Russian President Vladimir Putin is set to speak with his US and French counterparts yesterday after the United States warned that Moscow could invade Ukraine in days.

The United States will re-establish an embassy in the Solomon Islands, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said yesterday, in an effort to counter China’s influence in the politically troubled Pacific island.

The Ukrainian government yesterday urged citizens to stay calm and united, saying the armed forces are ready to repel any attack on the country amid concern that Russia may be poised to invade.

The head of the World Health Organization said the acute phase of the pandemic could end this year, if around 70 percent of the world gets vaccinated.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has received a legal questionnaire from police investigating claims of lockdown-breaking parties in his Downing Street office, his spokesperson said.

US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin will speak today, a White House official said, after Washington said earlier on Friday that Russia has massed enough troops near Ukraine to launch a major invasion.

French counter-terrorism forces based in west Africa killed ten suspected jihadists accused of involvement in a massacre of police officers in Burkina Faso last November, the French military announced on Thursday.

South Sudan risks a return to war, the United Nations warned yesterday, with outbreaks of interethnic violence and political infighting threatening to undo even the limited progress made in implementing its lumbering peace process.

Russia is now massing yet more troops near Ukraine and an invasion could come at any time, perhaps before the end of this month’s Winter Olympics, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said yesterday.

Cameroon committed “serious human rights violations” against dozens of its citizens after the US deported them back to the Central African country in breach of international refugee law, Human Rights Watch said Thursday.

A New York prosecutor said Thursday that his team was prosecuting its highest number of anti-Asian hate crimes since a unit was established more than a decade ago.

Australia officially listed koalas across a swathe of its eastern coast as “endangered” yesterday, with the marsupials fighting to survive the impact of bushfires, land-clearing, drought and disease.

A US congressional committee is investigating former President Donald Trump’s handling of White House records after 15 boxes of documents were transferred from his Florida resort to a federal agency, including whether the material included classified information, the panel’s chairwoman said on Thursday.

The European parliament is preparing to launch a committee of inquiry into the Pegasus spyware scandal after evidence emerged of government critics in Poland and Hungary being targeted with the surveillance software.

President Joe Biden seized $7 billion in assets belonging to the previous Afghan government yesterday with the aim of splitting the funds between victims of the 9/11 attacks and desperately needed aid for post-war Afghanistan.

Hundreds of people in Sweida, a Druze-majority city in southwestern Syria, have taken to the streets for a fifth day to decry corruption and worsening living standards, according to activists.

The United States, Australia, Japan and India yesterday pledged to deepen cooperation to ensure the Indo-Pacific region was free from “coercion”, a thinly veiled swipe at China’s economic and military expansion.

French President Emmanuel Macron refused a Kremlin request that he take a Russian Covid-19 test when he arrived to see President Vladimir Putin this week, to prevent Russia getting hold of Macron's DNA, two sources in Macron's entourage told Reuters.

Russia is now massing yet more troops near Ukraine and an invasion could come at any time, perhaps before the end of this month's Winter Olympics, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Friday.

An unidentified woman has filed a civil lawsuit that accuses American rapper Snoop Dogg of sexual assault and battery after she attended one of his concerts in 2013.