Greek banks are ready to open their branches across the country on July 20 after a three-week shutdown, officials said, while German Chancellor Angela Merkel called for swift aid talks so Athens could also lift withdrawal limits.

Secretary of State John Kerry will meet Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez in Washington on July 20, US officials said, to mark the historic restoration of diplomatic ties between former Cold War foes severed more than five decades ago.

President Barack Obama's administration sent a nuclear agreement with Tehran to Congress on July 19 and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged US lawmakers to reject a deal he said would only feed an "Iranian terror machine".

More than half of Germans think the planned deal with Greece is bad and many would have preferred that the crisis-stricken country left the euro zone rather than getting the chance for further aid, according to an opinion poll.

The governors of Florida, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas and Indiana on July 18 ordered National Guard members at offices and other facilities to be armed in the wake of attacks that left five servicemen dead in Tennessee.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on July 18 the nuclear deal with world powers did not signal any wider shift in Iran's relationship with Washington or its policies in the Middle East.

More than 100 people were killed in a suicide car bombing at a busy market in an Iraqi town on July 17, in one of the deadliest attacks carried out by Islamic State militants since they overran large parts of the country.

The Mexican Attorney General's office said on July 17 it had arrested seven officials over suspected involvement in the jail break of drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.

Europe moved to re-open funding to Greece's stricken economy on July 16 after the parliament in Athens approved a new bailout program in a fractious vote that left the government without a majority.

Two bombings by suspected Boko Haram militants killed an estimated 50 people at a market in the northeastern Nigerian city of Gombe on July 16, officials from two disaster agencies said.