Major questions remain over whether a partial truce in Syria, announced by the United States and Russia, will take hold as announced on February 27.

What are its prospects and what should the world expect from the key players in the conflict?

Germany fears xenophobia is taking root in its former communist east, where Islamophobic movement PEGIDA was born and where two recent incidents involving anti-migrant mobs shocked the country.

The ugly scenes of 20 to 30 apparently drunken onlookers cheering as a would-be asylum seeker home went up in flames Sunday in the town of Bautzen in Saxony state prompted one politician to warn that the region risked becoming a "failed state".

Alaa Ammar fled Syria to escape not just civil war but also the threat of persecution as a gay man. Yet when he arrived in The Netherlands last spring, he did not find the safe haven he craved.

He and four other gay travelers had to face newly arrived asylum seekers at a migrant center in the remote northern town of Ter Apel.

Billionaire businessman Donald Trump has in the past eight months defied his critics and proven his White House bid is not simply a surreal stunt. 

To the shock of the political world, the 69-year-old onetime reality TV star's nomination to be the Republican presidential candidate is now a genuine possibility.

Prime Minister David Cameron has cleared some key hurdles as he takes his first steps in what promises to be a bitter campaign ahead of an EU membership referendum in June, experts said.

Starting with a reform deal struck at a European Union summit on Friday, Cameron went on to secure the support of the overwhelming majority of his cabinet on Saturday.

Bullish and boyish in equal measure, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi is not shy about blowing his own trumpet.

To mark his second anniversary as premier, which falls on Monday, the Twitter-loving 41-year-old has posted a slideshow on his Facebook page vaunting his achievements since seizing power in an internal putsch inside his center-left Democratic Party (PD).

After two long days of talks, the European Union agreed a deal late Friday to recast Britain's EU membership at Prime Minister David Cameron's urging ahead of an in-out referendum.

Here are details of what Cameron was hoping for, as laid out in a letter to EU President Donald Tusk in November, and what he has achieved through a series of compromises couched in often ambiguous diplomatic language:

Britain will vote on whether to stay in the EU in a make-or-break referendum expected in June, after Prime Minister David Cameron sealed a reform deal in Brussels on Friday.

National referendums have often determined the direction taken by the European Union, whether by admitting new members, expanding its powers via treaty changes, or embarking on new projects:

Pope Francis's hint that the Vatican could relax its ban on contraception in response to the Zika virus was hailed as a shift in Church thinking Friday - but not everyone was convinced it amounts to meaningful change.

"Pope Francis signals openness to birth control for Zika," read a headline on the Boston Globe's Vatican-watching website www.cruxnow.com that reflected much media coverage around the world.

When Republican frontrunner Donald Trump offered a provocative retort Thursday to criticism by Pope Francis, it may have been a calculated political move to boost his standing ahead of South Carolina's presidential primary. 

Two-thirds of South Carolinians are Protestants, with evangelical voters comprising the largest voting block in the state during its Republican primary, which is being held on Saturday.