World

Cuba has erected a giant concrete flag in front of the US embassy in the capital Havana as hopes of an improvement in bilateral relations under the Joe Biden administration fade on the island nation.

The 12-meter (40-foot) high flag is on a square that has been the site of many pro-government rallies, including some targeting the United States.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday accused Moscow of building up troops on his country's border as the United States warned Russia against "intimidating" Ukraine.

Kiev has been locked in a conflict with Russian-backed separatists since 2014, and this week Ukrainian officials reported Russian troop movement in annexed Crimea and on the border, near territories controlled by Moscow-backed separatists.

Italy's government has ruled that large cruise ships and container vessels must not pass close to Venice's historic centre and should instead dock in a different location to preserve the famed lagoon.

A decree approved late on Wednesday called for public consultations on building a terminal outside the lagoon where passenger vessels over 40,000 tons and container ships can berth without passing in front of Saint Mark's square.

US and European scientists have called off a controversial balloon test flight that was to take place in Sweden's far north in June, part of a disputed solar geoengineering experiment to artificially cool the planet.

A team of Harvard scientists had been planning to launch a high-altitude balloon from the Esrange Space Station in the Swedish town of Kiruna, to test whether it could in future carry equipment to release solar radiation-reflecting particles into the Earth's atmosphere.

British spy author John le Carré became an Irish citizen shortly before he died last year, driven by his animosity towards Britain's decision to leave the European Union, UK media reported Thursday.

"He was, by the time he died, an Irish citizen," the novelist's son Nick Cornwell told the BBC.

The mummified remains of 22 ancient Egyptian kings and queens will be paraded through the streets of Cairo Saturday, in an eye-catching royal procession to a new resting place.

Dubbed the Pharaohs' Golden Parade, the 18 kings and four queens will travel in order, oldest first, each aboard a separate float decorated in Ancient Egyptian style.

Two small Ecuadoran girls, three and five years old, were hoisted over and dropped from the top of a 14-foot wall marking the US-Mexican border in the middle of the night before being picked up by US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers, the agency said Wednesday.

"On Tuesday evening, a Santa Teresa agent utilizing camera technology observed a smuggler dropping two young children from the top of the approximately 14-foot-high (four-meter-high) border barrier," CBP said in a statement.

Canada's health agency announced Wednesday restrictions on the use of neonicotinoid pesticides in agriculture to protect aquatic insects, backtracking on a proposed outright ban prompted by a massive bee die-off.

Health Canada had proposed in 2018 prohibiting the use of clothianidin and thiamethoxam, two of three neonicotinoid pesticides widely applied to crops in this country.

Queen Elizabeth II made her first public appearance outside the walls of Windsor Castle in nearly five months on Wednesday, making a quip about the country's frosty relationship with Russia.

The 94-year-old monarch has been shielding due to the coronavirus pandemic, but ventured out to attend a military service in southeast England.

Jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny announced Wednesday that he has gone on hunger strike until he receives proper medical treatment for severe back pain and numbness in his legs.

Last week the 44-year-old opposition politician, who is serving a 2.5-year prison sentence in one of Russia's most notorious penal colonies, said he was suffering from a pinched nerve that had caused his right leg to go numb.

Russia announced Wednesday it had registered what it said was the world's first coronavirus vaccine for animals, describing the step as important to disrupting mutations.

It said mass production of the vaccine could begin in April.

In his Warsaw apartment decorated with occult imagery, heavy metal star Adam Darski from the band Behemoth told AFP he has had enough of being prosecuted under Poland's anti-blasphemy law.

The artist, better known as "Nergal" -- the name of an ancient Babylonian demon, has launched a crowdfunding campaign to fight multiple cases against him and to help others do the same.