The first soldiers to face justice in a huge sex abuse scandal that has rocked the UN and France went on trial in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam has changed his mind and will not fight extradition from Belgium to France, his lawyer says.

France and Turkey have said that air strikes on hospitals in northern Syria constitute war crimes.

Facebook gives three months to stop tracking non-members of its social network without their consent in France.

French Justice Minister Christiane Taubira steps down from her job, shortly before MPs are due to debate plans to strip people convicted of terrorism of their citizenship.

France will seek to keep its state of emergency until a "total and global war" against so-called Islamic State (IS) is over, Prime Minister Manuel Valls tells the BBC.

France returns the head of a Hindu deity's statue from the 7th century more than 130 years after it was taken away in the name of research.

Belgian prosecutors believe to have found a Brussels apartment where one of the Paris jihadists have been hiding after the 13 November attacks.

A man is shot dead by police as he tries to attack a police station on the first anniversary of the jihadist assault on Charlie Hebdo had a knife and what appeared to be an explosives vest, the government says.

French composer and conductor Pierre Boulez passes away at the age of 90.

Zinedine Zidane replaces Rafael Benitez as Real Madrid coach.

French police have foiled a terror attack on police and army personnel in the region of Orleans, the interior minister has said.

An emergency landing of an Air France flight from Mauritius to Paris in Kenya was caused by a false bomb alert, the airline's chief says.

IMF chief Christine Lagarde is to stand trial in France for alleged negligence over a €400m (£291m; $434m) payment to a businessman in 2008, local media say.

French police arrests a man in Paris as part of the investigation into the 13 November attacks in the city, sources say.

France's far-right National Front fails to win a single region in the second round of municipal elections, preliminary results show.

Nine women ambassadors based in Bangladesh including Bhutan, Brazil, Denmark, France, Malaysia, Netherlands, Norway, Sri Lanka and the US emphasise the urgent need to prevent and respond to gender-based violence in the country, in their own countries, and across the globe.

France is set to vote in the first round of regional elections, the first electoral challenge since the Paris attacks, which killed 130 people.

Prince Charles is expected to call for better protection of the world's forests at the UN climate conference in Paris.

World leaders open an historic summit in Paris aimed at ending decades of political gridlock and forging an elusive agreement to avert calamitous global warming.