Variety

UNESCO on Tuesday added Arabic calligraphy, a key tradition in the Arab and Islamic worlds, to its Intangible Cultural Heritage list. A total of 16 Muslim-majority countries, led by Saudi Arabia, presented the nomination to the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation, which announced the listing on Twitter. “Arabic calligraphy …

Legendary Mexican singer Vicente Fernandez, an emblematic figure of ranchera music, died on Sunday at the age of 81, according to a message posted on his official Instagram account. Fernandez died at 6:15 a.m. local time, the post said. He had been suffering medical complications after a fall at his …

Saudi Arabia has disqualified some 40 camels from its lucrative annual beauty contest for the animals on the grounds that they received Botox injections, facelifts, and other cosmetic touch-ups to become more attractive. Describing it as the biggest-ever crackdown on such “tampering and deception,” the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported …

A small clay tablet dating back 3,500 years and bearing a portion of the Epic of Gilgamesh that was looted from an Iraqi museum 30 years ago and recently recovered from the United States formally returned to Iraq on Tuesday. The $1.7 million cuneiform tablet, known as the Gilgamesh Dream …

India’s total fertility rate has dropped below the replacement level for the first time, according to data released by the National Family Health Survey (NFHS). The rate has fallen to two in the latest survey, below the level at which a generation is producing enough children to replace itself. Given …

The United States Department of Defense late on Tuesday said it will establish a new group to investigate reports on the presence of UFOs in restricted airspace. The formation of the group comes after the government released a report in June, encompassing 144 observations, which said there was a lack …

Reuters has apologized for its poor choice of photo to illustrate a story about a monkey brain study that was deemed offensive and racist in China. On Thursday, Reuters published a story titled “Monkey-brain study with a link to China’s military roils top European university.” The report was about a …

Al-Chabayish Tourism and Environment Organization in Dhi Qar Governorate announced the recording of the highest number of Iraqi and foreign tourists entered this season on Friday. The director of the organization, Raad al-Asadi, said in a press statement, “The marshes area in the district of Chabayish, the far south of …

Children as young as five will need to be vaccinated to travel on Disney Cruise Line ships, the company has announced, in an expansion of its vaccine mandate. It is the first major passenger liner to require jabs for kids. The updated coronavirus vaccination requirements were announced by Disney on …

Negotiators shuttled between delegations at the U.N. climate talks in Scotland on Saturday, seeking a deal to give the world a fighting chance of avoiding the worst effects of global warming, as the British host told them they had just hours left. Alok Sharma delayed a public meeting in the …

The number of people around the world forced to abandon their homes likely increased to more than 84 million in the first half of this year, an increase fueled in particular by conflicts in Africa, the UN refugee agency said Thursday. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees said the number …

Joyful crowds pelted each other with fistfuls of cow manure this weekend as part of one village’s local ritual to mark the end of Diwali, India’s most important Hindu festival. Similar to Spain’s “La Tomatina” — the eccentric tomato-hurling celebration of the local fruit — residents of Gumatapura instead fling …

Archaeologists have uncovered a room at a villa just outside Pompeii containing beds and other objects that shed light on the living conditions of slaves in the ancient Roman city buried by a volcanic eruption. The room, in an excellent state of preservation, contains three wooden beds and a series …

More than one world leader says humanity’s future, even survival, hangs in the balance when international officials meet in Scotland to try to accelerate efforts to curb climate change. Temperatures, tempers, and hyperbole have all ratcheted up ahead of the United Nations summit. And the risk of failure looms large …

A Cambridge University college and Paris museum will on Wednesday hand back cultural artefacts that were looted from West Africa during the colonial era, setting a precedent that will pressure other institutions to return stolen works. Jesus College, Cambridge, will return a sculpture of a cockerel taken by British troops …

Long before Columbus crossed the Atlantic, eight timber-framed buildings covered in sod stood on a terrace above a peat bog and stream at the northern tip of Canada’s island of Newfoundland, evidence that the Vikings had reached the New World first. But precisely when the Vikings journeyed to establish the …

Poachers in Vietnam have shot dead five critically endangered langurs, a type of monkey killed for bushmeat and traditional medicine, state media said Tuesday. Rangers and police found the dead gray-shanked douc langurs during a regular patrol of forests in Quang Ngai province. Restricted to the forests of central Vietnam, …

Pope Francis said on Saturday he realizes some people, including within the Church, consider him to be “a pest” for defending the poor and most vulnerable, but that it won’t stop him as it is part of Christianity. “Thinking about these situations (of exclusion and inequality), I make a pest …

A teenager triggered a large-scale police operation after a restaurant owner mistook a toy gun he was carrying for a real weapon. A witness raised the alarm after seeing the 15-year-old, who was wearing a camouflage outfit and holding what appeared to be a rifle, running up and down the …

A massive fire broke out in the main hall of the El Gouna Film Festival site in Egypt on Wednesday, one day ahead of the opening ceremony of the fifth edition, according to social media videos and local media reports. The festival will go on as scheduled on Thursday, organizers …