An offshoot of the militant Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) claimed responsibility on December 11 for twin bombings that killed 38 people and wounded 155 outside an Istanbul soccer stadium, an attack for which the Turkish government vowed vengeance.

A suicide truck bomb hit the entrance of Somalia's biggest port on December 11, killing at least 29 people, police said, an attack claimed by Islamist al Shabaab militants.

A bombing at Cairo's largest Coptic cathedral killed at least 25 people and wounded 49, many of them women and children attending December 11 mass, in the deadliest attack on Egypt's Christian minority in years.

New Zealand Finance Minister Bill English was confirmed as the country's new prime minister on December 12, as expected, a week after John Key announced his surprise resignation after eight years in the role.

At least 100 people were killed by the collapse of a church in southeastern Nigeria, a resident and photojournalist who visited a morgue said on December 11, but officials put the death toll at just 27.

French judicial authorities have arrested and charged a sixth suspect in a foiled militant plot to attack sites in the Paris region, a judicial source said on December 11.

Italian President Sergio Mattarella pledged on December 11 to act quickly to solve a government crisis prompted by Matteo Renzi's resignation as prime minister, with all major parties calling for elections as soon as possible.

Opponents to Britain leaving the European Union will launch a fresh legal action this week, which could further hamper Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit plans, The Sunday Times reported.

A car bomb followed by a suicide bombing less than a minute later killed 29 people and wounded 166 outside a soccer stadium in Istanbul on December 11 night, Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said.

Iraqi forces captured a neighborhood in east Mosul on December 9 pushing deeper to the heart of Islamic State's Iraq stronghold and destroying three sites where it produced car bombs used in waves of suicide attacks, the campaign's commander said.