A Malaysian judge will Thursday deliver a key ruling in the trial of two women accused of the assassination of the half-brother of North Korea's leader, with their families insisting they are innocent and should be set free.

A major Davis Cup revamp that would condense the annual global tournament into an 18-team, week-long event will be voted upon Thursday with major tennis leaders divided over the proposal.

China will send a top negotiator to the United States in late August to resume trade talks, the commerce ministry said Thursday, the first public meeting on the subject in weeks as the trade conflict intensifies.

US President Donald Trump on Wednesday revoked the security clearance of former Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan, and warned several other prominent critics they too risk being blacklisted.

A state of emergency has been declared in Florida as the worst red tide in a decade blackens the ocean water, killing dolphins, sea turtles and fish at a relentless pace.

A Malaysian judge will Thursday deliver a key ruling in the trial of two women accused of the assassination of the half-brother of North Korea's leader, with their families optimistic they will be cleared.

Italy's government on Wednesday blamed the firm that operated the collapsed Genoa bridge for the disaster in which at least 39 people died, as it announced a state of emergency in the region.

Turkey hiked Wednesday tariffs on imports of several key US products in retaliation for American sanctions against Ankara, as a bitter dispute between the two allies that has battered the Turkish lira showed no sign of ending.

British police on Wednesday obtained more time to question a man arrested outside the Houses of Parliament for attempted murder and suspected terrorism after a car ploughed into cyclists before crashing into protective barriers.

The Aquarius rescue ship arrived in Malta on Wednesday after EU countries thrashed out a deal to take in the 141 migrants onboard, defusing another diplomatic standoff in the Mediterranean.

Israel reopened its only goods crossing with the Gaza Strip on Wednesday after closing it to most deliveries on July 9 over months of border tensions, as relative calm returned and truce talks progressed.

An Istanbul court on Wednesday ordered the release of Amnesty International's Turkey chair who has spent more than a year in jail over alleged links to a 2016 failed coup, the rights group said.

The number of days marked by potentially destructive ocean heatwaves has doubled in 35 years, and will multiply another five-fold at current rates of climate change, scientists warned Wednesday.

At least 22 children drowned on their way to school when their boat capsized in swollen waters of the Nile river north of the Sudanese capital on Wednesday, official media said.

At least 37 people, the majority of them students, were killed when a suicide blast ripped through a school in a Shiite area of Kabul Wednesday, officials said, the latest assault on Afghanistan's war-weary capital.

At least 22 Sudanese children drowned on Wednesday when their boat sank in the Nile while they were on their way to school, official media said.

At least 25 people, many believed to be students, were killed when a suicide blast ripped through a school in a Shiite area of Kabul Wednesday, officials said, the latest assault on Afghanistan's war-weary capital.

From the southern border with Guatemala to the northern border with the United States, AFP spent 24 hours traveling with migrants who are crossing Mexico to chase their American dreams.

At least 25 people were killed when a suicide attacker struck an education centre in a minority Shiite area of western Kabul Wednesday, officials said, the latest assault in Afghanistan's war-weary capital.

Only weeks ago it would have seemed fanciful to draw a link between the fate of an American pastor in Turkey, a crisis between two NATO allies and turmoil on global financial markets.

Afghan forces appeared to have finally pushed Taliban fighters from the strategic city of Ghazni on Wednesday, as shopkeepers and residents warily returned to the streets after days of intense ground fighting and US airstrikes.

India will send a manned mission to space by 2022 and introduce health insurance for half a billion of its citizens, Prime Minister Narendra Modi pledged Wednesday in a keynote speech ahead of an expected election campaign.

The Aquarius was due to dock in Malta on Wednesday after EU countries thrashed out a deal to take in the 141 migrants onboard the rescue ship, which had yet again become stranded in the Mediterranean.

Two women accused of assassinating the half-brother of North Korea's leader in a brazen hit that shocked the world face a key court ruling Thursday, with their families hopeful they will be acquitted and return home.

Afghan forces appeared to have finally pushed Taliban fighters from the strategic city of Ghazni on Wednesday, as shopkeepers and residents warily returned to the streets after days of intense ground fighting and US airstrikes.

Players and coaches traipse before the Chinese Football Association (CFA) like naughty school children to plead their innocence, then await their fate. It is rarely good news.

Turkey is hiking tariffs on imports of certain US products in response to American sanctions on Ankara that caused the value of the lira to plunge, a decree published Wednesday said.

The first reunions in years of families divided by the Korean War evoke bittersweet memories for Kim Jong-gyu, whose few hours with her brother in 2014 -– under the watchful eyes of the North's agents -– were probably their last ever together.

Ajla Nizic did not know what cancer was when she was diagnosed with it at age four.

First came the war, which developed into a brutal, bloody tussle between militias who abused civilians or killed them.

With hotels facing mass cancellations, Iraqis in the holy city of Najaf are being hit hard by US sanctions on neighbouring Iran, which have forced cash-strapped pilgrims to stay home.

A cholera epidemic in the Democratic Republic of Congo has killed 127 people since February, while a further 22 have died in Niger, officials said on Wednesday.

The number of days marked by potentially destructive ocean heatwaves has doubled in 35 years, and will multiply another five-fold at current rates of climate change, scientists warned Wednesday.

Spirits company Constellation Brands announced Wednesday it will significantly boost its investment in Canada's Canopy Growth in a big bet on the growth of cannabis-based products.

Austria has rejected the asylum application of an Afghan claiming to be gay because he did not "act" or "dress" like a homosexual, according to a media report.

The Rohingya had no time to consider what to take as Myanmar forces drove the Muslim minority into Bangladesh in a crackdown a year ago likened by the UN to ethnic cleansing.

The prime minister of Tonga has challenged fellow Pacific leaders to a year-long weight-loss competition to combat soaring obesity levels in the region.

Manmade global warming and a natural surge in Earth's surface temperature will join forces to make the next five years exceptionally hot, according to a study published Tuesday.

Raging conflict is hampering efforts to rein in an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the WHO chief warned Tuesday, urging a ceasefire to stop the virus from transmitting freely.

The collapse of the Turkish lira has caused trauma as Turks see their purchasing power slashed, but bargain-hunting foreign tourists visiting the country at the peak of the summer season are cashing in on a currency windfall.

Bin bags at the ready, "long-distance activist" Mohamed Oussama Houij moves methodically along a beach in Tunisia's Mediterranean town of Nabeul, scooping up all kinds of trash as he goes along.

A two-week jungle trek followed by a sheer climb up avalanche-prone slopes to a jagged ridge of icy pinnacles awaits three Myanmar mountaineers planning to take on Hkakabo Razi, a peak so treacherous it has been conquered only once.

In a dusty Baghdad dance studio, conductor Mohammed Amin Ezzat tries to fire up the musicians of Iraq's National Symphony Orchestra, whose enthusiasm has been dampened by eight months without pay.

Austria's capital Vienna has beaten Melbourne to be ranked the "world's most liveable city" in a new annual survey released Monday, ending the southern Australian city's seven-year reign.

Billionaire former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg on Tuesday gave a trio of anti-tobacco crusaders $20 million to up their game against an industry aggressively marketing its deadly wares worldwide, especially in developing countries.

It's barely 6:00 am and Alfred is already busy milking cows. But when his chores on the farm are done, he won't be going home -- he'll be returning to his prison cell.

In the tiny maternity ward in Murrupelane, two 16-year-old mothers breast-feed their babies, both born that morning.

Georgia's overly punitive drug laws cause severe and unjustifiable harm, Human Rights Watch said Monday, calling on the government to decriminalise personal use and possession of drugs.

Britain's Ken Loach, Canada's David Cronenberg and dozens of other filmmakers called Monday on Russia to free Ukrainian director Oleg Sentsov, who has been on hunger strike for nearly three months in a Siberian jail.

From hand-held copters that zoom around the living room to high-speed craft offering the sensation of flying over the countryside, drones have won over legions of fans -- and are proving a growing challenge for security authorities.

They may feel aggrieved at not obtaining an official seal of approval, but traditional Romanian dressmakers are riding a wave of demand for their folk designs after a top fashion house inadvertently showcased their craft.

After his wheat crop failed and wells dried up, Ghulam Abbas sold his animals and joined thousands of other farmers migrating to cities as Afghanistan's worst drought in living memory ravages the war-torn country.

Standing outside their yellow hut on a ridge 3,200 metres (10,500 feet) above sea level, two French gendarmes peer through binoculars at a group of foreign climbers making their way across a scree-littered stretch on what has become one of the deadliest routes to the top of Mont Blanc.

Monsanto's German owners insisted Saturday that the weed killer Roundup was "safe," rejecting a California jury's decision to order the chemical giant to pay nearly $290 million for failing to warn a dying groundskeeper that the product might cause cancer.

The women's draw took a beating on Wednesday in Cincinnati, where world number one Simona Halep's was still battling when rain halted play.

A major Davis Cup revamp that would condense the annual global tournament into an 18-team, week-long event will be voted upon Thursday with major tennis leaders divided over the proposal.

Lexi Thompson defends her LPGA Indianapolis title this week after more than a month away from the game to give herself a mental, emotional and physical break.

Saul Niguez and Koke scored in extra time as Atletico Madrid fought back to beat city rivals Real Madrid 4-2 and win the UEFA Super Cup in Tallinn on Wednesday, as Julen Lopetegui got off to a losing start with the European champions.

Cristiano Ronaldo's move to Juventus has injected an air of expectation into the Italian championship not felt in decades while spending has smashed the one billion euro mark with more than a day still to go before the transfer window closes.

Saul Niguez and Koke scored in extra time as Atletico Madrid fought back to beat city rivals Real Madrid 4-2 and win the UEFA Super Cup in Tallinn on Wednesday, as Julen Lopetegui got off to a losing start with the European champions.

Rickie Fowler says he'll skip next week's Northern Trust, first event of the US PGA Tour's FedEx Cup playoffs, as he recovers from injury, but vows to be "more than ready" for the Ryder Cup.

Two-time Grand Slam champion Garbine Muguruza lost her opening match of the North American hardcourt season on Wednesday, falling 2-6, 6-4, 6-4 to Lesia Tsurenko in Cincinnati.

Ajit Wadekar, the man who led India to their first series triumphs in England and the West Indies, died on Wednesday at the age of 77, the Press Trust of India reported.

British tennis chiefs said Wednesday they will vote against the controversial reforms planned for the Davis Cup, claiming the radical changes could see fewer players taking part and a waning of fan interest.

With Major League soccer still buzzing over Wayne Rooney's late-game exploits in DC United's Sunday win over Orlando, the former England star said Tuesday he's not in North America on holiday.

Schalke 04 are the latest big-name Bundesliga club chasing Bayern Munich midfielder Sebastian Rudy, who has also been linked to RB Leipzig, it was confirmed Wednesday.

Barcelona star Lionel Messi said the club will "do everything possible" this season to prise the Champions League trophy away from arch rivals Real Madrid, who have won the competition each of the past three years.

England rugby player Danny Cipriani has been charged with assaulting police during an incident at a nightclub on the island of Jersey early Wednesday, police and Gloucester Rugby Club said.

All Blacks lock Sam Whitelock will play his milestone 100th Test on Saturday as New Zealand stick with their strongest possible unit to play a confident Australia in Sydney.

Chelsea and Nigeria winger Victor Moses, who played in the 2014 and 2018 World Cups, announced his retirement from international football on Wednesday, saying he wants to develop his club career.

Facebook will broadcast Champions League matches in Latin America through 2021, UEFA announced Wednesday, in the latest bid by online platforms to tap into the lucrative live sports market.

A joint Korean women's basketball team marked their Asian Games debut Wednesday by pulverising hosts Indonesia 108-40, roared on by giddy fans waving unified Korean flags.

Manchester City midfielder Kevin de Bruyne could face a spell on the sidelines after injuring his right knee in training, the Premier League champions said Wednesday.

Manchester City midfielder Kevin de Bruyne could face a spell on the sidelines after injuring his right knee in training, the Premier League champions said Wednesday.

Taco van der Hoorn launched a late break to burst free of his fellow escapees and win Wednesday's third stage of the BinckBank Tour in Antwerp.

Billionaire tobacco tycoon Michael Bambang Hartono may not be the oldest competitor at the Asian Games, but he is the richest.

The torch for the 18th Asian Games reached Indonesia's capital Jakarta Wednesday, ending a month-long journey across the Southeast Asian archipelago nation.

Ben Curran is to play county cricket for Northamptonshire, the club his late father Kevin gave eight years of his career to, as he signed a two-year contract on Wednesday.

Former French Rugby Federation president Pierre Camou died on Wednesday aged 72 after a long illness, the federation announced.

Croatia goalkeeper Danijel Subasic announced his international retirement on Wednesday one month after starring in the World Cup final.

Manchester City don't need to win the Champions League to be judged a success, claims Belgian star Kevin de Bruyne in an interview with the BBC.

Rich, dashing man sweeps sweet young girl off her feet. It's the fantasy to launch a thousand love stories, but Hollywood's latest rom-com oozes more than sentimental escapism.

The Detroit church once led by Aretha Franklin's father -- and where she first tested her remarkable voice -- filled with music once again Wednesday as dozens gathered for a prayer vigil for the ailing "Queen of Soul."

A US man accused of taking a pickaxe to President Donald Trump's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame justified his actions on Wednesday as he pleaded not guilty to a felony vandalism charge.

Madonna, the Queen of Pop, appears to have travelled to the former imperial city of Marrakech in western Morocco to celebrate her 60th birthday on Thursday.

Only weeks ago it would have seemed fanciful to draw a link between the fate of an American pastor in Turkey, a crisis between two NATO allies and turmoil on global financial markets.

Legendary Soviet children's writer and creator of the USSR's most popular cartoon characters Eduard Uspensky died in his home in the Moscow suburbs at the age of 80 late on Tuesday.

China appears to have halted approvals of new online game licences, with reports Wednesday that a government shake-up was causing paralysis in the world's biggest gaming market.

Isaac Hou is one of Taipei's best-known street artists, famous for his mesmerising acrobatics using a giant spinning hoop.

Actor Ethan Peck -- whose grandfather was Hollywood legend Gregory Peck -- has been cast as iconic half-Vulcan science officer Spock in CBS's "Star Trek: Discovery."

Ugandan musician and opposition lawmaker Robert Kyagulanyi, better known as Bobi Wine, was arrested Tuesday after an incident in which security officers shot his driver dead, a police spokesman said.

In a dusty Baghdad dance studio, conductor Mohammed Amin Ezzat tries to fire up the musicians of Iraq's National Symphony Orchestra, whose enthusiasm has been dampened by eight months without pay.

One of China's biggest and wealthiest film stars, actress Fan Bingbing, has disappeared from public view as authorities probe alleged tax evasion by entertainers, sparking growing fan speculation over her fate.

Music legend Aretha Franklin is gravely ill and reportedly receiving hospice care, friends of the singer said Monday, as prayers and well wishes poured in for the Grammy-winning "Queen of Soul."

"Fortnite" star Tyler "Ninja" Blevins on Monday defended not streaming video game play with women, saying it was to guard against marriage-wrecking rumors.

Billionaire former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg on Tuesday gave a trio of anti-tobacco crusaders $20 million to up their game against an industry aggressively marketing its deadly wares worldwide, especially in developing countries.

The North American box office was under attack from shark thriller "The Meg" over the weekend, industry data showed Monday, as it more than doubled the earnings of its closest competitor to claim top spot.

Netflix chief financial officer David Wells on Monday announced plans to hand his job off to a successor and then focus on philanthropy.

Fifty years after the Beatles came to India, the bungalows where the Fab Four lived, the post office where John Lennon sent Yoko Ono postcards and the giggling guru's house are all ruins.

Singer Aretha Franklin, a multiple Grammy award-winner star whose legacy stretches back decades, is gravely ill and surrounded by relatives, a reporter and family friend wrote on his website Monday.

Britain's Ken Loach, Canada's David Cronenberg and dozens of other filmmakers called Monday on Russia to free Ukrainian director Oleg Sentsov, who has been on hunger strike for nearly three months in a Siberian jail.

Usain Bolt might be a superstar athlete but the fastest man ever won't be getting special treatment when he arrives in Australia in his bid to become a professional footballer.

The North American box office was under attack from sci-fi horror film 'The Meg' this weekend, industry estimates showed Sunday, as it more than doubled the earnings of its closest competitor to claim the top spot.

The lost resting place of British poet and artist William Blake was finally marked Sunday with a gravestone, almost 200 years after he died.

Tributes poured in Sunday for Nobel prize-winning author V.S. Naipaul, who has died aged 85, including from many of those who clashed with him.

British author V.S. Naipaul, a famously outspoken Nobel laureate who wrote on the traumas of post-colonial change, has died at the age of 85.

Whether by brazenly injecting sex in the public sphere, adopting gay subculture for mainstream audiences or becoming the top-selling female musician of all time, Madonna has asserted an incalculable influence.

The final of this year's edition of Mr Gay Europe took place on Saturday in the western city of Poznan in Poland, a conservative and devout Catholic country where many do not accept homosexuality.

First came the war, which developed into a brutal, bloody tussle between militias who abused civilians or killed them.

A state of emergency has been declared in Florida as the worst red tide in a decade blackens the ocean water, killing dolphins, sea turtles and fish at a relentless pace.

A new class of pesticides positioned to replace neonicotinoids may be just as harmful to crop-pollinating bees, researchers cautioned Wednesday.

The flood toll in India's southern tourist hotspot of Kerala jumped to 67 after another 25 deaths were reported Wednesday, with more than 50,000 people seeking shelter in relief camps, a state official told AFP.

British Columbia declared a province-wide state of emergency Wednesday as Canada's military joined firefighters in trying to douse 556 wildfires burning across the craggy region.

Canada announced plans Wednesday to phase out two pesticides widely applied to canola, corn and soybean crops in this country and linked to bee and now also aquatic insect deaths.

The number of days marked by potentially destructive ocean heatwaves has doubled in 35 years, and will multiply another five-fold at current rates of climate change, scientists warned Wednesday.

Manmade global warming and a natural surge in Earth's surface temperature will join forces to make the next five years exceptionally hot, according to a study published Tuesday.

Botanists have discovered a new species of orchid in Peru's central Amazonian rainforest, the country's national parks service announced Tuesday.

Bin bags at the ready, "long-distance activist" Mohamed Oussama Houij moves methodically along a beach in Tunisia's Mediterranean town of Nabeul, scooping up all kinds of trash as he goes along.

Burundi's president, Pierre Nkurunziza, has issued a decree banning the use of plastic bags in the small central African country within the next 18 months.

New Caledonia agreed Tuesday to tougher protections around a huge swathe of some of the world's last near-pristine coral reefs, in a move conservationists hailed as a major breakthrough.

Tech magnate Elon Musk's SpaceX vowed Monday to send its first astronauts into orbit on schedule next year -- part of a drive to restore America's dominance of the space race.

Scientists on Monday unveiled a previously unknown species of giant pterosaur, the first creatures with a backbone to fly under their own power.

France plans to introduce a penalty system next year that would increase the costs of consumer goods with packaging made of non-recycled plastic, part of a pledge to use only recycled plastic nationwide by 2025, an environment ministry official said Sunday.

France plans to introduce a penalty system next year that would increase the costs of consumer goods with packaging made of non-recycled plastic, part of a pledge to use only recycled plastic nationwide by 2025, an environment ministry official said Sunday.

NASA on Sunday blasted off its first-ever spaceship to explore the Sun, the $1.5 billion Parker Solar Probe, on a strategic mission to protect the Earth by unveiling the mysteries of dangerous solar storms.

The leaders of the five states bordering the resource-rich Caspian Sea signed a landmark deal Sunday on the legal status of the inland sea which boasts a wealth of oil and gas reserves and sturgeon.

After his wheat crop failed and wells dried up, Ghulam Abbas sold his animals and joined thousands of other farmers migrating to cities as Afghanistan's worst drought in living memory ravages the war-torn country.

Standing outside their yellow hut on a ridge 3,200 metres (10,500 feet) above sea level, two French gendarmes peer through binoculars at a group of foreign climbers making their way across a scree-littered stretch on what has become one of the deadliest routes to the top of Mont Blanc.

Monsanto's German owners insisted Saturday that the weed killer Roundup was "safe," rejecting a California jury's decision to order the chemical giant to pay nearly $290 million for failing to warn a dying groundskeeper that the product might cause cancer.

Flash floods in Kerala have killed 37 people and displaced around 36,000, Indian officials said Saturday, after heavy monsoons led to landslides and overflowing reservoirs across the southern state.

Glyphosate, the world's most widely used herbicide and the active ingredient in Monsanto's weedkiller Roundup, is the subject of fierce controversy all across the globe and is classified by the World Health Organization as "probably" being carcinogenic.

NASA postponed until Sunday the launch of the first ever spacecraft to fly directly toward the Sun on a mission to plunge into our star's sizzling atmosphere and unlock its mysteries.

Authorities battling massive wildfires in large swathes of California issued mandatory evacuation orders and health warnings Friday over the worsening air quality as the flames grew ever closer to populated areas.

Six crows specially trained to pick up cigarette ends and rubbish will be put to work next week at a French historical theme park, its president said on Friday.

NASA counted down Friday to the launch of a $1.5 billion spacecraft that aims to plunge into the Sun's sizzling atmosphere and become humanity's first mission to explore a star.