Lebanese lawmakers ended a two-year political vacuum Monday by electing as president ex-army chief Michel Aoun, who promised to protect the country from spillover from the war in neighbouring Syria.

Canada will lift a visa requirement for Romanian and Bulgarian travelers at the end of next year and ease some restrictions before then, the government announced on Monday.

Turkish police on Monday detained the editor-in-chief of the newspaper Cumhuriyet - a thorn in the side of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan - as Ankara widens a crackdown on opposition media.

French demolition teams cleared the last shacks in the Calais "Jungle" on Monday, signalling the end of the notorious camp as concerns mount for thousands of migrants sleeping rough in Paris.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, who won this year's Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to implement a peace deal with FARC rebels, begins a state visit to Britain on Tuesday that includes a trip to once conflict-ridden Northern Ireland.

Italy’s most powerful earthquake in 36 years struck the country’s mountainous centre Sunday, panicking shell-shocked residents for the third time in two months and flattening a world famous 600-year-old basilica.

Crisis talks opened late Sunday between Venezuela’s embattled socialist government and opposition leaders in a landmark gathering aimed at defusing an increasingly tense political crisis.

The world's largest marine reserve aimed at protecting the pristine wilderness of Antarctica will be created after a "momentous" agreement was finally reached Friday, with Russia dropping its long-held opposition.

Myanmar has detected its first Zika infection with state media reporting Friday that a pregnant foreign woman had been diagnosed with the mosquito-borne virus.