New Zealand and Cook Islands signed a defense and security pact Thursday, easing more than a year of tension between the Pacific nations over Cook Islands’ deepening ties with China. The fraught diplomatic standoff that prompted Wellington to pause millions of dollars in aid to Avarua was hardly a clash of geopolitical heavyweights: New Zealand has a population of 5 million, while Cook Islands has 15,000 people. But the lengthy freeze gripped Pacific observers because it reflected the struggle confronting tiny island nations with close ties to Western countries such as New Zealand and Australia as they seek to balance...

Pakistan and Afghanistan held the first round of peace talks on Wednesday, with China mediating to broker a durable ceasefire after weeks of fighting, two Pakistani officials said. But even as the talks were held, Afghanistan accused Pakistan of firing mortars into its territory. Representatives from the two countries were meeting in Urumqi, in northern China, the officials told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media. The first round of talks concluded on Wednesday afternoon and were expected to continue on Thursday, they said. China has not commented. Pakistan’s Ministry...

Valerie Wairimu has no time to rest during break time at Kenya’s Greenland Girls School. The teenager grabs a snack and goes straight to what makes this school unique: its nursery. The 19-year-old is met by a team of nannies who have been watching her baby, Kayden, before she feeds him between classes. The school is the only educational institute in Kenya dedicated to teenage mothers and cares for many of their children. For its 310 students and more than 80 children from infants to toddlers, Greenland represents a second chance at school that is free from stigma and, experts...

More than 200 years after being sunk by Adm. Horatio Nelson and the British fleet, a Danish warship has been discovered on the seabed of Copenhagen Harbor by marine archaeologists. Working in thick sediment and almost zero visibility 15 meters (49 feet) beneath the waves, divers are in a race against time to unearth the 19th-century wreck of the Dannebroge before it becomes a construction site in a new housing district being built off the Danish coast. Denmark’s Viking Ship Museum, which is leading the monthslong underwater excavations, announced its findings on Thursday, 225 years to the day since the...

American freelance journalist Shelly Kittleson often works without formal assignments from editors and on a shoestring budget, taking shared taxis to lawless corners of Iraq where militia rule outweighs government control. Kittleson, 49, has lived abroad for years, using Rome as her base for a time and building a respected journalism career across the Middle East. On Tuesday, she vanished after being forced into a car by two men at a busy Baghdad intersection, surveillance camera footage showed. “She is a great reporter and always wants to go to areas where no one wants to go,” said Patrizio Nissirio, a...

Royal Family: “Dating back to 600AD, every year on the Thursday before Easter, The Sovereign presents Maundy Money to people who’ve made an outstanding contribution to their communities. “Early in her reign, Queen Elizabeth II chose to take the Maundy Service around the UK, visiting a different cathedral or abbey each year in recognition of local communities across the country.”

Almost three dozen countries will meet Thursday in an effort to exert diplomatic and political pressure to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a vital shipping route that has been choked off by the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the virtual meeting chaired by Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper “will assess all viable diplomatic and political measures we can take to restore freedom of navigation, guarantee the safety of trapped ships and seafarers and to resume the movement of vital commodities.” Iranian attacks on commercial ships, and the threat of more, have halted nearly all traffic in...

“NASA is back in the business of sending astronauts to the moon,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman told reporters following liftoff, calling the half-century hiatus a brief intermission. The Artemis II launch at Cape Canaveral, Florida. The most powerful man rocket in history. Sending four brave astronauts further than any human has ever been from planet Earth The astronauts will stick close to home for the first 25 hours of their 10-day test flight, checking out the capsule in orbit around Earth before firing the main engine that will propel them to the moon. Once settled in a high orbit around...