Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, Africa's oldest leader at 89, began a new five-year term on Thursday by calling the West "vile" for questioning his re-election and vowing to press ahead with nationalist economic policies.

Suspected Islamist militants killed at least 24 Egyptian policemen on Monday in the Sinai peninsula, where attacks on security forces have multiplied since the army overthrew President Mohamed Mursi on July 3.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has sacked his attorney general after the chief law officer held an unsanctioned meeting with Taliban peace negotiators in the United Arab Emirates, a senior Afghan official and a legislator told Reuters on Monday.

More New Zealand milk products sold to China have been banned after elevated levels of nitrates were found, raising further concerns over quality and testing in the world's largest dairy exporter in the wake of a contamination scare earlier this

Thousands of Syrian refugees poured into the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq on Thursday, taking advantage of a new bridge along the largely closed border, the United Nations said on Friday.

South Korea said on Friday that at least one bid came in under budget for its 8.3 trillion Korean won ($7.42 billion) purchase of 60 next generation fighter jets, the country's biggest-ever defense import program to replace its ageing fleet.

The Egyptian military deployed around vital installations in Cairo, state media reported, before "Friday of Anger" protests called by backers of deposed President Mohamed Mursi.

Japan's prime minister sent an offering to a shrine for war dead on Thursday, the anniversary of Japan's World War Two defeat, while cabinet members visited it in person, drawing harsh complaints from China and South Korea, and putting at ris

At least 33 Iraqis were killed and scores wounded on Thursday as a wave of bomb attacks hit the capital Baghdad, police sources said.

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood called on followers to march in protest in Cairo on Thursday, after at least 421 people were killed in a security crackdown on the Islamist movement that has left the most populous Arab nation polarized and in turmoil.

Afghanistan's future security will remain dependent on international troops for many years after most foreign combat forces leave by the end of 2014, the U.S. commander of the NATO-led force in the South Asian country said.

A typhoon struck the south coast of China on Wednesday, forcing airlines to cancel flights and halting stock exchange trading in the financial center of Hong Kong after leaving a trail of destruction in the Philippines.

Egyptian security forces killed at least 30 people on Wednesday when they cleared a camp of Cairo protesters who were demanding the reinstatement of deposed President Mohamed Mursi, his Muslim Brotherhood movement said.

Russia wants a Syria peace conference to be held as soon as possible but it is unlikely to go ahead before October because there is a busy diplomatic schedule before then, a Russian diplomat said on Tuesday.

Taliban fighters have kidnapped a female parliamentarian who was travelling by car through Afghanistan's central Ghazni province with her children, a local police commander said on Tuesday, the latest in a string of high-profile, violent attacks

Israel shot down a rocket aimed at its southern resort city of Eilat early on Tuesday, blowing it up in mid air near the border with Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, a military official said.

Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for a series of bombings in Iraq which killed dozens of people during a Muslim holiday and warned the government to stop arresting suspected militants or face more violence.

President Hassan Rouhani said on Monday he had chosen a cabinet to overcome Iran's economic crisis and diplomatic isolation as parliament began debating whether to approve his proposed ministers.

Supporters of deposed President Mohamed Mursi urged Egyptians to take to the streets on Monday to thwart any police crackdown on two Cairo protest camps that Islamists have manned for weeks.

Two Pakistani soldiers were wounded in an exchange of fire with Indian troops along the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir in the latest flare-up of tensions between the two nuclear-armed neighbors, officials on both sides said Wednesday.

Egypt must release jailed Muslim Brotherhood leaders to help end political turmoil following the overthrow of Islamist President Mohamed Mursi, Qatar's foreign minister said as international mediation efforts to avert more bloodshed appeared to b

Sixty-two rebel fighters were killed in a Syrian army ambush at dawn on Wednesday near the town of Adra, east of Damascus, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group opposed to President Bashar al-Assad, said.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin will meet Iran's newly elected president in Tehran next month to discuss restarting talks on the Islamic Republic's nuclear program, Russian and Iranian media reports said on Wednesday.

At least 28 people were killed and dozens wounded in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta on Sunday when a suicide bomber attacked a largely Shi'ite Muslim neighborhood, police said.

An elite team of 19 firemen were killed on Sunday in one of deadliest U.S. firefighting disasters in decades as flames raced through dry brush and grass in central Arizona, destroying scores of homes and forcing the evacuation of two towns.

The United States increased pressure on Russia on Monday to hand over Edward Snowden, the American charged with disclosing secret U.S. surveillance programs, and said it believed he was still in Moscow.

Saudi Arabia is to change the start of its two-day weekend from Thursday to Friday, official sources say.

Israel carried out air strikes in the Gaza Strip on Monday in response to Palestinian militant rocket fire that broke weeks of relative calm along the frontier.

The White House on Monday said it expects the Russian government to "look at all options available" to expel former government contractor Edward Snowden back to the United States to face espionage charges.

The operator of the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant said it had found another leak of contaminated water on Wednesday, piling pressure on the utility to curb the problem as it seeks permission to release water to the sea.