DETROIT, the United States, May 25 (Xinhua) -- Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) trade ministers are meeting "at a time of shared uncertainty and challenges in the global economy," said U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai on Thursday.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Days from a deadline, President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy are narrowing in on a two-year budget deal aiming to curb federal deficits in exchange for lifting the nation’s debt ceiling and staving off an economically devastating government default.

KATHMANDU, May 26 (Reuters) - A renowned U.S. mountain guide has achieved the rare Mount Everest region "triple crown" of climbing the Everest, Lhotse and Nuptse peaks in one season, a hiking firm said on Friday, as the season's death toll on the world's highest mountain hit 12.

Garrett Madison, 44, climbed Lhotse, the world’s fourth tallest peak at 8,516 metres (27,939 feet) on Thursday, a day after he made his 13th ascent of Everest, at 8,849 metre (29,032 feet), said Ishwari Paudel of the Himalayan Guides company, which is helping Madison with logistics.

BRUSSELS, May 26 (Reuters) - The race to be the next NATO boss is heating up. But it is a race run largely in the dark, with no sign of a winner yet.

Jens Stoltenberg, the transatlantic military alliance's Norwegian secretary-general, is due to step down at the end of September after nine years in post.

Many alliance members would like his succession settled at, or even before, a NATO summit in Lithuania in mid-July.

25 May 2023; MEMO: A new bill is being proposed which will grant Israel powers to extend its crackdown on human rights groups. The Ministerial Committee on Legislation will put forward a plan on Sunday to impose a tax on 65 per cent of foreign donations to Israeli and Palestinian humanitarian and human rights groups.

KYIV, May 26 (Reuters) - Ukraine shot down 10 missiles and over 20 drones launched by Russia in overnight attacks on the capital Kyiv, the city of Dnipro and eastern regions, Ukrainian officials said on Friday.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's office said in a statement that a fire had broken out on the outskirts of the northeastern city of Kharkiv after an oil depot was hit twice, and that equipment for pumping oil products had been damaged.

BEIRUT, May 25 (Xinhua) -- An "all-out war" will include all the fronts of the axis of resistance, said Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Thursday in response to the Israeli military's warning.

"Never miscalculate; any folly may lead you to the abyss," Nasrallah said in a televised speech on the Resistance and Liberation Day.

"It is not you who are threatening a great war, but we are the ones who are threatening you with it," he said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — About 10% of people appear to suffer long COVID after an omicron infection, a lower estimate than earlier in the pandemic, according to a study of nearly 10,000 Americans that aims to help unravel the mysterious condition.

Early findings from the National Institutes of Health’s study highlight a dozen symptoms that most distinguish long COVID, the catchall term for the sometimes debilitating health problems that can last for months or years after even a mild case of COVID-19.

MOSCOW, May 26. /TASS/: Washington is unleashing its European satellites to nip at Moscow’s heels, believing it can get away with anything, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.

"For now, Washington is egging its European satellites on [to antagonize] the Russian Federation, thinking they can get away with anything," he said in an appearance on the "Moscow.Kremlin.Putin" television program, according to an excerpt posted on Friday on journalist Pavel Zarubin's Telegram channel.

SAO PAULO, May 26 (Reuters) - Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Friday he had a phone call with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin and reaffirmed his willingness to establish peace talks with both sides of the war in Ukraine.

Lula tweeted he had also thanked Putin for an invitation to attend an economic forum in Saint Petersburg, but had to decline it as he "can't visit Russia at the moment."

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Belgium and Iran conducted a prisoner exchange Friday in Oman, with officials saying Tehran released a Belgian aid worker in exchange for an Iranian diplomat convicted of attempting to bomb a meeting of exiles in France.

The initial announcement by Oman’s Foreign Ministry did not identify the prisoners being swapped.

BEIRUT, May 26 (NNN-NNA) – The Lebanese army, along with the UN Interim Force in Lebanon, are investigating an Israeli claim of shooting down a drone that crossed over from Lebanon earlier yesterday, a Lebanese security source, said.

An Israeli infantry force was found to be combing with armoured vehicles the borderline where the drone fell, the source said on condition of anonymity.

The Israeli military announced in the day, the downing of a drone near its border with Lebanon, without revealing who operated the drone or whether it was armed.