WORLD

Several Turks in quake-hit towns and cities have accused Syrians of robbing damaged shops and homes.

Walking through the rubble of flattened buildings, children watch as rescue workers lift body bags from the putrid-smelling debris.

Signs of the fighting that saw Russian forces pushed out of the city last year are everywhere: flattened buildings pockmarked with bullet holes; burned-out, overturned cars and destroyed bridges.

Assad agreed to open the crossings of Bab Al-Salam and Al Ra'ee, Guterres said in a statement after UN aid chief Martin Griffiths met with the Syrian president in Damascus on Monday.

Ukrainian defenders, who have already held out for months, were braced for new ground attacks, Ukrainian military officials said on Monday.

The United States opposes Israel's retroactive authorization of Jewish settler outposts in the occupied West Bank, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday, adding that he was "deeply troubled" by the move that came less than two weeks after he raised U.S.

Germany recently gave the green light for the modern German-made tanks to be sent to Ukraine after a tireless campaign by Kyiv and other countries.

Raisi is expected to hold private talks with his Chinese counterpart President Xi Jinping in the capital Beijing, with the pair expected to sign a number of "cooperation documents", Tehran has said.

Police raided the house of Noureddine Bhiri, a senior official in the biggest opposition party Ennahda and a prominent critic of Saied, and took him away, his lawyer Samir Dilou said by phone.

Despite weeks of speculation, Russia's invasion of its former Soviet neighbour at dawn on February 24, 2022 stuns Ukraine and the world.

Ukraine has called on the West to send more weapons, but NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg warned that the alliance needed to ramp up the production of ammunition to keep up with Kyiv's needs.

Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine last February, the once-thriving industrial city of 30,000 in the disputed Donbas region has become a ghost-town.

Eight days after the 7.8-magnitude tremor, Turkish media reported a handful of people were still being pulled from the rubble as excavators dug through ruined cities.

Talks between the International Monetary Fund and Pakistan will resume virtually on Monday, a Pakistani official said, as the two sides look to reach a deal to unlock funding critical to keep the cash-strapped south Asian country afloat.

U.S. President Joe Biden will travel to Poland on Feb. 20 to 22 to mark the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the White House said on Friday.

Men with limbs lost to mines and artillery wounds are pulled from battlefields carved with trenches and scarred by shells in a fight drawing comparisons to infamous battles of World War I.

The comments provided a rare glimpse into Russian expectations of the likely duration of the conflict, from a man whose private army is at the centre of some of the fiercest fighting.

The UAE has pledged tens of millions worth of assistance to Syria as earthquake death toll reaches 33,000.

The driver, a 31-year-old from East Jerusalem, was shot dead at the scene by officers, police said.

Questioned about the incident by reporters at the White House, Biden said the shoot-down "was a success."

In action films, snipers are typically portrayed as ruthless, silent lone wolves, lying in wait to pick off prey with clinical efficiency.

Netanyahu - who denies wrongdoing in his trial - says the reforms are aimed at restoring balance between Israeli authorities.

Zaluzhnyi did not specify where the gains were. He added that Ukraine continues to hold Bakhmut, tying to "stabilise" the frontline around the town.

For the past two years, the 1979 overthrow of the Western-backed shah was commemorated mainly by Iranians who drove around cities in their cars or on motorcycles due to Covid restrictions.

A UN convoy with supplies for northwest Syria arrived via Turkey, but the agency's relief chief Martin Griffiths said much more was needed for millions whose homes were destroyed.

An air of geopolitical mystery was added by news the U.S air force had shot down a flying object near the Canadian border, the fourth object downed this month.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said one person was killed in a pre-dawn Israeli army raid in Nablus in the northern West Bank, the scene of near-relentless violence over the past year.

Mechanical diggers, rescue workers and ordinary people who escaped injury have spent days trying to pull out remaining survivors.

Pakistan's economy is in dire straits, stricken by a balance-of-payments crisis as it attempts to service high levels of external debt amid political chaos and deteriorating security.