China kicked off a huge military ceremony marking the 70th anniversary of Japan's defeat in World War II on Thursday, as major Western leaders stayed away.

President Xi Jinping oversaw the event, riding in a black car past thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks and missiles ahead of a parade through Tiananmen Square.

Queen Elizabeth II will become Britain's longest-reigning monarch on Wednesday after over 63 years on the throne.

Here, three Britons talk about their very different views of her, and their lives during her reign:

Saudi Arabia's top cleric hit out at Iranian film "Muhammad" on Wednesday describing its portrayal of the prophet's childhood as a "hostile act" and a "distortion" of Islam.

Iran's most expensive movie, which opened nationwide in the Shiite Islamic republic last week, depicts the prophet on screen, an act that is prohibited in Sunni Islam.

Women drivers in Iran's capital could have their cars impounded by police if they are caught driving with a poorly fixed veil or without their heads covered, a police chief said Wednesday.

"If a (female) driver in a car is poorly veiled or has taken her veil off, the vehicle will be seized in accordance with the law," the head of Tehran's traffic police, General Teymour Hosseini, was quoted as saying by the official ISNA news agency.

Fiction writer Vanessa Hua and nonfiction writer Meehan Crist are among this year's recipients of the Rona Jaffe Awards, $30,000 prizes for emerging female authors.

Hua is working on a novel about a Chinese factory girl, and Crist is studying traumatic brain injury.

Syria's conflict has killed tens of thousands and displaced millions, but it has also seen the country's irreplaceable heritage dug up and sold, damaged by war and wilfully destroyed.

From pre-historic settlements and ancient markets, to Greco-Roman ruins and Crusader castles, Syria is a repository of treasures from different ages and cultures.

The American Catholics who will meet Pope Francis on his U.S. visit later this month are widely accepting of non-traditional families, according to a Pew survey out Wednesday.

While 90 percent of U.S. Catholics said that a household headed by a married mother and father -- traditionally supported by the Catholic Church -- is ideal for raising children, large majorities see single, unmarried and divorced parents as acceptable.

Christian schools in Israel stayed shut Tuesday, delaying the start of the new academic year, in a funding dispute with authorities in the Jewish state.

The strike action affects around 33,000 pupils, mostly Muslim Israeli Arabs, at 47 schools run primarily by the Roman Catholic church.

The exiled Tibetan government says there is no cause for celebrating 50 years since China formed the Tibetan Autonomous Region, and insists Tuesday instead marks a half-century of occupation and control over the once-independent Himalayan nation.

The Tibetan government-in-exile issued the statement as China was reveling in lavish celebrations marking the 70th anniversary of Japan's World War II defeat.

A German state minister sparked a social media storm Tuesday after calling a beloved German pop singer a "wonderful Negro" during a TV debate on Europe's migrant crisis.

The Twitter hashtag #Neger (Negro) topped trending topics in Germany the morning after Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann used the term for Roberto Blanco, who is of Afro-Cuban origin.