The United Nations Security Council held a minute of silence Friday for victims of the war in Ukraine as Secretary General Antonio Guterres said Russia's invasion had devastated the country.. Kuleba called for minute of silence "in memory of the victims of the aggression."
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will meet next week with his counterparts from India, Japan and Australia, on the heels of a flare-up in tensions with China, an official said Friday.. India has long had tensions with China, including a major border skirmish in 2020, and has a budding alliance with the United States.
Brazilian Amazon deforestation reached its worst-ever February level in the second month of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's presidential term, provisional data showed Friday.. The INPE report included data only up to February 17, but was already an increase from the previous worst February, in 2022, when far-right leader Jair Bolsonaro was still in office.
France's answer to the Oscars, the Cesar Awards, will hold its ceremony on Friday, with a distinct lack of women nominees despite a post-MeToo overhaul aimed at improving its feminist credentials. . There are no women among the nominees for best director this year -- indeed there has not been a female winner of that award since 2000 (Tonie Marshall for "Venus Beauty Institute").
The World Health Organization said Friday it was concerned about bird flu after the father of a 11-year-old Cambodian girl who died from the disease also tested positive, raising fears of human-to-human transmission.. On Friday, the authorities said the girl's 49-year-old father had tested positive, adding that he was asymptomatic.
A jihadist attack on a village in central Mali has killed 13 civilians, local officials told AFP on Friday.. Jihadists "killed more than 13 civilians", torched buildings and took away three people, according to another local politician speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
Fifteen EU states on the migration front line on Friday called for stronger borders and agreements to be struck with third-party countries to accept migrants.. The EU is currently exploring ways for its border agency, Frontex, to operate in third-party states to dissuade migration.
Italian authorities have detained a migrant rescue vessel run by Doctors Without Borders (MSF) for allegedly breaking new government rules on life-saving missions in the Mediterranean, the charity said Friday.. Charities only rescue a small percentage of those brought ashore, with most saved by coastguard or navy vessels.
In the heart of the Ecuadoran Amazon live the Cofan Avie, masters of ayahuasca -- the powerful hallucinogenic concoction said to open the door to the "spirit" world.. It is through yage medicine that we can connect to the spirits and... rebalance the world."
White Helmets rescuers in rebel-held northwest Syria called on international help Friday to save people with quake-related crush injuries after a boy they rescued died from the condition.. The group had spearheaded rescue efforts in rebel-held areas with virtually no outside help after a 7.8-magnitude quake that struck war-torn Syria and Turkey on February 6 killed more than 46,000 people.
