POLITICS & POLICY

Lawsuits, scandals, armed troops and a knife-wielding attacker all failed to deter Lee Jae-myung's ascendancy from sweatshop worker to the cusp of South Korea's presidency.

A French court on Wednesday gave the maximum 20-year jail term to a surgeon who admitted sexually abusing hundreds of patients, most of them children, during more than two decades.

The Kremlin on Wednesday rebuffed a call by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for a three-way summit with Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin as Kyiv seeks to force Moscow to halt its three-year-long invasion.

A French court is to give its verdict Wednesday in the trial of a surgeon who admitted to sexually abusing hundreds of patients over more than two decades, in one of the country's largest child sex abuse cases.

The UN on Wednesday condemned a US-backed aid system in Gaza after 47 people were injured during a chaotic food distribution that saw shots fired by the Israeli military.

Alix Popham, one of hundreds of former rugby players to bring a lawsuit against the sport's authorities for head injuries, told AFP he wants his day in court so he can look in the face some of the officials "who are part of the reason why we are in the mess we are in."

King Charles III hailed Canada as "strong and free" as he delivered a major speech to open parliament in Ottawa against the backdrop of US President Donald Trump's threats to take over the country.

Thousands of Palestinians rushed into a new aid distribution centre run by a US-backed group in southern Gaza on Tuesday, AFP journalists reported, leading to chaotic scenes as Israel implemented a new distribution system.

The crowd, some with signature red hats bearing US President Donald Trump's name, cheered when the man on the stage asked if they were happy that America was becoming great again.

Russia said Tuesday that its massive aerial assaults on Ukraine in recent days were a "response" to escalating Ukrainian drone strikes on its own civilians, accusing Kyiv of trying to "disrupt" peace efforts.

Britain was in shock on Tuesday as at least four people in a serious condition were receiving hospital treatment after a car ploughed into a crowd celebrating Liverpool's Premier League football victory.

From his roof, Sidi Mohamed Lemine Sidiya scans the mediaeval town of Oualata, a treasure that is disappearing under the sands of the Mauritanian desert.

Several people were injured on Monday when a car ploughed into football fans celebrating Liverpool's Premier League title victory while police said a 53-year-old British man had been arrested.

Russia fired its biggest ever drone barrage on Ukraine, authorities said Monday, just hours after Donald Trump called Vladimir Putin "CRAZY" and warned Moscow risked new sanctions if it kept up its deadly bombardment.

A French surgeon who sexually abused hundreds of patients over two decades, most of them minors, said Monday he was asking for no "leniency" as his three-month trial nears a verdict.

Israeli police deployed near the walls of Jerusalem's Old City on Monday ahead of annual celebrations marking Israel's capture of east Jerusalem, held this year under the shadow of the war in Gaza.

Liverpool lifted the Premier League trophy at a jubilant Anfield as the curtain came down on the 2024/25 season on Sunday.

Palestinian rescuers said an Israeli strike at dawn on Monday killed 13 people at a Gaza City school, as Israel presses ahead with what it has described as a renewed push to destroy Hamas.

US President Donald Trump called his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin "crazy" on Sunday after Moscow launched a deadly barrage of drones against Ukraine, even as the warring countries completed a large-scale prisoner exchange.

Gaza's civil defence agency said Saturday that an Israeli strike in the southern city of Khan Yunis killed nine children of a pair of married doctors, with the Israeli army saying it was reviewing the reports.

Syrian authorities on Saturday announced an interior ministry restructuring that includes fighting cross-border drug and people smuggling as they seek to improve ties with Western nations that have lifted sanctions.

As the Cannes film festival hands out its prizes, AFP looks back at some of the highlights of a politically charged fortnight of screenings and celebrity sightings.

Stripped naked, beaten until she could no longer walk, sexually assaulted and covered in excrement: award-winning Ugandan activist Agather Atuhaire told AFP of the torture she suffered at the hands of security forces in Tanzania this week.

The United Nations chief said Friday that Palestinians were enduring "the cruelest phase" of the war in Gaza, where more than a dozen food trucks were looted following the partial easing of a lengthy Israeli blockade.

A French court on Friday convicted a gang of robbers who stole $10 million in jewellery from reality TV star Kim Kardashian in a Paris hotel in 2016, although they will not return to jail and the verdicts were more lenient than requested by the prosecution.

Iran's foreign minister described nuclear talks with the United States as "complicated", following the conclusion of a fifth round of discussions in Rome on Friday.

A French prosecutor on Friday requested the maximum 20-year sentence for a former surgeon who admitted to sexually abusing almost 300 patients, mostly children.

Ukraine and Russia began a major prisoner exchange Friday, which if completed would be the biggest swap since Moscow invaded more than three years ago.

Donald Trump's administration on Thursday revoked Harvard's ability to enroll foreign nationals, putting the future of thousands of students at risk and threatening the prestigious university with a huge financial blow.