The U.N. and Red Cross voiced alarm Friday at alarming details of executions, gang rapes and abductions as Sudan's western city of El-Fasher fell to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

Embassies in Mali urged citizens to depart the country immediately this week while the United States and United Kingdom withdrew non-essential staff, as a fuel blockade by jihadists upturns daily life and stokes fears of growing insecurity.

Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji on Friday asked his visiting German counterpart Johann Wadephul to "help put pressure on Israel to stop its attacks."

"Only a diplomatic solution, not a military one, can ensure stability and guarantee calm in the south," Rajji was quoted by the National News Agency as saying.

Israel has returned the bodies of 30 more Palestinians to Gaza as part of an ongoing exchange deal under a US-brokered ceasefire plan, a hospital told AFP on Friday.

Pakistan and Afghanistan have agreed to extend a temporary ceasefire and will hold another round of peace talks in Istanbul next week, aiming to defuse tensions after a deadly flare-up this month.

U.S. President Donald Trump's surprise directive to begin nuclear weapons testing provoked global criticism on Friday, as it raised the specter of renewed superpower tensions.

A Turkish disaster response team is still waiting by the Gaza border for Israeli approval to enter the Palestinian territory to help with search and rescue operations, a defense ministry source said Thursday.

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa received German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul on Thursday and discussed bilateral ties with Berlin, which welcomed a large number of Syrian refugees during the country's 14-year civil war.

Thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jewish men, dressed in black, rallied in Jerusalem on Thursday to protest against military conscription, an issue that has caused major strain in Israel's right-wing ruling coalition.

Hamas' armed wing said it would hand over the remains of two more hostages on Thursday as demanded under the U.S.-brokered ceasefire agreement in Gaza.