The death toll from a series of earthquakes in western Afghanistan rose sharply again Sunday to more than 2,000 as rescuers scrabbled for survivors among the ruins of razed villages. Saturday’s magnitude 6.3 quake — followed by eight strong aftershocks — jolted hard-to-reach areas 30 kilometres (19 miles) northwest of the provincial capital of […]

  Major airlines cancelled flights to Tel Aviv this weekend after Palestinian militant group Hamas launched a surprise large-scale attack against Israel. On the arrivals board at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport Air France, Lufthansa, Emirates, Ryanair, Aegan Airlines and some US companies were all pulling flights. However, airport authorities did not stop commercial air […]

  A magnitude 6.3 earthquake hit western Afghanistan on Saturday killing 14 people and injuring 78, an official said, predicting the toll could rise amid reports of people buried under collapsed buildings. “These are the numbers that have been brought to the central hospital so far, but this is not the final figure,” the public […]

  The Indian army said Wednesday that 23 soldiers were missing after a powerful flash flood caused by intense rainfall tore through a remote valley in the mountainous northeast Sikkim state. A video released by an Indian army spokesman showed a thick torrent of raging brown water sweeping down a thickly forested valley, with roads […]

  Twenty-nine soldiers were killed in western Niger in an attack by suspected jihadists, the defence ministry said on Monday night, declaring a three-day national mourning period.   The soldiers were targeted using “improvised explosive devices and kamikaze vehicles by more than a hundred terrorists”, the ministry said in a televised statement. Two soldiers were […]

  Lawyers for Niger’s ousted president say they are filing a legal case in the West African country against those behind the coup that deposed the democratically elected leader. The lawyers for Mohamed Bazoum, who was overthrown on July 26 and has since been detained, also said in a statement they were appealing to the […]

  No fewer than 38 people have been injured in a huge fire that broke out at a police headquarters in the Egyptian city of Ismailia on Monday, before it was put out, according to the health ministry. No fatalities were immediately reported but the building was fully staffed with policemen when the fire broke […]

Burkina Faso’s military junta says it has thwarted a coup attempt following information from security and intelligence services. In a statement read out on national television on Wednesday, the authorities said the alleged perpetrators “had the sinister intention of attacking the institutions of the Republic and plunging the country into chaos”. “At present, officers and […]

  Sicilian Mafia boss Matteo Messina Denaro, captured in January after three decades on the run, died on Monday in a hospital in central Italy, taking to the grave the secrets of his brutal reign. The 61-year-old had been treated for colon cancer while detained in a high-security jail in L’Aquila but was moved last […]