French authorities opened a manslaughter inquiry Monday into the May crash of an EgyptAir plane that killed 66 people, saying there is no evidence so far to link it to terrorism.

Prosecutor's office spokesman Agnes Thibault-Lecuivre said the inquiry was launched as an accident investigation, not a terrorism investigation. She said French authorities are "not at all" favoring the theory that the plane was downed deliberately, though the status of the inquiry could eventually change if evidence emerges to that effect.

President Vladimir Putin has praised what he calls Russia's "all-embracing and strategic partnership" with China, at the start of a visit to Beijing that comes against the background of a drop in trade and lingering mistrust.

Putin told Chinese Premier Li Keqiang that ties were based firmly on common economic interests, a reference to Russian hopes for Chinese investment and purchases of its oil, gas and other natural resources.

Islamic State group fighters have detained some 900 Kurds in the northern Syrian province of Aleppo over the past three weeks, amid fierce fighting for control of a nearby IS stronghold, a Kurdish official and Syrian activists have said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Friday the 900 civilians were detained near the IS-held town of al-Bab.

Reporters Without Borders is condemning the arrest of its Turkey representative and two others on charges of "'disseminating terrorist propaganda."

Christophe Deloire, the secretary general of the media freedom watchdog, said Friday that the arrests are an attempt by the authorities to intimidate journalists and called them "illegitimate." He spoke at a news conference in front of Istanbul's Metris Prison, where the three journalists are being held.

The Russian parliament had adopted a set of controversial counter-terrorism amendments which have sparked alarm among rights activists.

The amendments that the Duma voted on Friday include introducing prison sentences for failure to report a grave crime. Another forces telecommunications companies to store logs and data for months, a measure which threatens to eat almost all of the companies' profits.

Greek police say a teenage Syrian refugee has been lightly injured after being shot by an unknown man while trying to illegally return to Turkey, from which he had entered Greece months earlier.

The 16-year-old, together with a 21-year-old Iraqi, had bought a small inflatable dinghy in which they planned to cross the Evros river, on Greece's northeastern border with Turkey, near Didymoteicho.

An Egyptian hijacker who is fighting his extradition from Cyprus claimed Thursday that he had been wounded in an attack on the Israeli army in Lebanon.

Police arrested around 100 protesters in Paris Thursday in hopes of preventing new scenes of violence in the streets as thousands staged the latest march against French labor reforms.

Pope Francis is making his first foray into the former Soviet Union with a weekend visit to Armenia, a year after he riled Turkey by declaring the Ottoman-era slaughter of Armenians genocide and amid fresh tensions with rival Azerbaijan.

The Vatican has long cheered the Armenian cause, holding up the poverty-wracked nation of 3 million mostly Orthodox Christians as a bastion of faith and martyrdom in a largely Muslim region, and the first nation that established Christianity as a state religion in 301.

Human Rights Watch is calling on Egypt's government to release from detention four members of a satirical street group who posted video clips on social media that mocked President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi and called on him to step down.

Five of the group's six members were detained in May, but one was later released on bail. The sixth member has gone into hiding. They are accused of using social media networks to undermine Egypt's stability, spreading false news and inciting protests.