Legislation intended to ban today’s British children from ever legally being able to smoke has begun its journey through Parliament.

British lawmakers are voting on a bill to strip hereditary aristocrats of the right to sit and vote in the House of Lords after more than 700 years.

New Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has opened his first policy speech in office by expressing deep regrets over the governing party’s slush funds scandal that dogged his predecessor.

South Africa’s Constitutional Court says it will hear a case next month brought by two opposition parties to revive impeachment proceedings against President Cyril Ramaphosa.

The speaker of the Georgian parliament has signed into a law a bill that severely curtails LGBTQ+ rights in the country and mirrors legislation adopted in neighboring Russia.

Czechs are casting ballots in the second round of voting for a third of the seats in Parliament’s upper house.

Sri Lanka’s new President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has dissolved parliament and called for a parliamentary election in an effort to consolidate his mandate following his weekend election victory.

Exceptionally heavy rainfall has been pounding Central Europe and has prompted deadly flooding in the region, with four new deaths reported in Poland, three in Czech Republic and one in Romania.

French President Emmanuel Macron is holding talks with key political players in a bid to form a new government.

Paetongtarn Shinawatra, the daughter of former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, will be nominated as the country’s new prime minister in a parliamentary vote, her party and its coalition partners said Thursday.

New Zealand's prime minister is defending the removal of basic Māori phrases meaning “hello” and “New Zealand” from a lunar new year invitation to an Australian official.

New Zealand is the latest country to confront cruel, systemic and commonplace abuse of children and vulnerable adults in state and faith-based care institutions.

Nearly a third of the children and vulnerable adults in state, foster and faith-based care in New Zealand between 1950 and 1999 were physically, sexually, verbally or psychologically harmed.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi plans to raise spending to create more jobs and spur economic growth.

King Charles III has arrived at Britain's Parliament to preside over the State Opening.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced that Parliament will open on July 18 as he remains locked in negotiations with other parties to form a Cabinet well before then amid rifts in the new governing coalition.

South Africa’s main political rivals are now partners in government after they came together in a last-ditch coalition deal that ensured President Cyril Ramaphosa was dramatically reelected with cross-party support.

A top official with South Africa’s African National Congress party says it has a broad agreement with the main opposition and other parties to form a coalition government.

South Africans have voted in a national election that could be the country’s most hotly contested in 30 years.

Britain’s lawmakers left Parliament on Friday for the last time before an election is held in six weeks.

Georgia’s parliament green-lit a final vote on a proposed law that critics see as a threat to media freedom and the country’s aspirations to join the European Union, after police dispersed the latest protests against it over the weekend.

Georgia has been engulfed by huge protests triggered by a proposed law that critics see as a threat to media freedom and the country’s aspirations to join the European Union.

Georgia’s Parliament has moved a step closer to passing a law that critics fear will stifle media freedom and endanger the country’s European Union membership bid.

Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu’s political party has swept parliamentary elections in a strong endorsement of his pro-China foreign policy.

Lawmakers in Thailand’s lower house of Parliament have overwhelmingly approved a marriage equality bill that would make the country the first in Southeast Asia to legalize equal rights for marriage partners of any gender.

New Zealand says hackers linked to the Chinese government targeted its Parliament in 2021.

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has told Australia’s Parliament that the strategic partnership between the two nations is more important than ever with the rule of law and peace in the region under threat from China.

The U.K.’s governing Conservative Party has suspended ties with one if its lawmakers after he accused London Mayor Sadiq Khan of being controlled by Islamists as tensions over the Israel-Hamas war roil British politics.

German lawmakers have approved a government plan to liberalize rules on cannabis, paving the way for the country to decriminalize limited amounts of marijuana and allow members of “cannabis clubs” to buy it for recreational purposes.

The chaotic debate over a cease-fire in Gaza reverberated through Britain’s Parliament as the speaker of the House of Commons faced calls to resign and lawmakers said they feared for their safety amid pressure from all sides of the issue.

U.K. lawmakers have called for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war.

Zimbabwe’s Cabinet has agreed to back a move in Parliament to abolish the death penalty.

German lawmakers have approved cuts to fuel subsidies for farmers that prompted angry protests, along with a 2024 budget the government had to revamp after a court ruling blew a hole in its financial plans.

Nearly $4 billion in drones and military equipment have been approved for sale to India by the Biden administration.

Russia’s national elections commission has registered the Communist Party’s candidate to compete with President Vladimir Putin in the March election that Putin is all but certain to win.

Britain is one of the world’s oldest democracies, but some worry that essential rights and freedoms are under threat.

Dozens of opposition lawmakers suspended from Parliament by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government for obstructing proceedings have held a protest accusing the government of throttling democracy in the country.

Naphat Krutthai and Rasithaya Jindasri have been in a committed relationship for eight years, but only now they can consider getting married.

A man charged with terrorism and other offenses over a 2022 fire that badly damaged South Africa’s historic Parliament complex in Cape Town has been declared unfit to stand trial.

The U.K. government says that Russia’s intelligence services have targeted high-profile British politicians, civil servants and journalists with cyberespionage and “malicious cyberactivity” as part of sustained attempts to interfere in U.K. political processes.

Thousands of protesters have rallied against the New Zealand government’s Indigenous policies as the Parliament convened for the first time since October elections.

Elton John has addressed Britain’s Parliament at an event honoring his dedication to fighting HIV in the U.K. and beyond.

New Zealand’s new prime minister plans to ban cellphone use in schools and repeal tobacco controls in the agenda for his first three months in office.

New laws rushed through Australia’s Parliament last week to mandate curfews and electronic tracking bracelets on some foreigners with criminal records are facing their first High Court challenge.

Albanian opposition lawmakers have disrupted the Parliament’s session again to protest what they say is increasingly authoritarian rule by the governing Socialists.

Kenya says it won't deploy its police officers to Haiti until all conditions on training and funding are met in line with last month’s approval from the U.

King Charles III is preparing to deliver the King’s Speech at the State Opening of Parliament.

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim says subsidies will be progressively cut and new taxes launched next year as part of the 2024 federal budget.

Turkish warplanes have carried out new airstrikes against suspected Kurdish militant sites in northern Iraq days after a suicide bomb attack in the Turkish capital.

The Turkish defense ministry says its warplanes have carried out raids on suspected Kurdish rebel targets in northern Iraq following a suicide attack on a government building in the Turkish capital.

Thailand’s new Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin has vowed to act quickly to relieve the country’s economic problems in his inaugural speech to Parliament.

Australians will vote on Oct. 14 in a referendum that would enshrine in the nation’s constitution a mechanism for Indigenous people to advise Parliament on policies that effect their lives known as the Voice.

Spain’s newly elected Parliament has voted by a majority to elect a Socialist candidate as chamber speaker, breathing some life into acting Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez´s aspirations to form another leftist government.

The Italian finance ministry is defending a proposed 40% tax on some bank profits as being in line with “already existing rules in Europe on extra bank margins.”.

The progressive political party that won the most seats in Thailand’s general election has been excluded from a coalition to form the next government.

India’s fractured opposition parties have joined forces in a rare show of unity and formed an alliance to unseat the popular but polarizing prime minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.

Thailand’s Parliament has voted against allowing the leader of the progressive party that finished first in May’s general election a second chance to be confirmed as prime minister.

A vessel that will accommodate up to 500 asylum-seekers has arrived in England as Parliament passed its controversial bill to curb migration.

The political party that captured first place in Thailand’s general election two months ago — only to see the country’s unelected Senators block it from taking power — is fighting back.

Greece’s conservative government has won a vote of confidence in Parliament to start its second four-year term.

British police have reopened an investigation into lockdown-breaching government parties after viewing video of Conservative Party staffers dancing and drinking at a 2020 Christmas soiree.

Greece’s center-right leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis has been sworn in as prime minister for a second consecutive term.

Up to five small far-right and far-left parties may cross the 3% parliamentary entry threshold in Greece's repeat election on Sunday.

Australia’s Senate has voted for a referendum to be held this year on creating an Indigenous Voice to Parliament, an advocacy body to give the nation’s most disadvantaged ethnic minority more say on government policy.

A U.K. parliamentary committee has met to conclude its inquiry into whether former Prime Minister Boris Johnson misled lawmakers over parties at his Downing Street office that breached COVID-19 lockdown restrictions.

Former U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson says he’s quitting as a lawmaker after being told he will be sanctioned for misleading Parliament.

Newly elected Greek lawmakers were sworn in Sunday but the Parliament in which they sit may be dissolved as early as Monday, ahead of fresh elections on June 25.

India’s major opposition parties have boycotted the inauguration of a new Parliament building by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a rare show of unity against his Hindu nationalist ruling party.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says he is working in the “most effective way possible” to secure the release of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Months before an election, New Zealand’s government is offering some modest financial relief to many people by making most prescription medicines free and increasing subsidies for childcare and public transportation.

British lawmakers are warning that the country's Parliament building is at “real and rising” risk of destruction.

Before the glory of his coronation weekend, King Charles III has visited Parliament to get a reminder that the monarch’s power has limits.

Members of opposition parties dressed in black disrupted India's Parliament and protested in the capital after Rahul Gandhi, a key opposition leader and fierce critic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was expelled from the legislature last week.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant is calling for an immediate and temporary halt to the far-right government’s contentious plan to overhaul the judiciary.

New Zealand lawmakers and other workers inside the nation’s Parliament will be banned from having the TikTok app on their government phones.

British authorities say they're banning the Chinese-owned video-sharing app TikTok from government mobile phones on security grounds, following similar moves by the U.S. and European Union.

Tens of thousands of people are marching in Athens and Greek cities to protest the deaths of 57 people and the serious safety deficiencies the country’s worst train disaster exposed.

New Zealand’s new Prime Minister Chris Hipkins says he is axing or delaying many of his government’s more contentious policy plans as he looks to refocus on priorities like the rising cost of living.

Trading in shares in troubled Adani Enterprises has gyrated as the flagship company of India’s second-largest conglomerate tumbled 30% and then rebounded after more than a week of heavy losses.

Indian finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced several new clean energy initiatives in her annual federal budget speech on Wednesday, saying “green growth” is a top priority for the country.

Britain’s Treasury chief says taming inflation is more important than cutting taxes.

The value of the Lebanese pound has hit a new low, now trading at 50,000 to the dollar, as the country’s deeply divided Parliament failed to elect a president for the eleventh time.

The Czech coalition government is facing a parliamentary no-confidence vote over opposition claims of incompetence.

U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is expected to highlight the benefits of remaining in the U.K. when he meets with the Scottish leader during his first visit to Scotland since taking office.

India has begun randomly testing international passengers arriving at its airports for COVID-19 after an increase in cases in neighboring China.

When New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was caught on a hot mic using a vulgarity against a rival politician last week, it seemed the nation’s politics could be taking an ugly turn heading into an election year.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has been caught on a hot mic using a vulgarity against a rival politician.

Voters in Nepal lined up to elect members of Parliament in hopes that a new government would bring political stability and help with development of the Himalayan nation.

For the first time in New Zealand’s history, a majority of lawmakers are women.

Iraqi lawmakers elected a new president in a key step toward ending a year-long political vacuum.

Forming a new government in Italy involves time and decades-old rituals.

Lebanon's parliament has failed to elect a president, just weeks before incumbent President Michel Aoun's six-year term comes to an end.

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus says Australia could have tough new data protection laws in place this year in an urgent response to a cyberattack that stole from a telecommunications company the personal data of 9.8 million customers.

Australia has honored Queen Elizabeth II with a day of mourning and a wreath of golden wattle — the plant that blooms in Australia's national colors in the southern spring.

A surging tide of people — ranging from London retirees to former England soccer captain David Beckham — have lined up to file past Queen Elizabeth II’s coffin as it lies in state at Parliament.

In his first visit to Britain’s Parliament as monarch, King Charles III spoke of feeling the “weight of history which surrounds us” and referenced his “medieval predecessors” as he pledged to follow in his late mother Queen Elizabeth II’s footsteps and uphold the principles of constitutional monarchy.

The death of Queen Elizabeth II has triggered a series of carefully structured ceremonial and constitutional steps, as Britain undergoes a period of national mourning and heralds the reign of King Charles III.

The British monarchy’s rules state that “a new sovereign succeeds to the throne as soon as his or her predecessor dies.”.

South African president Cyril Ramaphosa faced a grilling by lawmakers in Parliament as they demanded answers from him on his handling of the theft of millions of dollars from his farm.

Sri Lanka’s government plans to present an amended budget for the year that slashes expenses and aims to provide relief to people hit hard by an economic meltdown.