POLITICS & POLICY

At the foot of the Simandou mountains in southeast Guinea's lush tropical forest, thousands of workers, trucks and excavators are digging up the hills.

President Emmanuel Macron was on Tuesday under pressure even from allies to find a rapid solution to France's political deadlock, after his first prime minister and one-time ally urged him to resign for the sake of the country.

Israel marks the second anniversary of the October 7, 2023 attack on Tuesday, as Hamas and Israeli negotiators hold indirect talks to end the two-year war in Gaza under a US proposed peace plan.

Frenchwoman Gisele Pelicot, whose ex-husband recruited dozens of strangers online to sexually assault and rape her while drugged, arrived in court Monday for an appeal trial triggered by the bid of one man to overturn his conviction.

Delegations from Hamas, Israel and the United States are due to convene in Egypt for talks on Monday, with President Donald Trump urging negotiators to "move fast" to end the nearly two-year war in Gaza.

Gisele Pelicot, 72, who became an icon for women in a mass rape trial last year that resonated around the world, is to reluctantly break months of silence to face in court the one man in the case who still denies he raped her.

French President Emmanuel Macron named a new government on Sunday, putting together a team of largely familiar faces under Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu as he struggles to pull the country out of a political crisis.

Members of local committees in Syria began on Sunday selecting members of a transitional parliament, in a process criticised as undemocratic, with a third of the members appointed directly by interim leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.

Negotiators were converging on Cairo on Sunday ahead of talks aimed at ending nearly two years of war in Gaza, with Israel's leader expressing hope that the hostages still being held there would be released in a matter of days.

Georgia's ruling party won local elections Saturday and police fired tear gas and water cannons at anti-government protesters who tried to enter the presidential palace, as tens of thousands of people rallied to the opposition's call to save democracy.

The families of Israeli hostages held in Gaza on Saturday said it was "essential" to end the Gaza war immediately, as Israel bombarded the territory even after US President Donald Trump called on it to stop.

Sean Combs, once a music world powerhouse, took a deep breath. An outsider viewing the clip might have thought Combs was running for mayor.

A man who launched a car-ramming and stabbing attack on a British synagogue on Yom Kippur may have been inspired by Islamist extremism, police said on Friday, as emotions ran high after the atrocity.

Hundreds of thousands of people protested across Italy on Friday during a large-scale strike over the treatment of the Gaza aid flotilla and far-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's cautious stance on the conflict.

Years of criticism of an EU-backed migration pact between Italy and Libya are coming to a head as migrant rescuers say the Libyan coastguard has begun firing directly at them.

A Hamas official told AFP on Friday that the group still needed time to study a plan put forward by US President Donald Trump to end nearly two years of devastating war in Gaza.

Sean "Diddy" Combs will be sentenced Friday for his conviction on two prostitution-related counts, crimes prosecutors say deserve more than a decade behind bars as the music mogul seeks "mercy" and a swift release.

Indonesian families whose children were offered free school meals are joining non-profit groups calling for the flagship government programme to be suspended after thousands of students fell ill from the food.

President Vladimir Putin on Thursday condemned France's detention of a Russian-linked ship as "piracy", vowing a "significant" response to what he called European threats as tension flared.

Two people were killed on Thursday and four wounded when a man ploughed a car into a crowd outside a packed Manchester synagogue on a sombre Jewish holiday and then embarked on a stabbing spree, UK police said.

Days of violent clashes between anti-government protesters and police have gripped Pakistan's Kashmir on the border with India, with nine confirmed killed among scant news to emerge after an internet blackout.

British primatologist Jane Goodall, who transformed the study of chimpanzees and became one of the world's most revered wildlife advocates, has died at the age of 91, her institute announced Wednesday.

Israel issued a final warning Wednesday for people to flee Gaza's main city, as Hamas weighed US President Donald Trump's plan to end nearly two years of war in the Palestinian territory.

A Victor Osimhen penalty gave Galatasaray victory over Liverpool in the Champions League on Tuesday, while Chelsea edged out Jose Mourinho's Benfica and Kylian Mbappe hit a hat-trick for Real Madrid in Kazakhstan.

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday gave Hamas an ultimatum of "three or four days" to respond to his plan to end the war in Gaza, as the militant group reviewed the proposal backed by Israel.

Hamas had yet to respond Tuesday to Donald Trump on his plan for Gaza, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Israeli military would stay in most of the territory after he gave the US president his backing.

On a football field ringed by misty mountains, the air rang with fiery speeches as tribesmen protested a planned mega-dam -- India's latest move in its contest with China over Himalayan water.

Britain's interior minister proposed tough new rules on Monday for migrants seeking to settle in the UK, as the ruling Labour party sought to bolster its fight against the hard right at its annual conference.

Misinformation plagued the first rollout of a vaccine to protect Pakistani girls against cervical cancer, with parents slamming their doors on healthcare workers and some schools shutting for days over false claims it causes infertility.