SCIENCE

US farmers caught up in President Donald Trump's short-lived attempt to freeze all federal funding descended on Congress Tuesday to demand answers after grants to their politically influential sector were paused.

Britain's BP on Tuesday said its annual net profit slumped 97 percent last year, as the struggling oil and gas giant pledged to "fundamentally reset" its strategy.

New Zealand is considering withdrawing its support for an international ban on deep-sea mining, the country's resources minister told AFP on Tuesday.

Nearly all nations missed a UN deadline Monday to submit new targets for slashing carbon emissions, including major economies under pressure to show leadership following the US retreat on climate change.

Brazil's president this week amped up pressure for a major oil project to go ahead at the mouth of the Amazon River, despite criticism from environmentalists as the country prepares to host UN climate talks in November.

The Baltic states on Saturday began cutting ties with Russia's power grid in order to integrate with Europe's system, a years-long process that gained urgency with Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

It spans 200,000 light years and was formed when the universe was only 1.2 billion years old.

President Donald Trump on Friday raged against eco-friendly paper straws promoted by his predecessor Joe Biden, and pledged that the United States would return to using plastic ones.

Germany logged a record trade surplus with the United States last year, data showed Friday, news that could stoke tensions with US President Donald Trump as he threatens the EU with tariffs.

Each morning Indian farmer R Murali opens an app on his phone to check if his pomegranate trees need watering, fertiliser or are at risk from pests.

The UN's climate chief, seeking to shore up solidarity on combating global warming as the United States retreats from its leadership role, appealed to nations' self-interest in a speech Thursday.

A convicted British conman who featured in a Netflix documentary appeared in a French court on Thursday charged with knocking over and injuring two police officers in 2022 as he tried to escape from them.

Countries must aim as high as possible when setting new goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Andre Correa do Lago, the president of the COP30 climate conference to be hosted by Brazil in November, told AFP in an interview.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday he would skip Group of 20 talks this month in South Africa, accusing the host government of an "anti-American" agenda.

Last month was the hottest January on record, Europe's climate monitor said Thursday, despite expectations that cooler La Nina conditions might quell a streak of record-breaking global temperatures.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, as the saying goes, and Argentina's President Javier Milei has made clear his admiration for Donald Trump by liberally borrowing from the US president's playbook.

Argentina said Wednesday it will quit the World Health Organization, following in the footsteps of Donald Trump's United States and citing similar complaints over the UN body's management of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The European Commission announced Wednesday it would seek to impose new fees on e-commerce imports, as part of efforts to tackle a surge of "harmful" products into the bloc -- the bulk of them from China.

French oil and gas giant TotalEnergies said Wednesday it would reduce its low-carbon energy investments while Norwegian peer Equinor scaled back its renewables ambitions as the companies reported sharp drops in annual profits.

Holding long-term global warming to two degrees Celsius -- the fallback target of the Paris climate accord -- is now "impossible," according to a stark new analysis published by leading scientists.

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed an executive order withdrawing Washington from a number of United Nations bodies, including its Human Rights Council (UNHRC), and setting up a broader review of US funding for the multilateral organization.

In Ecuador's presidential election, both top candidates want a second chance.

US President Donald Trump's embattled health secretary pick, vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr, passed a crucial test in his confirmation bid on Tuesday as senators voted to advance his nomination to the floor.

Lack of military coordination and tension among countries in Africa's Lake Chad region are hindering efforts to end a more than decade-long jihadist insurgency, according to local officials and security sources.

A massive sinkhole near Tokyo that swallowed a truck and its driver a week ago, and has filled with sewage and debris, highlights the risk posed by Japan's ageing pipes.

Fans have waited more than eight years for the new instalment in heavyweight strategy game Civilization, with the release of the seventh instalment on February 11 promising to get budding philosopher-kings thinking more about the consequences of their actions.

Almost 96 percent of new cars registered in Norway in January were electric, an unparalled number in the world and close to the country's goal of selling only zero-emission vehicles as of this year.

Fast-moving floodwaters rose Monday in northeastern Australia after forcing many to flee, blacking out homes, and sweeping away a chunk of a critical bridge.

Marco Rubio heads Saturday to Panama on his debut trip abroad as US secretary of state as he looks for how to follow up on President Donald Trump's extraordinary threat to seize the Panama Canal.