Clad in black and with a baby in her lap, a woman sits on the ground shaking a cardboard box outside the door of a Saudi mosque.

Human Rights Watch on Thursday urged Egypt to drop legal charges against four youths over a satirical video posted on the Internet, saying the country was losing its "legendary sense of humor."

Thousands of Pakistanis on Thursday thronged the streets of Karachi to attend the funeral of one of the country's best known Sufi musicians, who was gunned down a day earlier in what police called an "act of terror."

Italy's highest court has allowed a lesbian to adopt the daughter of her partner in a landmark ruling a month after a law on gay civil unions was passed without any such provisions.

Before dawn in Istanbul, in the holy Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. A turbaned Turkish cleric kneels on a prayer carpet and prepares to recite verses from the Koran.

Pushing his cart through the teeming Egyptian capital, 71-year-old Cairo street sweeper Abdallah Mohamed says nothing can stop him from fasting during Ramadan.

Israel's military said Wednesday it was looking into why soldiers at an air force base were ordered to line up in a formation spelling out the word Google for a visit by the company's top gun.

Russia's security service said Tuesday it had raided over a dozen locations linked to the Church of Scientology in the latest step of a long-running battle between authorities and the U.S.-based organization.

Giorgio Armani has urged Britain to stay in the European Union, warning that the bloc would be worse off without England's influence on fashion and design.

Crowds flocked to China's most notorious dog meat festival to buy butchered canines as it opened Tuesday, activists on the scene said, as the annual slaughter proceeded despite international outrage.