Russia said yesterday that Ukraine is now opening a “second front” in Africa after Mali and Niger broke off diplomatic relations with Kyiv, accusing it of support for “terrorist groups”.

Sri Lanka’s ruling party nominated a scion of the controversial Rajapaksa family yesterday to challenge the incumbent president in next month’s polls, the first since the country’s unprecedented economic meltdown.

Israel has conducted a systematic policy of prisoner abuse and torture since the start of the Gaza offensive, subjecting Palestinian detainees to acts ranging from arbitrary violence to sexual abuse, Israeli rights group B’Tselem said in a report.

A Russian military blogger who criticised Moscow’s conduct in the Ukraine conflict was sentenced to six-and-a-half years’ jail for spreading “fakes” about the army, Moscow’s court service said yesterday.

Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is drawing more support from Black voters than President Joe Biden did when he was in the race this year, while Republican Donald Trump’s support among white voters has risen somewhat in recent months, according to an analysis of Reuters/Ipsos polling.

Thailand’s most popular politician was banned from politics for 10 years and his party dissolved yesterday over his attempt to reform the kingdom’s archaic royal defamation laws.

Venezuela’s opposition leader Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia said yesterday that he will not attend a Supreme Court hearing on the disputed re-election of President Nicolas Maduro.

Kamala Harris made her debut Tuesday evening with new White House running mate Tim Walz, who unleashed a stinging rebuke of their Republican rival Donald Trump, questioning his commitment to the country and skewering his record in office.

Turkey yesterday joined South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice.

Israel ordered residents and displaced Palestinians to evacuate the Beit Hanoon and Beit Lahiya areas of Gaza City yesterday, as reports said a “large scale” Israeli army operation is expected to begin there soon.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called Tuesday on Bangladesh to respect democracy after Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus was tapped to lead an interim government following an uprising

Hamas named its Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar as successor to former political chief Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated in Tehran last week, the group said on Tuesday.

The United States said it was working “round the clock” to avert an all-out war in the Middle East, as Israel remained on high alert yesterday for potential Iranian retaliation for two high-profile killings.

A Russian missile attack on the city of Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine damaged a medical clinic and injured at least five people yesterday, the governor of the Kharkiv region said.

A US judge ruled on Monday that Google violated antitrust law, spending billions of dollars to create an illegal monopoly and become the world’s default search engine, the first big win for federal authorities taking on Big Tech’s market dominance.

The British government has increased its prison capacity to help tackle violent, week-long anti-immigrant riots that have prompted a growing number of countries to warn their citizens about the dangers of travelling in Britain.

The Greek coastguard yesterday said it had rescued 75 migrants in an area where one of the Mediterranean’s worst migrant shipwrecks occurred last year.

Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris selected Minnesota Governor Tim Walz to be her running mate yesterday, choosing a progressive policy champion and a plain speaker from America’s heartland to help win over rural, white voters, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was intended to prolong the Gaza conflict, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told Russia’s state news agency, adding that he will discuss the regional crisis with President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.

There has been a week of nightly riots in various cities since three children were killed in a mass stabbing.