International

Italian opera singing has been added to the United Nations' cultural heritage list, a prestigious accolade for the four-centuries-old art mixing costume drama and music.

Israeli forces intensified its attack on Khan Yunis in southern Gaza, in what they called the most intense day of combat in five weeks of ground operations against Hamas.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told Ukrainians on Wednesday that Kyiv would defeat Russia and win a fair peace "against all odds" as the future of vital US military and financial aid hung in the balance.

Rescuers used boats to reach people stranded in their homes amid widespread flooding in the India's Chennai on Wednesday after cyclone Michaung barrelled into the southern coast, bringing in heavy rain and winds that uprooted trees and damaged roads.

Rescue workers in Zambia have pulled out the first survivor of a December 1 landslide that inundated an open-pit copper mine and trapped at least 25 people who were working there without a permit.

The year 2023 would be the warmest year on record after an "extraordinary" November became the sixth record-breaking month in a row, Europe's Copernicus Climate Change Service said Wednesday.

A bus in the Philippines carrying dozens of people lost its brakes and fell off a cliff in the central province of Antique, killing a least 16 people, local authorities said on Wednesday.

Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani on Tuesday called on the UN Security Council to push Israel to return to the negotiating table over the war in Gaza.

Workers, residents and students evacuated buildings in the Philippine capital Manila on Tuesday after an earthquake of magnitude 5.9 struck off the main Luzon island, according to the state seismology agency.

Cyclone Michaung barrelled into the southern Indian coast on Tuesday with intense winds, its arrival preceded by torrential rains and flooding that killed at least 13 people, as officials assessed the damage.

Ukraine's military shot down 10 out of 17 attack drones launched overnight by Russia, Ukrainian authorities said on Tuesday.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has called on Israel to withdraw an order to evacuate its medical warehouses in southern Gaza after a warning that ground operations would make it inaccessible.

The United States is running out of time and money to help Ukraine fight its war against Russia, White House officials warned on Monday.

Four children, aged 7 to 10, and an adult were injured in an explosion in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar early on Tuesday, hospital and rescue officials said.

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has tested positive for COVID-19, but remains healthy enough to hold online meetings, his office said on Tuesday.

At least four people died, factories closed and the runway of one of India's busiest airports lay submerged due to torrential rain, as two southern states were braced on Monday for the impact of a severe cyclone.

Israeli forces are preparing to expand ground operations in southern Gaza, warning residents of the city of Khan Yunis of an "imminent terrible attack" and instructing them to evacuate.

Authorities in southern India closed schools and offices, halted flights and evacuated coastal areas on Monday ahead of a severe cyclonic storm expected to make landfall in the next 24 hours, bringing torrential rainfall.

India's opposition faces a "herculean task" in next year's general elections against Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which wrested control of key states in a surprisingly strong showing in local polls.

Strong aftershocks from an earthquake that has killed at least three people and a new tremor in southern Philippines are forcing thousands of residents to stay in evacuation centres, disaster officials said on Monday.

A "massive" manhunt is underway for the attackers who bombed a church service that killed four people in the southern Philippines, a senior military officer said on Monday, vowing to do everything possible to bring the perpetrators to justice.

The US Central Command (Centcom) announced that a US destroyer shot down several drones while providing support to commercial ships in the Red Sea that were targeted by attacks from Yemen.

Indonesia's Marapi volcano in West Sumatra province erupted on Sunday, spewing volcanic ash as high as 3,000 metres into the air, according to the country's disaster management agency BNPB.

A German tourist died and two other people, including a British citizen, were hurt after an attack by a man armed with a knife and a hammer near the Eiffel Tower in Paris on Saturday, in what President Emmanuel Macron described as "a terrorist attack".

Fresh Russian shelling killed at least three people including an elderly man in a village garage and a woman beside a city bus stop, Ukrainian officials said, as President Volodymr Zelenskiy reported "intense battles" at dozens of frontline locations.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has decided to recall a Mossad intelligence team from Doha after reaching a "deadlock" in negotiations aimed at renewing the ceasefire and exchanging hostages with Hamas.

Philippine residents were allowed to return to their homes on Sunday after a magnitude 7.4 earthquake struck the country's south, killing at least one person, with disaster officials reporting minor damage to some infrastructure.

Israel has called on residents of the northern Gaza Strip to evacuate their homes and move to the south as it pressed its offensive against Hamas with renewed force after the collapse of a truce.

One of ousted Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan's lawyers was elected on Saturday as chairman of his party, allowing it to take part in a national vote scheduled for February as the former cricketer is in jail and barred from taking part.

Long-distance trains and hundreds of flights in and out of the German city of Munich were cancelled on Saturday because of heavy snowfall, according to statements by Deutsche Bahn and Munich Airport.

Israel's military said on Friday it has resumed combat against Hamas in the Gaza Strip after the end of a seven-day truce.

The United Nations Security Council unanimously voted on Friday to remove the final restrictions on weapons deliveries to Somalia's government and its security forces, more than 30 years after an arms embargo was first imposed on the country.

Thirty Palestinian prisoners have been released on the seventh day of the truce agreement between Hamas and Israel. 

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called for faster construction of fortifications in key sectors under pressure from Russian forces, particularly in eastern Ukraine, the focal point of Moscow's advances 21 months into its invasion.

The UN Security Council is due to vote on Friday to end a political mission in war-torn Sudan and to remove the final restrictions on weapons deliveries to Somalia's government and its security forces.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has called for his military to be ready to respond to any "provocation" by the enemy, state media said on Friday, after Pyongyang vowed to deploy stronger armed forces and new weapons along its border with the South.

Israel and Hamas have agreed to extend the pause in hostilities to facilitate a hostages-prisoners swap in Gaza for a seventh day.

All 41 men who were rescued from a collapsed tunnel in the Indian Himalayas earlier this week are well and will return to their homes in coming days after being discharged from the hospital where they were undergoing treatment, doctors said on Thursday.

Thirty Palestinians have been released from Israeli prisons in the sixth release of its kind under the truce agreement with Hamas.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has visited troops near the Kupiansk sector of the frontline in the country's northeast, he announced on social media on Thursday.

Henry Kissinger, a controversial Nobel Peace Prize winner and diplomatic powerhouse whose service under two presidents left an indelible mark on US foreign policy, died on Wednesday at age 100.

The United States has charged an Indian national with conspiring to assassinate a US citizen who advocated for a sovereign state for Sikhs.

A Pakistan court overturned the conviction of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in a corruption case on Wednesday, removing one of the many obstacles for him to qualify to stand in elections in February.

Hamas freed 12 more hostages and Israel released 30 Palestinian prisoners on Tuesday, the fifth day of an extended six-day truce in the Gaza war.

Russia launched 21 drones and three cruise missiles overnight on Ukraine, the country's Air Force said on Wednesday, adding that all the drones and two missiles were destroyed before reaching their targets.

Saudi Arabia's capital city of Riyadh won the right to host the Expo 2030 world fair, vote results showed on Tuesday.

Rosalynn Carter was remembered for her humanitarian work and compassion as President Joe Biden and other dignitaries joined 99-year-old former President Jimmy Carter at an Atlanta memorial service for the former US first lady.

All 41 construction workers have been rescued from a tunnel in India's Uttarakhand state, after being trapped for 17 days.

Indian rescuers led by "rat miners" drilled through rocks and debris on Tuesday to reach 41 construction workers trapped in a collapsed tunnel in the Himalayas for 17 days.

The US State Department said on Monday that Secretary Anthony Blinken will visit Israel, the West Bank and the UAE this week to press for more humanitarian aid to Gaza and help secure the release of all Hamas hostages.

Ten people have died in snowstorms in Ukraine, Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said on Tuesday, after icy winds and storms swept the country since Sunday, cutting power and blocking roads.

Jailed former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan was denied an open court trial on Monday as ordered by a high court after the government submitted reports citing threats to his life, his lawyer said.

The Philippine government and the country's communist rebels have agreed to restart peace negotiations after a six-year hiatus, with the aim of ending decades of armed strife, the two sides and facilitator Norway said on Tuesday.

The United Nations ambassadors of the United States and North Korea sparred at the Security Council on Monday over Pyongyang's first spy satellite launch and the reasons for growing tensions in a rare, direct, public exchange between the adversaries.

Australia will ban imports of disposable vapes in January, the Health Minister said on Tuesday, the first step in a crackdown aimed at curbing the growing popularity of the nicotine-filled devices with young people.

Russian forces are strenghtening their drive to capture the eastern Ukrainian town of Avdiivka, trying to advance on all sides after weeks of fighting, the town's top official was quoted as saying on Monday.

The humanitarian truce deal that brought a pause to the fighting in the Gaza Strip has been extended by two days, Qatar's ministry of foreign affairs said on Monday.

Hamas freed 17 hostages held in Gaza, including a four-year-old American girl, while Israel released 39 Palestinian prisoners on Sunday, the third day of their truce.

A severe snowstorm bringing strong winds blanketed Ukraine on Monday, leaving more than 2,000 settlements across 16 regions without power and more than a dozen motorways closed to vehicles, authorities said.

Wet weather expected on Monday could mean more complications for the rescue of 41 construction workers trapped in a tunnel in the Indian Himalayas for more than two weeks but emergency crew said they are prepared to deal with it.

Twenty-four people have died by lightning strikes and about 23 have been left injured in rain-related incidents in the western Indian state of Gujarat over the past two days, government officials said, with rains continuing on Monday morning.

Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted in the death of George Floyd, is expected to survive following an attack in a prison in Arizona on Friday, according to a spokesperson from the Minnesota Attorney General’s office.

North Korea warned on Monday it would continue to exercise its sovereign rights, including through satellite launches, while its troops were reported to be restoring some demolished guard posts on the border with South Korea.

A cargo ship carrying salt sank off the Greek island of Lesbos on Sunday, with all but one of its 14-strong crew still missing, the Greek coast guard said.

Thirteen Israelis and four Thai nationals arrived in Israel on Sunday in the second release of hostages from Hamas captivity in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.

Russia said on Sunday that it had thwarted a major Ukrainian drone attack with at least 20 drones shot down over its regions, including Moscow.

Israel will release 42 Palestinian prisoners, while Hamas will release 14 hostages on the second day of the truce.

A fire tore through a shopping mall in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi, killing at least nine people, officials and local media said on Saturday.

Ukraine's capital city took the brunt of what the country's air force described as Russia's largest drone attack of the war on Saturday, leaving five people wounded as the continuing rumble of air defences and explosions woke residents.

Rescuing 41 workers trapped in a highway tunnel in the Indian Himalayas for two weeks will take much longer than previously hoped as rescuers are switching to manual drilling following damage to machinery, officials said on Saturday.

Thirty-nine Palestinian women and children detainees were released from Israeli jails, shortly after 13 hostages were released from Gaza on the first day of the four-day truce between Israel and Hamas.

Jailed South African Paralympic star Oscar Pistorius was granted parole on Friday after serving nine years for killing his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, and will be released on January 5, authorities said.

The first group of hostages released under the truce deal between Hamas and Israel have been handed to the Red Cross and to an Egyptian security team.

Hopes for the imminent rescue of 41 men trapped in a highway tunnel in the Indian Himalayas for nearly two weeks were dashed by a problem with the drilling equipment, officials said on Friday, but efforts to reach the workers should resume soon.

There were no reports of bombings, artillery strikes or rocket attacks as the four-day truce between Israel and Hamas in Gaza kicked off on Friday. 

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said the country's recent launch of a spy satellite was an exercise of its right to self-defence, as Pyongyang celebrated the event as showing it could strike anywhere in the world, state media reported.

Buses and police vehicles were torched and shops looted as anti-immigrant protesters took to the streets in Dublin after three young children were injured in a knife attack.

A truce between Israel and Hamas in Gaza will start on Friday at 7:00 am (0500 GMT), with the first batch of hostages to be released at 4:00 pm (1400 GMT), a spokesperson for Qatar's foreign ministry said on Thursday.

Irish police said five people, including three young children, had been taken to hospital on Thursday following what local media said was a stabbing in Dublin city centre.

Venice will start testing a daily admission fee and cap on visitor access to its famous canals from next April, in what the Italian city's mayor hailed as the world's first such scheme.

Far-right populist Geert Wilders wants to be the Netherlands' next prime minister and would focus his efforts on curbing immigration, he said following a landmark election win.

The release of hostages under a temporary truce between Israel and Hamas will not happen before Friday, Israel's national security adviser said.

A Pakistani court on Thursday ordered authorities to produce former Prime Minister Imran Khan for trial on November 28 on charges of leaking state secrets, his lawyer said, in what would be his first public appearance since he was jailed in August.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has asked China for details on an increase in respiratory illnesses and reported clusters of pneumonia in children, which its China office on Thursday called a "routine" check.

Rescuers in India are set to work through Thursday drilling through debris to reach 41 men trapped in a highway tunnel in the Himalayan region after removing a metal obstruction that slowed progress overnight, a top official said.

North Korea said on Thursday it would deploy stronger armed forces and new weapons on its border with the South, a day after Seoul suspended part of a 2018 military accord between the two Koreas in a protest over Pyongyang's launch of a spy satellite.

A speeding car crashed in flames on the bridge linking New York state and Ontario at Niagara Falls on Wednesday, killing two people in the vehicle and sparking a security scare that closed four US-Canadian border crossings and New York's Buffalo International Airport.

The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) will carry out a safety audit of more than two dozen tunnels it is building after one such tunnel in the Himalayas collapsed this month, trapping 41 construction workers.

Israel's government and Hamas have agreed to a four-day pause to allow the release of 50 hostages held in Gaza in exchange for 150 Palestinian children (under the age of 19) and women from Israeli prisons.

Rescuers hope to drill through the last third of the debris blocking a collapsed tunnel in the Indian Himalayas by early on Thursday to reach 41 workers trapped for 10 days, an official said, so long as there are no new hurdles.

India resumed issuing e-visas for Canadian tourists and business travellers on Wednesday two months after it suspended such services following a row over Ottawa's accusation of possible Indian government involvement in the murder of a Canadian Sikh separatist leader.

Pakistan's Supreme Court accepted on Wednesday a bail application from detained former Prime Minister Imran Khan, his lawyer said, a day after another court declared illegal his trial on charges of leaking state secrets.

At least three people have been killed, and three others are believed to be missing, in a landslide on the principal highway serving an island community in Southeast Alaska, state officials said on Tuesday.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly given the green light to implement a prisoner exchange deal with Hamas.

Both South and North Korea aim to launch their first spy satellites into orbit by the end of the month, entering a race for military capabilities in space.

The first images emerged on Tuesday of 41 men trapped for more than a week in a highway tunnel in the Indian Himalayas, showing them standing in a confined space and communicating with rescue workers.

Three people were killed and eight were wounded in overnight Russian missile attacks and shelling in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk and Kharkiv regions, Ukrainian officials said on Tuesday.

Ukrainian forces were engaged in containing increasing Russian attacks on Monday around the shattered eastern town of Bakhmut, military officials said.

The Arab-Islamic Ministerial Committee has renewed the call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza during a summit in Beijing.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Sunday demanded rapid changes in the operations of the country's military and announced the dismissal of the commander of the military's medical forces.

Rescuers are trying to send cooked food and set up a phone connection to 41 workers trapped for eight days in a collapsed tunnel in the Indian Himalayas as they explore fresh rescue plans after previous attempts stalled, officials said on Monday.

Israeli forces on Monday targeted the Indonesian Hospital north of Gaza City on Monday, killing at least 12 people and injuring dozens more.

Former US first lady Rosalynn Carter, who President Jimmy Carter called "an extension of myself" owing to his wife's prominent role in his administration even as she tirelessly promoted the cause of mental health, died on Sunday at age 96, the Carter Center said.

A Turkish cargo ship with 12 crew onboard sank off Turkey's Black Sea coast during a storm on Sunday and authorities have been unable to make contact with the crew, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said on Monday.

The Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip has confirmed the evacuation of at least 31 premature babies from Al-Shifa Medical Complex on Sunday, in coordination with the World Health Organization and the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Russia launched several waves of drone attacks on Kyiv early on Sunday for the second night in a row, stepping up its assaults on the Ukrainian capital after several weeks of pause, the city's military administration said.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have agreed on the basic principles for a peace treaty but are still "speaking different diplomatic languages", Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said on Saturday.

The Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces blamed each other for a strike that damaged a bridge over the Jebel Awlia dam south of Khartoum, the latest piece of key infrastructure to suffer in a seven-month war.

Russia launched a major drone attack on Ukraine overnight, hitting infrastructure facilities in the south and north of the country, the Ukrainian military said on Saturday.

Bombing in the city of Khan Yunis by an Israeli aircraft that targeted several residential apartments at dawn on Saturday killed 26 civilians, most of them children.

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr met with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday, seeking ways to come up with ways to reduce tensions in the South China Sea and restore Filipino fishermen's access to fishing grounds.

A communication blackout due to fuel shortage in Gaza has delayed the evacuation of the injured and foreigners, and impacted the entry of humanitarian aid.

Judges at the World Court have ordered Azerbaijan to let ethnic Armenians who fled Nagorno-Karabakh in September return, and to keep the Armenians remaining in the enclave safe, as part of a set of emergency measures.

Sudan asked the United Nations on Thursday to "immediately terminate" the UN political mission in the country (UNITAMS), Sudan's acting Foreign Minister Ali Sadeq told the Security Council in a letter.

A magnitude 6.7 earthquake struck the southern Philippines on Friday, killing one person, injuring dozens and damaging buildings, authorities said.

Ukraine's air defences shot down nine out of 10 Russian drones overnight over the southern Mykolayiv and Odesa regions and also near Zhytomyr in the centre and in the Khmelnytskyi region in the west of the country, the air force said on Friday.

The federal civil rights trial of a former Louisville, Kentucky, police officer charged in the 2020 death of Breonna Taylor, a Black woman whose killing fueled a wave of racial justice protests, was declared a mistrial on Thursday.

Rescuers are racing to reach 40 workers trapped inside a collapsed highway tunnel in India for five days, with emergency crew drilling about one-third of the way into the debris.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Chinese President Xi Jinping held their first face-to-face talks in a year on the sidelines of the APEC summit in San Francisco on Thursday evening.

Israel ordered civilians to leave four towns in the southern part of the Gaza Strip on Thursday, indicating imminent military operations in the areas.

The UN Security Council has approved a resolution calling for urgent and extended humanitarian pauses and corridors throughout the Gaza Strip, after four failed attempts to respond to the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Britain's Foreign Secretary David Cameron travelled to wartime Kyiv and met President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for talks on his first working trip abroad, the Ukrainian leader said on Thursday.

US President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping agreed on Wednesday to open a presidential hotline, resume military-to-military communications and work to curb fentanyl production, showing tangible progress in their first face-to-face talks in a year.

Two of 40 men trapped inside a collapsed highway tunnel in the Indian Himalayas were treated for nausea and headache, officials said on Thursday, as they endured a fifth day confined to a small space in the rubble.

Toxic smog gripping New Delhi grew more intense on Thursday as farm fires raged in nearby fields despite a court-ordered ban, making India's capital the world's most polluted city again.

Twenty-five people were killed in a fire at a coal company's office building in China's northern Shanxi province, state media said on Thursday.

Sir Richard Branson, the founder of the Virgin Group, will be boarding Virgin Galactic's VSS Unity and blasting off to space on Sunday.

Singapore is reviewing penalties for violent offences following an outcry over a 12-day prison sentence for a student who strangled his girlfriend until she blacked out.