A bomb tore through a mosque in Afghanistan's northeastern Kunduz province on Friday, killing and wounding more than 100 people, a UN agency said.
"Initial information indicates more than 100 people killed and injured in a suicide blast inside the mosque," the United Nations' mission to Afghanistan said in a tweet.
No group immediately claimed responsibility. The blast followed several attacks, including one at a mosque in Kabul, in recent weeks, some of which have been claimed by the IS terror group.
One Taliban official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said at least 28 people had been killed and dozens more wounded in Friday's blast.
The attacks have underscored security challenges for the Taliban, which took over the country in August and have since carried out operations against the IS cells in Kabul.
"This afternoon, an explosion took place in a mosque ... as a result of which a number of our compatriots were martyred and wounded," Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Twitter.
Israel struck multiple targets linked to the Houthi movement in Yemen on Thursday, including Sanaa International Airport, while the chief of the World Health Organisation (WHO) was boarding a plane.
Syria's new authorities on Thursday launched a security crackdown in a coastal region where 14 policemen were killed a day before, vowing to pursue "remnants" of the ousted Bashar al-Assad government accused of the attack, state media reported.
Described as a "reluctant king" in his first stint as prime minister, the soft-spoken Manmohan Singh, who died on Thursday at the age of 92, was arguably one of India's most successful leaders.
The Azerbaijan Airlines flight that crashed in Kazakhstan on Wednesday was downed by a Russian air defence system, four sources in Azerbaijan with knowledge of the investigation told Reuters.
Survivors and families of victims of the Indian Ocean tsunami 20 years ago visited mass graves, lit candles and comforted one another across Southeast and South Asia in ceremonies on Thursday to mark the disaster that killed some 230,000 people.
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