U.S. consumer inflation slowed slightly to 3.4 percent in July despite turbulent oil prices due to the Iran war, government data showed, with the data likely giving the Federal Reserve room to breathe on interest rates.

The consumer price index (CPI) rose 0.1 percent from a month earlier, but fell on a year-on-year basis, according to data released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The data was in line with analyst expectations.

Ukrainian drone strikes on Russia's south killed two people, including an eight-year-old child, the regional governor said on Wednesday after the latest exchange of air attacks between the warring countries.

Russian overnight strikes on a frontline city in southern Ukraine also killed two.

Pakistan's interior minister is visiting Iran to discuss regional security, stability and other developments, the Pakistani foreign office said Wednesday, as Islamabad tries to mediate a resolution to the Middle East war.

Mohsin Naqvi, previously involved in mediation efforts between Iran and the US, is known to be close to the powerful head of the Pakistani army, Asim Munir.

Lebanon's military has seized 1.2 million captagon pills that were about to be sent abroad.

Lebanon has faced pressure from Gulf states to counter the production and trafficking of drugs, particularly the amphetamine-like narcotic captagon, for which the conservative monarchies are a major market.

The United Nations hailed Lebanon’s decision to scrap the death penalty, and urged other countries in the Middle East and North Africa to do likewise.

"I commend the decision by the Lebanese parliament to formally abolish the death penalty in the country. Lebanon is now the first country in the region to do so, and I call on the other countries that still maintain the death penalty to follow its lead in ending this inhumane practice," U.N. rights chief Volker Turk said Tuesday.

U.S. President Donald Trump has said that Iran should be “responsible for the damages and death caused to the people of Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and Gaza,” in response to Iran’s insistence that U.S. payment of war reparations is a pre-condition to any resolution of the ongoing hostilities.

"I am likewise demanding compensation from Iran," Trump said, noting that his demand included not only damages arising from the current war with Iran, but also Iranian attacks on U.S. targets going back more than two decades as well as payments to the families of Iranian protesters killed by authorities over the past 50 years.

The family of former Palestinian ambassador to Lebanon Ashraf Dabbour urged Lebanese authorities to not extradite him after authorities in Ramallah requested his transfer over corruption allegations.

Lebanon's public prosecutor ordered the arrest of Dabbour, ambassador from 2012 to 2025, last week after questioning him based on a warrant from the Palestinian Authority over corruption and embezzlement during his tenure, a judicial official told AFP at the time.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Tuesday that Russia fired North Korean missiles in an overnight attack that killed six and wounded 19 in the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia.

"The city was struck with North Korean ballistic missiles, Zircons, and guided aerial bombs," he said, referring to Russia's hypersonic cruise missile system, Zircon.

Standing on the ferry as it waits to dock on the Greek island of Ithaca, Giorgia Ongarato is only too keen to talk about the "Odyssey" -- the epic poem that inspired Christopher Nolan's blockbuster film.

The Italian lawyer said it was her dream to come to Ithaca, widely believed to be the same island as the home of Odysseus in the poem.

Syria said that it reached a deal with Russia on the fate of its two bases in the country, which Moscow once used to provide military support to ousted leader Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian civil war.

Russia was a key Assad ally during the 13-year conflict, helping to keep the former leader in power, and his ouster in 2024 dealt a major blow to its influence in the region.