WORLD

Thousands of people have been ordered to evacuate as a wildfire rages out of control in northern California, with a swathe of the United States in the grip of a "record-breaking and dangerous" heatwave that was complicating firefighting efforts.

Britain voted Thursday in a general election widely expected to hand the opposition Labour party a landslide win and end nearly a decade-and-a-half of Conservative rule.

As residents of Joe Biden's hometown Scranton prepared to mark that most American of holidays -- July 4 -- many were also voicing alarm about the US president following his disastrous debate last week against Donald Trump.

More than seven percent of all deaths in 10 of India's biggest cities are linked to air pollution, a large study said Thursday, leading researchers to call for action to save tens of thousands of lives a year.

US Vice President Kamala Harris is engaged in a delicate balancing act, playing cheerleader for President Joe Biden while standing by as a leading contender to replace him if he ends his reelection bid.

Venezuela and the United States have agreed to "improve relations" as they resumed negotiations just months after Washington reimposed crippling sanctions on the South American country, Caracas said Wednesday.

The Kenyan presidency said Wednesday it had ordered a review of salary increases for public servants in an apparent move to defuse tensions after a wave of sometimes deadly anti-government protests.

Ex-prime minister Boris Johnson tried to rally the Conservative party faithful as UK politicians on Wednesday spent a final day campaigning ahead of the general election.

Georgian student Elene Deisadze was browsing TikTok in 2022 when she stumbled across the profile of a girl, Anna Panchulidze, who looked exactly like her.

Kenyan police said they have arrested more than 270 people masquerading as protesters who are suspected of going on a criminal rampage during anti-government rallies on Tuesday.

Survivors of India's deadliest stampede in more than a decade recalled on Wednesday the horror of being crushed at a vastly overcrowded Hindu religious gathering where 121 people were killed.

Nearly a quarter of a million people were evacuated in eastern China as rainstorms lashed swathes of the country and caused the Yangtze and other rivers to swell, state media reported Wednesday.

US President Joe Biden on Tuesday congratulated South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa on winning a new term, devoting time to a key if complicated relationship despite a political storm in Washington.

A second contingent of the Kenya-led multinational policing mission in Haiti will arrive "in the coming weeks," Prime Minister Garry Conille told AFP on Tuesday.

A judge postponed Tuesday Donald Trump's sentencing for covering up hush money payments until September 18, the first fallout of a Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity, pushing it to after the Republican convention.

US President Joe Biden on Tuesday called on pharmaceutical giants Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly to lower prices for diabetes and weight loss drugs such as Ozempic, saying firms must stop "ripping off the American people."

The Philippines and China agreed on Tuesday to "de-escalate tensions" over the South China Sea, Manila said, following a violent clash in the disputed waters last month.

Democrats shocked by Joe Biden's dismal debate performance urged the US president Tuesday to be transparent about his mental fitness as he faced the first call from his own side to drop out of the election.

The UN humanitarian coordinator for Gaza said Tuesday that 1.9 million people -- 80 percent of the territory's population -- were now displaced, adding she was "deeply concerned" by reports of new evacuation orders for Khan Yunis.

Dutch King Willem-Alexander swore in former spy chief Dick Schoof as new prime minister Tuesday, at the head of a right-wing coalition cabinet with a mission to implement the country's "strictest-ever" immigration policy.

Uber driver Hussein Khalil was battling traffic in Beirut when he found himself in the Gaza Strip -- according to his online map, anyway -- as location jamming blamed on Israel disrupts life in Lebanon.

Israeli forces carried out deadly strikes Tuesday on southern Gaza and battled militants after the army again ordered Palestinians to leave areas near the besieged territory's border with Israel and Egypt.

Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban arrived in Ukraine on Tuesday for a surprise visit to the war-torn country by the EU and NATO's most vocal critic of Western support for Kyiv.

Raped by her husband on her wedding night aged 17, Divya described her repeated suffering -- an all-too-common account in India, permitted by a terrifying colonial-era legal loophole.

US President Joe Biden's son Hunter is suing right-wing Fox News for airing nude images of him in a miniseries that he claims amount to "revenge porn," court documents showed Monday.

Jose Raul Mulino was sworn in Monday as Panama's new president, with the right-leaning leader pledging to make his Central American country no longer a "transit" point for US-bound undocumented migrants.

The Brazilian Amazon recorded 13,489 wildfires in the first half of the year, the worst figure in 20 years, satellite data revealed Monday.

Taliban authorities were told women must be included in public life, UN Under-Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo said on Monday as she defended a decision to sideline civil society groups at official talks in Doha.

Hurricane Beryl was Tuesday hurtling towards Jamaica as it strengthened into a record top-level Category 5 storm after sweeping across several islands in the southeastern Caribbean.