Sulaimaniyah, Iraq | AFP | Ex-Iraqi president Jalal Talabani, a veteran leader of the struggle for Kurdish self-determination and a unifying elder statesman, died on Tuesday in Germany aged 83, Kurdish officials said. Talabani was Iraq’s president from 2005 to 2014 and a key figure in Iraqi Kurdistan, where voters …

Pretoria, South Africa | AFP | Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe returned to South Africa on Tuesday for the first time since his wife claimed diplomatic immunity over allegedly assaulting a model in a Johannesburg hotel room. Mugabe, 93, was not accompanied by his wife Grace as he met President Jacob Zuma …

Maputo, Mozambique | AFP | Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi vowed on Monday to push ahead with national peace talks after he was overwhelmingly re-elected leader of the ruling Frelimo party at a five-yearly conference. Nyusi, who has ruled the country since 2015 and is likely to stand again in 2019 …

Johannesburg, South Africa | AFP | Ethiopia, Equatorial Guinea or Morocco will replace Kenya as hosts of the 2018 African Nations Championship (CHAN), the organisers said Monday. A Confederation of African Football (CAF) statement said one of the three countries will be selected this month to host the January 12-February …

Paris, France | AFP | Messing with your body’s clock is dangerous business, in fact it could make you sick — or worse. The inner timekeeper dubbed the “circadian clock”, governs the day-night cycle that guides sleep and eating patterns, hormones and even body temperature. It is important enough that the …

Stockholm, Sweden | AFP | US geneticists Jeffrey C. Hall, Michael Rosbash and Michael W. Young were awarded the Nobel Medicine Prize on Monday for shedding light on the biological clock that governs the sleep-wake cycles of most living things. The team’s work revealed the role of genes in setting …

Madrid, Spain | AFP | Spain moved into uncharted waters after leaders in the wealthy Catalonia region signalled they may declare independence following a banned secession referendum which was marred by police violence. Catalonia’s leader Carles Puigdemont said the region had won the right to break away from Spain after 90 …

London, United Kingdom | AFP | British short-haul carrier Monarch Airlines went bust Monday in the biggest airline failure in Britain, prompting the government to take emergency action to return home 110,000 stranded passengers. Monarch and its holidays business went into administration, with KPMG appointed to oversee the financial chaos …

Barcelona, Spain | AFP | Barcelona president Josep Maria Bartomeu confirmed on Monday two of the club’s board members resigned in the wake of his decision to play a match behind closed doors after a violent crackdown by police of an independence referendum for Catalonia on Sunday. Police fired rubber …

New York, United States | AFP | Lady Gaga urged US leaders Monday to act quickly to tighten gun laws following the carnage in Las Vegas as artists voiced shock at the deadliest shooting in modern US history. While most artists left their comments to general messages of sympathy after the …