Russia sent paratroopers to Belarus Friday in a show of support for its ally amid the tensions over an influx of migrants on the Belarusian border with Poland.

The Russian Defense Ministry said that as part of joint war games Russian paratroopers will parachute from heavylift Il-76 transport planes in Belarus' Grodno region that borders Poland.

A Taliban provincial spokesman says a bomb exploded in a mosque during Friday prayers, wounding 15 people in eastern Afghanistan, where Islamic State group militants have been waging a campaign of violence.

Qari Hanif, the government spokesman for Nangarhar Province, said the bomb appeared to have been planted inside the mosque in the town of Traili, located in the mountainous Spin Ghar area outside the provincial capital Jalalabad.

South Korea's main opposition presidential candidate said Friday he will strengthen military cooperation with the United States and Japan if elected to better cope with North Korea's nuclear threat and would strive to make the North a leading foreign policy priority for the U.S.

Yoon Suk Yeol has been leading public opinion surveys since becoming the conservative main opposition party's nominee last week for next March's election to choose the successor of current liberal President Moon Jae-in.

Turkey's Civil Aviation Authority said Friday that the country is halting airline ticket sales to Iraqi, Syrian and Yemeni citizens wanting to travel to Belarus, which in recent months became a route for migrants and refugees to enter the European Union.

EU leaders have put increasing pressure on airlines to stop bringing people from the Middle East to Minsk, the capital of Belarus, from where asylum-seekers seeking better lives can then travel by car to the EU's doorstep.

Izzeldin Abuelaish captured widespread sympathy in Israel when he lost three daughters and a niece in an Israeli strike during the 2009 war in the Gaza Strip. Now, the Palestinian doctor is seeking justice in Israel's highest court.

Abuelaish is scheduled to appear before the Supeme Court in Jerusalem on Monday in hopes of receiving an apology from Israel and compensation for his loss.

Pakistan on Thursday hosted talks with special envoys from the United States, Russia and China on the path forward for Afghanistan, where a deepening humanitarian crisis has forced many Afghans to migrate to neighboring countries since the Taliban takeover in August.

The international community has not recognized the government appointed by the Taliban. Afghanistan's Taliban-appointed foreign minister, Amir Khan Muttaqi, did not attend the meeting but later met with the special envoys in Islamabad.

Israel has faced growing calls to release five Palestinians who have been on hunger strike for weeks to protest a controversial policy of holding them indefinitely without charge, including one who has been fasting for 120 days and is in severe condition.

Israel says the policy, known as "administrative detention," is needed to detain suspects without disclosing sensitive intelligence, while the Palestinians and human rights groups say it denies them due process. Suspects can be held for months or years without seeing the evidence against them.

France is hosting an international conference on Libya on Friday as the North African country heads into long-awaited elections next month, a vote that regional and world powers hope will pull the oil-rich nation out of its decade-old chaos.

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and several world leaders will take part in the Paris conference, and are expected to push for transparent, credible elections. They will also urge the withdrawal of mercenaries and foreign forces from Libya, as stated in last year's U.N.-brokered cease-fire that ended fighting between rival factions in the country.

Australia and Saudi Arabia played to an often ill-tempered, rainy 0-0 draw on Thursday in the Socceroos' first home match in more than two years.

After winning the opening three games of the current qualifying stage, and 11 World Cup qualifiers in a row, Australia has now dropped five points from the last two, including a loss to Japan in the previous match.

Pope Francis renewed his call for Europe to welcome and show solidarity with migrants, saying the diversity they're bringing to the continent is renewing European cities as a "beautiful mosaic, which should not be scarred or corrupted with prejudices or hatred."

Francis didn't mention the latest migration crisis at Poland's eastern border during a meeting with European Catholic missionary groups attending a meeting of the Migrantes foundation of the Italian bishops conference. Hundreds and possibly thousands of asylum-seekers, most from the Middle East, have massed along Belarus' border with Poland as a political standoff between the two countries intensifies.