AFP news

A truck driver rammed his vehicle near a checkpoint in the West Bank Thursday, injuring three people before he was "neutralised", medics and police said, in the latest attack to rock the occupied territory.

Russia on Wednesday vetoed an attempt to keep inside military-run Mali a team of UN experts who had charged that foreign forces -- a veiled reference to Moscow-linked Wagner mercenaries -- were involved in widespread abuses.

China's biggest developer Country Garden on Thursday faces a crunch vote on extending debt repayment terms that could determine whether it defaults, plunging the country's property market deeper into turmoil.

China's Baidu rolled out its ChatGPT rival ERNIE Bot to the public on Thursday, in a major leap for the country's tech sector as it aims to cash in on the global artificial intelligence gold rush.

Markets were mixed Thursday as investors struggled to maintain momentum from Wall Street's rally, even after fresh data reinforced optimism the Federal Reserve will be able to hold off any more interest rate hikes this year.

Rebel officers in the oil-rich central African state of Gabon announced on Wednesday they had seized power following disputed elections in which President Ali Bongo Ondimba, in power since 2009, had been declared victor.

British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said he had raised human rights concerns at "every single one" of his meetings with top Chinese officials, as he made a state visit to Beijing on Wednesday.

Iran is ratcheting up a crackdown ahead of the one-year anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini, arresting prominent personalities, campaigners and relatives of those killed by security forces in protests last year, activists say.

A Pakistan court on Wednesday ordered that former prime minister Imran Khan be kept in jail over allegations he leaked classified documents, a day after a judge granted his release in a separate graft case.

Indian officials preparing for the G20 summit next week have hired teams of "monkey-men" and erected primate cutouts to deter marauding monkeys from munching on the floral displays laid out for global leaders.

Oil companies are paying popular influencers to pump their gas on social media, sparking a backlash from some climate-conscious fans for promoting planet-warming fossil fuels among young people.

Sixty years ago, a crisis hotline for the first time sent a message between the world's superpowers.

Welcoming back potentially misleading political messages at X came less than a week after former president Donald Trump posted there for the first time since January 2021.

Former Algerian defence minister Khaled Nezzar has been indicted in Switzerland on charges of committing crimes against humanity in the 1990s during the civil war, state prosecutors said Tuesday.

Algeria's foreign minister on Tuesday proposed a six-month transitional plan for neighbouring Niger, whose coup leader seeks a far longer timeline back to democracy.

Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was killed in a plane crash two months after staging a short-lived mutiny, was on Tuesday laid to rest in a secret ceremony in his native Saint Petersburg.

Cyprus police said Tuesday they have arrested 21 people after violent clashes between Cypriots and migrants near the resort city of Paphos, where authorities have started removing Syrians from a condemned apartment complex.

The cap of a Ukrainian fighter pilot known as "Juice" sat atop his flag-draped casket Tuesday as mourners gathered to pay homage to the 29-year-old considered legendary by the country's air force.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz's government on Tuesday agreed a huge tax relief programme for companies in a bid to revive Germany's sputtering economy.

The United States is racing to improve its messaging to the developing world as the BRICS group grows, although few in Washington view an immediate threat from the Chinese-backed club.

Google on Tuesday said it was weaving artificial intelligence (AI) deeper into its cloud offerings as it vies for the business of firms keen to capitalize on the technology.

At least 183 people have been killed since July in clashes in Ethiopia's Amhara region, the United Nations said Tuesday as it appealed for the killings, violence and rights abuses to end.

Asian investors on Wednesday tracked a rally on Wall Street as a softer-than-expected report on US job openings soothed fears the Federal Reserve will hike interest rates again.

Strolling in Moscow on a summer's day as pop music blared from a cafe, Tigran is one of the capital's residents who say they have come to terms with a surge in Ukrainian drone attacks.

As UBS prepares to post earnings this week, investors and employees are eagerly awaiting clues as to how Switzerland's largest bank is faring after swallowing up its fallen rival Credit Suisse.

Sudan's army chief travelled Tuesday to Egypt on his first trip abroad since the outbreak of war in April, with the latest violence killing dozens of civilians in battle-scarred Darfur.

Imran Khan's prison sentence for a graft conviction was suspended on Tuesday, his lawyer said, but it was unclear if the former Pakistan prime minister would be immediately released.

Russian masterpieces are hidden away in a Ukrainian museum, writers like Pushkin and Dostoyevsky are shunned and the Russian language is eschewed.

Air pollution is more dangerous to the health of the average person on planet Earth than smoking or alcohol, with the threat worsening in its global epicenter South Asia even as China fast improves, a study showed Tuesday.