International

European leaders on Thursday said they would stand by Ukraine and spend more on defence in a world upended by Donald Trump's reversal of US policies.

A Russian missile struck a hotel in the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih late on Wednesday, killing four people and injuring 31, with rescuers still searching on Thursday morning for anyone trapped in the rubble, officials said.

The United States broke a long-standing diplomatic taboo by holding secret talks with Hamas on securing the release of US hostages held in Gaza, sources told Reuters on Wednesday, while US President Donald Trump warned of "hell to pay" should the Palestinian group not comply.

The US has paused intelligence sharing with Ukraine, CIA Director John Ratcliffe said on Wednesday, piling pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to cooperate with US President Donald Trump in convening peace talks with Russia.

New footage shows the moment Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost has became the first ever successful commercial moon landing, following touchdown on Mare Crisium, a basin in the north-east quadrant of the Moon.

At least 15 people were hurt on Thursday after a shell was dropped on a civilian district, damaging houses and a church during live-fire military exercises in Pocheon, South Korea, a fire official said.

US President Donald Trump took a victory lap in an address to Congress on Tuesday, drawing catcalls and interruptions from some Democratic lawmakers who held up signs and walked out mid-speech in protest in the longest presidential speech to Congress.

Arab leaders adopted an Egyptian reconstruction plan for Gaza on Tuesday that would cost $53 billion (AED 194 billion) and avoid displacing Palestinians from the enclave, in contrast to US President Donald Trump's "Middle East Riviera" vision.

Serbian opposition lawmakers threw smoke grenades and tear gas inside parliament on Tuesday to protest against the government and support demonstrating students, with one legislator suffering a stroke during the chaos.

Ukraine said on Tuesday it would do all it can to maintain its ties with the United States, after US President Donald Trump paused military aid to Kyiv in the most dramatic step yet in his pivot towards closer ties with Russia.

Arab leaders are gathering in Cairo on Tuesday to discuss an alternative to a widely condemned plan from US President Donald Trump to assume control of war-battered Gaza and displace its Palestinian population.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, on his first trip abroad since taking office, met on Monday with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh, Saudi state media said.

US President Donald Trump has paused all military aid to Ukraine following his clash with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last week, a White House official said on Monday.

A truck traveling on a highway in southern Bolivia collided with a bus early on Monday morning, forcing the vehicle off the road and killing at least 31 people, police said.

A car drove into a crowd in the western German city of Mannheim on Monday, killing at least two people andseriously injuring several others, overshadowing carnival celebrations in the region where police had been on alert for attacks.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, said on Monday that Judge Yuji Iwasawa had been elected as its new president to complete former president Nawaf Salam's term that ends on February 5, 2027.

An Israeli fire killed at least two people in Rafah and injured three others in Khan Younis in the south of Gaza, raising fear among Palestinians that the ceasefire could collapse altogether after Israel imposed a total blockade on the area.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday he believed he could salvage his relationship with US President Donald Trump after their explosive meeting in the Oval Office, but that talks needed to continue behind closed doors.

Nearly 1,700 firefighters are battling Japan's biggest forest fire in three decades, officials said Monday, as some 4,600 residents remain under an evacuation advisory.

Pope Francis remained stable through the day on Sunday and no longer required the use of mechanical ventilation to breathe, the Vatican said, in a sign of progress as the 88-year-old pontiff battles double pneumonia.

Russian Aerospace Forces, part of the country's armed forces, launched a Soyuz rocket carrying a spacecraft for defence purposes, the state RIA news agency reported early on Monday, citing the Russian Defence Ministry.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty said on Sunday the Egyptian Gaza reconstruction plan, which ensures Palestinians remain in their land, is ready and will be presented to the emergency Arab summit on March 4.

Britain and France are working with Ukraine on plans to end the fighting with Russia, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Sunday, as European leaders gathered for crisis talks after a blowout between Kyiv and Washington.

Israel blocked the entry of aid trucks into Gaza on Sunday as a standoff over the truce that has halted fighting for the past six weeks escalated, with Hamas calling on Egyptian and Qatari mediators to intervene.

A crash involving two buses in Bolivia left at least 33 people dead and several injured in the western Potosi region, police and local authorities said on Saturday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Saturday it was "very important" that Ukraine's plight was heard and not forgotten, a day after a heated White House meeting with US President Donald Trump.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and US President Donald Trump clashed on Friday, with Zelenskyy questioning Trump's tilt toward Russia and Trump accusing him of being disrespectful as their differences erupted into a shouting match.

An Israeli delegation in Cairo aims to negotiate to extend the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire deal by an additional 42 days, two Egyptian security sources said on Friday.

At least 41 people are still trapped after an avalanche in the Indian Himalayan mountain state of Uttarakhand, authorities said on Friday, following recent heavy snowfall in the region.

A California federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from ordering the US Department of Defense and other federal agencies to carry out the mass firings of thousands of recently hired employees.

US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts on Wednesday paused a federal judge's order requiring President Donald Trump's administration to pay foreign aid funds to contractors and grant recipients.

Hamas handed over the bodies of four Israeli hostages while it waited for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners to be released by Israel in return, in an overnight exchange marking the final swap as part of a fragile truce in Gaza.

An overnight Russian drone attack on the Kyiv region killed one person, injured at least two and set several houses on fire, governor of the region that surrounds the Ukrainian capital, Mykola Kalashnyk, said on Wednesday.

Eighteen people were killed after a tour bus lost control and fell into a ditch in Thailand's Prachinburi province, police said on Wednesday.

Hamas said on Tuesday it has agreed during a visit to Cairo on a solution to end the delay of releasing of Palestinian prisoners.

Israeli warplanes hit a town south of Syria's capital as well as the southern province of Daraa late on Tuesday, residents, security sources and local broadcaster Syria TV said.

The US and Ukraine have agreed on the terms of a draft minerals deal central to Kyiv's push to win Washington's support as President Donald Trump seeks to rapidly end the war with Russia, two sources with knowledge of the matter said on Tuesday.

Russia's embassy in London said Britain's new package of sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine was "illegitimate" and many of those targeted had no connection to the conflict.

Taiwan's coast guard said it detained a China-linked cargo ship on Tuesday after a nearby undersea cable to the Penghu Islands in the sensitive Taiwan Strait was disconnected.

At least four people died and six were injured on Tuesday after a collapse at a highway construction site in an area south of the South Korean capital, Seoul, fire authorities said.

Israeli bulldozers have demolished large areas of the now virtually empty Jenin refugee camp and appear to be carving wide roadways through its once-crowded warren of alleyways, echoing tactics already employed in Gaza as troops prepare for a long-term stay.

The United Nations Security Council adopted a US-drafted resolution on the third anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine that takes a neutral position on the conflict as US President Donald Trump seeks to broker an end to the war.

Pope Francis, remains in critical condition battling double pneumonia, but had a "good" night in hospital, slept and is resting, the Vatican said on Monday.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says he is willing to give up his position if it means peace in Ukraine, adding that he could exchange his departure for his country's entry into the NATO military alliance.

Israel on Sunday said it will not tolerate presence of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) in southern Syria, nor any other forces affiliated with the country's new rulers, and demanded the territory be demilitarised.

Talks with Israel through mediators on further steps in a ceasefire agreement are conditional on Palestinian prisoners being released as agreed, Hamas official Basem Naim said on Sunday.

Friedrich Merz, who set to become Germany's next chancellor after his opposition conservatives won the national election on Sunday, vowed to help give Europe "real independence" from the US as he prepared to cobble together a government.

Hamas has condemned Israel's decision to postpone the release of Palestinian prisoners and detainees, saying its claim that the hostages' handover ceremonies are "humiliating" was false and a pretext to evade Israel's obligations under the Gaza ceasefire agreement.

A new mass polio vaccination campaign by UNRWA began in Gaza on Saturday, to inoculate nearly 600,000 children in Gaza Strip.

The Vatican says that Pope Francis' health had deteriorated over the past 24 hours and for the first time described his condition as "critical", reporting he had needed supplemental oxygen and blood transfusions.

Israeli authorities have not provided relatives with any details regarding the killing of the three Bibas hostages after they were taken to Gaza during the October 7 attack by Hamas militants, the family said in a statement.

Hamas freed five hostages in two separate areas from Gaza on Saturday, including two who have been held for over a decade, while the sixth was handed over privately to the Red Cross.

President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of U.S. military leadership.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Friday that Israel would make Hamas pay for failing to release the body of hostage Shiri Bibas as agreed.

Luigi Mangione, the man accused of fatally gunning down health insurance executive Brian Thompson on a Manhattan street in December, is due in court in New York on Friday afternoon as he faces state murder and terrorism charges.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed the military to carry out an "intensive" operation in the West Bank after explosions on buses close to Tel Aviv on Thursday, in what Netanyahu's office described as an attempted mass attack.

The Israeli military said on Friday that one of the bodies released by Hamas did not belong to any of the hostages held in Gaza, accusing Hamas of violating an already shaking ceasefire.

Staff at the US Internal Revenue Service were told on Thursday that about 6,000 employees would be fired, in a move that would eliminate roughly six per cent of the agency's workforce in the midst of the busy tax-filing season.

Hamas handed over the bodies on Thursday of Israeli infant Kfir Bibas and his four-year-old brother Ariel, the two youngest captives taken by Hamas in their October 7, 2023 attack and among the most potent symbols of the trauma inflicted that day.

Two people have been killed in a midair plane crash in Arizona, police said. The small, single-engine aircraft both had two people onboard when they made contact above Marana Regional Airport, north-west of Tucson.

A US appeals court let stand an order blocking US President Donald Trump from curtailing automatic birthright citizenship nationwide as part of the Republican's hardline crackdown on immigration and illegal border crossings.

US President Donald Trump said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy "better move fast," calling him a "dictator without elections" after the Ukrainian leader earlier on Wednesday accused Trump of being trapped in a "disinformation bubble."

The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday that a mass campaign to vaccinate children against polio in Gaza would resume on Saturday, with over half a million children targeted.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy hit back on Tuesday at Donald Trump's suggestion that Ukraine was responsible for Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion, saying the US president was trapped in a Russian disinformation bubble.

The Israeli military prosecutor has filed indictments against five reservists, alleging severe abuse and injury of a Palestinian prisoner at Sde Teiman prison, the military said on Wednesday.

US President Donald Trump said he intends to impose auto tariffs "in the neighbourhood of 25 per cent" and similar duties on semiconductors and pharmaceutical imports, the latest in a series of measures threatening to upend international trade.

Unknown gunmen shot dead seven passengers on a Lahore-bound bus in southwestern Pakistan's Balochistan provinceafter forcing them off the vehicle and checking their identity documents late on Tuesday, officials said.

Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte has asked the Supreme Court to nullify an impeachment complaint against her, making her first legal move to fight the case that could lead to her removal and lead to a lifetime ban from public office.

Former Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro was charged on Tuesday with overseeing a plot to overturn his 2022 election loss with a coup, further complicating the far-right firebrand's already narrow hopes of pulling off a political comeback.

Wildlife rangers will on Wednesday begin shooting 90 dolphins stranded on a remote Australian beach, saying the stressed creatures would be euthanised after attempts to refloat them failed.

Pope Francis has the onset of double pneumonia, the Vatican said on Tuesday, complicating treatment for the 88-year pontiff and indicating a further deterioration in his fragile health.

The United States and Russia said on Tuesday they had agreed to press ahead with efforts to end the war in Ukraine after holding talks in the Saudi capital at which Kyiv was not represented.

A large-scale overnight Russian drone attack hit a residential building in the city of Dolynska in central Ukraine, injuring a mother and her two children and forcing evacuations from 38 apartments, a regional official said on Tuesday.

Top US and Russian officials are set to meet on Tuesday in Riyadh for what are expected to be the most significant talks between the two former Cold War foes on ending Moscow's war in Ukraine.

A deadline expired on Tuesday for all Israeli troops to leave south Lebanon under a ceasefire deal with Hezbollah, hours after Israel said it planned to remain in five strategic locations.

A Delta Air Lines regional jet flipped upside down upon landing at Canada's Toronto Pearson Airport on Monday as windy weather following a snowstorm, injuring 18 of the 80 people on board, officials said.

A passenger bus plunged into an 800-meter-deep abyss in southern Bolivia on Monday, killing at least 30 people and injuring 15, police and local media said.

Israel is preparing to receive the bodies of four hostages from Gaza on Thursday and is working on bringing back six living captives on Saturday, an Israeli security official said on Monday.

A Florida man was arrested and charged with two counts of attempted murder after shooting at a vehicle with two men who he thought were Palestinians but turned out to be Israeli visitors, local authorities said. 

The Israeli military on Monday killed a Hamas leader in southern Lebanon's Sidon area, it said in a statement.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Monday ruled out territorial concessions to Ukraine, setting out a tough opening stance on the eve of talks on Tuesday with US President Donald Trump's team in Saudi Arabia.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived in Saudi Arabia on Monday ahead of expected high-stakes talks between American and Russian officials aimed at ending Moscow's nearly three-year war in Ukraine.

Israel has received a shipment of heavy MK-84 bombs from the United States, after US President Donald Trump lifted a block imposed on the export of the munitions by the administration of predecessor Joe Biden, the defence ministry said.

Israel and the United States are both determined to thwart Iran's nuclear ambitions and its "aggression" in the Middle East, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday following a meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

France said on Sunday it would host a summit of European leaders on Monday to discuss the Ukraine war and European security as the continent tries to respond concretely to US President Donald Trump's unilateral approach to the conflict.

An Israeli airstrike killed three policemen east of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on Sunday, the Hamas-run interior ministry said, calling it a breach of the fragile January 19 ceasefire.

At least 18 people died in a stampede at the main railway station in India's capital New Delhi on Saturday night, the chief minister of the capital territory told reporters early on Sunday.

Forty-three people, mostly women, were killed after an artisanal gold mine collapsed in western Mali on Saturday, the head of an industry union said.

A 23-year-old Syrian asylum seeker stabbed several passers-by in the centre of the Austrian town of Villach on Saturday, killing a 14-year-old boy and injuring four other people, police said, adding that the suspected attacker had been arrested.

The attorney-general for England and Wales, Richard Hermer, has rejected calls to request a court review of the length of a jail sentence imposed on the British teenager who killed three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance event last summer.

The outgoing deputy force commander of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) was injured on Friday after a convoy taking peacekeepers to Beirut airport was "violently attacked", UNIFIL said.

Israeli hostages Iair Horn, Sagui Dekel-Chen and Sasha (Alexander) Troufanov were freed in Gaza on Saturday and Israel began releasing some 369 Palestinian prisoners and detainees in exchange, after mediators helped avert a ceasefire collapse.

The death toll due to heavy rains in Bolivia since November last year has risen to 28, said Juan Carlos Calvimontes, Vice Civil Defence Minister, on Friday.

The campaign by US President Donald Trump and his adviser Elon Musk to radically cut back the US bureaucracy spread on Friday, firing more than 9,500 workers who handled everything from managing federal lands to caring for military veterans.

Palestinian officials in Gaza said they would release hostages Iair Horn, U.S.-Israeli Sagui Dekel-Chen and Russian-Israeli Alexandre Sasha Troufanov on Saturday, in accordance with the terms of the ceasefire with Israel.

Pope Francis was taken to hospital on Friday with bronchitis and he will skip several planned public events over the next three days, the Vatican said, after the 88-year-old pontiff was seen struggling to speak during one of his meetings in the morning.

A Russian drone attack caused significant damage to the radiation shelter of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant overnight, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Friday.

The United States will increase military sales to India starting in 2025 and will eventually provide F-35 fighter jets, US President Donald Trump 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.