Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Syrian President Bashar Assad have recently signaled that they are interested in restoring diplomatic ties that have been ruptured for more than a decade.

Erdogan has said that he will soon extend an invitation to Assad to meet for the first time since Ankara and Damascus broke off relations in 2011, as mass anti-government protests and a brutal crackdown by security forces in Syria spiraled into a still-ongoing civil war.

England is into another European Championship final after its latest dramatic, come-from-behind win that even took King Charles III on a roller coaster ride.

Ollie Watkins, who came on for captain Harry Kane in a bold call by England coach Gareth Southgate, scored in the first minute of stoppage time to earn England a 2-1 win over the Netherlands on Wednesday and a shot at Spain in the title match.

French referee François Letexier was picked by UEFA to handle the European Championship final between Spain and England.

At 35, he's one of the youngest referees to take charge of a major final. The game is on Sunday at the Olympiastadion in Berlin.

A year after a high-profile failure to sign Portugal midfielder João Palhinha, Bayern Munich finally made the deal happen on Thursday.

Palhinha joins Bayern from English Premier League club Fulham for a reported fee of nearly 50 million euros ($54.2 million) on a contract through June 2028, the Bavarian club announced.

Colombia is headed to the Copa America championship game for the first time in 23 years after a contentious win over Uruguay in which it played the second half a man short and players brawled with fans in the stands following the final whistle.

Jefferson Lerma scored in the 39th minute for a 1-0 win Wednesday night and a matchup with Lionel Messi and defending champion Argentina on Sunday.

The South African city of Cape Town and surrounding areas were hit by more storms Thursday that ripped roofs off houses and caused widespread flooding, forcing at least 4,500 people out of their homes and damaging at least 15,000 structures, authorities said. The devastating weather began a week ago.

Multiple cold fronts have battered the region on the southwest tip of Africa since late last week, bringing record rainfall in some parts and gale-force winds. City authorities said the bad weather was expected to continue until the weekend and possibly into next week.

Weather alerts, forest fires, melting pavement in cities: A sizzling heat wave has sent temperatures in parts of central and southern Europe soaring toward 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in some places.

From Italy to Romania, authorities warned people to be cautious, drive carefully if going on holiday, drink plenty of water and avoid going out during the hottest hours of the day.

Authorities in Western states warned of the rising risk of wildfires as hot conditions and low humidity dry out the landscape amid a protracted heat wave that is expected to bake much of the U.S. again Thursday.

California's top fire official said Wednesday that so far this year the state has responded to more than 3,500 wildfires that have scorched nearly 325 square miles (842 square kilometers) of vegetation — five times the average burned through July 10 in each of the past five years.

The IRS announced Thursday that it has collected $1 billion in back taxes from high-wealth tax cheats — a milestone meant to showcase how the U.S. agency is making use of the money it received as part of the Biden administration's signature climate, health care, and tax package signed into law in 2022.

Part of the push for public awareness of high-wealth tax collections is a growing recognition by agency officials that a potential Republican takeover of the White House and Congress could mean massive future budget cuts for the IRS. Showing the public how much work the IRS is getting done is meant to give the much-maligned agency a more sympathetic image.

The U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday declared 2025 to 2034 the United Nations Decade on Combating Sand and Dust Storms — extreme weather events that are increasing and threatening health and economies from central Africa to northern China.

Uganda's U.N. Ambassador Godfrey Kwoba, who introduced the resolution on behalf of the Group of 77, a powerful U.N. group of 134 developing countries and China, told the 193-member assembly the initiative aims to "halt and mitigate the negative effects of sand and dust storms " through "international and regional cooperation."