British filmmaker Alan Parker, director of movies ranging from "Bugsy Malone", a gangster comedy featuring children armed with cream-shooting guns, to tense prison drama "Midnight Express", has died aged 76, British media reported on Friday. Parker, who also directed "Fame", "Evita",...

Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam on Friday postponed a Sept. 6 election to the Chinese-ruled city’s legislature by a year because of a rise in coronavirus cases, dealing a blow to the pro-democracy opposition which had hoped to make huge gains. The United States quickly condemned the move,...

The World Health Organization reported a record increase in global coronavirus cases on Friday, with the total rising by 292,527. The biggest increases were from the United States, Brazil, India and South Africa, according to a daily report. Deaths rose by 6,812. The four countries have...

Apple shares surged as much as 7.1% to a record high on Friday after reporting blockbuster quarterly results, helping the iPhone maker briefly overtake Saudi Aramco to become the world’s largest public company. Shares of the company rose to a record high of $412 in early trading. Closing at...

Two American oil giants lost more than $9 billion in the second quarter as the pandemic kept households on lockdown, cutting a gaping hole into a once-thriving business as the need for oil diminished around the world. Exxon lost $1.1 billion in the second quarter, and the Irving,...

The novel coronavirus claimed 1,129 lives in Brazil and 639 in Mexico over the past 24 hours, according to health authorities on Friday. In Brazil, the country second hardest hit by the virus, the death toll reached 91,263 with the latest fatalities, while the number of cases surged to over...

As a New York University medical researcher who works once a week in an emergency room, Dr. David Lee had the luxury of time to think like a scientist while also treating coronavirus patients whose lungs kept giving out. In every case, he saw the same thing: Their blood was starved of oxygen....

On the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, when Iraqis visit loved ones' tombs and take children to the funfair, the coronavirus pandemic put both cemeteries and Ferris wheels off-limits on Friday. The virus has cost almost 4,700 lives and infected over 121,000 people in Iraq, but it has also...

On the streets of Tripoli, Lebanon’s second biggest city and one of its poorest, there are no signs of festivities for Eid al-Adha this year, no decorations or twinkling lights. There’s no electricity anyway. Only a large billboard welcomes visitors at one of the city’s entrances. “We’re...

 As scientists and pharmaceutical companies work at breakneck speed to develop a vaccine for the novel coronavirus, public health officials and senior U.S. lawmakers are sounding alarms about the Trump administration’s lack of planning for its nationwide distribution. The federal...

The dollar extended its dramatic fall Friday, putting it on course for its biggest monthly drop in a decade as investors fretted that a rebound in the US economy would be derailed by the struggle to stem the coronavirus epidemic. Weakness in the US currency propelled the euro higher, with...

Iran will not open talks with the United States that will only benefit Donald Trump, supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Friday, insisting the US president's sanctions policy had failed. Decades-old tensions between Tehran and Washington have soared in the past year, with the sworn...

Max Verstappen outpaced championship leader Lewis Hamilton to top the times for Red Bull in Friday's opening free practice for this weekend's British Grand Prix. The Dutchman clocked a best lap in one minute and 27.422 seconds to beat Hamilton's Mercedes by 0.474 seconds. As the action...

Syria’s health ministry on Friday has announced 19 new confirmed coronavirus cases, topping the total of infections to 757.   At least 43 people have died of COVID-19 in the war-torn country but experts doubt that the number is accurate, saying Syria is seen at high risk from the...

Turkish intelligence has freed two Syrian army officers after three weeks of being arrested in the southern Hatay province, rebel sources told Zaman al-Wasl Friday. Lieutenant Colonel Mohamed Hamado and Captain Khaled Rahhal were arrested in Antakya city, the capital of Hatay. At the...

Millions of households in Manchester and nearby parts of northern England woke up to new lockdown rules Friday, hastily imposed following concerns over a spike in regional coronavirus infections. Under the measures, people from different households in the affected areas are banned from...

 Egypt’s president has approved new legal amendments that further exclude any serious competitors from elections and give the military greater control over civilian affairs, a leading rights group said Thursday. The amendments, published earlier this week in the country’s official...

Organising this year's scaled-down hajj required "double efforts" by Saudi authorities amid the coronavirus pandemic, King Salman said Friday after being discharged from hospital following gall bladder surgery. Only up to 10,000 people already residing in the kingdom are participating in...

Saudi Arabia’s 84-year-old ruler, King Salman bin Abdulaziz, tweeted Eid al-Adha greetings early on Friday, shortly after leaving hospital. The Saudi King, custodian of Islam’s holiest sites, left King Faisal hospital on Thursday after undergoing surgery to remove his gallbladder earlier in...

Syria's “inconsequential” presidential elections slated for next year “must be ignored,” a D.C.-based think tank said Friday. Writing in a blog post on the Atlantic Council's website, Jomana Qaddour and Danny al-Baaj argued "there is little way to stabilize Syria so long as" Bashar al-Assad...