India today said its envoy in Beijing would not attend the opening and closing ceremonies of the Winter Olympics in China in protest against China for allowing its soldier, who was present in a standoff with Indian troops in Ladakh in 2020, to join the Olympic torch relay.

President Tayyip Erdogan will discuss tensions between Ukraine and Russia with his counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv on Thursday, after pitching Turkey as a mediator, and an official said he was not picking any sides in the crisis.

Melinda French Gates is no longer pledging to give the bulk of her wealth to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on February 2.

The United States will send nearly 3,000 extra troops to Poland and Romania to shield Eastern Europe from a potential spillover from the crisis over the massing of Russian troops near Ukraine, US officials said on Wednesday.

Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Xavier Bettel on Tuesday announced he was giving up a degree he earned in 1999 after being hit with accusations of plagiarism.

A Norway court on Tuesday rejected a request for parole from neo-Nazi Anders Behring Breivik 10 years after he was convicted of killing 77 people in the country’s deadliest peacetime attack.

US President Joe Biden has approved sending additional forces to eastern Europe, two U.S. officials told Reuters on Wednesday, as Washington reinforces its allies against what it describes as a Russian threat to invade Ukraine.

Many of the names believed to have been put forth this year have been in the running for several years, including Pope Francis, Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, and David Attenborough, who has been nominated together with UN biodiversity experts. Being nominated for a prize is however in no way a sign of approval by the Nobel committee.

Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the US and its western allies on Tuesday of ignoring Russia’s security concerns and deliberately creating a scenario designed to lure Russia into war.

A single flash of lightning in the United States nearly two years ago cut across the sky for nearly 770 kilometres, setting a new world record, the United Nations said yesterday.

The heaviest flooding to hit Ecuador in two decades has killed at least 18 people in Quito, washing away cars, damaging homes and sweeping away volleyball players and spectators on a sports field, officials said yesterday.

A pregnant New Zealand journalist who claimed to have nowhere to go but Afghanistan will be allowed to return home, after officials granted her

A pregnant New Zealand journalist who was stranded in Afghanistan by her home country’s Covid-19 border policy said today she will return home after NZ government offered her a pathway back.

The United States, Britain and Canada on Monday imposed sanctions against additional officials in Myanmar, in measures timed to mark one year since the military seized power and plunged the country into chaos.

The New Zealand government has defended its strict quarantine system known as MIQ after Charlotte Bellis, a pregnant New Zealand journalist, said that she had to turn to Taliban for help as her own country rejected her requests to get back there.

British nature broadcaster David Attenborough, the World Health Organization and Belarusian dissident Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya are among the nominees for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize after being backed by Norwegian lawmakers who have a track record of picking the winner.

The United States and Britain are prepared to punish Russian elites close to President Vladimir Putin with asset freezes and travel bans if Russia enters Ukraine, Washington and London said on Monday as tensions also spilled over at the United Nations.

The UN Security Council is scheduled to meet Monday for the first time on Russia’s troop buildup and threatening actions against Ukraine at the request of the United States, and all key players are expected to square off in public over the possibility of a Russian invasion and its global impact.

NATO has no plans to deploy combat troops to non-NATO member Ukraine in the event of a Russian invasion, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Sunday.

North Korea on Sunday tested its most powerful missile since 2017, ramping up the firepower for its record-breaking seventh launch this month as Seoul warned nuclear and long-range tests could be next.