International news

Israeli security forces backed by helicopters raided the volatile West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday, killing at least nine Palestinians in what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called a, "large-scale and significant military operation".

US President Donald Trump has announced a private sector investment of up to $500 billion (AED1.8 trillion) to fund infrastructure for artificial intelligence, aiming to outpace rival nations in the business-critical technology.

Israel's army chief Herzi Halevi said on Tuesday he would resign on March 6, taking responsibility for the massive security lapse on October 7, 2023, when Hamas gunmen from Gaza carried out a cross-border attack on Israel.

A fire at a ski resort hotel in Turkey's Bolu mountains killed 76 people and injured dozens on Tuesday, forcing panicked guests to jump out of windows in the middle of the night.

The United States will exit the World Health Organization (WHO), President Donald Trump said on Monday, saying the global health agency had mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic and other international health crises.

A landslide in Indonesia's Central Java city of Pekalongan killed 16 people and injured 10, an official at the country's regional disaster mitigation agency and police said on Tuesday.

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol attended on Tuesday a Constitutional Court hearing of his impeachment trial where he denied ordering military commanders to drag lawmakers out of parliament during his short-lived bid to impose martial law.

President Donald Trump has pardoned nearly everyone criminally charged with participating in the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol, in a show of solidarity with supporters who stormed the seat of American power in his name.

Donald Trump vowed to usher in a new era of American greatness, minutes after he was sworn in as president for the second time to complete an extraordinary political comeback.

US President Joe Biden issued pre-emptive pardons on Monday for people Republican successor Donald Trump has targeted for retaliation.

US President-elect Donald Trump will call for a "revolution of common sense" during his inaugural address, the Wall Street Journal said on Monday citing excerpts of his prepared remarks.

An Indian court awarded the life sentence on Monday to a police volunteer convicted of the assault and murder of a junior doctor at the hospital where she worked in the eastern city of Kolkata, rejecting demands for the death penalty saying it was not a rare crime.

Eight people died and seven were injured in a fire at a nursing home outside Belgrade on Monday which authorities said was caused by arson, Serbian state TV RTS reported.

South African police have launched a manhunt for a Lesotho gang member believed to have controlled operations at an illegal gold mine where 78 bodies were recovered last week during a police siege, from which he escaped.

US President Joe Biden welcomed a ceasefire in Gaza on Sunday and said hundreds of trucks were entering the seaside enclave to help its civilians.

A ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip took effect on Sunday after a nearly three-hour delay, pausing a 15-month-old war that has brought devastation and seismic political change to the Middle East.

At least 86 people were killed and more injured in northern Nigeria on Saturday when a petrol tanker truck overturned, spilling fuel that exploded, the country's national emergency agency said.

Hundreds of supporters of South Korea's arrested president, Yoon Suk Yeol, stormed a court building early on Sunday after his detention was extended, smashing windows and breaking inside, an attack the country's acting leader called "unimaginable".

Russian forces unleashed a combined drone and missile strike on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv early on Saturday, killing three people in a central district, officials said.

Donald Trump's incoming US presidential administration plans to intensify immigration enforcement nationwide soon after he takes office on Monday, Reuters reported.

Israel's cabinet approved a deal with Hamas for a ceasefire and release of hostages in the Gaza Strip, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said on Saturday, a day ahead of the agreement's scheduled start.

The US Supreme Court upheld on Friday a law banning TikTok in the United States on national security grounds if its Chinese parent company ByteDance does not sell the short-video app by Sunday.

The Palestinian group Hamas is expected to release the first hostages under a Gaza ceasefire deal on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said on Friday, after 15 months of war that demolished the enclave.

A Russian missile attack killed at least four people and damaged an educational facility in the city of Kryvyi Rih in southern-central Ukraine on Friday, the regional governor said.

Pakistan launched its first home-made observation satellite on Friday from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northern China.

A Pakistani court sentenced former Prime Minister Imran Khan to 14 years imprisonment on Friday in a land corruption case, a setback to talks between his party and the government aimed at cooling political instability in the country.

The Israeli cabinet will meet to give final approval to a deal with Palestinian group Hamas for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and release of hostages, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said on Friday.

The Gaza Strip ceasefire should begin on Sunday as planned, despite the need for negotiators to tie up a "loose end" at the last minute, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday.

A SpaceX Starship rocket broke up in space minutes after launching from Texas on Thursday, forcing airline flights over the Gulf of Mexico to alter course to avoid falling debris and setting back Elon Musk's flagship rocket programme.

A student killed a female teacher and classmate with a knife and injured another classmate at a high school in northern Slovakia on Thursday.

Israel intensified strikes on Gaza, with at least 70 people killed overnight, hours after a ceasefire and hostage release deal was announced, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accusing Hamas, on Thursday, of reneging on some of the agreements.

Blue Origin's giant New Glenn rocket blasted off from Florida early Thursday morning on its first mission to space, an inaugural step into Earth's orbit for Jeff Bezos' space company as it aims to rival SpaceX in the satellite launch business.

President Joe Biden capped a half-century political career on Wednesday with a final Oval Office speech as he hopes to seal a legacy overshadowed by Democrats' failure to stop Donald Trump from returning to the White House.

India on Thursday became the fourth nation in the world to achieve space docking, a technological milestone that underscores its ambitions to expand its share in the rapidly growing $400 billion global space market.

Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani announced that the joint mediation efforts of Qatar, Egypt and the United States secured a Gaza ceasefire and prisoner swap deal between Hamas and Israel.

Negotiators reached a deal on Wednesday for a ceasefire in the Gaza war between Israel and Hamas, an official briefed on the negotiations said, after 15 months of conflict that has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians.

Bangladesh’s Supreme Court acquitted former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia in a 2008 corruption case on Wednesday, clearing the way for the ailing leader to fight parliamentary elections in the South Asian country.

A man set himself on fire on Wednesday near South Korea's corruption investigation office, where impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol was being interrogated over insurrection allegations, the national fire agency said.

The Russian Investigative Committee has charged 27 individuals in connection with last year's terror attack on Crocus City Hall in the Moscow suburbs.

South African authorities have pulled at least 78 bodies from the shaft of a closed gold mine more than 2 km underground where an unknown number of men are still feared trapped, following a siege in a crackdown on illegal mining.

Ukraine introduced emergency power cuts in six regions amid what authorities described as a "massive" Russian missile strike, the national grid operator said on Wednesday.

Negotiators were near to hammering out the final details of a ceasefire in Gaza on Wednesday after marathon talks in Qatar, and the US and Egyptian leaders promised to stay in close contact about a deal.

South Korean authorities arrested impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol on Wednesday over insurrection allegations, with the embattled leader saying he agreed to comply with investigations to avoid "bloodshed", ending weeks of tense political standoff.

US Special Counsel Jack Smith concluded that Donald Trump engaged in an "unprecedented criminal effort" to hold onto power after losing the 2020 election, but was thwarted in bringing the case to trial by the president-elect's November election victory, according to a report published on Tuesday.

South Korea's Constitutional Court adjourned the opening session of the impeachment trial of suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol within minutes on Tuesday after the embattled leader did not attend court.

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power was sued on Monday on claims that it failed to properly manage water supplies critical to fighting the deadly Palisades Fire, a court filing showed.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun summoned Nawaf Salam, the head of the International Court of Justice, to designate him prime minister after most lawmakers nominated him on Monday, a big blow to Hezbollah, which accused opponents of seeking to exclude it.

Mediator Qatar gave Israel and Hamas a final draft of a deal to end the war in Gaza on Monday, after a midnight "breakthrough" in talks attended by US President-elect Donald Trump's envoy, an official briefed on the negotiations told Reuters.

Firefighters raced to contain the frontiers of two Los Angeles wildfires that burned for the sixth straight day on Sunday, taking advantage of a brief respite in hazardous conditions before high winds were expected to fan the flames again.

Nigeria's air force said it was investigating reports of civilian casualties during a weekend air strike that targeted armed gangs in the northwest, the latest military operation where innocent people may have been accidentally killed.

European foreign ministers will meet at the end of January to discuss the lifting of sanctions on Syria, the EU foreign policy chief said on Sunday in Riyadh ahead of a meeting of top Middle Eastern and Western diplomats and Syria's new foreign minister.

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin called off the launch of its New Glenn rocket after "a few anomalies" during the mission countdown on Monday, postponing by at least a day an inaugural attempt to reach orbit and compete with SpaceX in the satellite launch market.

US President Joe Biden spoke on Sunday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the White House said, as US officials race to reach a Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal before Biden leaves office on January 20.

Israel plans to use tax revenue it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA) to pay the PA's nearly 2 billion shekel ($544 million) debt to state-run Israel Electric Co (IEC), Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday.

Aircraft dropped water and fire retardant on steep hills to stem the eastward spread of the Palisades wildfire in Los Angeles on Saturday as on-the-ground firefighting intensified amid warnings of wind gusts of up to 110 kph that could make matters worse.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called on allies on Sunday to honour all promises to supply Ukraine with weapons, including those to counter Russian air attacks.

Six people died when a propane-butane cylinder exploded at a restaurant in the northwest Czech city of Most, setting the building on fire, emergency services said on Sunday.

Ukraine has captured two North Korean soldiers in Russia's Kursk region, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday.

Syria's Intelligence Directorate foiled an attack by the IS group on the Sayeda Zeinab shrine in a Damascus suburb, state news agency Sana reported on Saturday.

The flight data and cockpit voice recorders on the Jeju Air jet that crashed on December 29 stopped recording about four minutes before the airliner hit a concrete structure at South Korea's Muan airport, the transport ministry said on Saturday.

Newly elected Lebanese President Joseph Aoun will hold consultations with members of parliament from January 13 to nominate a prime minister, the presidency said on Friday.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro was sworn in for a third term on Friday, despite a six-month-long election dispute, international calls for him to stand aside and an increase in the US reward offered for his capture.

US President-elect Donald Trump said at his sentencing on Friday for his criminal conviction stemming from hush money paid to an adult movie star that the case has been a "terrible experience."

Wildfires menacing Los Angeles have killed at least 10 people and devoured nearly 10,000 structures, with five fires burning into a third night into Friday as dry desert winds fanning the flames again gathered strength.

An official Palestinian tally of direct deaths in the Israel-Hamas war likely undercounted the number of casualties by 41 per cent through the middle of 2024 as the Gaza Strip's healthcare infrastructure unravelled, according to a study published on Thursday.

Israel confirmed that a hostage found killed in Gaza was Hamza Ziyadne, the son of another hostage, Youssef Ziyadne, found dead alongside him in an underground tunnel near the southern city of Rafah.

South Korea's presidential security chief resigned Friday as he faced questioning over why his guards prevented the detention of impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol and investigators prepared to make a fresh arrest attempt.

The US House of Representatives voted on Thursday to sanction the International Criminal Court (ICC) to protest its issuing arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister over Israel's campaign in Gaza.

Elon Musk urged Germans to vote for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) in an upcoming election in a conversation with its leader on his social media platform X that highlighted the US billionaire's growing ambition to sway European politics.

Two massive wildfires menacing Los Angeles from the east and west were still burning uncontained on Thursday, but a brief respite from the fierce winds that have fanned the flames for two days allowed crews to slow their explosive spread.

Lebanon's parliament elected army chief Joseph Aoun head of state on Thursday, filling the vacant presidency with a general who enjoys US approval and showing the diminished sway of the Hezbollah group after its devastating war with Israel.

Authorities moved more than 47,000 people to shelters in earthquake-hit Tibet, Chinese officials said on Thursday, while rescuers widen a massive combing effort for survivors near the foothills of the Himalayas, despite slim survival odds.

Raging wildfires surrounded Los Angeles on Wednesday, killing at least five people, destroying hundreds of homes and stretching firefighting resources and water supplies to the limit, as more than 100,000 people were ordered to evacuate.

At least six people were killed and several others injured late on Wednesday in a stampede in southern India after thousands of devotees queued outside one of the most visited Hindu temples to collect tokens for a free visit to the deity.

A Russian guided bomb attack on Wednesday killed at least 13 people and injured 113 in Ukraine's southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, authorities said.

Israeli military strikes across Gaza killed at least 22 people on Wednesday, Palestinian medics said, as the US stepped up efforts to overcome sticking points between Israel and Hamas to reach a ceasefire to end the war.

Ukraine struck a Russian oil depot that serves a military airfield in the Russian city of Engels, Ukraine's military said on Wednesday.

At least 126 people have been killed by Tuesday's 6.8 earthquake in Tibet, while more than 400 people trapped in the foothills of the Himalayas have been rescued, and over 30,000 residents relocated, as the search for survivors continues.

A rapidly growing wildfire raged across an upscale section of Los Angeles on Tuesday, destroying homes and creating traffic jams as 30,000 people evacuated beneath huge plumes of smoke that covered much of the metropolitan area.

A magnitude 6.8 earthquake rocked the northern foothills of the Himalayas near one of Tibet's holiest cities on Tuesday, Chinese authorities said, killing at least 95 people and shaking buildings in neighbouring Nepal, Bhutan and India.

Israeli forces killed at least three Palestinians n stepped-up operations across the occupied West Bank on Tuesday following the killing of three Israelis on Monday, the Israeli military said.

Jean-Marie Le Pen, an unabashed nationalist and founder of the French far-right National Front (Front National) party, has died aged 96, French media said on Tuesday.

International flights resumed at Syria's main airport in Damascus on Tuesday for the first time since rebels toppled President Bashar al-Assad last month.

A South Korean court has re-issued a warrant to arrest impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol, the country's corruption investigation agency said on Tuesday.

Three miners were feared dead inside a flooded coal mine in a remote district of India's northeastern Assam state, authorities said on Tuesday, and the men were part of a total of nine still trapped as rescue teams worked to reach them.

Donald Trump Jr. is expected to visit Greenland on Tuesday as his father, US President-elect Donald Trump, has again expressed interest in gaining control over the vast Arctic island.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un oversaw a successful test of a new intermediate-range hypersonic ballistic missile (IRBM), state media KCNA said, pledging to accelerate the country's nuclear and missile capabilities.

The US Congress formally certified Republican President-elect Donald Trump's election victory during a session presided over by Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris, who lost the November contest.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced his resignation as Liberal Party leader on Monday after nine years in office.

French President Emmanuel Macron called on Ukraine Monday to have "realistic" expectations on territory as its fight against the Russian invasion heads into a fourth year, saying he saw no "quick and easy solution" to the conflict.

Three Israelis were killed on Monday and several injured in a shooting attack on a car and bus near the settlement of Kedumim in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Israel's national ambulance service Magen David Adom (MDA) said.

Pope Francis on Monday named a Catholic cardinal who has criticized Donald Trump's political agenda as the new leader for the Catholic Church in Washington, D.C., days before Trump is set to be inaugurated as US president.

At least eight policemen and a driver were killed in a bomb blast set off by Maoist rebels in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, police said on Monday.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) plans to expand its work in Syria significantly beyond an initial $100 million programme, the organisation's president said on Monday, citing pressing needs in the health, water and power sectors.

Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere said on Monday that he found it worrying that billionaire Elon Musk was involving himself in the political issues of countries outside of the United States. 

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that Washington wanted to see a ceasefire deal in Gaza concluded and the hostages brought out in the next two weeks.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is increasingly likely to announce he intends to step down, though he has not made a final decision, after nine years in office, according to a Reuters source.

A review of over 100 buildings in the UK has found that contractors who fitted cladding panels that didn't meet fire-safety standards when installed have largely escaped financial liability. The findings come seven years after the Grenfell Tower blaze in London.

A winter storm brought snow, ice and freezing temperatures to a broad swath of the U.S. on Sunday, with some 60 million people across more than a dozen states from Kansas to New Jersey under winter weather warnings and advisories.

Ukrainian forces have launched a major new attack in Russia's western Kursk region, Russian military bloggers reported on Sunday.

Thousands braved heavy snow in Seoul on Sunday to rally for and against arresting impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol, as South Korea's political crisis appeared headed toward another high-stakes confrontation.

Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Hassan al-Shibani, appointed by the country's new rulers, arrived in Qatar on Sunday to meet senior Qatari officials.

Millions of Americans from the Plains to the East Coast faced the threat of blizzards, heavy snow, treacherous ice and freezing rain through Monday, the National Weather Service said on Saturday.

Israeli military strikes in the Gaza Strip have killed at least 70 people over the last day, Palestinian medics said on Saturday, as mediators launched a new ceasefire push to end the 15-month-old war.

Syria's Damascus airport will start operating international flights from January 7, Syrian Civil Aviation Authority chief Ashad Al Saliby told Syrian state news agency Sana on Saturday.

The administration of President Joe Biden has notified Congress of a proposed $8 billion arms sale to Israel, a US official said on Friday, with Washington maintaining support for its ally whose war in Gaza has killed tens of thousands.

Poland launched its presidency of the Council of the European Union on Friday mired in a diplomatic row with Hungary that underscored a deepening sense of political disunity across Europe just as it confronts a raft of major global challenges.

Israel carried out airstrikes on dozens of Hamas targets in Gaza over the past 24 hours, it said on Friday, pressing attacks that Palestinian health authorities said had killed more than 110 people in two days.

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said on Friday it is deeply alarmed by the devastating impact of winter rains and freezing temperatures on displaced Palestinians in Gaza, adding to the unparalleled humanitarian catastrophe.

South Korean investigators called off their attempt to arrest impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol at his residence Friday over a failed martial law bid, citing safety concerns after a standoff with his security team. 

Officials on Thursday positively identified the person found dead inside the Cybertruck that exploded outside the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas as a US Army soldier from Colorado, while the FBI said it was not yet clear if the blast was an act of terrorism.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu authorised Israeli negotiators to continue talks in Doha on a hostage release, his office said Thursday, after Israel and Hamas traded blame for their slow progress.

Israel's military said on Thursday its special forces had raided an underground missile production site in Syria in September that it said was primed to produce hundreds of precision missiles for use against Israel by the Iranian-backed Hezbollah.

Authorities entered impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol's compound on Friday to execute an unprecedented arrest warrant, evading a crowd of protesters outside, but were confronted with presidential security forces.

Investigators in New Orleans were searching on Thursday for what motivated a US Army veteran flying an IS flag from his truck to plough into a crowd of New Year's revelers, killing 15 people and injuring 30 more before dying in a shootout with police.

An Israeli airstrike killed at least 10 Palestinians in a tent encampment sheltering displaced families in the southern Gaza strip early on Thursday, medics said.

Ten people were injured in a mass shooting in the New York City borough of Queens late on New Year's Day, the New York Police Department said in a news briefing early on Thursday.

South Korean police on Thursday raided the offices of Jeju Air and the operator of Muan International Airport as part of the probe into the fatal crash of a Boeing 737-800 plane that killed 179 people. 

A high-ranking Syrian delegation arrived in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday on the first foreign visit by the country's new rulers since they ousted president Bashar al-Assad last month, state media said.

Former Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, who had often taken an independent line against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right government allies, said on Wednesday he was resigning from parliament.

The population of Gaza has fallen 6 per cent since the war with Israel began nearly 15 months ago as about 100,000 Palestinians left the enclave while more than 55,000 are presumed dead, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS).

A man shot dead 12 people in a rampage in a small town in Montenegro before dying from self-inflicted injuries early on Thursday, authorities said, in one of the tiny Balkan nation's worst mass killings.

A Tesla Cybertruck exploded in flames outside the Trump International Hotel Las Vegas on Wednesday, killing the driver and injuring seven others, and the FBI was investigating whether the blast was an act of terrorism, officials said.

Chinese government hackers breached the US Treasury office that administers economic sanctions, the Washington Post reported on Wednesday, identifying targets of a cyberattack Treasury disclosed earlier this week.

A US Army veteran flying an ISIS flag from his truck swerved around makeshift barriers and plowed into New Orleans' crowded French Quarter on New Year's Day, killing 15 people in an attack officials said may have been carried out with the help of others.

Seven migrants were rescued, but at least 20 are missing after their boat sank en route to Italy from Libya, the mayor of the Italian island of Lampedusa said on Wednesday.

Israeli air strikes on al-Bureij refugee camp and Jabalia town in central and northern Gaza killed at least 17 Palestinians on Wednesday, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.

Senior aides to South Korea's impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol offered to resign en masse on Wednesday, a day after his office expressed regret over acting President Choi Sang-mok's approval of two new judges to a court set to decide Yoon's fate.

Russia launched a New Year's Day drone strike on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv early on Wednesday, killing two people, wounding at least six others and damaging buildings in two districts, authorities said. Explosions boomed across the morning sky as Ukraine's air force warned of incoming drones and Mayor Vitali Klitschko said air defences were repelling an enemy attack. Two floors of a residential building in central Kyiv were partially destroyed in the strike, according to the State Emergency Service. Two people were killed, it said. Photos posted by the agency showed firefighters dous

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.