WORLD

The 100-day sprint to the US election began Sunday, the final act of a campaign transformed by an assassination attempt and the stunning exit of President Joe Biden.

Nicolas Maduro was declared the winner of Venezuela's presidential election Sunday but the opposition and key regional neighbours immediately rejected the official results.

Former US president Barack Obama endorsed his fellow Democrat Kamala Harris' bid for the White House on Friday, delivering a major boost to her campaign to defeat Donald Trump in November's presidential election.

China and Russia's foreign ministers met their Southeast Asian counterparts Friday after vowing to counter "extra-regional forces", a day before Washington's top diplomat was due to arrive.

Santorini is a key stopover of the Greek cruise experience. But with parts of the island nearing saturation, officials are considering restrictions.

Authorities evacuated nearly 300,000 people and suspended public transport across eastern China on Friday, as Typhoon Gaemi brought torrential rains already responsible for five deaths in nearby Taiwan.

Sri Lanka's first presidential elections since an unprecedented economic crisis spurred widespread unrest will be held in September, the election commission said Friday.

The Philippine Coast Guard on Friday raced to offload 1.4 million litres of industrial fuel oil from a sunken tanker and prevent an "environmental catastrophe" in Manila Bay.

US agents arrested two top leaders of Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel in Texas on Thursday, the justice department said, striking a major blow to one of the most powerful and violent criminal organizations in the world.

An "out of control" wildfire has devoured up to half of the main town in western Canada's popular Jasper National Park, authorities said Thursday, with 400 foreign firefighters called in to help battle the blaze.

Humanity is suffering from an "extreme heat epidemic," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned Thursday, calling for action to limit the impacts of heat waves intensified by climate change.

The United States sees no need to negotiate an international agreement on taxing the super-wealthy, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Thursday on the sideline of a G20 finance ministers' meeting.

Kamala Harris launched a blistering attack on Donald Trump and his "extremist" Republicans as she addressed teachers Thursday, seeking to rally a key part of the Democratic coalition behind her bid to take on the billionaire for the presidency.

Anton Yushyn spent four years studying Italian at university in Kyiv but the outbreak of war taught him the most valuable lesson of his student life: to prioritise what matters most.

Hong Kong pro-democracy tycoon Jimmy Lai will take the witness stand for the first time in November in a high-profile national security trial where he is accused of sedition and colluding with foreign forces, a court said Thursday.

Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina wept Thursday as she surveyed the destruction wrought by days of deadly unrest, as student leaders weighed the future of the protests that precipitated the disorder.

The death toll from landslides in a remote region of southern Ethiopia has risen to 257, the United Nations said Thursday, warning that the number of victims could soar to up to 500.

Police on Thursday arrested climate activists who glued themselves to the tarmac at Frankfurt airport, Germany's busiest, compelling it to temporarily suspend arrivals and departures.

Israeli forces retrieved the remains of five Israelis, killed during Hamas's October 7 attack on southern Israel, whose bodies had been taken to the Gaza Strip, the military said Thursday.

Myanmar's junta and an ethnic minority armed group both claimed on Thursday they were in control of a town and regional military command in northern Shan state following days of clashes.

Joe Biden will press Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday to seal a Gaza ceasefire deal, despite the US president's shock election exit threatening to limit his leverage over the Israeli premier.

The strongest typhoon to hit Taiwan in eight years killed three people and flooded parts of the island's second-biggest city on Thursday, while rescuers searched for nine sailors missing after their cargo ship sank in the storm.

A Philippine-flagged tanker carrying 1.4 million litres of industrial fuel oil sank off Manila on Thursday, authorities said, as they raced to contain a spill.

President Vladimir Putin held talks with Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad in Moscow amid calls for Russian mediation to cool tensions between Turkey and Syria.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed Gaza ceasefire demonstrators Wednesday and called for a global alliance against the Iranian regime he accuses of funding them, as he addressed a US Congress divided by the war.

US President Joe Biden told Americans Wednesday he quit the 2024 election to unite the country, saying in a historic Oval Office speech that it was time to pass the torch to "younger voices."

The tired troops moved through the forest in east Ukraine at dawn, imitating assault rifle fire while searching for non-existent Russians between the trees.

Rescuers aided by drones were continuing a desperate search on Wednesday for possible survivors of devastating landslides in an isolated area of southern Ethiopia that have claimed the lives of at least 229 people.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas's Fatah movement has agreed with Hamas to form a "national unity government" in post-war Gaza, but analysts are sceptical about the significance of the Beijing-brokered deal.