WORLD

Oil extended losses Thursday after OPEC announced the shock delay of a key policy meeting, suggesting fresh upheaval in the bloc, while equities struggled after two US reports dented recent euphoria over the future of interest rates.

North Korea said Thursday it would deploy new weapons and stronger armed forces to the border with the South, as Seoul's spy agency said Pyongyang had received Russian help to successfully put a military spy satellite into orbit.

The World Health Organization has asked China for more data on a respiratory illness spreading in the north of the country, urging people to take steps to reduce the risk of infection.

World leaders will face a reckoning over humanity's failure to curb climate-heating emissions and polluting fossil fuels when they meet for UN climate talks next week, as the planet swelters in likely the hottest year in human history.

By helping broker an Israel-Hamas deal to free hostages, US President Joe Biden has achieved a long-sought win in a war that has cost him politically.

Declaring her preference for "something light and comfortable", an Israeli mother-of-four browsed through a collection of pistols in a Jerusalem gun store, which appeared to be experiencing a business boom in wartime.

A secret cell headed by CIA and Mossad chiefs, and multiple contacts between US President Joe Biden and leaders of Israel, Qatar, and Egypt underpinned an "excruciating" five weeks resulting in the truce agreement, a US official said.

Climate conspiracy theories are flourishing with lifestyle influencers joining in the misinformation war and scientists hounded on social media, researchers say, as pressure rises on leaders at the COP28 summit.

North Korea said Wednesday it had succeeded in putting a military spy satellite in orbit after two previous failures, as the United States led its allies in condemning the launch as a "brazen violation" of UN sanctions.

The US intelligence chief secured promises from the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo to de-escalate after alarm over a surge in violence, the White House said Tuesday.

US forces carried out new strikes against two sites in Iraq early on Wednesday in retaliation for attacks by "Iran and Iran-backed groups," US Central Command said.

Israel and Hamas announced a deal on Wednesday allowing at least 50 hostages and scores of Palestinian prisoners to be freed, while offering besieged Gaza residents a four-day truce after weeks of all-out war.

Around 200 Rohingya refugees arrived in Indonesia's westernmost province by sea overnight, the United Nations refugee agency said Wednesday, taking the total arrivals in the last week to more than 1,000 members of the persecuted Myanmar minority.

Indonesia on Tuesday launched an investment plan to attract $20 billion pledged by Western nations in a renewable energy transition pact agreed last year for the archipelago to slash emissions and wean itself off coal.

Countries' greenhouse gas-cutting pledges put Earth on track for warming far beyond key limits, potentially up to a catastrophic 2.9 degrees Celsius this century, the UN said Monday, warning "we are out of road".

Deep in Oman's parched interior, the ancient oasis town of Bahla abounds with myths of camel-eating, fire-mouthed hyenas and men turning into donkeys -- a reputation for magic and mystery that persists to this day.

Britain's Conservative government this week unveils a budget update that could determine its chances of re-election -- or the size of its defeat -- with promises to reinvigorate the economy as the party lags badly in the polls.

North Korea has issued formal notice of a satellite launch as early as Wednesday, Japan said, with Pyongyang's third attempt to put a military eye in the sky coming after it likely received technical help from Russia in exchange for arms transfers.

A Sino-Canadian row reared its head on Monday after one of two Canadians jailed by China for nearly three years claimed he was unwittingly used for intelligence gathering and is seeking compensation from Ottawa.

Argentine president-elect Javier Milei ran his campaign on promises to ditch the peso for the US dollar and do away with a central bank -- all in the name of subduing rampant inflation.

The presence of United Nations peacekeepers, whose shortcomings can frustrate local populations, is not a "magic wand" for conflict zones, said their leader Jean-Pierre Lacroix, who supports an expanded tool kit to protect civilians in increasingly complex territory.

Rising sea levels threaten to swamp the Maldives and the Indian Ocean archipelago is already out of drinking water, but the new president says he has scrapped plans to relocate citizens.

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said Tuesday a truce agreement with Israel was in sight, raising hopes that his militant group could soon release dozens of people taken hostage in the October 7 attacks.

Lebanon's Hezbollah movement said it targeted troops in northern Israel with drones, artillery and missiles on Monday, claiming a string of new attacks.

A woman rings a bell outside a makeshift church of wood and tarpaulin, calling the faithful to worship and a respite from war in eastern Myanmar's Kayah state.

Three boats filled with more than 500 Rohingya refugees landed in Indonesia's westernmost province on Sunday, a UN agency said, in one of the biggest arrivals since Myanmar launched a military crackdown on the minority group in 2017.

Kenya on Sunday said tens of thousands of people across the country had been impacted by heavy rainfall, flooding and landslides that had also interrupted cargo services at Mombasa port.

The Ukrainian army said Sunday it has pushed Russian forces back "three to eight kilometres" from the banks of Dnipro river, which if confirmed would be the first meaningful advance by Kyiv's forces months into a disappointing counteroffensive.

Indian rescuers are considering opening a vertical shaft to free 41 men trapped in a collapsed tunnel after drilling at the site was paused over fears of further cave-ins and as efforts stretched into a second week.