INTERNATIONAL

A glass-bottomed bridge in China that was heralded as a record-breaker when it opened just 13 days ago has closed. Officials said the government was planning urgent maintenance work in the area and the bridge closed on Friday, with a re-opening time to be announced. But the US CNN network said a spokesman told them the bridge, spanning a canyon, ...

At least 14 people have been killed in a bomb attack in the home city of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. Dozens more were wounded in the explosion at a packed market in the southern city of Davao. A presidential spokesman said investigators had found shrapnel from a mortar-based improvised explosive device (IED) at the scene. Police in the capital Manila ...

A suicide bomber has attacked a court in the northern Pakistani city of Mardan, killing at least 12 people and injuring more than 50, officials say. The attacker threw a hand grenade before running into the court area and detonating a bomb, police told the BBC. Also on Friday, four suicide bombers targeted a Christian neighbourhood near Peshawar before being ...

Tropical Storm Hermine has strengthened into a hurricane, threatening to bring a dangerous storm surge to Florida. Hermine is expected to make landfall on the northern Florida Gulf Coast early on Friday – the first hurricane to hit the state since 2005. Governor Rick Scott declared a state of emergency for 51 counties as residents were braced for the dangerous ...

Hundreds of thousands of people have marched through the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, in rival demonstrations. Opposition supporters, staging their largest rally for two years, called for President Nicolas Maduro’s removal. They blame him for Venezuela’s economic crisis and accuse the electoral commission of delaying a referendum that could shorten his stay in power. Mr Maduro, whose supporters also rallied in ...

A rocket operated by the aerospace company SpaceX has exploded on the launch pad at Cape Canaveral where it was being test-fired ahead of a launch. In a statement, the company blamed the blast on “an anomaly” and said no-one had been injured. It said the rocket’s payload, a satellite due to be launched on Saturday, was also destroyed. The ...

Gabonese security forces have stormed the headquarters of the defeated presidential candidate, Jean Ping, as unrest continues after Saturday’s disputed election. A government spokesman said the operation in the capital, Libreville, was aimed at rooting out “criminals”. Mr Ping said two people had been killed in the assault on his headquarters. His supporters have staged protests after official results gave ...

Brazil’s Senate has voted to remove President Dilma Rousseff from office for manipulating the budget. It puts an end to the 13 years in power of her left-wing Workers’ Party. Ms Rousseff had denied the charges. Sixty-one senators voted in favour of her dismissal and 20 against, meeting the two-thirds majority needed to remove her from the presidency. Michel Temer ...

A US commercial flight has arrived in Cuba for the first time in more than half a century. JetBlue Flight 387 had 150 passengers, including US transport secretary Anthony Foxx. The plane took off from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, at 09:45 EDT (13:45 GMT) and landed in Santa Clara in central Cuba about an hour later. The flight marks the latest ...

Singapore is advising all pregnant women with symptoms associated with Zika, to be tested for the virus. The city-state has now confirmed 82 locally transmitted cases of Zika, a mosquito-borne virus linked to severe birth defects. It has initiated a drive to wipe out mosquitoes in affected areas. On Tuesday, the US joined Australia, Taiwan and South Korea in advising ...