ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Floods caused by torrential rains hit two Turkish provinces that were devastated by last month’s catastrophic earthquake, killing at least 13 people and increasing the misery for thousands who were left homeless, officials and media reports said Wednesday. At least two other people were reported missing.

LONDON (AP) — British and German air force fighter jets were scrambled to intercept a Russian aircraft flying close to Estonian airspace, the U.K. defense ministry said Wednesday, amid mounting concerns about confrontation in the skies near Russia and Ukraine. The U.K. and Germany are conducting joint air policing missions in Estonia as part of NATO efforts to bolster its eastern flank in response to Russia.

LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — Clashes between Pakistan's police and supporters of former Prime Minister Imran Khan persisted outside his home in the eastern city of Lahore on Wednesday, a day after officers went to arrest him for failing to appear in court on graft charges. The police operation triggered clashes between Khan's supporters and police in the country's major cities, including Karachi, Islamabad, the garrison city of Rawalpindi, Peshawar, Quetta and elsewhere in Pakistan.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A Russian fighter jet struck the propeller of a U.S. surveillance drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday in a “brazen violation of international law,” causing American forces to bring down the unmanned aerial vehicle, the U.S. said. Moscow said the U.S. drone maneuvered sharply and crashed into the water following an encounter with Russian fighter jets scrambled to intercept it near Crimea, but insisted its warplanes didn’t fire their weapons or hit the drone.

BLANTYRE, Malawi (AP) — The devastating Tropical Cyclone Freddy which has devastated southern Africa in a rare second landfall has killed at least 216 people in Malawi and Mozambique since Saturday night, with the death toll expected to rise. Heavy rains that triggered floods and mudslides have killed 199 people in Malawi, authorities said Tuesday.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea test-fired two short-range ballistic missiles in another show of force Tuesday, a day after the United States and South Korea began military drills that Pyongyang views as an invasion rehearsal. The missiles launched from the southwestern coastal town of Jangyon flew across North Korea before landing in the sea off that country’s east coast, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement. It said both missiles traveled about 385 miles.

HONG KONG (AP) — China will reopen its borders to tourists and resume issuing all visas Wednesday as it tries to revive tourism and its economy following a three-year halt during the COVID-19 pandemic. China is one of the last major countries to reopen its borders to tourists. The announcement Tuesday came after it declared a “decisive victory” over COVID-19 in February.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A Russian missile struck an apartment building in the center of Kramatorsk on Tuesday, killing at least one person and wounding seven others in one of Ukraine’s major city strongholds in its eastern Donetsk region as it fights against Moscow’s invasion, officials said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted a video showing gaping holes in the facade of the low-rise building that bore the brunt of the strike.

BLANTYRE, Malawi (AP) — An unrelenting Cyclone Freddy that is currently battering southern Africa has killed at least 56 people in Malawi and Mozambique since it struck the continent for a second time on Saturday night, authorities in both countries have confirmed. Local police said 51 people in Malawi, including 36 in Chilobwe in the financial hub of Blantyre in the center of the country have died, with several others missing or injured. Authorities in Mozambique reported that five people were killed in the country since Saturday.

BEIJING (AP) — An agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia to reestablish diplomatic relations has cast China in a leading role in Middle Eastern politics — a part previously reserved for longtime global heavyweights like the U.S. and Russia. It's another sign that China's diplomatic clout is growing to match its economic footprint.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran announced Monday that the country's supreme leader has pardoned more than 22,000 people arrested in the recent anti-government protests that swept the Islamic Republic. There was no immediate independent confirmation of the mass release. The statement by Iran's judiciary head Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejehi offered for the first time a glimpse of the full scope of the government's crackdown that followed the demonstrations over the September death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who had been detained by the country's morality police.

MOMBASA, Kenya (AP) — Surrounded by miles of dried land and what remains of his famished livestock, Daniel Lepaine is a worried man. Dozens of his goats in Ngong, a town in southern Kenya, have died after three years of harrowing drought in the east and Horn of Africa. The rest are on the verge of starvation as rain continues to fail.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran and Saudi Arabia on Friday agreed to reestablish diplomatic relations and reopen embassies after years of tensions between the two countries, including a devastating attack on the heart of the kingdom's oil production attributed to Tehran. The deal, struck in Beijing this week amid its ceremonial National People’s Congress, represents a major diplomatic victory for the Chinese as Gulf Arab states perceive the United States slowly withdrawing from the wider Middle East.

BERLIN (AP) — Shots were fired inside a building used by Jehovah's Witnesses in the northern German city of Hamburg on Thursday evening, with several people killed and wounded, police said. “We only know that several people died here; several people are wounded, they were taken to hospitals,” police spokesman Holger Vehren said of the shooting in the Gross Borstel district of Germany’s second-biggest city.

BEIJING (AP) — Chinese leader Xi Jinping was awarded a third five-year term as president Friday, putting him on track to stay in power for life. The endorsement of Xi's appointment by the ceremonial National People's Congress was a foregone conclusion for a leader who has sidelined potential rivals and filled the top ranks of the ruling Communist Party with his supporters since taking power in 2012.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un supervised a live-fire artillery drill simulating an attack on a South Korean airfield and called for his troops to be ready to respond to the enemies’ “frantic war preparation moves” — apparently referring to the recent series of military drills between the United States and South Korea.

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s president said Thursday that his country does not produce or consume fentanyl, despite enormous evidence to the contrary. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador appeared to depict the synthetic opioid epidemic largely as a U.S. problem, and said the United States should use family values to fight drug addiction.

CIUDAD VICTORIA, Mexico (AP) — A letter claiming to be from the Mexican drug cartel blamed for abducting four Americans and killing two of them condemned the violence and said the gang turned over to authorities its own members who were responsible. In a letter obtained by The Associated Press through a Tamaulipas state law enforcement official, the Scorpions faction of the Gulf cartel apologized to the residents of Matamoros where the Americans were kidnapped, the Mexican woman who died in the cartel shootout, and the four Americans and their families.

PENAJAM PASER UTARA, Indonesia (AP) — Orange-red ground has been broken in the jungle of East Borneo, where the Indonesian government has begun construction of its new capital city. Officials promise a “sustainable forest city” that puts the environment at the heart of development and aims to be carbon-neutral by 2045. But the project has been plagued by criticism from environmentalists and Indigenous communities, who say it degrades the environment, further shrinks the habitat of endangered animals such as orangutans and displaces Indigenous people that rely on the land for their livelihoods.

JABA, West Bank (AP) — Three Palestinian militants were killed in a shootout with Israeli troops on Thursday. Israeli security forces said they raided the village of Jaba in the northern West Bank to arrest suspects wanted for attacks on Israeli soldiers in the area. The suspects opened fire on Israeli troops, who shot back and killed three people, all affiliated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant group, police said.

BEIJING (AP) — China’s leader Xi Jinping has called for “more quickly elevating the armed forces to world-class standards,” in a speech just days after a top diplomat warned of the growing possibility of conflict with the U.S. unless Washington changes course. China must maximize its “national strategic capabilities” in a bid to “systematically upgrade the country’s overall strength to cope with strategic risks, safeguard strategic interests and realize strategic objectives,” Xi said Wednesday.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea on Thursday fired a short-range ballistic missile toward waters off its western coast, South Korea’s military said. The launch came as the United States and South Korea prepare to hold their biggest combined military training exercises in years next week to counter the threat of North Korea’s nuclear arsenal, which leader Kim Jong Un has aggressively expanded in recent years despite his country's deepening economic isolation and pandemic-related difficulties.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia launched a massive barrage of missiles and drones that hit residential buildings and critical infrastructure across Ukraine on Thursday, killing six people, leaving hundreds of thousands without heat or electricity, and knocking a nuclear plant off the power grid for hours. It was the largest such attack in three weeks.

BEIJING (AP) — China President Xi Jinping accused Washington this week of trying to isolate his country and hold back its development. That reflects the ruling Communist Party's growing frustration that its pursuit of prosperity and global influence is threatened by U.S. restrictions on access to technology, its support for Taiwan and other moves seen by Beijing as hostile.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Tens of thousands of people marched in Athens and cities across Greece on Wednesday to protest the deaths of 57 people in the country's worst train disaster, which exposed significant rail safety deficiencies. Labor unions and student associations organized the demonstrations, while strikes halted ferries to the islands and public transportation services in Athens, where at least 30,000 people took part in the protest. Clashes broke out after the rallies in Athens and two other cities.