More than 62 million US voters have already cast their ballots in the 2024 election, breaking records in some states and leading both sides to hope it gives them an edge -- even as experts warn the data is difficult to interpret.

A Russian former employee of the US consulate in Russia’s Far Eastern city of Vladivostok has been sentenced to four years and ten months in prison for “secret collaboration with a foreign state”, Russian agencies said yesterday.

A team of archaeologists has discovered more than 6,000 ancient Mayan structures hidden by vegetation in the southeastern Mexican state of Campeche, including a city of pyramids they have dubbed “Valeriana.”

The EU, UK, and Canada yesterday announced fresh sanctions targeting the Myanmar junta’s access to “military materiel, equipment and funds”.

Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte said yesterday he could confirm that North Korean troops have been sent to Russia and that North Korean military units have been deployed to the Kursk region.

A man whose home had to be demolished because of coastal erosion yesterday lost a landmark legal claim against the UK government that accused it of failing to meet  obligations to protect citizens from the effects of climate change.

A major international airport serving the UK’s second-largest city was evacuated and all flights were suspended for several hours yesterday because of a security alert.

The BRICS group will generate most of the global economic growth in the coming years thanks to its size and relatively fast growth compared with that of developed Western nations, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday.

President Volodymyr Zelensky told allies yesterday Ukraine must be in a position of strength before any peace talks with Russia, as he presented his “victory plan” to EU leaders and NATO defence chiefs in Brussels.

Nuclear-armed powers have no intention of giving up the atom bomb as part of their military strategy, experts said after the Nobel Peace Prize committee urged against any weakening of the nuclear “taboo”.

A Russian attack on the city of Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine injured at least 21 people yesterday, including a child, regional officials said.

A record 973 migrants crossed the Channel on small boats on the same day in which four died while attempting the journey from France to England, UK Home Office figures showed yesterday.

French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday urged a halt to arms deliveries to Israel, which has been criticised over the conduct of its operation in Gaza.

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov yesterday called on the West to lift sanctions on Taliban-led Afghanistan and take “responsibility” for reconstruction efforts in the country.

Banning the sale of tobacco to people born between 2006 and 2010 could prevent around 1.2 million deaths from lung cancer by the end of the century, said a modelling study released yesterday.

Britain yesterday said it would give up sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius but under what US President Joe Biden called a “historic agreement” will keep its strategic joint military base with the United States on Diego Garcia.

The prosecution of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was “politically motivated” and had a “chilling” effect on the whole media landscape, the parliamentary arm of pan-European rights body the Council of Europe said on Wednesday.

Afghanistan’s embassy in London closed yesterday after Taliban authorities cut ties with diplomatic missions set up by the previous government in Kabul and fired its UK staff.

An Irish regulator helping to police European Union data privacy said yesterday it had fined Facebook-owner Meta 91 million euros ($102 million) for password-security breaches.

Russia hit a high-rise apartment block in Ukraine’s northeastern city of Kharkiv during an attack with guided bombs yesterday, killing at least three people and injuring 15 more, with others feared trapped under rubble, local authorities said.