World

The Church of England will not change its rules to allow priests to marry same-sex couples following five years of internal debate on the issue, it announced on Wednesday.

"Under the proposals, same-sex couples would still not be able to get married in a Church of England church," the church said in a statement.

Notorious drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman has appealed to Mexico's president for help due to alleged "psychological torment" he is suffering in a US prison, his lawyer said Tuesday.

"In the six years that Joaquin has been in the United States, he has not seen the sun," said Jose Refugio Rodriguez, a Mexico-based legal representative of the Sinaloa cartel founder.

Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg was hauled away and detained on Tuesday during a protest near a German village being razed to make way for a coal mine expansion, police said.

Thunberg has been in Germany for several days to support protests against the demolition of Luetzerath, which have become a symbol of resistance against fossil fuels.

France is to face severe public transport disruptions on Thursday, operators have warned, as workers join a nationwide strike against a widely unpopular pension reform plan.

The suggested changes, still to be debated in parliament, would raise the retirement age from 62 to 64 and increase contributions required for a full pension.

The world's population may have shot up beyond eight billion for the first time recently, but some countries including the most populous, China, are seeing their populations shrink.

And the decline is set to continue as factors including rising living costs, more women entering the workforce and having children later mean people in some countries are having fewer babies.

Italy's National Cinema Museum has given Oscar-winning Hollywood actor Kevin Spacey an award, it emerged Tuesday, just days after he appeared in court in Britain accused of sexual assault.

Accepting the award on Monday in Turin, the 63-year-old thanked the museum "for having had 'le palle' (the balls) to invite me tonight", according to Deadline and Variety reports.

Artificial intelligence (AI) tools may be able to generate beguiling images, "deepfake" video and passable high-school essays, but Australian musician Nick Cave is deeply unimpressed with their song-writing skills.

Cave, whose decades-long career has been built on macabre lyrics and emotional stage performances, was asked by a fan to assess the merits of a work created in his style with ChatGPT.

Norwegian archaeologists believe they have found the world's oldest runestone inscribed almost 2,000 years ago, making it several hundred centuries older than previous discoveries, they announced on Tuesday.

The square brown sandstone rock, measuring about 30 by 30 centimeters (12 by 12 inches), was found during the excavation of an ancient burial ground in late 2021, at Tyrifjorden northwest of Oslo, ahead of construction on a railway line.