AFP news

Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been trying to mediate an agreement between Israel and Hamas for months, but a flurry of diplomacy in recent days appeared to suggest a new push towards halting the fighting.

The announcement is the latest twist in a bidding war which last week saw US music group Concord ramp up its offer to beyond Blackstone's previous bid for Hipgnosis, whose catalogue includes Justin Bieber, Shakira and Neil Young.

The tech billionaire arrived on Sunday for his second trip to China in less than a year, meeting top officials including Premier Li Qiang as he worked to boost his electric car company's fortunes in the face of intense competition from local challengers such as BYD.

The visit to France, which will be followed by trips to Serbia and Hungary, marks the Chinese leader's first European tour since the coronavirus pandemic.

Blinken was starting his seventh visit to the Middle East since the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel, which has responded with a relentless military campaign in the Gaza Strip that has brought growing public pressure for a ceasefire.

The 75-year-old actor, who has made more than 200 films and television series, was charged with rape in 2020 and was forced to put his career on hold last autumn as allegations of sexual harassment and assault mounted against him.

The disaster raises the total death toll over the March-May wet season in Kenya to more than 120 as heavier than usual rainfall pounds East Africa, compounded by the El Nino weather pattern.

A former Rugby Sevens international, Ombachi reinvented himself to become a social media star with a global fanbase in just a few years.

The West has viewed Russia and China with increased anxiety over the past two years as they boost military co-operation and seek to expand their global influence.

Tehran launched its first direct military assault on Israeli territory nearly two weeks after an April 1 air strike -- widely blamed on Israel -- that killed seven members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Damascus.

The historic case -- the last in the court's current term -- has far-reaching implications for executive power and the 77-year-old Trump's multiple legal entanglements as he seeks the White House again.

The overnight success of OpenAI's ChatGPT thrust generative AI as Silicon Valley's latest tech revolution, lifting Microsoft, OpenAI's main backer, to become the world's most valuable company.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is widely expected to win a third term in the election, which concludes in early June.

US lawmakers set the nine-month deadline on national security grounds, alleging that TikTok can be used by the Chinese government for espionage and propaganda as long as it is owned by ByteDance.

Police have carried out large-scale arrests in universities across the country, at times using chemical irritants and tasers to disperse protests over Israel's war with Hamas.

She's best known as the logo of Dogecoin, but to Atsuko Sato, Kabosu is the elderly former rescue puppy who accompanies her every day to work at a kindergarten.

The snub came one day after BHP formally announced its colossal bid, which aims to create the world's biggest-listed copper producer and reshape the global mining sector.

Thousands of car lovers and company representatives descended on Beijing this week for the Auto China show -- a chance for industry giants to show off new designs and cutting edge technologies aimed at getting ahead in the fiercely competitive sector.

Blinken, in China for the second time in less than a year, pointed to improvements in the relationship but urged greater action from Beijing on areas including curbing support for Russia.

Both sides have stepped up attacks this week, with Hezbollah increasing rocket fire and Israel saying it had carried out "offensive action" across southern Lebanon.

The government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is seeking to strike a delicate balancing act between Russia and Iran, which have propped up it up during 13 years of civil war and helped it reclaim lost territory.

Darktrace chief executive Poppy Gustafsson said the group's "technology has never been more relevant in a world increasingly threatened by AI-powered cyberattacks".

The company joins Facebook, TikTok, X, YouTube in a list of 23 "very large online platforms", which have more than 45 million monthly active users in the European Union.

The effort comes alongside preparations for a military push against Hamas militants in southern Gaza's Rafah, and with spillover from the Gaza war leading to stepped-up exchanges of fire over Israel's northern border with Lebanon.

As weapons and ammunition are rushed to the country, other issues such as manpower shortages in Kyiv's struggling military have come to the fore.

The company founded by Mark Zuckerberg said that net profit in the January to March period rose to $12.4 billion with total revenue, mainly from selling ads, up an impressive 27 percent, at $36.5 billion.

Blinken is expected to address a range of thorny issues including Chinese support for Russia and its treatment of Taiwan, with China likely to raise trade concerns such as new US action against popular social media app TikTok.

Police intervened as dozens of students gathered on a central Paris campus of the prestigious Sciences Po university on Wednesday evening, management said.

Pyongyang views unsanctioned border crossings as a serious crime and is believed to hand brutal punishments to transgressors.