The Pakistani Taliban have claimed responsibility for multiple overnight gun attacks on police in the capital of Islamabad and the country's restive northwest.

Officials say at least 22 people, including 10 children, died in a popular mountain resort town in Pakistan after being stuck in their vehicles overnight during a heavy snowstorm.

The Taliban violently dispersed scattered protests for a second day as they moved to consolidate their rule less than a week after seizing power.

New Zealand medical regulators have approved use of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine, after earlier in the year approving the Pfizer vaccine.

A lawmaker from Pakistan’s ruling party has kicked off a debate in Parliament on whether the French ambassador should be expelled over the publication of controversial cartoons depicting Islam’s Prophet Muhammad.

Pakistan's interior minister says an outlawed Islamist political group has freed 11 police it had held hostage in the eastern city of Lahore amid clashes with security forces.

The French embassy in Pakistan is advising all of its nationals and companies to temporarily leave the country amid violent anti-France protests by supporters of a radical Islamist political party.

Sheikh Mohammed made the announcement Tuesday on Twitter that his country plans to send an unmanned spacecraft to the moon in 2024. Already, an Emirati space probe is hurtling through space on its way to Mars while last year it sent its first astronaut to the International Space Station. Sheikh Mohammed said the rover would be named “Rashid,” the same name of his late father, Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum. Sheikh Rashid was one of the original founding rulers of the United Arab Emirates, a federation of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula. ___Associated Press writers Isabel DeBre in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.