The invasion of Iraq began when at least five cruise missiles slammed into the heart of Baghdad.

The Royal Mail said it was paying tribute to “one of the most iconic and enduring music artists of all time”.

The Franciscan order of friars is mired in a financial scandal allegedly involving fraud and embezzlement of tens of millions of euros.

US President Barack Obama has warned North Korea it will face retaliation for a crippling cyber attack on Sony Pictures over an irreverent film comedy that infuriated Pyongyang.

The iCloud account of Pippa Middleton, younger sister of the Duchess of Cambridge, has allegedly been hacked and 3000 photographs stolen.

Off-duty Swedish police officer Mikaela Kellner was sunbathing in a Stockholm park this week when one of her friends' mobile phones went missing.

Gulf Arab coalition forces fighting Houthi militia in Yemen are advancing on the capital in a two-pronged offensive, generals declared at a desert oil compound they have turned into a military base.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo thanked Malcolm Turnbull for Australia's assistance fighting the forest fires when he arrived in Jakarta on Thursday.

Veteran China watchers are debating what is behind this latest police action as Xi Jinping appears to be reinforcing his power.

The former NY mayor is now the leading candidate to become President-elect Donald Trump's secretary of state, but even some Republicans say the tough-guy with business connections to Russia may not be suitable.

Indian security officials said clashes came after at least 18 Chinese soldiers tried to cross into Indian-claimed territory at Naku La in Sikkim on January 20.

As a teen, Alexi McCammond posted racist and homophobic tweets. A decade later, they’ve led to her resignation as editor of Teen Vogue before she’d even begun.

An American pastor jailed in Turkey for 'spying' appears to have become a pawn in a power play between the US, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.

Officials are trying to quell outrage at the latest fatal police encounter captured on video - the shooting of Alton Sterling, a black man, by white officers.

The visit is being closely watched in the West, where some fear both men might use their rapprochement to exert pressure on the US, EU and NATO.

Turkish police have detained at least 24 police officers and media workers, days after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signalled a new campaign against supporters of a Muslim cleric.

Thailand's Supreme Court has issued an arrest warrant for former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra after she failed to turn up to hear the verdict in her trial on negligence charges on Friday.

* British embassy closed to the public since Sunday

Beheaded corpses found in a mass grave are a message from Islamic State militants according to a moderate Syrian group.

A man has shot and killed a Florida police officer.

A Channel Nine employee implored disgraced NSW Labor government powerbroker Eddie Obeid to use his Lebanon connection to help secure the release of the 60 Minutes crew jailed in Beirut.

The US Supreme Court has ruled that almost $US 2 billion in frozen Iranian assets must be turned over to American families of people killed in the 1983 bombing of a US Marine Corps barracks in Beirut and other attacks blamed on Iran.

A Texan teenager who tipped off the FBI about his father’s alleged involvement in the Capitol riots said he would “do it again”.

The North American neighbours swung sharply towards a diplomatic and trade crisis on Sunday as top White House advisers lashed out at the Canadian Prime Minister.

List includes a man who punched a Japanese shop assistant and people fighting on a flight from Cambodia.