WORLD

Hundreds of thousands of people fleeing Sudan's war have crossed into Chad to find themselves in overcrowded camps, sweltering in plastic huts and awaiting healthcare that never comes.

Singaporeans headed to the polls Friday in the city-state's first contested presidential election in more than a decade, a vote being closely watched as an indication of support for the ruling party after a rare spate of political scandals.

A key US inflation measure used by the Federal Reserve to set interest rates rose in July, due largely to another jump in the cost of services, according to government data published Thursday.

At least 48 people have been killed in a crackdown on an anti-UN protest in eastern DR Congo, according to sources and official documentation reviewed by AFP on Thursday, raising a previously reported death toll.

The United Nations Security Council on Thursday renewed the mandate for its peacekeeping force in Lebanon for another year after tense debate around the troops' freedom of movement.

Five railway workers died after being hit by a train during overnight maintenance in northern Italy, officials said Thursday, triggering outrage among trade unions who blamed a lack of safety procedures.

US envoy Amos Hochstein who oversaw a maritime border deal between Lebanon and Israel, countries technically still at war, said Thursday it was time to delineate their land border also.

Britain's Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, who last month announced he would step down in the next UK government cabinet reshuffle, has resigned, the prime minister's office said Thursday.

A fire that engulfed a five-storey building killed more than 60 people including children in central Johannesburg on Thursday, the South African city's emergency services said.

A truck driver rammed his vehicle near a checkpoint in the West Bank Thursday, injuring three people before he was "neutralised", medics and police said, in the latest attack to rock the occupied territory.

Russia on Wednesday vetoed an attempt to keep inside military-run Mali a team of UN experts who had charged that foreign forces -- a veiled reference to Moscow-linked Wagner mercenaries -- were involved in widespread abuses.

Rebel officers in the oil-rich central African state of Gabon announced on Wednesday they had seized power following disputed elections in which President Ali Bongo Ondimba, in power since 2009, had been declared victor.

British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said he had raised human rights concerns at "every single one" of his meetings with top Chinese officials, as he made a state visit to Beijing on Wednesday.

Iran is ratcheting up a crackdown ahead of the one-year anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini, arresting prominent personalities, campaigners and relatives of those killed by security forces in protests last year, activists say.

A Pakistan court on Wednesday ordered that former prime minister Imran Khan be kept in jail over allegations he leaked classified documents, a day after a judge granted his release in a separate graft case.

Indian officials preparing for the G20 summit next week have hired teams of "monkey-men" and erected primate cutouts to deter marauding monkeys from munching on the floral displays laid out for global leaders.

"On 2 September, the Dragon spacecraft will undock from the ISS, carrying aboard @Astro_Alneyadi and his Crew-6 crewmates. The arrival is scheduled for 3 September," Dubai Media Office shared.

Sixty years ago, a crisis hotline for the first time sent a message between the world's superpowers.

Former Algerian defence minister Khaled Nezzar has been indicted in Switzerland on charges of committing crimes against humanity in the 1990s during the civil war, state prosecutors said Tuesday.

Algeria's foreign minister on Tuesday proposed a six-month transitional plan for neighbouring Niger, whose coup leader seeks a far longer timeline back to democracy.

Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was killed in a plane crash two months after staging a short-lived mutiny, was on Tuesday laid to rest in a secret ceremony in his native Saint Petersburg.

Cyprus police said Tuesday they have arrested 21 people after violent clashes between Cypriots and migrants near the resort city of Paphos, where authorities have started removing Syrians from a condemned apartment complex.

The cap of a Ukrainian fighter pilot known as "Juice" sat atop his flag-draped casket Tuesday as mourners gathered to pay homage to the 29-year-old considered legendary by the country's air force.

The United States is racing to improve its messaging to the developing world as the BRICS group grows, although few in Washington view an immediate threat from the Chinese-backed club.

At least 183 people have been killed since July in clashes in Ethiopia's Amhara region, the United Nations said Tuesday as it appealed for the killings, violence and rights abuses to end.

Strolling in Moscow on a summer's day as pop music blared from a cafe, Tigran is one of the capital's residents who say they have come to terms with a surge in Ukrainian drone attacks.

Sudan's army chief travelled Tuesday to Egypt on his first trip abroad since the outbreak of war in April, with the latest violence killing dozens of civilians in battle-scarred Darfur.

Imran Khan's prison sentence for a graft conviction was suspended on Tuesday, his lawyer said, but it was unclear if the former Pakistan prime minister would be immediately released.

Russian masterpieces are hidden away in a Ukrainian museum, writers like Pushkin and Dostoyevsky are shunned and the Russian language is eschewed.