Burkina army seizes power after uprising against veteran ruler
Burkina Faso's President Blaise Compaore was toppled on Thursday as the army took power after protesters set parliament ablaze in a popular uprising against the veteran leader's 27-year-rule.
The demonstrators earlier forced the government to scrap a vote on controversial plans to allow Compaore to extend his reign, with tens of thousands of people joining a mass rally in the capital Ouagadougou calling for the strongman to go.
Hundreds of people stormed parliament and other public buildings including the national TV headquarters, ransacking offices and setting fire to cars, despite a heavy police and army presence across the capital.
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Kerry says reported US slur of Israel's Netanyahu 'damaging'
The description of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a "chickenshit" by an anonymous US official as quoted in a US magazine this week was disgraceful and damaging, Secretary of State John Kerry said on Thursday.
Netanyahu on Wednesday condemned the comment from an unnamed official in The Atlantic, which added to tensions between his government and the Obama administration, particularly over settlement building in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem.
"We condemn anybody who uses language such as was used in this article," Kerry told an audience at the annual Washington Ideas Forum in his first comment on the issue. "It does not reflect the President, it does not reflect me, it is disgraceful, unacceptable, damaging."
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North Korea orders Ebola quarantine on all foreigners
North Korea has announced it intends to quarantine all foreigners entering the country for 21 days, no matter what their country of origin, as a measure against the spread of the Ebola virus.
Britain, which has an embassy in Pyongyang, issued a travel advisory on its government website Thursday, detailing the quarantine order which was apparently issued to all foreign missions in the North Korean capital.
According to the advisory, travellers to North Korea from regions or countries that Pyongyang considers affected by the Ebola virus, will be quarantined for 21 days "in a government-appointed hotel under medical supervision".
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US right-to-die woman Brittany Maynard holds on after viral video
An American woman with terminal cancer whose video about planning to kill herself on Nov 1 went viral, says she will hold on a little longer before taking her own life.
A spokesman said Brittany Maynard, 29, will likely end her life with a powerful combination of drugs in early November, as she is experiencing increasingly debilitating headaches as a result of brain cancer.
"I still feel good enough and I still have enough joy and I still laugh and smile with my family and friends enough that it doesn't seem like the right time right now," Maynard said in a new six-minute video. "But it will come, because I feel myself getting sicker. It's happening each week."
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French village bans 'evil' clowns for Halloween after country-wide terror wave
A French village has banned teenagers from dressing up as clowns for Halloween after people kitted out as the colourful pranksters have sown terror and violence in several parts of the country.
The 6,000-strong village of Vendargues in southern France wants to "avoid any disruption... by evil clowns," Bruno Giraudo from the village hall told AFP on Thursday.
The eerie trend of fake, evil clowns terrifying passers-by has hit several parts of France over recent weeks in what many see as a follow-on from hugely popular YouTube prank videos. Police have jailed or arrested more than a dozen teenagers after they dressed up as the pranksters and wrought havoc on the streets, at times armed with pistols, knives or baseball bats, sometimes beating people up.
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