Republican U.S. presidential frontrunner Donald Trump on Sunday refused to take back claims he saw Muslims cheering in New Jersey after the September 11, 2001 attacks, despite a lack of proof.

The brash real-estate tycoon has drawn sweeping condemnation after saying earlier this month that Arab and Muslim Americans had publicly rejoiced the unprecedented terror attacks on the United States.

A Honduran judge Sunday ordered a hearing on five Syrians who made it to the country after a five-nation odyssey, as a slice of the refugee crisis unfolds in far-flung Central America.  

Honduras say the men were arrested on November 17 with stolen Greek passports.

Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on Sunday condemned the West's "double standards" in a letter to the youth of America and Europe following the Paris attacks that killed 130 people.

"Anyone who has benefited from affection and humanity is affected and disturbed by witnessing these scenes -- whether it occurs in France or in Palestine or Iraq or Lebanon or Syria," he wrote in the letter, translated into English and French.

Hundreds of Americans have traveled to Iraq and Syria to fight for the Islamic State group and around 50 have returned to America, a senior U.S. lawmaker said Sunday.

That's the kind of scenario that led to the Paris terror attacks of November 13, said Republican Congressman Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.

Turkey and the European Union agreed at a summit on Sunday on a "historic" three-billion-euro ($3.2 billion) aid deal to stem the flow of Syrian refugees and other migrants to Europe.

Ankara's bid for membership of the EU will be kickstarted in return for its cooperation in preventing the 2.2 million Syrian refugees it hosts from coming to Europe, EU president Donald Tusk said.

About 300 people on Sunday protested the arrest of two prominent journalists on charges of spying over their reports about Ankara's alleged arms supplies to Syrian rebels in a case that has revived long-standing criticism of Turkey's press freedom record. 

The demonstrators, including journalists, rights groups and opposition MPs, marched to the Istanbul offices of the Cumhuriyet daily to express solidarity with its editor-in-chief Can Dundar and Ankara bureau chief Erdem Gul.

Two people died and about 3,000 were left homeless when a fire destroyed 800 shacks at the Masiphumelele informal settlement in Cape Town Sunday, officials said.

"Disaster risk management and the South African Red Cross Service are on scene to co-ordinate relief efforts including providing food, baby packs, mattresses and blankets," mayor Patricia de Lille said in a statement.

Clashes broke out Sunday between hundreds of asylum seekers at a shelter in Berlin, in the second mass brawl to erupt over the weekend in Germany's crowded migrant accommodations.

Several people were arrested at the fight that started in the food distribution queues at the former airport of Tempelhof, which has been turned into a temporary accommodation for 1,200 refugees, an AFP photographer witnessed.

Voters in the east Ukrainian government-held port of Mariupol on Sunday cast their ballots in a delayed local elections after an earlier poll was scrapped in the strategic frontline city.

The rest of Kiev-controlled Ukraine has already voted in local polls but the election was dramatically canceled in Mariupol on October 25 amid claims of widespread ballot paper irregularities.   

Suspected jihadist fighters attacked an armored van transporting money from a gold mine in Burkina Faso, the country's security minister said Sunday, the latest sign of Islamist violence spreading from neighboring Mali.

A group of heavily armed men with rocket launchers and automatic rifles attacked the truck in the country's north on Friday, killing the driver and wounding one other person, security minister Alain Zagre told AFP.