The swift fall of the Armenian-majority enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijani troops and exodus of much of its population has stunned the large Armenian diaspora around the world. Traumatized by genocide a century ago, they now fear the erasure of what they consider a central and beloved part of their historic homeland.

The separatist ethnic Armenian government in Nagorno-Karabakh on Thursday announced that it was dissolving and that the unrecognized republic will cease to exist by year's end – a seeming death knell for its 30-year de-facto independence.

The Internal Security Forces has confirmed that a food delivery driver who opened fire outside the U.S. Embassy in Beirut last week allegedly did so because of a personal grudge against the guards at the compound.

The ISF said they had arrested the suspected shooter on Monday, identifying him only by his initials M.K. and that he later confessed to the shooting.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán cast doubt Friday on the prospect of the European Union beginning negotiations any time soon for Ukraine to join the bloc, saying it was unrealistic to launch the accession process with a country that's at war.

Speaking to state radio, Orbán noted that unanimity among the EU's 27 member states is required to admit a new country into the bloc. In the case of Hungary, he said, the parliament would have to give the go-ahead to Ukraine, which has ambitions to join the EU within two years.

More than a year after Algeria launched a pilot program to teach English in elementary schools, the country is hailing it as a success and expanding it in a move that reflects a widening linguistic shift underway in former French colonies throughout Africa.

Students returning to third and fourth grade classrooms this fall will participate in two 45-minute English classes each week as the country creates new teacher training programs at universities and eyes more transformational changes in the years ahead. Additionally, the country is strengthening enforcement of a preexisting law against private schools who operate primarily in French.

Kosovo police on Friday raided several locations in a tense Serb-dominated area in the north of the country where weekend clashes left four people dead and further strained relations with Serbia.

Police said in a statement that they were conducting searches on five locations in three municipalities in northern Kosovo. A statement said the operation was in connection with Sunday's shootout between Serb insurgents and Kosovo police in the village of Banjska.

The leaders of nine southern European Union countries met in Malta on Friday to discuss common challenges such as migration, the EU's management of which has vexed national governments in Europe for years.

The nations represented at the one-day huddle included host Malta, France, Greece, Italy, Croatia, Cyprus, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain. Slovenia and Croatia, with Adriatic Sea coasts, were added to the so-called "Med Group" in 2021. While Portugal has a long Atlantic Ocean border, the European Union considers it partially in the Mediterranean region.

Chaos erupted as a gunshot rang out during a protest in northern New Mexico where officials had planned to install a statue of Spanish conquistador Juan de Oñate, an event that county officials had already postponed anticipating that tempers would flare.

One man was struck by the gunfire and rushed to the hospital as Rio Arriba County sheriff's officials took the suspected shooter, 23-year-old Ryan Martinez, into custody. Authorities said they were not currently seeking any other suspects in connection with the shooting.

A powerful bomb exploded in a crowd of people celebrating the Prophet Muhammad's birthday in southwestern Pakistan on Friday, killing at least 52 people and wounding nearly 70 others, authorities said. It was one of the deadliest attacks in recent years.

TV footage and videos on social media showed an open area near a mosque strewn with the shoes of the dead and wounded. Some of the bodies had been covered with bedsheets. Residents and rescuers were seen rushing the wounded to hospitals, where a state of emergency had been declared and appeals were being issued for blood donations.

The United States has quietly acknowledged that Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard successfully put an imaging satellite into orbit this week in a launch that resembled others previously criticized by Washington as helping Tehran's ballistic missile program.

The U.S. military has not responded to repeated requests for comment from The Associated Press since Iran announced the launch of the Noor-3 satellite on Wednesday, the latest successful launch by the Revolutionary Guard after Iran's civilian space program faced a series of failed launches in recent years.

Rana Hariri doesn't know when she'll be able to send her children back to school, as Lebanon's grinding economic crisis thrusts the fate of public education into uncertainty.

Lack of funding for the school system has precipitated repeated teachers' strikes and school closures, resulting in children being increasingly pulled out of the formal learning system, and in some cases being forced to work.