China’s foreign ministry yesterday accused US Secretary of State Antony Blinken of “smearing” the country, after America’s top diplomat delivered a landmark policy speech calling for action to counterbalance Beijing’s influence.

Film buffs have to wait until today for the Cannes Film Festival’s top prize, the Palme d’Or, but the real scene-stealers get their awards a day earlier – at the annual Palm Dog ceremony.

Panicked children and teachers placed half a dozen calls to 911 emergency services from the Texas classrooms where a massacre was unfolding, pleading for police to intervene, while roughly 20 officers waited in a hallway for nearly an hour before entering the room, authorities said yesterday.

Nearly 20 police officers waited for nearly an hour in a hallway outside the classrooms where a gunman killed 19 children and two teachers in a Texas elementary school, even as panicked 911 calls were placed from inside the rooms pleading for police to intervene, authorities said on Friday.

The United Nations said Friday that, of the more than 6.6 million Ukrainian refugees who have fled to neighbouring countries, 2.9 million have moved on to other European nations.

Japan Friday for the first time joined fellow members of the Group of Seven industrialised nations in pledging to end public financing for fossil fuel projects abroad by the end of the year to help combat global warming.

Russia's separatist proxies in eastern Ukraine claimed full control of the important battlefield town of Lyman on Friday, and Ukraine appeared to concede it, as Moscow presses its biggest advance for weeks.

Pakistan’s ousted prime minister Imran Khan yesterday warned the government to stage fresh elections or face more mass protests, after leading thousands of supporters to the capital Islamabad in a showdown with his political rivals.

Advancing Russian forces came closer to surrounding Ukrainian troops in the east, briefly seizing positions on the last highway out of a crucial pair of Ukrainian-held cities before being beaten back, a Ukrainian official said yesterday.

Japan announced Thursday it will reopen to tourists from 36 countries starting June 10, ending a two-year pandemic closure, but travellers will only be allowed in with tour groups.

Pakistan's ousted prime minister Imran Khan on Thursday warned the government to stage fresh elections or face more mass protests, after leading thousands of supporters to the capital Islamabad in a showdown with his political rivals.

Sri Lanka's Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was on Wednesday given the additional responsibility of running the finance ministry as the island nation grapples with its worst-ever economic crisis.