AFP news

Over mountains, by air, and by sea, pilgrims have flocked to Port Moresby, the Papua New Guinea capital where Pope Francis landed on Friday on a landmark four-day visit.

China's years of splashing cash on big-ticket infrastructure projects in Africa may be over, analysts say, with Beijing seeking to shield itself from risky, indebted partners on the continent as it grapples with a slowing economy at home.

France's Top 14, with its seemingly bottomless resources, has always attracted the finest cuts of world rugby talent but the arrival of Owen Farrell, the epitome of English 'rosbif', at Racing 92 comes across as more substantial than most.

Movie critics and audiences don't always see eye-to-eye -- but rarely have they appeared as divided as they are over "Reagan," a highly flattering biopic of the Republican president released just months before another deeply polarized US election.

Taiwanese volunteers gathered around a large inflatable whale as they learned how to help beached sea mammals -- an increasingly common sight across the island.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on a rare visit to violence-ravaged Haiti on Thursday heard guarded optimism as he promised $45 million in aid, urged greater international support for a new security mission and sought concrete action toward elections.

One of Colombia's biggest left-wing guerrilla groups says peace talks are "blocked" over the government's failure to cancel warrants for the arrest of its leaders.

Republican White House candidate Donald Trump unveiled a plan Thursday to install billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk at the head of a government efficiency commission to eliminate "trillions" of dollars in wasteful spending.

German police shot dead a man who opened fire on them near the Israeli consulate in Munich on Thursday in what they treated as a foiled "terrorist attack" on the diplomatic mission.

French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday named the European Union's former Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier as new prime minister, counting on the veteran politician to end two months of political deadlock after snap elections.

The roots of war, its harrowing realities and aftermath are explored in a host of offerings at the Venice Film Festival this year, including a remarkable documentary going behind the lines with Russian soldiers.

A French woman whose husband has admitted to enlisting dozens of strangers to rape her while she was drugged told his trial on Thursday that police had saved her by uncovering the crimes.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Thursday pledged over $50 billion in financing for Africa over the next three years, promising to deepen cooperation in infrastructure and trade with the continent as he addressed Beijing's biggest summit since the pandemic.

Hiring in the US private sector markedly undershot analyst expectations in August, said payroll firm ADP on Thursday, as the labor market's health comes under scrutiny.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday he supported Kamala Harris in November's US presidential election, an apparent wry remark a day after the United States issued indictments accusing Moscow of vote interference.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday his main aim in Ukraine after 30 months of fighting was to capture the eastern Donbas area -- and claimed that Ukraine's Kursk counter-offensive had made that easier.

Around 24 million Algerians are poised to head to the polls on Saturday for a vote in which experts say incumbent President Abdelmadjid Tebboune faces no real risk to his rule as he seeks a second term.

Ugandan Olympian Rebecca Cheptegei died in Kenya on Thursday, four days after being set on fire by her boyfriend in an attack in her home.

A 14-year-old boy killed four people, including two students, and wounded nine more when he opened fire at a high school in the US state of Georgia on Wednesday, law enforcement said.

Elon Musk's woes are hardly limited to Brazil as he now risks possible EU sanctions in the coming months for allegedly breaking new content rules.

Greek barista Kyriakos Giannichronis has seen the headlines about his country's newly booming economy after years of recession -- but he does not feel the wealth.

New Zealand's Maori chiefs anointed a 27-year-old queen as their new monarch Thursday, a surprise choice hailed as a symbol of change for the country's Indigenous community.

Pope Francis warned Thursday against religion being used to stoke conflicts, in a declaration signed with a top Indonesian imam before he holds mass for tens of thousands in Jakarta.

Hamas on Thursday accused Benjamin Netanyahu of trying to "thwart" a Gaza truce deal, after the Israeli premier said the Palestinian militant group has "rejected everything" in negotiations.

Kamala Harris and Donald Trump returned to the US campaign trail Wednesday, with new polls showing the White House race remains on a knife-edge less than a week before their crucial first debate.

United States Steel warned Wednesday it could shut its headquarters and factories in Pennsylvania, a key swing state in the upcoming election, if a takeover by Japan's Nippon Steel is blocked.

Cathay Pacific plans to resume full operations by Saturday after replacing defective engine fuel lines on its Airbus A350 planes, the airline said Wednesday, a problem that forced it to cancel dozens of flights this week.

An investigator leading the probe into a French man accused of orchestrating multiple rapes of his wife told a court Wednesday of painstaking efforts to identify the perpetrators via the husband's detailed records of the assaults.

After sleeping overnight in a line of cars waiting for fuel, Nigerian taxi driver Oluwashina Ilesanmi had to calculate how much a sudden petrol price increase cut into his earnings.