A convoy of tanker trucks carrying Iranian diesel crossed the border from Syria into Lebanon early Thursday, a delivery organized by Iran-backed Hizbullah to ease crippling fuel shortages in the crisis-hit country.

The trucks entered from Syria through an illegal crossing in the eastern region of Hermel.

An earthquake destroyed houses, killed at least three people and injured dozens Thursday in southwest China's Sichuan province.

Rescue work was underway following the magnitude-6.0 earthquake.

U.S. President Joe Biden has announced that the United States is forming a new Indo-Pacific security alliance with Britain and Australia that will allow for greater sharing of defense capabilities — including helping equip Australia with nuclear-powered submarines. It's a move that could deepen a growing chasm in U.S.-China relations.

Biden made the announcement alongside British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who joined him by video to unveil the new alliance, which will be called AUKUS (pronounced AWK-us). The three announced they would quickly turn their attention to developing nuclear-powered submarines for Australia.

The key defendant in the 2015 Paris attacks trial has said the coordinated killings were in retaliation for French airstrikes on the Islamic State group, calling the deaths of 130 innocent people "nothing personal" as he acknowledged his role for the first time.

Salah Abdeslam, who wore all black and declined to remove his mask as he spoke in a custom-built courtroom, has been silent throughout the investigation. Observers were waiting to see if he would offer any details during the trial.

Lebanon's former prime minister Hassan Diab left the country for the United States on Tuesday, his advisor said, despite a subpoena from the judge investigating last year's devastating explosion at Beirut port.

Diab was the country's prime minister when the explosion happened on Aug. 4, 2020. He resigned after the blast that killed over 200 people and injured over 6,000, leaving large parts of the city devastated.

Three former U.S. intelligence and military officials have admitted providing sophisticated computer hacking technology to the United Arab Emirates and agreed to pay nearly $1.7 million to resolve criminal charges in an agreement that the U.S. Justice Department described Tuesday as the first of its kind.

The defendants — Marc Baier, Ryan Adams and Daniel Gericke — are accused of working as senior managers at a UAE-based company that conducted hacking operations on behalf of the government. Prosecutors say the men provided hacking and intelligence-gathering systems that were used to break into computers in the United States and elsewhere in the world.

Egypt's president has met with Libya's parliament speaker and a powerful military commander as Cairo pushes for the withdrawal of foreign forces and the holding of elections as scheduled in December.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi received Speaker Aguila Saleh and Gen. Khalifa Haftar, commander of the self-styled Libyan Arab Armed Forces, in Cairo, the Egyptian leader's office said in a statement.

The rival Koreas test-launched ballistic missiles hours apart from each other on Wednesday in a display of military assets that came amid a faltering diplomatic push to strip North Korea of its nuclear program.

South Korea's presidential office said it conducted its first underwater-launched ballistic missile test on Wednesday afternoon. It said a domestically built missile fired from a 3,000-ton-class submarine flew a previously set distance before hitting a designated target.

Authorities in Greece Tuesday opened an investigation into the crash of a private plane from Israel that killed a prosecution witness in the corruption trial of former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Haim Geron, a former senior official at Israel's ministry of communications, and his wife Esther were killed in the crash late Monday off the island of Samos. The Israeli Foreign Ministry identified the victims, both aged 69, adding that consular officials and the ministry were working with the family to return the bodies. Geron was one of more than 300 witnesses that prosecutors listed for Netanyahu's trial on corruption charges. He is on trial for allegedly accepting expensive gifts from wealthy associates, allegations he denies. Greece's Air Accident Investigation and Aviation Board is investigating the causes of the crash, officials said Tuesday.

Saydi Mubarak and her mother share a bond that goes beyond a close mother-daughter relationship: They were both diagnosed with breast cancer a year ago and underwent months of chemotherapy at a Beirut hospital, together facing the anxiety, the hair loss and the uncertainty for the future.

Now they share the fear of not being able to get the medication they need to complete their treatment because in Lebanon, where a devastating economic crisis has upended daily life, there are almost no drugs to be found.