Raqqa will be part of a decentralised federal Syria now the city has been freed from Islamic State, the US-backed militias that captured it said on Friday, tying its political future to Kurdish-led autonomy plans for northern Syria.

EU anti-trust regulators have raided the offices of automaker BMW in Munich, the company said, in a fresh blow to the German car industry already hit by the Dieselgate scandal.

A suicide bomber killed at least 30 people inside a Shia mosque in the Afghan capital Kabul on Friday night, a security official said, the latest in a string of violent attacks in the country. The attack occurred at Imam Zaman mosque in the western Dasht-e-Barchi part of Kabul, as Shia worshippers

A small island community in the Thames Estuary that voted massively for Brexit is now drawing inspiration from distant Catalonia for its own plans to gain independence from authorities on the mainland.

EU leaders agreed on Friday to start internal work on the bloc's relationship with Britain after Brexit, giving some progress for embattled Prime Minister Theresa May to take back home.

Ine Eriksen Soereide replaces Boerge Brende, who last month was appointed president of the World Economic Forum.

Jacinda Ardern gave a glimpse about what the country can expect from the new coalition, with policy agreements to be released early next week.

The group kicked off its first working session in a seafront hotel on the island of Ischia on how to deal with the potential return to Europe of foreign fighters fleeing a crumbling Islamic State group.

Ms Senior America celebrates women aged 60 and above who defy stereotypes of what it means to be ladies of a certain age who in past years may have sunk into a rocking chair.

There was no claim of responsibility for the attack, one of three on Thursday in the gas-rich southwestern province of Baluchistan.

A typhoon is expected to lash Japan with heavy rains on Sunday, potentially weighing on turnout as millions of voters head to the polls in the world's third-biggest economy.

Ezra Chiloba said he had taken a personal decision to take leave in light of the opposition's demands, without giving more details.