World News

BUCHA, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainians marked the anniversary Friday of the liberation of Bucha with calls for remembrance and justice after a brutal Russian occupation.

“We will not let it be forgotten,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said at a formal ceremony in Bucha, vowing to punish those who committed outrages there.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Five days ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to fire his defense minister set off a wave of spontaneous mass protests and a general strike that threatened to paralyze the country, forcing the Israeli leader to suspend his divisive plan to overhaul the judicial system.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden on Friday urged Russia to release Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who was arrested on espionage charges — allegations the newspaper denies.

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Russian strategic nuclear weapons might be deployed to Belarus along with part of Russia's tactical nuclear arsenal, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said Friday.

PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) — Former Olympic runner Oscar Pistorius was denied parole Friday and will have to stay in prison for at least another year and four months after it was decided that he had not served the “minimum detention period” required to be released following his murder conviction for killing girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp 10 years ago.

HELSINKI (AP) — Finland received the green light to join NATO when Turkey ratified the Nordic country’s membership late Thursday, becoming the last country in the 30-member Western military alliance to sign off.

THESSALONIKI, Greece (AP) — Greece’s prime minister promised Friday to extend a wall across all of the country’s land border with Turkey as he campaigned for the country's general election.

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who called the May 21 election earlier this week, is expected later in the day to sign his center-right government's decision to nearly double the length of the existing steel border wall over the next year.

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — A small plane crashed on Friday in northern Croatia, killing two people on board, authorities said.

The plane crashed around 12:30 p.m. during takeoff at the airport in the town of Pula, in the Istria peninsula, according to the Ministry of Sea, Traffic and Infrastructure.

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis is expected to be discharged on Saturday from the Rome hospital where he is being treated for bronchitis as his recovery proceeds in a “normal” way, even had pizza for dinner and will be in St.

March 23-30, 2023

From protests against the raising of the retirement age in France to Kamala Harris’ visit to Ghana and Belgium beating Germany in an international friendly soccer match in Colgone, this photo gallery highlights some of the most compelling images made or published in the past week by The Associated Press from Europe and Africa.

KUKES, Albania (AP) — If you'd like to walk for miles in concrete burrows built to defend an isolationist totalitarian regime that nobody wanted to attack, Kukes in northeastern Albania is the place for you.

NEW YORK (AP) — In a highly sensitive U.S. visit, Taiwan’s president delivered the message Thursday that keeping her self-ruled island strong will help ensure the world’s safety — even as her travel is carefully calibrated to try to contain what furious Chinese officials warn could be a strong response.

MUMBAI (AP) — In a glittering splash of luxury fashion Thursday, Dior transformed Mumbai’s grand, historic Gateway of India monument into a runway laden with celebrity, beauty and craftsmanship.

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkey’s parliament on Thursday ratified Finland’s application to join NATO, lifting the last hurdle in the way of the Nordic country’s long-delayed accession into the Western military alliance.

Working as a journalist in Moscow seemed a natural fit for Evan Gershkovich, the son of immigrants from the Soviet Union who grew up speaking Russian at home in Princeton, N.J.

After he graduated in 2014 from Bowdoin College, one of the country’s most selective schools, however, “it took me awhile to figure out that journalism was the career for me,” he said in a 2020 interview on the school's website.

Responding to Indigenous demands, the Vatican has formally repudiated the “Doctrine of Discovery” -- papal documents from the 15th century that legitimized the colonial-era seizure of Native lands.

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The United Nations’ top court on Thursday rejected Tehran’s legal bid to free up some $2 billion in Iranian central bank assets frozen by U.S. authorities to be paid in compensation to victims of a 1983 bombing in Lebanon and other attacks linked to Iran.

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis showed a “marked improvement” Thursday after being given intravenous antibiotics for a bronchitis infection and could be released from the hospital in the coming days, the Vatican and his doctors reported.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House on Thursday said it has new evidence that Russia is looking again to North Korea for weapons to fuel the war in Ukraine, this time in a deal that would provide Pyongyang with needed food and other commodities in return.

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Authorities in Belarus said Thursday they have detained a fugitive single father who escaped house arrest in neighboring Russia shortly before he was convicted of discrediting the army and sentenced to prison following his daughter's antiwar sketch at school.

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican on Thursday responded to Indigenous demands and formally repudiated the “Doctrine of Discovery,” the theories backed by 15th-century “papal bulls” that legitimized the colonial-era seizure of Native lands and form the basis of some property laws today.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece’s defense minister announced Thursday that he will travel to neighboring Turkey next week as part of an effort to ease tension between the two NATO members, which have long-standing and often volatile disputes.

DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday encouraged Tanzania’s fragile progress toward a more inclusive government, stepping onto the front lines of America’s push to strengthen democracy in Africa as part of her weeklong trip to the continent.

SAVINES-LE-LAC, France (AP) — President Emmanuel Macron launched a broad plan on Thursday to ensure that France has sovereignty over its water resources, growing increasingly scarce because of climate change, challenging farmers, drying lakes and leaving some households without water running from their faucets.

BERLIN (AP) — King Charles III became the first monarch to address Germany's parliament, the Bundestag, on Thursday as part of a high-profile visit by the U.K.

BANGKOK (AP) — Air strikes by Myanmar’s military on a village in the country’s northwest on Thursday killed at least eight civilians, including two children, according to members of a rebel ethnic minority group and independent media reports.

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia will continue to give the U.S. advance notice about its missile tests despite suspending the last remaining nuclear arms treaty between the two countries, a top Russian diplomat said Thursday.

BEIRUT (AP) — A contract for a new terminal at cash-strapped Lebanon's main airport was cancelled following criticism that no public bidding was held for the $122 million project, Lebanon’s caretaker transportation minister said Thursday.

SAN MARTÍN, Peru (AP) — The Cordillera Azul National Park on the eastern flank of the Peruvian Andes takes in a sweep of Amazon rainforest, mountains and waterfalls in a territory about the size of Connecticut, so precious that tens of millions of dollars in carbon credits have been sold in a program that supporters said would protect its trees.

VILNIUS, Lithuania (AP) — France's top diplomat said Thursday that she hoped the NATO applications of Sweden and Finland would be “ratified quickly,” as the Turkish parliament was expected to vote soon on whether Finland should join the 30-member alliance.

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has compared the policies of the Bosnia Serb separatist leader to those of Russian President Vladimir Putin following his moves to curb dissent and LGBTQ rights.

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A fire broke out on a ferry in the southern Philippines and raged overnight for eight hours, killing at least 31 of the approximately 250 passengers and crew, officials said Thursday.

BEIJING (AP) — As Taiwan's president began a stopover in the United States on her way to Central America, China said it was closely watching and would “resolutely safeguard our sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union must be prepared to develop measures to protect trade and investment that China might exploit for its own security and military purposes, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen warned on Thursday.

GENEVA (AP) — Four former bankers with the Swiss affiliate of a key Russian bank were found guilty Thursday of failing to properly check accounts opened in the name of a Russian cellist with longtime ties to President Vladimir Putin.

HELSINKI (AP) — Expulsions of Russian intelligence officers and visa refusals have substantially weakened Moscow’s intelligence operations in neighboring Finland in the past year, the Finnish Security and Intelligence Service said Thursday.

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — In his more than a decade battling wildfires, firefighter Manuel Rubio had never seen a blaze like the one that raged for the past week in eastern Spain. Not this early in the year.

BRUSSELS (AP) — European Union countries and negotiators from the EU's parliament reached a provisional deal Thursday to raise the share of renewables in the bloc's energy mix, another step to accelerate its green transition.

ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine (AP) — The caravan of unmarked vehicles tears across the muddy grass next to the playground. On the merry-go-round, the children stop swinging and spinning. The curious — parents and other residents of this southeastern town — gather around.

ON BOARD A TRAIN FROM SUMY TO KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A team of journalists from The Associated Press spent two days traveling by train with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as he visited the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, which still faces regular shelling from Russian forces, and northern towns in the Sumy region that were liberated shortly after the war began a year ago.

BO'AO, China (AP) — China’s new No. 2 leader said Thursday its economic recovery improved in March and tried to reassure foreign companies the country is committed to opening to the world.

Premier Li Qiang spoke before an international audience of businesspeople and politicians as the government tries to revive business and consumer confidence after anti-virus controls that isolated China were abruptly dropped in December.

HAIFA, Israel (AP) — Amal Oraby is usually a fixture at street protests. But as tens of thousands of Israelis have demonstrated for months against a contentious government plan to overhaul the judiciary, Oraby is sitting this one out.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — The Australian Parliament created landmark new laws Thursday that will make the nation’s biggest greenhouse gas polluters reduce their emissions or pay for carbon credits.

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (AP) — Mexican authorities said Wednesday that eight employees or officials are being investigated for possible misconduct at a migrant detention center where a fire killed 39 detained men.

GENEVA (AP) — Indonesia was stripped of hosting rights for the Under-20 World Cup on Wednesday only eight weeks before the start of the tournament amid political turmoil regarding Israel's participation.

BEIJING (AP) — China threatened retaliation on Wednesday if U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy meets with Taiwan's president during her upcoming trip through Los Angeles.

President Tsai Ing-wen left Taiwan Wednesday afternoon on a tour of the island's diplomatic allies in the Americas, which she framed as a chance to demonstrate Taiwan’s commitment to democratic values on the world stage.

DNIPRO, Ukraine (AP) — The head of the U.N.’s atomic energy watchdog crossed the front line in the war in Ukraine to visit Europe's largest nuclear power plant Wednesday, and warned that it was easy to see evidence of intensified fighting in the area that poses a threat to the facility's safety.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden on Wednesday offered an optimistic outlook on the health of democracy worldwide, declaring that leaders are “turning the tide” in stemming a yearslong backslide of democratic institutions.

The countries of the United Nations led by the island state of Vanuatu adopted what they called a historic resolution Wednesday calling for the U.N.'s highest court to strengthen countries' obligations to curb warming and protect communities from climate disaster.

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Russia's prosecution of a single father whose daughter drew an antiwar sketch at school elicited outrage from the European Union on Wednesday, even as the man, who fled house arrest before the verdict was announced, remained at large.

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia will no longer give the U.S. advance notice about its missile tests as envisioned under a nuclear pact the Kremlin has suspended, a senior Moscow diplomat said Wednesday, as its military rolled missile launchers across Siberia in a show of the country’s massive nuclear capability amid fighting in Ukraine.

BERLIN (AP) — King Charles III arrived in Berlin on Wednesday for his first foreign trip as Britain’s monarch, hoping to improve the U.K.'s relations with the European Union and show he can win hearts and minds abroad, just as his mother did for seven decades.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s prime minister on Wednesday brushed aside criticism of his judicial overhaul plan from President Joe Biden, saying the matter was an internal Israeli issue and would not be influenced by outside pressure.

A seemingly relentless series of severe storms, likely with deadly tornadoes, are forecast to rip across parts of America’s Midwest and South over the next couple weeks, especially Friday, meteorologists said.

ON A TRAIN FROM SUMY TO KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine's president invited his powerful Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, to visit his nation, saying they haven't been in contact since the war began and he is “ready to see him here.”

PARIS (AP) — Striking sanitation workers in Paris began returning to work Wednesday, ending one of the most enduring symbols of opposition to French President Emmanuel Marcon’s unpopular pension bill, as nationwide protests also appeared to be winding down.

ON A TRAIN FROM SUMY TO KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned Tuesday that unless his nation wins a drawn-out battle in a key eastern city, Russia could begin building international support for a deal that could require Ukraine to make unacceptable compromises.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — An oil tanker owned by a major U.S.-traded transportation company appears to be taking on Iranian crude oil in a key Asian maritime strait in violation of American sanctions, an advocacy group alleges.

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Calls mounted Wednesday for the Taliban to free a girls' education activist arrested earlier this week in Kabul, as a minister in the Taliban-led government defended the detention.

LISBON, Portugal (AP) — Authorities in Portugal said Wednesday that the fatal stabbings of two women at an Ismaili Muslim center in Lisbon was not being treated as a potential act of terrorism.

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — This year’s holy month of Ramadan coincides with the longest drought on record in Somalia.

MADRID (AP) — Renewable energy investors who lost subsidies promised by Spain are heading to a London court to try to claw back $125 million from the government — a decadelong dispute with ramifications for clean energy financing across the European Union.

BANGKOK (AP) — Myanmar’s military government took another major step in its ongoing campaign to cripple its political opponents on Wednesday, dissolving dozens of opposition parties including that of ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi for failing to meet a registration deadline ahead of elections.

CAPE COAST, Ghana (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday stepped through the black doors of a colonial-era seaside fort and down into the dungeons, touring a site where millions of enslaved Africans were held captive before they were loaded onto ships bound for the Americas.

NANJING, China (AP) — Former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou began a 12-day tour of China with a symbolism-laden visit to the mausoleum where a founding figure revered in both China and Taiwan is entombed.

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The fire that killed 38 people at an immigration detention center in Mexico happened as Western hemisphere countries face pressure to address the extraordinary number of people fleeing their homes.

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesia could lose its chance to host a global youth soccer tournament, and its chance to qualify for the 2026 World Cup, after refusing to welcome a team from Israel.

FIFA canceled an important preparatory step after regional governors and protesters demanded Israel's team be excluded, and the tournament, planned for May 20-June 11, appears to be on hold.

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (AP) — After migrants in northern Mexico placed mattresses against the bars of their detention cell and set them on fire, guards quickly walked away and made no apparent attempt to release the men before smoke filled the room and killed 38 men, surveillance video showed Tuesday.

OKHTYRKA, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine’s president visited the Sumy region in northern Ukraine on Tuesday, continuing his tour over recent days of areas of the country that have felt the brunt of Russia’s full-scale invasion and as the stage increasingly looks set for a Ukrainian counteroffensive.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece’s center-right prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, called a May 21 general election Tuesday as his party’s long-standing lead in opinion polls has declined in the aftermath of the country’s worst train disaster.

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — A Russian court on Tuesday convicted a single father over social media posts critical of the war in Ukraine and sentenced him to two years in prison — a case brought against him after his daughter’s drawing at school opposed the invasion, according to his lawyer and activists.

JERUSALEM (AP) — As Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu put his contentious judicial overhaul plan on hold this week, he vowed to pass the package through parliament “one way or another.” But he may have a hard time keeping that promise.

PARIS (AP) — Bolstered French police forces clashed with demonstrators in numerous cities Tuesday as hundred of thousands of marchers protested President Emmanuel Macron's unpopular retirement reform.

GENEVA (AP) — Some Russian athletes can soon return to international sports, although their status for next year's Paris Olympics is still up in the air.

The International Olympic Committee recommended Tuesday that individual athletes from Russia and Belarus should be allowed to return to competition under a neutral status as long as they have no military links.