AFP news

Previously, Ukraine exported via the Black Sea on large ships but a wartime deal on safe passage broke down after Moscow exited July 17.

Iran on Tuesday declared a two-day holiday for government workers and banks nationwide as searing temperatures sweep across the country, state media reported.

X is suing a nonprofit group in US federal court over reports that hate speech has flourished at the platform formerly known as Twitter.

Meta on Tuesday started blocking Canadians' access to news on Facebook and Instagram in response to a new law requiring digital giants to pay publishers for such content.

From BP to ExxonMobil to TotalEnergies, none of the oil and gas majors have repeated the exceptional profits posted in 2022 when prices surged in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but they nevertheless remain comfortably profitable this year.

Asian markets followed Wall Street lower Wednesday as the wind came out of the latest rally, with traders jolted by the downgrade of US sovereign debt, soft economic data and concerns about elevated valuations.

US lawmakers are probing American investment flows facilitated by BlackRock and MSCI to Chinese companies that Washington has sanctioned, a congressional panel announced Tuesday.

Workers lowered a hammer and sickle from a towering sculpture overlooking Kyiv on Tuesday in a campaign to remove Soviet icons that ramped up after Russia invaded last year.

Fitch downgraded the United States' top-notch credit rating by a step on Tuesday, citing a growing federal debt burden and an "erosion of governance" that has manifested in debt limit standoffs.

NASA's distant Voyager 2 probe has sent a "heartbeat" signal to Earth after mission control mistakenly cut contact, the US space agency said Tuesday.

Tunisian President Kais Saied sacked Prime Minister Najla Bouden without explanation Tuesday night and replaced her with former central bank executive Ahmed Hachani, whom he tasked with overcoming the "colossal challenges" facing the cash-strapped North African country.

The British government on Tuesday officially acknowledged that the Islamic State group committed "acts of genocide" against the Yazidi people in 2014.

A Palestinian gunman opened fire at a group of Israelis in a settlement in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, wounding six people before being shot dead, police said.

Chinese controls on exports of two metals critical to making semiconductors came into force on Tuesday, a day after Beijing imposed curbs on the foreign sales of some drones.

The leader of an influential Pakistan political party called Tuesday for better state-provided security after an Islamic State suicide bomber killed 54 people -- almost half of them children -- at an election gathering.

Banking giant HSBC said on Tuesday that pre-tax profit more than doubled to $21.7 billion in the first half of 2023, boosted by higher interest rates.

A missile strike on a residential building killed six and wounded dozens in Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's hometown on Monday, as Russia said it stepped up strikes against military facilities in response to attacks on its territory, including Moscow.

Two men set the Koran alight outside parliament in Stockholm on Monday, an AFP reporter saw, at a protest similar to previous ones that have sparked tensions between Sweden and Muslim nations.

Myanmar's junta extended the country's state of emergency by six months on Monday, signalling a delay to elections they had pledged to hold as the military battles anti-coup fighters across the country.

After bust-ups with Mali and Burkina Faso, France is now watching its relationship with Niger spiral downwards following the Sahel's third military takeover in as many years.

The company formerly known as Twitter removed a towering, blinking X from atop its San Francisco headquarters Monday after the rebranded tech firm tangled with city officials over the controversial sign.

The Euclid space telescope, launched July 1 on a mission to shed more light on elusive dark matter and dark energy, has reached its destination orbit and on Monday its European operators revealed its first test images.

US officials met with Taliban representatives in Doha, where they denounced the deteriorating human rights situation in Afghanistan -- particularly for women and girls, according to a statement from the State Department on Monday.

At least four people were killed including a 10-year-old child after a Russian missile attack on the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rig on Monday, officials said.

Chinese authorities announced new measures to boost consumption on Monday, as fresh economic data suggested that the country's post-Covid recovery is running out of steam and growth is slowing.

Frustration as other foreign nationals were set free. The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has classified his detention as arbitrary and confirmed the family's details on his abduction.

Automatic weapons and anti-tank fire shook south Lebanon's Ain al-Helweh Palestinian refugee camp on Monday, after fighting killed six people over the weekend, an AFP correspondent said.

Blood-stained chairs, scattered ball bearings and shoes shed by the dead, wounded and panicked bore testimony Monday to the carnage caused by a suicide bombing at a Pakistan political event.

Markets rallied Monday, tracing another bump on Wall Street, where investors cheered a further slowdown in US inflation that stoked optimism the Federal Reserve will not have to hike interest rates again.