Massive wildfires have torn through Syria’s coastal mountain region of Jabal Turkman since Thursday, destroying thousands of hectares of forest and overwhelming emergency services. Abdel Kafi Kayyal, director of civil defense in Lattakia province, said efforts to control the fires have been hampered by strong winds, rugged terrain and the danger of landmines left behind from years of war. The fires come as Syria’s new government tries to drive the country’s recovery after more than a decade of war and crippling sanctions, with basic services non-existent in many parts of the country. The fires have burned along a line of 20-kilometers (12 miles), cutting off roads and forcing thousands to flee their homes. They have also left some areas without power. Drone video showed fires advancing along a broad front in rugged territory, occasionally flaring up as they encounter tinder-dry woodland. The fires have now spread into parts of Tartous…

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is now Germany’s largest opposition group and even topped several opinion polls – briefly putting it ahead of now-Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s center-right party – in the weeks after February’s federal election. At the same time, the AfD is facing growing calls for an outright ban, most recently from another major political party. In May, the country’s domestic intelligence agency formally classified the AfD as an extremist entity that threatens democracy. In a 1,100-page report, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, or BfV, also laid out its findings that the party was racist, anti-Muslim, and devaluing of “entire segments” of Germany’s population. That move, which enables the BfV to better monitor the group , has reignited attempts to impose a ban, despite the party claiming a significant 20.8% of the vote in February’s national election – the best performance by a far-right…

As Denmark takes over the presidency of the European Union, Danes are more strongly pro-European than at any time in the past two decades – a shift in sentiment that can at least partly be attributed to US President Donald Trump. An eye-opening survey published in March by Berlingske, a Danish daily newspaper, said 41% of Danes now see the United States as a threat. It also said 92% of respondents either “agree” or “mostly agree” that the Nordic nation needs to rely more on the European Union than the US for its security. Given the recent tensions between Washington and Copenhagen, those statistics may not be surprising. Since his return to the White House, Trump has spoken frequently and aggressively about Greenland, an autonomous crown dependency of Denmark, saying he would like the US to own it. Vice President JD Vance and members of the Trump family have made…

A man set the door of a synagogue alight and a group of protesters stormed an Israeli restaurant in Melbourne on Friday night, the latest in a wave of antisemitic attacks in Australian cities. About 20 people were inside the synagogue in the downtown area of East Melbourne when a man poured flammable liquid on the front door of the synagogue on Albert Street before setting it on fire, Victoria state police said. The group was having Shabbat dinner, marking the beginning of the Jewish day of rest, when the attack took place at 8 p.m. local time, Alex Ryvchin, the co-CEO of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), wrote on X. No one was injured and firefighters extinguished the small blaze, police said, adding that the perpetrator, who remains unidentified, fled the scene. Just over 1 kilometer to the west on Hardware Lane – one of the city’s…

South Korea has recently been hit by another surge of lovebugs. But romance is certainly not in the air for residents of Seoul and neighboring Incheon city, who have been plagued by these pesky insects in recent weeks, as rising temperatures due to climate change spur their spread. On Friday, dozens of government workers were sent to Gyeyangsan, a mountain west of the capital, to manage an “extremely severe outbreak,” the country’s environment ministry said in a statement. Videos on social media earlier this week showed scenic hiking trails along the peak transformed into buzzing corridors of chaos. Footage shows hikers thrashing through swarms of thumbnail-sized bugs, with one person engulfed by the black-winged creatures and another scooping thousands of tiny carcasses from the trail. In a YouTube video, a man collected thousands of the insects and took them home to make them into hamburgers, which he then appeared to…

Two female tourists in Zambia were killed by an elephant Thursday while on a walking safari in a national park, police said. Eastern Province Police Commissioner Robertson Mweemba said the victims – 68-year-old Easton Janet Taylor from the United Kingdom and 67-year-old Alison Jean Taylor from New Zealand – were attacked by a female elephant that was with a calf. Safari guides who were with the group attempted to stop the elephant from charging at the women by firing shots at it, police said. The elephant was hit and wounded by the gunshots. The guides were unable to prevent the elephant’s attack and both women died at the scene, police said. It happened at the South Luangwa National Park in eastern Zambia, around 600 kilometers (370 miles) from the capital, Lusaka. Female elephants are very protective of their calves and can respond aggressively to what they perceive as threats. Last…

A prominent Catholic Church leader and ally of Pope Leo XIV has strongly criticized the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, describing the rounding up and deportation of immigrants as “inhumane” and “morally repugnant.” McElroy was appointed to lead the archdiocese in the US capital by Pope Francis in January, the month of Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration. He was among the more than 100 cardinals who took part in the conclave that elected the first American pope in May. “This is simply not only incompatible with Catholic teaching, it’s inhumane and is morally repugnant,” he added. “The scenes that occurred in Los Angeles where you saw mass agents of the government descending on car washers and Costco parking lots to round up whoever they can round up is not a sign of going after those who have criminal convictions.” Trump has said his tough immigration policies are necessary to keep criminals off…

Bangladesh’s ousted and self-exiled Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was sentenced to six months in prison by the country’s International Crimes Tribunal on Wednesday in a contempt of court case, a top prosecutor said. Hasina has been facing multiple cases since she fled to India after deadly student-led protests in August, but it was the first time the former leader was sentenced in one of them. Shakil Akand Bulbul, a leader of the Awami League party’s banned student wing Chhatra League, was also sentenced to two months in prison in the same case, Chief Prosecutor Muhammad Tajul Islam told reporters. The party had been led by Hasina for years. A three-member ICT tribunal, led by Justice Golam Mortuza Mozumder, delivered the verdict in their absence, noting that the sentences will take effect upon arrest or surrender, the prosecutor added. The contempt charges stem from a leaked phone recording where Hasina was…

North Korea is set to triple the number of its troops fighting for Russia along the front lines with Ukraine, sending an additional 25,000 to 30,000 soldiers to assist Moscow, according to an intelligence assessment from Ukrainian officials. The assessment also says there are signs that Russian military aircraft are being refitted to carry personnel, reflecting the vast undertaking of moving tens of thousands of foreign troops across Russian Siberia, which shares a border with North Korea in its far southwest. North Korea initially sent 11,000 troops to Russia in the fall of 2024 in great secrecy, with Russian President Vladimir Putin only confirming the deployment in late April. In October, North Korean soldiers were pictured being handed equipment for the frontlines at the Sergeevka military base in Primorskyi Krai. A month later, a Ropucha-class Russian ship docked at the Dunai port near Nakhodka, 95 kilometers (59 miles) to the…

The Dalai Lama has announced that he will have a successor after his death, continuing a centuries-old tradition that has become a flashpoint in the struggle with China’s Communist Party over Tibet’s future. Tibetan Buddhism’s spiritual leader made the declaration on Wednesday in a video message to religious elders gathering in Dharamshala, India, where the Nobel Peace laureate has lived since fleeing Tibet after a failed uprising against Chinese communist rule in 1959. “I am affirming that the institution of the Dalai Lama will continue,” the Dalai Lama said in the pre-recorded video, citing requests he received over the years from Tibetans and Tibetan Buddhists urging him to do so. “The Gaden Phodrang Trust has sole authority to recognize the future reincarnation; no one else has any such authority to interfere in this matter,” he added, using the formal name for the office of the Dalai Lama. The office should…