The outgoing United Nations’ human rights chief says the power held by the five permanent members of the Security Council could cause the U.N. to “collapse.” Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein spoke to reporters Monday in Geneva as he prepares to step down from office at the end of the month. He said the five Council members with veto power — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States — are “running…

Islamic militants launched a series of attacks Monday in Russia’s southern province of Chechnya, leaving five young militants dead and several police officers wounded, officials said. The violence indicated the Islamist insurgency remains active in the mostly Muslim province despite authorities’ claims that it has been eradicated. It follows an attack on a Russian Orthodox church in May that left four attackers, two policemen and a churchgoer dead. Chechnya’s regional…

The World Health Organization says the number of measles cases in Europe jumped sharply during the first six months of 2018 and at least 37 people have died. The U.N. agency’s European office said Monday more than 41,000 measles cases were reported in the region during the first half of the year — more than in all 12-month periods so far this decade. The previous highest annual total was 23,927…

There’ll be no dancing in the moonlit streets of Athens. For all the official pronouncements that Greece’s eight-year crisis will be over as its third and last bailout program ends Monday, few Greeks see cause for celebration.   Undeniably, the economy is once again growing modestly, state finances are improving, exports are up and unemployment is down from a ghastly 28 percent high.   But one in five Greeks are…

Iran’s oil minister says France’s oil giant Total SA has pulled out of Iran after cancelling its $5 billion, 20-year agreement to develop the country’s massive South Pars offshore natural gas field over renewed U.S. sanctions. The parliament’s website ICANA.ir quoted Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh as saying on Monday that since Total first announced its decision a while ago, Iran has been in the process of “looking for an alternative”…

Pope Francis said Monday every effort must be made to ensure the culture of the Catholic Church prevents future clerical sexual abuse of children and to make sure that if such abuses do take place, they cannot be covered up. The pope’s comments came in a letter to the world’s Catholics in response to the latest revelations of abuses by clergy members. Last week, a U.S. grand jury report said…

Italy’s firebrand interior minister is threatening to return to Libya 177 migrants who have been aboard an Italian coast guard ship for days following another standoff with Malta. Interior Minister Matteo Salvini demanded Sunday that other European countries take in the migrants after his Maltese counterpart, Michael Farrugia, insisted that the “only solution” is for the Diciotti ship to dock at the Sicilian island of Lampedusa. The Diciotti has been…

The death toll of Genoa’s bridge collapse has risen to 43 as rescuers confirm they found remains believed to be of a missing family. Firefighters discovered the three bodies, reported to be those of a couple and their nine-year-old daughter, early Sunday inside a car extracted from the rubble of the viaduct. All those reported missing after Tuesday’s collapse have now been accounted for, although rescuers say they will continue…

Senior U.N. Human Rights officials condemn the decision by the Republika Srpska National Assembly in Bosnia and Herzegovina to take back its endorsement of a report acknowledging the massacre of thousands of Muslims in Srebrenica. U.N. Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, Adama Dieng, warns the decision by the Republika Srpska National Assembly to revoke its endorsement of the 2004 Srebrenica Commission Report is a step backwards for Bosnia…

Kofi Annan left the United Nations far more committed than it had been to combating poverty, promoting equality and fighting for human rights — and until his death Saturday he was speaking out about the turbulent world he saw moving from nations working together to solve problems, to growing nationalism. As secretary-general of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006, Annan saw as his greatest achievements the programs and policies…