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The speaker of Iran’s Parliament wrote that two conditions, a cease-fire in Lebanon and the release of Iran’s blocked assets, “must be fulfilled” before negotiations with the United States begin.

The four Artemis II astronauts, returning from the world's first crewed moon voyage in over ​half a century, hurtled back toward Earth on Friday aboard their gumdrop-shaped Orion spacecraft, headed for a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off Southern California. The finale to NASA's celebrated 10-day mission was expected to begin with separation of Orion's crew capsule from its service module, followed by a fiery re-entry through Earth's atmosphere and a six-minute radio ​blackout before the capsule parachutes ‌into the sea.

Negotiators from Iran and the U.S. prepared for high-level talks with their ceasefire still shaky Friday, as Israel and Hezbollah traded fire and Tehran maintained its stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz. FRANCE 24's Hoda Abdel-Hamid reports from Doha, Qatar.

An exclusive report published in the New York Times, with the title 'How Trump Took the U.S. to War With Iran' outlines how, in the run up to the Iran war, President Trump weighed his instincts to go to war against the deep concerns of his vice president and also a pessimistic intelligence assessment. FRANCE 24's International Affairs Editor Kethevane Gorjestani tells us more.

First lady Melania Trump denied on Thursday that she had any relationship with Jeffrey Epstein and said she was not ​one of his victims, thrusting the Epstein matter back into the spotlight after her husband had sought to put it behind him. She denied online speculation that the disgraced financier and sex offender had introduced her to Donald Trump, saying she had met her husband at a New York City party in 1998, two years before crossing paths with Epstein at another event she attended with Trump.

A cloud of uncertainty hung Friday over the scheduled start of talks in Pakistan between the United States and Iran, with no announcement yet on the arrival of negotiators and both sides accusing the other of failing to properly implement a fragile ceasefire. US President Donald Trump has voiced displeasure at Iran's handling of the strategic Strait of Hormuz, which was meant to be reopened under the deal, while Tehran has reacted angrily to Israeli attacks in Lebanon, insisting that it too falls under the agreement -- something Washington disputes. Islamabad was nonetheless pressing ahead with its preparations for the high-stakes talks.

The Rev. Marko Ivan Rupnik has installed mosaics across the Roman Catholic world, including at the Vatican. After nuns accused him of abuse, some want his work removed.

China's leader Xi Jinping promoted "peaceful development" in talks with Taiwan's opposition chief, a move analysts say could be aimed at US President Trump to soften Washington's stance on the self-ruled island.

Clarence Curtis Jordan was convicted in 1978 but hadn’t had a lawyer for over 30 years The Texas court of criminal appeals has overturned the death sentence of Clarence Curtis Jordan, a 70-year-old man with intellectual disabilities, who spent nearly 50 years on death row – much of that time without a lawyer. Jordan was convicted in 1978 for the murder of Joe L Williams, a 40-year-old grocer in Houston, and was sentenced to death. In the years that followed, courts determined that Jordan, who has intellectual disabilities, was “incompetent”, making him ineligible for execution under constitutional standards. Continue reading...

Official social media accounts for Iranian embassies have engaged in information warfare, but the ones in Africa appear to have taken the lead on the attacks.