Two ex-prostitutes on Monday dropped a civil suit against former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn who is standing trial for pimping in France, their lawyer said.

The former prostitutes -- Jade and Mounia -- had delivered dramatic testimony during the trial of how they felt powerless to say no to Strauss-Kahn sodomizing them during sex parties.

France on Monday signed its first export contract for Rafale fighter jets, with Egypt agreeing to buy 24 of the warplanes.

Eric Trappier, chief executive officer of France's Dassault Aviation, signed the multi-billion-euro contract at a presidential palace in Cairo in the presence of Egyptian leader Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian.

Five adolescents aged 15 to 17 have been detained for questioning in eastern France over the vandalism of Jewish graves, a local prosecutor said on Monday. 

All five are from the region of Sarre-Union in Alsace, where around 300 tombs were defaced and damaged on Thursday.

The controversial sale of two high-tech warships to Russia is "not on the agenda", France's defense minister said on Monday, despite the ceasefire agreed in Ukraine last week.

"It's not on the agenda," Jean-Yves Le Drian told French radio.

French President Francois Hollande said on Monday that Jews were welcome in Europe and France, in an apparent retort to Israel's prime minister who urged Jews to move to Israel after attacks on a synagogue in Copenhagen.

Jews "have their place in Europe and in particular in France", Hollande said, in reference also to the vandalizing of several hundred tombs at a Jewish cemetery in the east of the country over the weekend.

Egypt's leader vowed to punish the "murderers" responsible for the beheading of 21 Egyptian Christians after the Islamic State group in Libya released a video on Sunday purportedly showing the mass killing.

A visibly angry President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said Egypt "reserves the right to respond in a suitable way and time" in a televised speech, and declared seven days of mourning after the video was distributed by jihadists on social media.

A gunman killed at least one person and wounded three police officers after opening fire Saturday on a cultural center in Copenhagen as it was hosting a debate on Islam and free speech.

Swedish artist Lars Vilks -- the author of controversial Prophet Mohammed cartoons that sparked worldwide protests in 2007 -- was among those at the debate targeted by the gunman, who fled the scene after a shootout with police.

The U.S. said Friday that France's multibillion-dollar sale of Rafale fighter jets to Egypt was no cause for worry, despite Cairo's close defense-sales relationship with America.

"Egypt is a sovereign country," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said. "We have our own security relationship, so I wouldn't say there's a concern from this end."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel next week is to visit France for talks with President Francois Hollande and the Vatican, where she will meet Pope Francis, Berlin said Friday.

In her lunch meeting with Hollande on February 20, Merkel plans to discuss the crises in Ukraine, Syria and Iraq and the major themes of this year's G7 summit in Germany, her spokesman said.

Fighting raged in Ukraine on Friday as the clock ticked down to a ceasefire that will be a first test of the commitment by Kiev and pro-Russian separatists to a freshly-inked peace plan.

At least 27 civilians and soldiers died in shelling as German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned Russia it risked fresh sanctions if the fighting did not stop.