Colombia's government has declared a disaster and asked for international help to combat raging wildfires that are expected to worsen in coming days due to warm, dry conditions associated with the El Niño weather phenomenon.

Officials raised the number of fires from 25 to 31, and said nine of them were under control. They did not order mandatory evacuations despite some fires burning in the mountains that surround some municipalities.

China's leaders launched a barrage of new policies this week to prop up languishing financial markets and rekindle growth in the world's second-largest economy.

The moves to support lending and spending with billions of dollars of fresh cash gathered pace when the central bank cut bank reserve requirements and issued new rules to encourage banks to lend more to property companies.

Strong winds hit Australia's northeast coast Friday, leaving thousands without power, but the area was spared heavy damage as Tropical Cyclone Kirrily weakened into a tropical storm.

Wind gusts of up to 170 kilometers an hour (105.6 miles per hour) battered coastal cities and towns, while fallen trees caused property damage. Weather officials warned of continuing heavy rain and strong winds.

Mohamed Salah has begun rehabilitation on his hamstring and said Thursday that he will do "everything possible" to rejoin Egypt at the Africa Cup of Nations.

Salah returned to Liverpool on Wednesday for treatment on the injury he sustained during Egypt's 2-2 draw with Ghana a week ago.

Turkey finalized the ratification of Sweden's membership in NATO on Thursday, bringing the previously nonaligned Nordic country a step closer to joining the military alliance.

Hungary now remains the only NATO ally not to have ratified Sweden's accession.

In the aftermath of World War II and the murder by Nazi Germany of 6 million Jews in the Holocaust, the world united around a now-familiar pledge: Never again.

A key part of that lofty aspiration was the drafting of a convention that codified and committed nations to prevent and punish a new crime, sometimes called the crime of crimes: genocide.

The U.S. government privately warned Iran that the Islamic State group's affiliate in Afghanistan was preparing to carry out a terrorist attack before bombings in Kerman earlier this month that killed 95 people, a U.S. official said.

The official, who was not authorized to comment and insisted on anonymity to discuss the intelligence, said Thursday the U.S. was following its longstanding policy of a "duty to warn" other governments against potential lethal threats.

The U.S. and U.K. have imposed sanctions on four leaders of Yemen's Houthi rebel group who have supported the militant group's recent attacks on vessels in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.

Houthi leaders Mohamed al-Atifi, Muhammad Fadl Abd al-Nabi, Muhammad Ali al-Qadiri and Muhammad Ahmad al-Talibi are all accused of assisting or sponsoring acts of terrorism, according to U.S. Treasury.

The United States and Iraq will begin talks soon to wind down the mission of a U.S.-led military coalition formed to fight the Islamic State group in Iraq, both governments have said. The Pentagon said the size of the U.S. military footprint in the country will be part of the discussions.

The announcement comes as U.S. forces in Iraq have been increasingly targeted by Iran-backed militias, though the U.S. says the talks were first discussed last year and the timing is not related to the attacks.

Israel faces a growing risk of damaging its peace with neighboring Egypt as its military pushes the offensive against Hamas further south in the Gaza Strip. Already, the two sides are in a dispute over a narrow strip of land between Egypt and Gaza.

Israeli leaders say that to complete their destruction of Hamas, they must eventually widen their offensive to Gaza's southernmost town, Rafah, and take control of the Philadelphi Corridor, a tiny buffer zone on the border with Egypt that is demilitarized under the two countries' 1979 peace accord.