AFP news

A Chinese aircraft carrier group sailed through the Taiwan Strait on Wednesday, Taiwan's defence minister said, a day after Beijing held a live-fire exercise near the self-ruled island.

Human-caused climate change worsened floods that have killed hundreds of people and displaced millions in Cameroon, Chad, Niger, Nigeria and Sudan this year, according to a study published on Wednesday.

Kamala Harris faces voters' questions at a live forum Wednesday in must-win Pennsylvania as the vice president and her rival Donald Trump battle for undecided voters in the closing stretch of an extremely close White House race.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday "now is the time" to end the conflict in Gaza, and urged Israel to avoid further escalation with Iran.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday touted the creation of a new "multipolar world order" at the BRICS summit, a gathering of world leaders he hopes will show that Western attempts to isolate Moscow over its Ukraine offensive have failed.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Wednesday played down allegations made by Donald Trump's team of "blatant foreign interference" by his Labour Party in the US election, saying it was normal for its volunteers to campaign.

The World Health Organization said Wednesday that "intense bombardment" and "escalating violence" in northern Gaza had forced it to postpone the final phase of a child polio vaccination drive.

With the summit, the biggest such meeting in Russia since it ordered troops into Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin is seeking to show Western attempts to isolate Moscow over the two-and-a-half-year offensive have failed.

China's Communist Party has never ruled the island, but it claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has said it will not renounce the use of force to bring it under its control.

Former SodaStream CEO Daniel Birnbaum told AFP Monday he had received around 100 calls after announcing on social media platform X that he would give $100,000 in cash or bitcoin to "anyone who delivers from Gaza a living Israeli prisoner".

Britain is urgently looking to reset its trading relationship with the European Union and sees international commerce as key to reviving UK growth, trade minister Douglas Alexander told AFP.

While Democratic candidate Kamala Harris's campaign has not commented on the contest, Josh Shapiro, the Democratic Governor of Pennsylvania, said on NBC's Meet the Press: "I think it's something that law enforcement should take a look at."

South Korea's spy agency said Friday that Pyongyang sent a "large-scale" troop deployment to help its ally, claiming that 1,500 special forces were already training in Russia's Far East and ready to head soon for the frontlines of the Ukraine war.

The future of the 2026 edition was thrown into doubt when the Australian state of Victoria, the original hosts, withdrew last year citing rising costs.

The iPhone maker remains popular among Chinese consumers but has ceded ground to domestic rivals in recent years as the Asian nation faces slowing economic growth and sluggish consumption.

A booming stock market in the world's fifth-largest economy has stoked an IPO frenzy over the last two years, with start-ups and established companies alike scooping up billions of dollars from investors.

Both campaigns are pumping hundreds of millions of dollars into a final push for any wavering, undecided voters who could tilt the balance in their favor, with polls consistently showing their candidates in a dead heat ahead of Election Day.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel Tuesday to push for a ceasefire in Gaza after his administration called for an end to the war in Lebanon "as soon as possible".

Among the 75 graphic novels is a one-of-a-kind copy of "Tintin in America", first published in 1932, which has an estimated value of 200,000 euros ($217,000).

The High Court in London will examine over several months whether BHP was partly liable for the 2015 collapse of a dam at a mining waste site in Brazil.

China's central bank on Monday said it had cut two key interest rates to historic lows, in the latest move by Beijing to boost sluggish spending and kickstart the world's second-largest economy.

Emergency services are still distributing food and water in the worst-affected parts of the state almost a month after Helene slammed into the southeastern United States, leaving more than 240 dead in its wake, according to an AFP tally.

Israel, which is besieging the war-devastated Palestinian territory, "is committed to 1,000 more medical evacuations within the next months to the European Union," Hans Kluge said in an interview with AFP.

About 1,500 North Korean special forces soldiers are already in Russia acclimatizing and likely to head to the front lines after, Seoul's spy agency said Friday, with additional troops set to depart soon, Pyongyang's first such deployment overseas.

Carrefour told AFP that an internal probe had not confirmed most allegations but was planning on conducting an external review.

US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, who was accused by Ankara of organising a failed 2016 coup, has died in exile in the United States aged 83, his movement and the Turkish government said Monday.

French drugmaker Sanofi's Monday confirmation that it plans to sell a controlling stake in its over-the-counter unit to a US investment fund sparked a new political backlash, stoked by fears the deal marks a loss of sovereignty over key medications.

Two dozen world leaders will meet in Russia next week for a summit of the BRICS group, an alliance of emerging economies that the Kremlin hopes will challenge Western "hegemony".

Israel began bombing Lebanese branches of an association accused of financing the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement, Lebanese state media reported late Sunday, a further escalation of Israel's nearly month-long war against the militants.