Quirky

Giant pandas Huan Huan and Yuan Zi, star attractions at France's Beauval Zoo, will head to retirement in China next month, leaving behind twins born during a 13-year stay intended to strengthen diplomatic ties.

A 1919 Pablo Picasso painting has disappeared in transit ahead of its display at a temporary exhibition in the southern Spanish city of Granada, prompting a police investigation, according to the foundation organising the exhibit.

Voters in Cameroon were in for a shock when they spotted Liverpool star Mohamed Salah as one of the presidential candidates.

The fossil of a small reptile that inhabited Scotland during the age of dinosaurs 167 million years ago has scientists puzzled.

Entrepreneur Nelson Yang is reaching back into Taiwan's history to turn the humble banana plant into an unlikely sustainable textile.

A much-loved Palestinian ice-cream parlour Kazem, forced to shutter its Gaza doors in 2023 as the Israel-Hamas war escalated, has opened up in the UAE, offering not just frozen treats, but a taste of nostalgia to the local community.

Every year, hundreds of Chinese tourists flock to the Bulgarian mountain village of Momchilovtsi for a festival celebrating the local yoghurt, which is renowned for its health benefits and has become a hit among consumers in China.

An exhibition in northern Italy is expanding traditional ideas about taste by exploring how sound influences the way people experience their food.

A hair salon in Beijing has been offering patriotic and military-themed haircuts and styles to children in the weeks leading up to China's largest military parade to date to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II.

China kicked off the three-day long World Humanoid Robot Games on Friday, looking to showcase its advances in artificial intelligence and robotics with 280 teams from 16 countries.

Public transport will be temporarily free of charge in Geneva, in a first for Switzerland, as part of a series of measures aimed at tackling a spike in pollution in the city.

A collection of hundreds of jewels linked to Buddha's remains has returned to India after 127 years following an auction planned for earlier this year that drew threats of legal action from the government in Delhi.

A colossal $80 (AED 294) popcorn container shaped like Marvel's planet-devouring villain Galactus is offering a unique twist on movie snacks.

Thailand's baby pygmy hippo and internet sensation Moo Deng celebrated her first birthday on Thursday, devouring a massive tropical fruit platter alongside her mother as throngs of adoring fans turned up for her four-day party.

Killer whales are known for exceptional intelligence, displaying complex social structures and sophisticated communication.

Years of floods and low food prices have driven a dairy farm in England's northeast to stop milking its cows and instead charge visitors to cuddle them.

A Beijing auction house sold a human-sized Labubu figure for 1.08 million yuan ($150,275, around AED 551,901) on Tuesday, setting a new record for the "blind box" toy as it moves from craze to collectible.

The Milky Way and the neighboring Andromeda galaxy are currently hurtling through space toward each other at a speed of about 400,000 kph, setting up a possible future galactic collision that would wreck both of them.

Astronomers have observed two distant galaxies - both possessing roughly as many stars as our Milky Way - careening toward each other before their inevitable merger at a time when the universe was about a fifth its current age, a scene resembling two knights charging in a joust.

Black-winged white stilts wade through a salt pan, plunging their beaks into the water in search for food at the Kalloni bay on the Greek island of Lesbos, as bird-lovers watch through binoculars from afar.

Archaeologists in coastal Peru have discovered the 5,000-year-old remains of a woman who may have belonged to the upper echelons of the ancient Caral civilisation, a find they say points to the importance of women in the city some five millennia earlier.

Surmising even the physical appearance of a dinosaur - or any extinct animal - based on its fossils is a tricky proposition, with so many uncertainties involved. Assessing a dinosaur's intelligence, considering the innumerable factors contributing to that trait, is exponentially more difficult.

A number of horses are running amok in London and at least one person has been injured, with the army called in to help locate the animals, authorities in the British capital said on Wednesday.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida drew cheers and applause from US lawmakers on Thursday when he announced a plan to donate 250 cherry trees to the US capital to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the US independence.

Peru's Andean mountains may hold the secret to longevity and the world's oldest ever person, if a new claim by state officials of a 124-year-old man born in 1900 are proven to be true.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz sent his first post on TikTok on Monday, joining a growing roster of Western politicians who have set aside security concerns to use the Chinese-owned social media platform.

Bored of buying eggs made of chocolate and wrapped in foil with predictable bunny motifs? This Easter in South Africa you could instead spend your cash on an egg that will hatch a live penguin.

Dogs are able to understand that some words refer to objects in a way that is similar to humans, a small study of canine brain waves has found, offering insight into the way the minds of man's best friends work.

An ostrich that escaped from a zoo in the South Korean town of Seongnam has been captured, local authorities said on Tuesday, after it spent an hour dodging vehicles in heavy traffic, surprising many drivers.

Scientists on Wednesday unveiled a 16 million-year-old fossil skull unearthed in Peru of a river dolphin that once swam in waters that are now the Amazon, and whose closest living relative is the South Asian river dolphin in India's Ganges River.

Lanky greyhounds placidly let a bunch of beaming children pet them in the SOS Galgos shelter in the suburbs of Barcelona, where the rescued dogs are helping kids learn empathy for animals.

China's rapidly aging population is fuelling a promising and fast-growing market for companies providing recreational classes and activities for the elderly middle class, from yoga to African drumming and smartphone photography.

A shop has opened in Brussels selling still-sealed unwanted Amazon parcels by the kilo, effectively a lottery ticket which could win the holder a connected watch, a smartphone - or a worthless trinket.

Ostriches are normally territorial and aggressive birds best approached with caution, but at a Belgian animal rescue farm, the hand-reared birds are so gentle they will cuddle with visitors.

In her tiny Athens apartment, 93-year-old Ioanna Matsouka has knit thousands of brightly coloured scarves for children in need from Greece to Ukraine - and she has no plans to quit just yet.

A South Korean zoo on Sunday threw a farewell party for Fu Bao, the first giant panda born in the country, ahead of the beloved animal's scheduled return to China.

Researchers in the Amazon have discovered the world's largest snake species - an enormous green anaconda - in Ecuador's rainforest that split off from its closest relatives 10 million years ago though they still nearly look identical to this day.

The Taylor Swift craze has arrived in classrooms in the Philippine capital, with a premier university rolling out a celebrity studies course examining the singer and her impact on global pop culture.

Buzzing underneath a set of railway arches in central London are hundreds of thousands of little flies, showcasing insect-farming technology that could help fight climate change.

Calling all Taylor Swift superfans: your dream job has just been posted.

"The struggle is real", reads the caption of one TikTok video in which South African mom Lungile Zenda tries to teach her daughter how to say a sentence in their native language, Zulu.

An eight-year-old became the youngest player to defeat a grandmaster in classical chess on Sunday when Ashwath Kaushik beat Poland's Jacek Stopa at the Burgdorfer Stadthaus Open in Switzerland.

Two friends in western France have built a 16-metre high replica of the Eiffel Tower from recycled wood, which they hope to display along the path of the Summer 2024 Olympic torch relay and on Olympic sites.

In a small warehouse in Cambodia's capital, a group of workers sit and spin waste plastic bottles into strips, turning them into bristles for brooms, of which they churn out 500 each day.

Medallists at the Paris Olympics will be rewarded with a piece of the Eiffel Tower, organisers said as they unveiled the hexagon-shaped medals forged out of scrap metal from the monument.

Italy plans to use information on living standards that professionals and entrepreneurs post on social media to track down tax dodgers, Deputy Economy Minister Maurizio Leo said on Wednesday, describing tax evasion as akin to terrorism.

A health warning from South Korea's food ministry has urged people not to eat fried toothpicks made of starch in a shape resembling curly fries, after the practice went viral in social media posts.

Butter chicken - one of India's best-known dishes globally - is delicious and apparently also contentious, with two Indian restaurant chains battling it out in court over claims to its origins.

Benito the giraffe, whose lonely life at a park on Mexico's arid northern border inspired a campaign to relocate him, was en route to a new home at a safari park in the center of the country.

German remote-driving startup Vay said on Wednesday it had launched its first commercial service in Las Vegas where a "teledriver", or remote driver, delivers electric short-term rental cars to customers and then collects them after the rental.

Guinness World Records said it was conducting a formal review of the "world's oldest dog" title it gave to a Portuguese dog named Bobi who died last year after veterinarians raised doubts over his age.

China's annual Ice and Snow Festival, with its fairy-tale ice sculptures, opened on Friday attracting throngs of tourists who shuffled carefully over the slippy ice and snow and dragged their children in sledges around the park.

Simple gestures could be all it takes to alter the colour of your clothes in the future, according to a research team that has developed a colour-changing textile embedded with a tiny camera and making use of artificial intelligence.

Another Sumatran Rhinoceros was born in an Indonesian sanctuary last week, the Environment Ministry said, the second birth of this critically endangered animal at the reserve this year.

The world's largest iceberg is on the move for the first time in more than three decades, scientists said on Friday.

Britain came out on top when 21 teams from around the world gathered in Tokyo this week to collect litter in the inaugural SpoGomi World Cup, an initiative aimed at raising awareness of environmental issues.

When Lucy was rescued from a rural property in New South Wales two years ago, she was suffering from chlamydia, a disease widespread among koalas.

A traditional ceremony for children is catching on among pet owners in Japan, where dogs and cats are receiving ever more attention amid the nation's plummeting birth rates.

SeaWorld San Diego has welcomed the hatching of an emperor penguin for the first time in 13 years, announcing that the female chick came out of its shell with help from zoo staff on September 12.

Sydney Opera House celebrated its 50th birthday on Friday, with a laser show planned to illuminate the iconic building.

Bomb disposal experts in Singapore successfully disposed of a 100kg World War II aerial bomb on Tuesday, police said, after evacuating more than 4,000 people living nearby.

An unusually well-preserved dinosaur skeleton, a Camptosaurus known as Barry that dates from the late Jurassic period some 150 million years ago, will go under the hammer in Paris next month.

The India Club, a historic London curry house with links to India's freedom struggle, will close its doors for the last time on Sunday after failing to stop a hotel redevelopment plan.

NASA on Thursday said it has named a new director of research into what the government calls "unidentified anomalous phenomenon," or UAP.

Five asteroids, one the size of a house, three the size of a plane, and one the size of a bus, will fly past Earth, according to NASA's Asteroid Watch dashboard.

An Australian scientist detailed on Tuesday a world-first discovery after an 8-cm-long parasitic worm was found in the brain of a woman in Canberra, spotlighting the risks of infectious organisms jumping between species.

Marking a significant stride towards green energy adoption, Norway inaugurated the world's largest floating wind park on Wednesday.

Inspired by her passion for the furry animal, Naeema Mea'bed opened the "MEOW Cat Cafe" in the Gaza Strip this week, hoping to bring cat lovers some joy, while boosting awareness over pet raising, which has become increasingly popular in the region.

Health officials are issuing warnings as a flesh-eating bacteria responsible for the deaths of eight people in the United States has raised concerns for swimmers during the summer months.

A recent post by the Canadian Space Agency on social media platform X of an image it claimed was the 108 million-year-old Tycho Crater in the Moon's southern hemisphere has gone viral but for all the wrong reasons.

A series of seemingly unexplainable assaults commenced on July 11, throwing an isolated indigenous community into turmoil in rural Peru.

Visitors are thronging a zoo in eastern China's Zhejiang province after a video of one of its bears went viral with some netizens suggesting she looked so human that she might be a staff member in a bear suit, local media reported on Tuesday.

Sotheby's, the renowned auction house, is offering a unique and "ultra-rare" pair of Apple sneakers for a staggering $50,000, a price tag higher than any of the current Apple tech products.

On a recent vacation in Tokyo, Takumi Yamamoto opted for a special lunch of cricket curry and silkworm sashimi, washed down with a water bug cider.

Uruguay's Gabriel Leyes has turned to social media to find a new club as a free agent after the striker's transfer deal to Deportivo Binacional in Peruvian Liga 1 fell apart due to age and nationality quotas.

Hengheng's friends could tell he was enjoying his birthday party in the pricey, health-conscious restaurant in downtown Shanghai by the way he licked his food off the plate.

An Australian sailor, who survived months at sea eating raw fish and drinking rainwater alongside his dog, is being compared to Tom Hanks' much-loved blockbuster "Cast Away".

A genuine photograph taken on an iPhone was disqualified from a competition after the judges suspected it was generated by artificial intelligence (AI).

Under a scorching sun, visitors to Thailand's renowned Temple of Dawn cool down by tasting an elaborately-shaped ice cream depicting intricate patterns inspired by the tiles of the pagoda.

Burger King is causing quite a sensation in Thailand with its latest offering: a meatless burger stacked with an astonishing amount of cheese.

A South Korean zoo said on Tuesday it had recently welcomed the first giant panda twins to be born in the country.

Nadine, a social robot powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI) with human-like gestures and expressions, could have an important future role to play in tending to the sick and elderly, according to a professor who helped invent it.

An advertising agency has issued a formal apology after facing criticism for using footage from other countries in a promotional tourism video for the Philippines.

South Koreans became a year or two younger on Wednesday as new laws that require using only the international method of counting age took effect, replacing the country's traditional method.

Phil Stringer has become a living example of the age-old adage, "patience is a virtue".

In a significant advancement with far-reaching implications for future lunar and interstellar missions, NASA has recycled an impressive 98 per cent of all water brought onboard by ISS astronauts.

The quiet of early morning streets in one downtown Tokyo neighbourhood is broken by joggers, parents with children in strollers - and a pair of alpacas, out for their daily constitutional walk.

In a bid to revive sparsely populated islands along its coast, the Irish government has introduced an ambitious programme that offers financial support of up to $92,000 to individuals seeking a quieter lifestyle.

Phosphorus, a crucial chemical component for life, has been discovered on Saturn's moon Enceladus, according to findings published in the journal Nature.

IKEA is training call centre workers to become interior design advisers as the Swedish furniture giant aims to offer more home improvement services and hand run-of-the-mill customer queries to an artificial intelligence bot called Billie.

A pair of Rubber Ducks made a splash in Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour on Friday, part of an art installation dubbed "Double Ducks" by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, who says he hopes the ducks will bring happiness to the city.

Nigerian fourth-grader Fawas Adeosun often used to get sent home from school through the gritty streets of Lagos because his mother, Fatimoh, had not paid his fees, until he enrolled in a different school offering a novel solution.

Authorities in Vietnam's capital of Hanoi are turning off street lights to keep the national power system running amid record temperatures bringing a surge in demand in some parts of the Southeast Asian nation.

Amid the growing hype surrounding artificial intelligence (AI) in recent months, concerns about job displacement have become a common topic of discussion.

The cheap and cheerful savoury Japanese pancake that stirs both feelings of local pride and deep rivalry in the city of Hiroshima has found its newest fan in British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

A professor at Texas A&M University failed over half of his class after an incident involving the use of OpenAI's language model, ChatGPT, Rolling Stone reported.

A Nigerian chef has spent 100 hours preparing meals non-stop, aiming to set a Guinness World Record for the longest ever cooking session by an individual.

Scientists have discovered that a major glacier in northwest Greenland is interacting with the ocean tides, resulting in previously unaccounted-for melting and potentially faster sea level rise, according to a study.

A news presenter, created using artificial intelligence, has made her debut in Kuwait.

Wearing blue tracksuits and waving their national flag, South Africa's Vakhegula Vakhegula football team jogged into the stadium to loud cheer, ahead of their first match against team USA.

A lucky tourist from Tennessee has discovered a 3.29-carat brown diamond at Crater of Diamonds State Park in Arkansas, and has named it "Bud".

A team of scientists led by Jean-Michel Claverie from Aix-Marseille University School of Medicine has revived a virus, which he describes as "zombie viruses", that had been dormant for almost 50,000 years. 

In a creative bid to raise environmental awareness, a group of musicians from Paraguay belted out familiar tunes at a hilltop concert just outside Bolivia's capital city, overlooking a not-so-scenic and sprawling garbage dump.

Starbucks has launched a new drink that mixes coffee with olive oil, offering it initially in Italy as an alternative to the more standard espresso or cappuccino.

With tears, waves and shouts of farewell from fans, a Japan-born giant panda set off for China on Tuesday from the Tokyo zoo where she was raised.

A famed California mountain lion was celebrated at a sold-out event at the Greek Theater in Los Angeles, with thousands of fans honouring the big cat's life and contribution to urban wildlife.

Scientists at Peking University in China have published a new study that suggests Earth's inner core has recently stopped spinning and may be reversing direction on a periodic cycle lasting about 60 to 70 years.

A woman in the US has credited her Apple Watch with saving her and her unborn baby's lives.

U.S. President Joe Biden, wearing his trademark aviator sunglasses, pardoned two turkeys from North Carolina named Chocolate and Chip on Monday, sparing them from Thanksgiving dinner tables.

Humans are on course to live and work on the moon for "durations" by 2030, a NASA official has said.

The Green Planet Dubai, a tropical rainforest home to over 3,000 plants and animals across four indoor rainforest levels, has welcomed two young sloth sisters.

Quadloop, a Nigerian-based company, has found a way to turn electronic waste into solar lanterns and other products which will have a lower impact on the environment.

A "flying car" built by Chinese electronic vehicle maker Xpeng Inc made its first public flight in the UAE, as the company works towards launching the electric aircraft on international markets.

Alain Robert, the free climber dubbed the "French Spiderman", scaled one of Barcelona's highest skyscrapers without a harness. And for the first time ever, the famous daredevil was joined by his son.

Lindt & Spruengli's foil-wrapped chocolate bunnies deserve protection from copycat products, Switzerland's highest court ruled on Thursday, and ordered German discounter Lidl to stop selling a similar product in Switzerland and to destroy its remaining stock.

Michael Jordan's jersey from the opening game of the 1998 NBA Finals sold for over $10 million at an auction, making it the most expensive piece of game-worn sports memorabilia in history.

A team of Egyptian archaeologists have unearthed pots of white cheese 'Haram', dating back to the 26th dynasty (664–525 BC), in Cairo's Saqqara area.

Shoji Morimoto has what some would see as a dream job: he gets paid to do pretty much nothing.

A new exhibition that celebrates the life of the late Princess Diana opens in Las Vegas on Friday, days after the 25th anniversary of her death in a car crash in Paris.

Gibraltar finally joined the official list of British cities on Monday, after 180 years in which its status, granted by Queen Victoria, had been overlooked due to an administrative error.

Charles Defoort is the only postman in mainland France to make his deliveries by boat.

McDonald's will increase the price of its cheeseburger by 20 per cent in Britain, in the first price hike for the popular item in 14 years as it responds to soaring inflation.

A cruise bound for the mysterious Bermuda Triangle has promised passengers they will receive a full refund if the ship disappears.

An app designed to help visually impaired or blind pedestrians use public transit will debut at a Washington subway station on Tuesday.

Fans of Thai rapper, Milli, had a hankering for mango sticky rice in Bangkok this week after the 19-year-old ate mouthfuls of the much-loved dessert on stage at the Coachella music festival in the United States.

The Trapp family from Duluth in Minnesota has achieved the Guinness World Records title for the tallest family.

Police in India were seeking to arrest members of a gang who dismantled a 60-feet-long iron bridge and likely sold it off in parts as scrap metal, officials said on Sunday.

The Eiffel Tower grew 6 metres on Tuesday after a new digital radio antenna was attached to the top of the Paris monument.

There are new tour guides in town at the Chicago Shedd Aquarium, and they are about to star in a children's book.

Malawian musician Giddes Chalamanda had never dreamed in his 92 years that he might one day be famous enough to dine with the president followed by a night in a luxury hotel.

German carmaker BMW has unveiled the world's first "colour-changing" car at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

A Vietnamese hotel is offering diners the chance to try gold leaf-coated steaks, seeking to tap a wave of publicity after a government minister was caught on camera being fed the dish at a London restaurant, where steaks can cost over £1,000.

The first dual-language MONOPOLY board game in the region brings out the incredible authenticity, culture and future of Doha to the world.

A Beijing bakery has introduced a Squid Game-themed confection-making challenge in its store as it seeks to cash in on the massive popularity of the South Korean Netflix show.

With climate change threatening traditional coffee farming, Finnish scientists say they have produced coffee from cell cultures with an aroma and taste resembling the real thing.

A rare copy of the Holy Quran translation, once owned by Thomas Jefferson, a former US President, is displayed in the United States’ pavilion at EXPO 2020 Dubai.

Abu Dhabi’s Environment Agency is monitoring a rare blue hole located in the Al Dhafra region.

A Barbie doll version of Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti has jetted off on a zero-gravity flight with the aim of inspiring young girls to consider a career in space and science, technology, maths and engineering (STEM).

With demand for taxis drying up in Thailand and thousands of drivers leaving town, one Bangkok cab company has turned its vehicles into mini vegetable gardens, hoping to take the edge off the coronavirus crunch.

You can now send a letter to your 50-year-old self in a new Dubai initiative that marks the Year of the 50th.

Jude Walker, an 11-year-old boy, is on an odyssey he hopes will help save the planet. He is walking to London from northern England in a bid to garner support for a carbon tax to tackle carbon emissions.

A Spanish company has devised a system to extract drinking water from thin air to supply arid regions where people are in desperate need.

Cat owners who love to take pictures of their furry friends now have a new excuse to pull out their smartphones and take a snapshot: it may actually help the cat.

A project in Kenya is using biogas technology to tackle two major pollution problems with one device: a machine that converts waste such as invasive water hyacinth into cleaner cooking fuel.

An animal conservation charity is going to reintroduce a herd of elephants from England into the Kenyan wild.

A different type of participant dropped in on Pope Francis' general audience at the Vatican on Wednesday - Spider-Man.

Some might cringe, but at one Maryland chocolate shop, 17-year-old insects are flying off the shelves.

Scientists have confirmed the discovery of a new dinosaur species in Australia, one of the largest found in the world, more than a decade after cattle farmers first uncovered bones of the animal.

A giant slab of ice bigger than the Spanish island of Majorca has sheared off from the frozen edge of Antarctica into the Weddell Sea, becoming the largest iceberg afloat in the world.

From the age of five, Filipino graphic artist Percival Lugue has had a passion for collecting toys from fast-food restaurant chains like McDonald's, Burger King and home-country favourite Jollibee.

Fifteen people have emerged from a cave in France after 40 days in an experiment to see how a lack of external communications would affect their sense of time.

Matchbox is launching a new series of toy cars based on real-life electric and hybrid vehicles, in a bid to make its miniatures more sustainable and to raise awareness of the environmental impact of motoring.

It is an eerie, foreboding, reverberating tune, enough to send a tingle down your spine.

Hoping to capitalise on a surge in demand for home deliveries, a Singapore technology company has deployed a pair of robots to bring residents their groceries in one part of the city state.

A Russian reporter had a 'ruff' time on live TV when a dog grabbed her microphone and took off, starting a chase that stunned newscasters and melted viewers' hearts.

A 121-year-old chocolate bar, from a batch commissioned by Queen Victoria for British troops fighting in South Africa, has been found in its original tin in the attic of an English manor.

A digital artwork by humanoid robot Sophia was sold at auction on Thursday for $688,888 in the form of a Non-Fungible Token (NFT), the latest sign of a frenzy in the NFT art world.

In a room crammed from ceiling to floor with boxes, cabinets and drawers of Lego bricks, Hoang Dang intently builds a bright blue, yellow and red fishing boat with a Vietnamese flag and eyes at its prow.

A picture of a ship floating not on water, but in the sky, has left the internet truly confused.

A haven for humans craving furry feline company, a cat cafe in Dubai also doubles as an adoption centre for some of the United Arab Emirates' many strays.

Fifty-two couples in Thailand got married while riding elephants on Sunday, in an annual Valentine's Day mass wedding ceremony at a botanical garden in a province east of Bangkok.

Nothing says social distancing quite like Dubai's RoboCafe, where robots have replaced their human overlords.

In the bustling northern Pakistani city of Peshawar a man in bowtie, bowler hat and carrying a cane flamboyantly weaves through busy traffic in a scene reminiscent of a 1920s silent film.

He may be a giant panda, but for now Xiao Qi Ji is still a baby, romping with toys and snacking on sweet potato, his first solid food.

A bluefin tuna sold for 20.8 million yen ($202,197) in the first auction of the new year at Tokyo's Toyosu fish market on Tuesday when it reopened after the holiday break.

Staying overnight at an airport isn't unheard of, especially if you miss a flight. But choosing to spend your holidays there in a tent is something entirely different.

How many disposable masks does it take to make a stool? Kim Ha-neul knows it takes 1,500.

Driverless robot buggies started delivering hot restaurant meals to paying customers in one central Moscow district on Wednesday, their operator, Russian Internet giant Yandex, said.

Swedish furniture giant IKEA has decided to discontinue its catalogue, one of the world's biggest annual publications, as shoppers move online.

Japan's oldest zoo unveiled the first baby elephant to be born there since its founding more than a century ago, and asked the public for help in naming it.

Pakistan's lonely elephant Kaavan arrived in Cambodia by cargo plane on Monday to start a new life at a local sanctuary, the culmination of years of campaigning for his transfer by singer Cher.

With his black sports jacket, reflective aviator sunglasses and bespoke orange helmet with holes so his ears can stick out, Bogie the dog sure is one suave-looking canine, with an Easy Rider look that would earn him a place in any motorcycle gang.

When hiker Kim Kang-eun found the slopes of Mount Jiri, South Korea's largest national park, littered during a trip in 2018, she decided it was time to send out a message about taking better care of nature.

A robot has signed on as the newest staff member at a store in Japan, taking on the job of ensuring customers wear masks and practice social distancing to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

At the lowest point on earth, in the middle of a giant salt lake, a jolly man dressed in red with a flowing white beard stuck a Christmas tree in the ground and went for a swim.

The first panda to be born in South Korea was introduced to a group of lucky children and reporters on Wednesday and given a name - Fu Bao, meaning lucky treasure.

Darting around the pool as a group of swimmers stands in the shallow end, the dolphin looks much like those that jump through hoops and perform acrobatics at theme parks.

In South Korea, some of the world's biggest food delivery firms are scrambling to surf an estimated $4 billion wave of new orders, in a boom triggered by the coronavirus pandemic.

Another Guinness World Record has been broken in Dubai - this time it's to do with basketball.

Singapore Airlines plans to turn one of its grounded jumbo jets into a pop-up restaurant as part of initiatives to re-engage customers who haven't been able to travel due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Japanese artist Takahiro Shibata's glasses are fogging up because of his face mask - a problem familiar to many spectacles wearers during the coronavirus pandemic.

Designers Mark Badgley and James Mischka used their desire for travel as inspiration for their new Spring 2021 collection, debuted via video this week at New York Fashion Week.

Qantas Airways said a seven-hour flight over Australia's Outback and Great Barrier Reef had sold out in 10 minutes, as it joined a growing trend offering "flights to nowhere".

UAE is set to launch the highest restaurant atop Ras Al Khaimah's Jais Adventure Peak in October.

The number of Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins seen around Hong Kong has jumped due to the pause in high-speed ferry traffic due to the coronavirus, scientists said.

When the bones of the early armoured dinosaur Scelidosaurus were unearthed in 1858 in west Dorset, England, they comprised the first complete dinosaur skeleton ever identified.

Tokyo has given public toilets an interesting makeover, in a bid to change the common view that such facilities are dark and dirty places.

A pun on the Spanish word for "honey" and the name of one of the world's most famous actors has landed a small scale Chilean vendor in a less-than-sweet spot.

A restaurant in Spain is pioneering a dining experience that allows customers to avoid face-to-face contact with staff and minimise the risk of coronavirus contagion.

Tennis star Roger Federer did the unthinkable for two young players, after their rooftop match in their Italian hometown, went viral.

A 10.69 carat diamond, with an estimated value of almost a quarter of a million dirhams, was unearthed in a mine in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh.

Thousands of Czechs gathered in Prague for a "symbolic farewell party" for the coronavirus pandemic.

Diego, the giant Galapagos tortoise, has returned to his native island in Ecuador after decades of breeding in captivity.

As people across the world are finding fun ways to stay creative during the pandemic, a father and daughter in Spain are winning over hearts for how they take out their trash.

Six athletes based in Abu Dhabi have smashed the Guinness World Records title for "most chest to ground burpees in 24 hours" by a mixed team.

A restaurant in Thailand has come up with a unique plan to help its diners meet social distancing guidelines in the fight against COVID-19.

How do you fancy owning a unique pair of Air Jordan’s, worn by the basketball legend himself?

A five-year-old boy was pulled over by the police in the American state of Utah for driving his parent's car.

As several food stalls in Singapore have remained closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, a 28-year-old chef has vowed to stay open to serve those in need.

A kangaroo was spotted hopping through the empty streets of the Australian city of Adelaide amid the coronavirus lockdown.