Austria's foreign ministry said Wednesday that it would implement a vote by MPs calling for the closure of a controversial Saudi-funded centre for religious dialogue in the capital Vienna.

Since its sale for a record $450 million, the whereabouts of the "Salvator Mundi," said to be painted by Leonardo da Vinci, has become one of the art world's greatest mysteries.

It was four years ago when Jacky Chen embarked upon a challenge after quitting his job as an electronics engineer: riding his bicycle across the world.

No longer at the food fringes, plant-based meats are selling well in supermarkets and emerging as a hot commodity for fast food chains, industrial food companies and Wall Street investors.

"Big wave incoming, use your legs!" shouts Gabriella Lazzari, as her laughing students try out their new gondoleering skills in the sunshine of Venice's lagoon.

Construction of Barcelona's Sagrada Familia may have started 137 years ago, but the emblematic basilica only got a building permit... on Friday.

Greece's leftist government on Friday said an official mosque in Athens, over a decade in the making, would open by September to satisfy a longstanding demand by tens of thousands of Muslims in the capital.

Just 10 years before he was crowned the world's best sommelier after winning a rigorous global competition against dozens of elite beverage connoisseurs, Marc Almert thought wine "stank."

Pope Francis has named a special envoy to prioritize spirituality at the Roman Catholic shrine at Lourdes in France over "managerial and financial" aspects.

Thousands took part in Jerusalem's Gay Pride parade Thursday, waving rainbow flags and calling for tolerance in the Holy City with security tight following a 2015 knife attack by a Jewish extremist that killed a teenager.