AFP news

Four memorials to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda of more than 800,000 people, mainly Tutsi, were added to UNESCO's World Heritage list on Wednesday, the UN cultural body said.

Italy's prime minister on Wednesday urged the United Nations to launch a "global war without mercy" against migrant smugglers, after a surge of arrivals on the island of Lampedusa.

Poland said Wednesday it will no longer arm Ukraine and instead focus on its own defense, as the two allies clashed at a key moment in Kyiv's fightback against invasion by Russia.

French Foreign Minister Catherina Colonna said Wednesday that Poland's decision to ban Ukrainian grain imports was unjustified, amid rising tensions between the two eastern European countries over the dispute.

Saudi Arabia and Israel voiced optimism Wednesday that they were moving closer to a historic normalization of ties as Iran -- their common foe -- accused the kingdom of betraying the Palestinians through the US-led effort.

Nearly 70 countries at the United Nations on Wednesday signed a first-ever treaty on protecting the international high seas, raising hopes that it will come into force soon and protect threatened ecosystems vital to the planet.

US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried to smooth over tensions at talks Wednesday, hailing "unbreakable" ties despite Biden's concerns over the state of Israeli democracy.

Archaeologists said on Wednesday they have unearthed the oldest wooden structure ever discovered, dating from nearly half a million years ago, which suggests that our ancestors may have been more advanced than previously thought.

Vanessa Uwase had little chance of survival when her mother was murdered during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

The United States on Wednesday announced $225 million in investments to support emerging democracies in the face of a rise in autocracies around the world.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame has said for the first time that he plans to run for a fourth term in elections due to be held next year.

"Please let them not kill us, let them not kill us." "I just knew that these guys are here to kill us... that realisation was so heavy," recalled a sobbing Awat, now 33.

The son of Ali Bongo Ondimba and several allies of the ousted Gabon president have been charged with high treason and corruption and placed in custody, the state prosecutor told AFP Wednesday.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is set Wednesday to host a climate meeting marred at its outset by the absence of speakers from the world's top two emitters, China and the United States.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Tuesday he was willing to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, seeking a diplomatic path as tensions soar over Pyongyang's weapons programs.

Muslim leaders addressing the United Nations on Tuesday berated the West over burnings of the Koran, denouncing the acts protected as free speech as discriminatory.

The UN Security Council on Tuesday scheduled an urgent meeting as France and the United States led efforts to stop a military operation by Azerbaijan in the ethnic Armenian enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Researchers at Google DeepMind, the tech giant's artificial intelligence arm, on Tuesday introduced a tool that predicts whether genetic mutations are likely to cause harm, a breakthrough that could help research into rare diseases.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Tuesday denounced the billions of dollars spent on war instead of development as he renewed his call for diplomacy in Ukraine.

The International Criminal Court said Tuesday it had been affected by what it called "anomalous activity" regarding its IT systems and that it was currently responding to this "cybersecurity incident."

Climate change made torrential rains that triggered deadly flooding in Libya up to 50 times more likely, new research said Tuesday, noting that conflict and poor dam maintenance turned extreme weather into a humanitarian disaster.

Iraq's President Abdel Latif Rashid condemned on Tuesday "repeated Turkish attacks", a day after a drone strike on a northern airfield killed three Kurdish counterterrorism officers.

In a Libyan hospital ward, trauma and grief mix with disbelief and anger among the survivors of the flood disaster that killed untold thousands in the devastated city of Derna.

Elon Musk has suggested charging all users of his social media platform X, which would be the biggest shake-up since he took over the site then known as Twitter last October, but experts say he might struggle to get users on board.

Foreign business confidence in China has reached its lowest in years, US and European enterprise lobbies warned Tuesday, as slowing growth and geopolitical tensions hit investment prospects.

The OECD raised its global economic outlook for 2023 on Tuesday but cut the growth forecast for next year as "painful" interest-rate hikes aimed at curbing inflation take their toll.

Drones attacked the western Ukrainian city of Lviv early Tuesday killing one person and destroying three warehouses, officials said.

The European Commission's digital chief said Tuesday that murky Chinese laws were fuelling concerns among foreign firms in the country, following discussions with Beijing officials about critical areas such as AI and data governance.

A Sudanese activist on Monday blasted world leaders for excluding young people from key decisions affecting the future of the planet and urged them to step up the fight against climate change and poverty.