday, accusing them of infringing GSK patents related to messenger RNA (mRNA) technology in the companies' blockbuster COVID-19 vaccines.

Israel's military is poised to evacuate Palestinian civilians from Rafah and assault Hamas hold-outs in the southern Gaza Strip city, a senior Israeli defence official said, despite international warnings of a humanitarian catastrophe.

Relentless rains, hail and winds of near hurricane intensity battered southern China, forcing the evacuation of an entire town of more than 1,700 people in the province of Guangdong, media said on Thursday.

Marine wildlife experts were frantically trying to rescue some 140 pilot whales stranded on Thursday in the shallow waters of an estuary in the southwest of the state of Western Australia.

A grand jury has charged 18 people with allegedly participating in an Arizona fake elector scheme to re-elect then-US President Donald Trump in 2020, the state's attorney general said on Wednesday.

India is inspecting facilities of spice makers MDH and Everest for compliance with quality standards after sales of some of their products were halted in Hong Kong and Singapore for allegedly containing high levels of a cancer-causing pesticide.

Israel is poised to send troops into Rafah, the Gazan city it sees as the last bastion of Hamas, Israeli media reported on Wednesday, saying preparations were under way to evacuate war-displaced Palestinian civilians who have been sheltering there.

A Russian court on Wednesday ordered one of Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu's deputies be kept in custody on suspicion of taking bribes, the highest-profile corruption case since President Vladimir Putin sent troops into Ukraine in 2022.

Former Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, a senior figure in the country's ruling party, met with Donald Trump on Tuesday, becoming the latest US ally seeking to establish ties with the Republican presidential candidate.

Russian missiles damaged residential buildings and injured six people in Ukraine's second-largest city, Kharkiv, early on Wednesday, Governor Oleh Synehubov said on Telegram.

Five migrants died in an attempt to cross the English Channel from France to Britain in an overcrowded small boat on Tuesday, hours after Britain passed a bill to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda in a move to deter the dangerous journeys.

Israel bombarded northern Gaza overnight in some of the heaviest shelling in weeks, causing panic amongst residents and flattening neighbourhoods in an area from which the Israeli army had previously down its troops, residents said on Tuesday.

Russia launched a drone attack on Ukraine that injured seven people in the Black Sea port of Odesa, two of them children, and also targeted Kyiv, the capital, Ukraine's military officials said early on Tuesday.

A Delhi court on Tuesday extended the pre-trial detention of Indian opposition leader Arvind Kejriwal until May 7 in a corruption case, the legal news website Live Law reported.

Taiwan's quake-hit eastern county of Hualien was rattled by more than 200 aftershocks late on Monday and early on Tuesday, but only minor damage was reported and no casualties and major chipmaker TSMC said it saw no impact on operations.

Two Malaysian navy helicopters collided in mid-air during a rehearsal for a naval parade on Tuesday, killing all 10 crew members aboard, the navy said in a statement.

New York prosecutors said on the first day of Donald Trump's criminal hush money trial that the former president broke the law and corrupted the 2016 election by trying to cover up encounters with an adult film star and a model, while his defense lawyer said he committed no crime.

The head of Israeli military intelligence has resigned after accepting responsibility for the failures that allowed the devastating Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7, the military said on Monday.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he would fight against sanctions being imposed on any Israeli military units for alleged rights violations, after media reports said Washington was planning such a step.

Rescuers on boats in China's flood-ravaged Guangdong province raced to evacuate trapped residents, carrying some elderly people by piggyback from their homes and deploying helicopters to save villagers caught in rural landslides.

In fake videos that have gone viral online, two of India's A-lister Bollywood actors are seen criticising Prime Minister Narendra Modi and asking people to vote for the opposition Congress party in the country's ongoing general election.

More than a dozen earthquakes, the strongest of 5.7 magnitude, struck Taiwan's east coast on Monday and some caused brief shaking in the capital Taipei, the island's weather administration said, with no immediate reports of damage.

A contaminated batch of Benylin Paediatric Syrup is no longer available in the African countries where it was sold, the World Health Organisation said on Monday.

At least five rockets were launched from Iraq's town of Zummar towards a US military base in northeastern Syria on Sunday, two Iraqi security sources and a US official told Reuters.

Israeli forces killed 14 Palestinians during a raid in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, while an ambulance driver was killed as he went to pick up wounded from a separate attack, Palestinian authorities said.

India, staging the world's biggest election, will re-run voting at 11 polling stations in the north-eastern state of Manipur on Monday after reports of violence and damage to voting machines in the state torn by months of ethnic clashes.

Two Japanese navy helicopters crashed into the sea during a training exercise, killing at least one of the eight crew members on board, the defence minister said on Sunday.

The US House of Representatives on Saturday, with broad bipartisan support, passed a $95 billion legislative package providing security assistance to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, over bitter objections from Republican hardliners.

A huge blast at a military base in Iraq early on Saturday killed a member of an Iraqi security force.

A man has died after setting himself on fire on Friday outside the New York courthouse where Donald Trump's historic hush-money trial was taking place as jury selection wrapped up.

India began voting on Friday in the world's largest election as Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeks a historic third term in office on the back of growth, welfare, his personal popularity and Hindu nationalism.

A 16-year-old boy has been charged with a terrorism offence for allegedly stabbing an Assyrian church bishop in Sydney during a church service, Australian police said on Friday, as investigations continued into a riot after the knife attack.

Kenya's military chief, General Francis Ogolla, was among 10 people killed when their military helicopter crashed shortly after take-off on Thursday.

The UN Security Council is due to vote on Thursday on a Palestinian bid for full UN membership.

The death toll from a Russian airstrike on Chernihiv in northern Ukraine has risen to 18, officials said on Thursday, while another 78 were wounded when three missiles slammed into the city centre.

A man-made famine is "tightening its grip" across the Gaza Strip, the head of the United Nations Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA warned on Wednesday as he accused Israel of blocking aid deliveries and seeking to end UNRWA's activities in the enclave.

Indonesia shut a provincial airport and evacuated hundreds of people from the vicinity of the Ruang volcano after it belched explosive plumes of lava, rocks and ash for days, officials said on Thursday, declaring the highest alert on the situation.

The US House of Representatives will have its long-awaited vote on aid for Ukraine, Israel and the Indo-Pacific as soon as Saturday, Republican Speaker Mike Johnson said on Wednesday, paving the way for its possible passage despite fierce objections from the right wing of his conference.

Georgia's parliament on Wednesday approved the first reading of a bill on "foreign agents" that the European Union said risked stifling freedoms and blocking the country's path to membership.

Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said on Wednesday talks on a Gaza ceasefire and a release of hostages are at a "delicate phase".

A Russian missile attack killed and injured residents and damaged social infrastructure in the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv on Wednesday, regional governor Vyacheslav Chaus said.

Pakistan's interior ministry said on Wednesday it ordered the temporary blockage of social media platform X in February on national security concerns, confirming a long-suspected shutdown.

Israeli tanks pushed back into some areas of the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday which they had left weeks ago, while warplanes conducted air strikes on Rafah, the Palestinians' last refuge in the south of the territory, killing and wounding several people, medics and residents said.

Iran will respond to any action against its interests, President Ebrahim Raisi said on Tuesday, according to the Iranian Student News Agency, a day after Israel warned it will respond to Tehran's weekend drone and missile attack.

Four days of widespread rains across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan have left 21 killed and 32 injuries, the Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) confirmed.

US President Joe Biden and his wife Jill on Monday released tax returns showing that their income rose 7 per cent to $619,976 in 2023 and that the couple paid 23.7 per cent of their income in federal taxes.

A number of people were injured in a stabbing at a church in a suburb of Sydney on Monday, police said.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Sunday warned members not to further escalate tensions with reprisals against Iran, while the US warned the Security Council it would work to hold Tehran accountable at the UN.

A Delhi court extended on Monday the detention of opposition leader Arvind Kejriwal in a graft case until April 23, legal news website Live Law reported, a setback to the opposition which needs him to campaign in general elections that begin this week.

Kuwait's Emir on Monday appointed Ahmad Abdullah al-Ahmad al-Sabah as prime minister, state news agency KUNA reported.

President Joe Biden warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the US will not take part in a counter-offensive against Iran, an option Netanyahu's war cabinet favours after a mass drone and missile attack on Israeli territory, according to officials.

Flooding is expected to peak on Monday in Russia's Kurgan region straddling the Tobol River near the border with Kazakhstan, as officials said waters maintained a sharp rise.

Australian police on Monday said the attacker who fatally stabbed six people at a busy shopping centre in Sydney's beach suburb of Bondi may have targeted women, as the country mourned the victims and hundreds of people laid flowers near the scene.

Iran warned Israel and the United States on Sunday of a much larger response if there is any retaliation for its mass drone and missile attack on Israeli territory overnight, as Israel said "the campaign is not over yet".

Iran launched more than 300 drones and missiles at Israel overnight, 99 per cent of which were shot down, the Israeli military said on Sunday, adding that the armed forces remained fully functional and were discussing follow-up options.

At least 14 people have been killed in landslides on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, the country's disaster mitigation agency said on Sunday, with rescue efforts ongoing for those reported missing.

Hamas has rejected the latest proposal for a deal to return Israeli hostages and Israel will continue to pursue its objectives in Gaza "with full force", Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said in a statement on Sunday.

The man who fatally stabbed six people in Sydney had mental health issues in the past and there was no indication ideology was a motive in the attack in one of the city's busiest shopping centres, police said on Sunday.

One person was killed and 10 others have been injured in the southern Turkish province of Antalya after a cable car cabin collided with a broken pole, the interior ministry said.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards seized an Israeli-linked cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, the Iranian state-run IRNA news agency reported, days after Tehran warned it could close the area to sea traffic.

Tess Ingram, Communications Specialist at UNICEF, has warned of the long term repercussions of the physical health, growth, and mental well-being of Gaza's children.

An attacker who fatally knifed five people in a Sydney mall was shot dead by police in Sydney's beachside suburb of Bondi on Saturday, police said, as hundreds fled the scene.

A man was shot at a mall in Sydney on Saturday following reports of multiple people stabbed, police in the city have said.

Israeli forces fought Hamas in the north and centre of the Gaza Strip on Friday as Khaled Meshaal, a senior official in the Gaza movement, said its six-month-old battle with Israel would "break the enemy soon".

The Philippines' foreign minister said on Friday his country was determined to assert its sovereign rights in the South China Sea, at a meeting with US allies over an increasingly fraught standoff with Beijing over the waterway.

The prospect of Palestinians crossing into Egypt from the border town of Rafah to escape a military assault would make the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict impossible and cause an "atrocious dilemma" for the people fleeing, the UN refugee chief said on Friday.

Soaring prices have helped fuel a food crisis in West and Central Africa, where nearly 55 million people will struggle to feed themselves in the coming months, UN humanitarian agencies warned on Friday.

The Israeli army said on Friday that the first trucks carrying food aid entered the Gaza Strip on Thursday through the newly opened northern crossing point.

The Biden administration will cancel $7.4 billion in student debt for 277,000 borrowers, the White House said in a statement on Friday.

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said on Thursday his group was still seeking a deal for a ceasefire and hostage release after an Israeli strike killed three of his sons in an attack in Gaza.

Belgian prosecutors are looking into possible Russian interference in the upcoming European Parliament election following findings provided by intelligence services, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said on Friday.

Italian rescuers have found the bodies of the last two missing workers from an explosion at a hydroelectric plant near Bologna three days ago, a spokesperson for the fire brigade said on Friday, bringing the final death toll to seven.

Russian missiles and drones destroyed a large electricity plant near Kyiv and hit power facilities in several regions of Ukraine on Thursday, officials said, ramping up pressure on the embattled energy system as Kyiv runs low on air defences.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday that the crisis in Sudan could worsen in the coming months as the distribution of humanitarian aid and medical supplies remains restricted.

Authorities in the Russian city of Orenburg called on residents to evacuate immediately on Friday due to rapidly rising flood waters after major rivers burst their banks due to a deluge of melting snow.

Israeli forces killed three sons of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in an air strike in Gaza without consulting senior commanders or political leaders including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli media reported on Thursday.

OJ Simpson, the American football star and actor who was acquitted in a sensational 1995 trial of murdering his former wife but was found responsible for her death in a civil lawsuit and was later imprisoned for armed robbery and kidnapping, has died at the age of 76.

A court in Vietnam handed the death sentence on Thursday to real estate tycoon Truong My Lan for her role in a 304-trillion-dong ($12.5-billion) financial fraud, the country's biggest on record, state media said.

US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Wednesday unveiled plans for military cooperation and projects ranging from missiles to moon landings, strengthening their alliance with an eye on countering China and Russia.

Russia test launched its Angara-A5 rocket from the Vostochny Cosmodrome on Thursday for the first time after technical glitches prompted officials to abort missions at the very last minute for two days in a row.

The Russian city of Orenburg battled rising water levels on Thursday after major rivers across Russia and Kazakhstan burst their banks in the worst flooding seen in the areas in nearly a century.

President Joe Biden on Wednesday said he was considering Australia's request to drop the prosecution of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who had released troves of confidential US classified documents and is battling extradition to the United States.

At least 13 religious pilgrims died and 30 were injured when the truck they were riding in overturned on Wednesday in southwestern Pakistan, police said.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said unstable geopolitical situations surrounding his country mean now is the time to be more prepared for war than ever, as he inspected the country's main military university, KCNA news agency said on Thursday.

Three sons of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on Wednesday, the group and Haniyeh's family said.

Governments, business leaders and development banks have two years to take action to avert far worse climate change, the UN's climate chief said on Wednesday, in a speech that warned global warming is slipping down politicians' agendas.

Israel has agreed in Gaza war ceasefire talks in Egypt to concessions about the return of Palestinians to the north of the enclave, but believes Hamas does not want to strike a deal, Israeli officials said on Wednesday.

Russian air strikes on Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region on Wednesday afternoon hit a clinic and a pharmacy, killing at least three people, a local official said.

A fire broke out in a densely populated residential building in Hong Kong's bustling Kowloon district on Wednesday, killing five people and injuring 35 others, the city's hospital authority and fire services said.

Russia on Wednesday aborted the test launch of its Angara-A5 space rocket due to a malfunction of the engine launch control system, the second time in two days that the rocket's blast-off was cancelled at the very last minute.

A federal judge decided on Tuesday to allow the special counsel prosecuting former US President Donald Trump for allegedly mishandling classified documents to shield the identities of possible witnesses in the case for now.

Floods gripped cities and towns across Russia and Kazakhstan on Wednesday after Europe's third-longest river burst its banks, forcing over 100,000 people to evacuate and swamping parts of the Russian city of Orenburg.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's approach to the war in Gaza is a "mistake," US President Joe Biden said in an interview published on Tuesday, offering further criticism of Israel's handling of the conflict.

The mother and father of a Michigan teen who shot and killed four classmates were each sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison on Tuesday after a jury convicted them of manslaughter in a rare case of parents being held responsible in a school shooting.

Germany denied on Tuesday that it was aiding genocide in the Gaza Strip by selling weapons to Israel in a lawsuit filed by Nicaragua before the International Court of Justice, the United Nations' highest court.

Four people have died and several are missing following an explosion at a hydroelectric power plant in northern Italy.

Europe's top human rights court ruled on Tuesday that the Swiss government had violated the human rights of its citizens by failing to do enough to combat climate change.

An Indian court rejected on Tuesday an appeal against last month's arrest of key opposition leader and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in a graft case, an order that comes as a disappointment to the opposition 10 days before general elections.

Hamas said on Tuesday that an Israeli proposal on a ceasefire in Gaza met none of its demands.

The world just experienced its warmest March on record, capping a 10-month streak in which every month set a new temperature record, the European Union's climate change monitoring service said on Tuesday.

Throngs of skywatchers across North America gazed upward at a blackened sun in the midday dusk on Monday, celebrating with cheers, music and matrimony the first total solar eclipse to darken the continent in seven years.

The death toll from a ferry boat that capsized off the northern coast of Mozambique on Sunday has climbed to nearly 100, President Filipe Nyusi said on Monday. Nearly 20 others are still missing.

Flood sirens blared out in two Russian cities on Tuesday, warning thousands more people to evacuate immediately as two major rivers swelled to bursting point in some of the worst flooding in at least 70 years.

Russia said Ukraine struck the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station controlled by Russian forces three times on Sunday and demanded the West respond, though Kyiv said it had nothing to do with the attacks.

An Israeli strike on southern Lebanon early on Monday killed a field commander in the heavily-armed Lebanese group Hezbollah, as the United Nations warned that shelling was spreading and urged a halt to the violence.

A total solar eclipse will have millions of people across a heavily populated swath of North America gazing toward the heavens on Monday as the moon completely blocks the sun for more than four minutes in some locales.

Philippines' President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on Monday called on China to talk to prevent more incidents like ramming vessels and the use of water cannons in the South China Sea.

Russia launched two dozen attack drones on Ukraine overnight, targeting chiefly critical infrastructure in the country's south and east, Ukraine's air force said on Monday.

More than 90 people died after a ferry sank off the north coast of Mozambique, the BBC said, citing domestic authorities, with five rescued from among the nearly 130 believed to have been on board.

Sir Richard Branson, the founder of the Virgin Group, will be boarding Virgin Galactic's VSS Unity and blasting off to space on Sunday.

Singapore is reviewing penalties for violent offences following an outcry over a 12-day prison sentence for a student who strangled his girlfriend until she blacked out.