North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will make his first visit to China in six years to attend a military parade next week, the two countries said Thursday, in an event that would bring him together with a large group of world leaders for the first time since taking office in late 2011.

With Russian President Vladimir Putin also coming for the parade, the event will underline the three-way alignment among Beijing, Moscow and Pyongyang in the face of a U.S. push to bolster its alliances with South Korea and Japan.

Rescuers in boats raced to reach stranded families in Pakistan's populous eastern Punjab province Thursday, after three major rivers burst their banks because of heavy rain and the release of water from overflowing dams in neighboring India.

The floods displaced nearly 250,000 people and officials said more than 1 million people were affected, with crops and businesses destroyed and many unable to leave their homes.

Climate change that has driven scorching temperatures and dwindling rainfall made massive wildfires in Turkey, Greece and Cyprus this summer burn much more fiercely, said a new study released Thursday.

The study by World Weather Attribution said the fires that killed 20 people, forced 80,000 to evacuate and burned more than 1 million hectares (2.47 million acres) were 22% more intense in 2025, Europe's worst recorded year of wildfires.

Pope Leo XIV demanded Wednesday that Israel stop the "collective punishment" and forced displacement of Palestinians in Gaza as he pleaded for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the besieged territory amid preparations by Israel for a new military offensive.

Leo was interrupted twice by applause as he read aloud his latest appeal for an end to the 22-month war during his weekly general audience attended by thousands of people in the Vatican's auditorium.

Iran's ambassador to Australia was seen preparing to leave the country on Thursday, days after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese ordered him to leave over accusations that Tehran masterminded at least two antisemitic arson attacks in the country.

Local television stations Network Seven and Network Nine spoke to Ambassador Ahmad Sadeghi as he headed for a flight at the airport in Sydney.

An aid convoy entered the city of Sweida in southern Syria via the main highway from Damascus on Thursday, for the first time since a major outbreak of sectarian violence last month shook the country's fragile recovery from nearly 14 years of civil war.

Clashes broke out in mid-July between government forces and local Bedouin tribesmen on one side, and fighters from the country's Druze minority on the other. Hundreds were killed and tens of thousands displaced, and allegations have surfaced of government fighters executing Druze civilians and looting and burning houses.

A paramilitary group fighting against Sudan's military shelled a besieged city in the western region of Darfur, killing at least 24 people, a medical group said Thursday.

The Rapid Support Forces shelled the densely populated areas of the central market and Awlad al-Reef neighborhood in el-Fasher, the provincial capital of North Darfur province, according to the Sudan Doctors Network, which tracks the country's civil war. The attack wounded 55 people, including five women, it said.

Iran's rial currency fell to near-record lows Thursday as concerns grew in Tehran that European nations will start a process to reimpose United Nations sanctions on the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program, further squeezing the country's ailing economy.

The move, termed the "snapback" mechanism by the diplomats who negotiated it into Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, was designed to be veto-proof before the world body and would be likely to go into effect after a 30-day window.

The Security Council scheduled a vote Thursday on a resolution that would end the more than four-decade operation of the U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon on Dec. 31, 2026.

Two council diplomats said late Wednesday that the United States, which had been demanding that the force known as UNIFIL be terminated in a year, did not object to a French draft resolution with that end date in 16 months.

Russia bombarded the Ukrainian capital with drones and missiles early Thursday, including a rare strike in the city center, killing at least 15 people and wounding 48, local authorities said.

It was the first major Russian attack on Kyiv in weeks as U.S.-led peace efforts to end the three-year war struggled to gain traction. Russia launched 598 strike drones and decoys and 31 missiles of different types across the country, according to Ukraine's Air Force, making it one of the war's biggest air attacks.