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Former US president Barack Obama on Thursday called out Silicon Valley, urging tech companies to stop dividing society and undermining democracy, and for political leaders to help guide the way with regulation.

After two long years without its frenetic festival of sparkling sequins, sultry samba and towering floats, Rio de Janeiro will hold its famed carnival parades Friday for the first time since Covid-19 hit Brazil.

In a rich neighborhood east of Caracas, a bodyguard flashes his rifle as a private armored car with dark tinted windows speeds away under his intimidating watch.

Premier League leaders Manchester City and their relentless challengers Liverpool will expect to stay neck and neck in the title race after this weekend's matches.

Milwaukee star Khris Middleton will miss the rest of the Bucks' NBA first-round playoff series against the Chicago Bulls with a sprained left knee ligament, the team said Thursday.

Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay combined for a 13-under par 59 on Thursday in the four-ball first round of the Zurich Classic of New Orleans, the only two-man team event on the PGA Tour.

Ivan Yuskevych used to export truckloads of edible snails from his Ukrainian farm to western Europe, but first coronavirus and now war have dashed production and emptied his restaurant.

The World Health Organization said Friday it "strongly recommended" Pfizer's Covid-19 antiviral pill Paxlovid for patients with milder forms of the disease who were still at a high risk of hospitalisation.

Ecotourists feeding grapes to rock iguanas on remote islands in the Bahamas have given them a sweet tooth and high blood sugar, researchers said Thursday, warning of unknown effects on the health of the vulnerable reptiles.

Struggling world champion Fabio Quartararo warned his Yamaha team on Thursday that "we are not allowed to make mistakes" as the French rider looks to get his season back on course in Portugal.

Turkey's opposition leader said Thursday that his power supply had been cut after he stopped paying electricity bills in protest at soaring prices that he blamed squarely on President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

US stocks tumbled while the dollar rallied Thursday following hawkish comments from the head of the Federal Reserve that exacerbated worries over higher interest rates, offsetting a lift from a resurgent airline industry.

A miniature book of poems written by a 13-year-old Charlotte Bronte was unveiled in New York on Thursday after more than a century hidden away.

World number eight Andrey Rublev blasted Wimbledon's ban on Russian and Belarusian players as "complete discrimination" on Thursday while Belarus officials said the decision will only "incite hatred" and threatened legal action to have the sanction overturned.

Ukraine needs $7 billion in month to keep its economy afloat amid the "economic losses" inflicted by Russia, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Thursday, as the United States announced another infusion of financial aid for the country.

Former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez was extradited to the United States Thursday to stand trial for allegedly aiding the smuggling of hundreds of tons of cocaine to America.

The empty graves under a leaden Ukrainian sky have passed their secrets to investigators, who exhumed the bodies in them as an effort intensifies to probe war crimes accusations against invading Russian troops.

Russia on Thursday slapped travel bans on US Vice President Kamala Harris, Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg and dozens of prominent Americans and Canadians in retaliation for sanctions imposed over Ukraine.

The 79 evacuees emerged exhausted and dirty from three yellow school buses into a supermarket carpark in the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia.

Argentina rugby great Juan Manuel Leguizamon, the last active player of the team that finished third at the 2007 World Cup, announced his retirement on Thursday aged 38.

Brazilian football great Pele was discharged Thursday from the hospital where he was admitted four days earlier for colon cancer treatment, the establishment announced.

US Open champion Emma Raducanu had to fight back in her second round tie on Thursday to set up a quarter-final match against world number one Iga Swiatek at the WTA Stuttgart tournament.

"Pirates of the Caribbean" star Johnny Depp was grilled about his history of drug and alcohol use as he took the witness stand for the third day on Thursday in his defamation case against his ex-wife, the actress Amber Heard.

French President Emmanuel Macron appealed Thursday to "stigmatised" young people in the country's multi-racial suburbs in the final days of an election campaign he said had been "unbearable" for many because of constant anti-immigrant rhetoric.

Spanish authorities said Thursday they had arrested and then granted conditional release to a Portuguese man wanted by Interpol over the 2020 Beirut port blast that killed over 200 people.

The International Monetary Fund ended its semi-annual gathering of global finance chiefs without a consensus for the first time in its history on Thursday, a sign of the strains created by Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

CNN will shut down its new streaming service next week, just one month after launching it with much fanfare, the US network announced Thursday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday claimed the "liberation" of the flattened city of Mariupol after nearly two months of fighting, demanding its trapped Ukrainian defenders be sealed into their underground last stand.

George Russell insisted Thursday that there are no "hard feelings" between him and Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton despite sitting ahead of the seven-time world champion in the Formula 1 title race.

Novak Djokovic came back from a set down against a Serbian compatriot for the second successive day to reach the Belgrade semi-finals on Thursday.

The United States will provide Ukraine with a new $500 million infusion of aid to help the government in Kyiv continue paying salaries, pensions and providing services, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Thursday.

More than a million children in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi have now received at least one dose of the first anti-malaria vaccine, the World Health Organization said Thursday.