A senior U.S. diplomat apologized Friday to thousands of Afghans stranded in the United Arab Emirates months after the fall of Kabul to the Taliban, promising to speed repatriation for some to America while acknowledging that authorities still do not know who some of them are.

The visit comes as America still struggles with how to handle the tens of thousands who piled into planes in the hectic final days of Afghanistan's U.S.-backed government, capping the end of a 20-year experiment in replacing hard-line Taliban rule with a nascent democracy.

The U.N.'s top official for Libya on Friday urged the country's divided factions to refrain from violence and agree on a framework for the future. Libya is being pulled apart again, with two rival governments claiming power after tentative steps towards unity in the past year following a decade of civil war.

Stephanie Williams, the U.N. special adviser on Libya, invited lawmakers to appoint 12 members to a committee that will work to overcome the political deadlock.

The Russian parliament has passed a bill introducing sentences of up to 15 years in prison for intentionally spreading "fake" information about military action.

Russian state news agencies reported Friday the passing of the bill in the third and final reading.

As the West condemns Russia, President Vladimir Putin has vocal supporters in China, where the ruling Communist Party tells its people they are fellow targets of U.S.-led harassment.

"If Russia is destroyed, we will be next. This is for sure," said Wang Yongchun, a retiree in Beijing. "The United States wants to dominate the world."

A woman crouches down in the doorway of a blue and yellow train at a station in Kyiv, Ukraine's embattled capital city. Her husband stands on the platform below and cranes his neck up for a kiss that both hope will not be their last.

As the train door closes, the woman holds up their 2-year-old son and he smiles and presses his tiny hand against the smudged window to wave goodbye to his father, who is staying behind to fight the Russian invaders.

French President Emmanuel Macron has formally announced that he will run for a second term in April's presidential election, ahead of which he is already leading in the polls.

In a "letter to the French" published on domestic media websites, Macron said: "I am seeking your trust again. I am a candidate to invent with you, faced with the century's challenges, a French and European singular response."

The Russian invasion of Ukraine is the largest conflict that Europe has seen since World War II, with Russia conducting a multi-pronged offensive across the country.

The Russian military has pummeled wide areas in Ukraine with airstrikes and has conducted major rocket and artillery bombardments, resulting in large numbers of casualties.

A fire at Europe's biggest nuclear plant ignited by Russian shelling has been extinguished, two people on the site were injured in the fire and Russian forces have taken control of the site.

The head of the United Nations’ atomic watchdog said there has been no release of radiation at the Ukrainian nuclear plant that was targeted.

When Russia launched its war on Ukraine, a Syrian student in the city of Kharkiv joined the exodus of people fleeing the onslaught. It was the third time that 24-year-old Orwa Staif, who grew up in the suburbs of Damascus, was being displaced by war and crises.

For Staif, it was a jarring déjà vu: columns of people, many on foot, carrying what few belongings they could, desperate to escape bombs and missiles. He had seen it all before, in his native Syria.

The walls of Saifullah's home in northern Jakarta are lined like tree rings, marking how high the floodwaters have reached each year -- some more than four feet from the damp dirt floor.

When the water gets too high, Saifullah, who like many Indonesians only uses one name, sends his family to stay with friends. He guards the house until the water can be drained using a makeshift pump. If the pump stops working, he uses a bucket or just waits until the water recedes.