A massive fire raged through an overcrowded prison near Indonesia's capital early Wednesday, killing at least 41 inmates, two of them foreigners serving drug sentences, and injuring 80 others.

Televised footage showed firefighters battling to extinguish orange flames while black smoke billowed from the compound. Indonesian Red Cross officials evacuated the victims to ambulances and dozens of bodies in orange bags were laid in a room of Tangerang prison on the outskirts of Jakarta.

Some of the world's largest broadcasters including American network NBC are being asked by human rights groups to cancel plans to cover next year's Winter Olympics in Beijing. The Winter Games are scheduled to open on Feb. 4.

The request comes in an open letter from rights groups representing minorities in China, including Uyghurs, Tibetans, Hong Kong residents and others.

Pakistan is hosting a virtual meeting of foreign ministers from countries neighboring Afghanistan to discuss the situation there.

A foreign ministry statement said Wednesday's meeting will be attended by China, Iran, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

The Taliban on Tuesday announced an all-male interim government for Afghanistan stacked with veterans of their hard-line rule from the 1990s and the 20-year battle against the U.S.-led coalition, a move that seems unlikely to win the international support the new leaders desperately need to avoid an economic meltdown.

Appointed to the key post of interior minister was Sirajuddin Haqqani, who is on the FBI's most-wanted list with a $5 million bounty on his head and is believed to still be holding at least one American hostage. He headed the feared Haqqani network that is blamed for many deadly attacks and kidnappings.

In a secure complex embedded within a 13th-century courthouse, France on Wednesday will begin the trial of 20 men accused in the Islamic State group's 2015 attacks on Paris that left 130 people dead and hundreds injured.

Nine gunmen and suicide bombers struck within minutes of each other at France's national soccer stadium, the Bataclan concert hall and Paris restaurants and cafes on Nov. 13, 2015. Survivors of the attacks as well as those who mourn their dead are expected to pack the rooms, which were designed to hold 1,800 plaintiffs and 350 lawyers.

Government shelling of rebel-held areas in northwestern Syria killed four people, including a child and a woman, and wounded more than a dozen Tuesday night, opposition activists said.

The shelling of the city of Idlib came after several airstrikes hit the region that borders Turkey earlier in the day.

As the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks approaches, Americans increasingly balk at intrusive government surveillance in the name of national security, and only about a third believe that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were worth fighting, according to a new poll.

More Americans also regard the threat from domestic extremism as more worrisome than that of extremism abroad, the poll found.

A Jordanian soldier killed in the 1967 Middle East war was given a military funeral and laid to rest in east Jerusalem on Monday, in an extraordinary scene that pointed to improved ties between Israel and Jordan after years of tensions.

The soldier's remains were discovered last month during construction work at Ammunition Hill, the site of a famous battle between Israeli and Jordanian forces. Funeral prayers were held at the Al-Aqsa mosque and a Jordanian honor guard in uniform, with red-checkered headscarves wrapped around their faces, carried the casket to a nearby Islamic cemetery.

Movies from 77 countries will screen at the 2021 London Film Festival, as Britain's leading cinema showcase welcomes mass audiences back to movie theaters after a pandemic-disrupted year.

The main underground group coordinating resistance to Myanmar's military government issued a sweeping call for a nationwide uprising on Tuesday, raising the prospect of spiraling unrest.

The National Unity Government, which views itself as a shadow government, was established by elected legislators who were barred from taking their seats when the military seized power in February.