An influential aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday that the West and the U.S.-led NATO alliance had helped to plan Ukraine’s surprise attack on Russia’s Kursk region, something Washington has denied.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) on Friday raised its risk level for mpox, a day after global health officials confirmed the first infection with a new strain of the virus outside Africa, in Sweden.

Anger over the brutal rape and murder of a doctor in eastern India showed no signs of dying down on Friday, as medics called for the largest shutdown of hospital services in recent times, and political parties geared up for protests.

Global health officials on Thursday confirmed an infection with a new strain of the mpox virus in Sweden and linked it to a growing outbreak in Africa, the first sign of its spread outside the continent a day after the World Health Organization declared the disease a global public health emergency.

Negotiators were to meet in the Qatari capital Doha again on Friday in an effort to hammer out a Gaza ceasefire agreement as Israel continued to slam targets in the Palestinian enclave.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un reaffirmed a pledge to deepen cooperation with Russia in a message to President Vladimir Putin as Pyongyang marked an anniversary of independence from Japan’s colonial rule, KCNA state news agency said on Friday.

Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump sought to tie his Democratic rival Kamala Harris to the Biden administration’s economic record on Thursday during a meandering, 80-minute press conference at his New Jersey golf club, his latest effort to blunt her momentum.

The U.S. State Department told the U.S. Congress on Thursday that Australia, Britain and the United States now have comparable export-control regimes, a significant step needed to facilitate technology sharing and allow the trilateral AUKUS defense pact to move ahead.

Federal prosecutors are seeking to move alleged Mexican drug kingpin Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada from Texas to face trial in the same Brooklyn courthouse where his Sinaloa Cartel co-founder Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was convicted in 2019.

The United States has negotiated down the prices of 10 top-selling prescription drugs used by Medicare by as much as 79%, hoping to save $6 billion in the first year as part of a plan hailed on Thursday by President Biden to ease anger about high prices ahead of November elections.

The World Health Organization on Thursday confirmed that a case of the viral infection mpox in Sweden was linked to an outbreak in Africa, the first sign of its spread outside the continent a day after the WHO declared the disease a global public health emergency.

The murder and rape of a trainee doctor as she took a rest during a long shift in a Kolkata hospital has highlighted the vulnerability of medics left without proper protections and facilities, her colleagues and friends said on Thursday.