AFP news

Western leaders gather in Lithuania's capital on Monday to demonstrate solidarity with Ukraine amid rare glimmers of disunity over Washington's controversial decision to supply cluster bombs to Kyiv.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday he would back Sweden's NATO candidacy if the European Union resumes long-stalled membership talks with Ankara.

The Threads app launched by Instagram as a rival to Twitter has signed up more than 100 million users in less than five days, data tracking websites said on Monday, smashing the record of AI tool ChatGPT for fastest-growing consumer app.

Annual inflation in Egypt hit 36.8 percent in June, official figures showed on Monday, an all-time high for the country grappling with a punishing economic crisis.

Six people were killed and one wounded in a kindergarten stabbing in southern China's Guangdong province on Monday, local officials said.

On the 500th day since Russia's invasion and as the war grinds on, Ukrainian forces are advancing slowly without enough arms and ammunition and with its main cities under constant threat.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday voiced hope for the "best possible result" from an upcoming NATO summit where Kyiv is hoping for a clear signal that it could one day join the alliance.

Conflict-torn Sudan is on the brink of a "full-scale civil war" that could destabilise the entire region, the United Nations warned Sunday, after an air strike on a residential area killed around two dozen civilians.

Saudi Arabia should review its goals for lowering carbon emissions and consider adopting targets to be met as soon as 2030, France's energy transition minister told AFP in the kingdom. Agnes Pannier-Runacher left the world's biggest oil exporter early Sunday morning after meeting with her Saudi counterpart and French and Saudi business people. Emissions reduction targets can be more credible "when we give ourselves objectives in a short period -- 2030-2035 -- and therefore do not postpone the subject to 2050," Pannier-Runacher said in an interview late Saturday.

To the sound of club beats, hundreds of young Ukrainians swarmed over the ruins of bombed-out homes in several villages in the north of the country this weekend.

Women in Iran, who have long been barred from attending football matches except for rare occasions, will be allowed into stadiums during the upcoming season, a top official said Sunday.

US President Joe Biden was in Britain on Monday for a brief visit to his key ally during which he will meet King Charles III and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak before going on to a NATO summit in Lithuania.

Since 2009, a cloistered band of hard-rock geologists and other scientists have toiled on a mission of great consequence.

Sweden's prime minister will meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday in a last-gasp attempt to bridge a diplomatic impasse over his Nordic state's stalled NATO membership drive.

Hong Kong led gains in most Asian markets Monday on hopes China has ended its long-running crackdown on the tech sector after imposing huge fines on the fintech affiliates of Alibaba and Tencent.

Pakistani mountaineer Shehroze Kashif faces sub-zero temperatures and biting winds in his race to scale the world's highest peaks, but his biggest challenge is finding the money.

Top Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi's efforts to overturn his expulsion from parliament were again blocked Friday when a court refused to stay his jail sentence for defamation.

Human Rights Watch on Friday urged Tunisia to put an end to what it called the "collective expulsions" of Black African migrants to a desert area near the Libyan border.

Iraq has opened an investigation into the suspected kidnapping of an Israeli-Russian academic after her disappearance in Baghdad, a government spokesman said.

At least 50 people, including eight children, have been killed by floods and landslides triggered by monsoon rains that have lashed Pakistan since last month, officials said Friday.

Andy Murray was within touching distance of the Wimbledon third round on Thursday when he opened up a two sets to one lead over world number five Stefanos Tsitsipas while Stan Wawrinka set up a tasty clash with Novak Djokovic.

The mind-blowing growth of artificial intelligence poses many questions that have no answers yet, the United Nations admitted Thursday at its AI summit, attended by some exceptionally life-like humanoid robots.

The head of French firm TotalEnergies says national oil giants from the Gulf and other nations must pull their weight against global warming, and the Emirati oil executive chairing the COP28 climate summit is right man to press them.

The company that operated the sub which imploded during a dive to the Titanic wreck, killing all five people aboard, said Thursday it had halted all activities indefinitely.

France's star footballer Kylian Mbappe arrived in Cameroon to an ecstatic welcome from fans Thursday for a visit that includes charity work with deaf children and a trip to his father's village.

In the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, couples stroll in a popular park and parents push their children on swings on a hot summer day.

Threads, Mark Zuckerberg's Instagram-based challenge to dethrone Elon Musk's troubled Twitter, has already secured tens of millions of downloads, but it remains to be seen whether this Twitter rival will be a winning one.

Stocks tumbled again Friday in Asia after another round of strong US data reinforced expectations the Federal Reserve will resume its interest rate hikes as officials wrestle with stubbornly high inflation.

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen begins a full day of meetings in Beijing including with Premier Li Qiang on Friday, as Washington seeks to steady the tense relationship between the world's top two economies.