POLITICS

French President Emmanuel Macron was to face journalists' questions Tuesday after calling risky snap elections that could result in a far-right surge in parliament.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken pushed on with a Middle East crisis tour Tuesday to promote a Gaza ceasefire plan as fighting rocked the Palestinian territory and a blast killed four Israeli soldiers.

Donald Trump was interviewed by New York's probation service on Monday ahead of his sentencing next month for concealing hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

Jury deliberations began on Monday in the trial of Hunter Biden on federal gun charges, a historic first criminal prosecution of the child of a sitting US president.

North Korea has sent hundreds more trash-carrying balloons toward South Korea, Seoul's military said Monday, after Kim Jong Un's powerful sister warned of further responses if the South keeps up its "psychological warfare".

Giorgia Meloni's far-right party won a decisive victory in European elections in Italy, unofficial results showed Monday -- making her one of the few EU leaders to emerge stronger after the vote.

French President Emmanuel Macron has taken the biggest gamble of his political career by calling early legislative elections to combat the surge of the far right, with the outcome decisive for his political legacy.

Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz quit Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government on Sunday, heaping domestic pressure on the Israeli leader as the war in Gaza rages.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's coalition suffered a stinging defeat at the European elections Sunday, all three parties in his government trailing the conservatives and the far right, preliminary results showed.

UK leader Rishi Sunak apologised on Friday for leaving the D-Day anniversary commemorations in northern France early to conduct a television interview during Britain's general election campaign.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will on Friday address the French parliament and US President Joe Biden is to give a keynote speech on democracy after world leaders marked 80 years since the D-Day landings in World War II. Biden, Britain's King Charles III, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and French President Emmanuel Macron paid tribute Thursday to the tens of thousands of Allied troops who stormed the beaches of Normandy in northern France on June 6, 1944.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will address lawmakers in the US Congress on July 24, Republican party leaders announced Thursday.

South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa said Thursday that his African National Congress (ANC) would seek to form a government of national unity, after failing to win an outright majority in last week's general election.

France will transfer Mirage-2000 fighter jets to Ukraine and train their Ukrainian pilots as part of a new military cooperation with Kyiv as it fights the Russian invasion, President Emmanuel Macron announced on Thursday.

Former top Donald Trump advisor Steve Bannon was ordered by a federal judge on Thursday to report to prison by July 1 to begin serving his four-month sentence for contempt of Congress.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was preparing Thursday to be sworn in for a third term after an unexpectedly close election that forced his party into a coalition government.

In an electoral system in which money is the ultimate kingmaker, Donald Trump has been courting the country's billionaires -- and they have their checkbooks ready.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday criticised the West's delivery of long-range weapons to Ukraine, arguing Moscow could arm other countries with similar weapons to attack Western targets.

Joe Biden is looking to convince voters of his leadership credentials with a striking flurry of major announcements on Gaza, Ukraine and the Mexican border, analysts say.

Trump is expected to receive the Republican presidential nomination at the party's convention in Milwaukee, which is to begin just four days after his July 11 sentencing in New York for his conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.

A South African minister was arrested and charged with corruption on Wednesday, as his ANC party wrangles with how to form a new government after major election losses.

US President Joe Biden on Wednesday began a state visit to France marking 80 years since the World War II D-Day landings, with a new war shadowing Europe as Ukraine battles Russian invasion.

Donald Trump faced Republican voters for the first time as a convicted felon on Tuesday during the final state primaries for the 2024 presidential nomination, where he continued to sweep up votes.

Claudia Sheinbaum's election as Mexico's first woman president has shored up the left's dominance of Latin America, a region more used to sometimes-dramatic political shifts in recent years.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party was in talks with key allies to form a government Wednesday, after failing to secure an outright majority for the first time since sweeping to power a decade ago.

India's Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his allies were heading for victory in the country's general election count on Tuesday, but with a reduced parliamentary majority as the opposition surpassed expectations.

Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak hunkered down Tuesday as he prepared to go head-to-head with Labour opposition leader Keir Starmer in the first televised debate of the UK general election campaign on the back foot.

The Israeli ambassador to Japan has not yet been invited to Nagasaki's annual peace ceremony, said city officials who instead sent the embassy a letter calling for a Gaza ceasefire.

US President Joe Biden is expected to announce steps Tuesday to close the Mexican border to asylum seekers when numbers surge, in a bid to tackle a key weak spot in his election battle with Donald Trump.