Cancun will host the WTA Finals October 29-November 5, the WTA announcing Thursday the Mexican resort would stage the season ending tournament after reports that Saudi Arabia was front-runner to land the event.

The WTA said in a statement that officials "weighed a number of competitive bids throughout the process" and made a decision "based on multiple factors including player logistics, travel accessibility, venue capacity and a commitment to supporting and showcasing women's tennis."

EU chief Ursula von der Leyen visited the United Arab Emirates Thursday, three months before it hosts UN climate talks and as it comes under pressure over sanctions on Russia.

The European Commission president held talks with President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed in Abu Dhabi, before the neighbouring emirate of Dubai organises COP28 in November-December.

"We both want to make COP28 a success and I look forward to our continued cooperation," she posted on X, formerly known as Twitter. "We will work across the board to reinforce UAE-EU relations."

Sudanese army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan met Qatar's emir on Thursday during his third trip abroad since war broke out in April, after also visiting Egypt and South Sudan in recent days.

Burhan, whose troops are fighting the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), had spent months under siege inside the military headquarters in Khartoum and stayed in conflict-hit Sudan until late August.

France's highest administrative court is to rule on Thursday whether a school ban on abayas, traditional over-garments worn by some Muslim women, is legal.

President Emmanuel Macron's government announced last month it was banning the abaya in schools, saying it broke the rules on secularism in education that have already seen Muslim headscarves banned on the grounds that they constitute a display of religious affiliation.

Traditional mud-brick houses that the people of northern Syria have built for thousands of years risk disappearing, as 12 years of war have emptied villages and left the buildings crumbling.

Also knowns as "beehive houses", the conical adobe structures are designed to keep cool in the blazing desert sun, while their thick walls also retain warmth in the winter.

Umm Amuda Kabira village in Aleppo province is among a handful of places where residents long used to live in the small domed houses, made of mud mixed with brittle hay.

An Iranian journalist who interviewed the father of Mahsa Amini said she was sexually assaulted during her latest arrest and was now on hunger strike in prison, according to an audio message published Wednesday by several Persian media outlets and rights groups.

Nazila Maroufian, 23, has been repeatedly targeted by the Iranian authorities since she published an interview with Amjad Amini, whose daughter died in custody on September 16, 2022, sparking months of protests.

United States-backed Kurdish-led fighters in northern Syria on Wednesday fought a deadly battle with Turkish-supported forces who said they intervened after clashes killed dozens in an Arab-majority province further east.

Days of fighting in eastern Syria's Deir Ezzor province, which left 90 people dead, had raised fears of broader conflict in a region where jihadists and foreign powers are present.

The new fighting involving Turkish-backed fighters came hours after the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) declared the "end of military operations" in Syria's east.

Israeli archaeologists on Wednesday displayed four Roman-era swords and a javelin discovered inside a cave in the Judean desert, where they had been preserved for nearly 1,900 years.

The archaeologists said the ancient weapons were believed to have been used during the Bar Kokhba revolt of Jews against the Romans in the second century.

"It's a very unique and important discovery, which is unprecedented in Israel," Eitan Klein, director of Israel Antiquities Authority, told journalists at an event showcasing the weapons.

Millions of Shiite Muslim pilgrims massed at the golden-domed mausoleums of the holy Iraqi city of Karbala on Wednesday, commemorating Arbaeen, one of the largest religious gatherings in the world.

The event, organised under strict security, brought together some 22 million pilgrims this year, according to official figures.

Iran hit a new participation record with four million visitors, a top security official told the Iranian news agency IRNA, up from three million last year.

Saudi Arabia's ambassador to Iran arrived Tuesday in the Islamic Republic, and his counterpart landed in Riyadh, cementing a restoration of ties between the Gulf rivals after a seven-year rupture in ties.

Shiite-dominated Iran and Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia agreed to resume diplomatic relations and reopen their respective embassies following a China-brokered deal announced in March.

Riyadh and Tehran severed ties in 2016 after Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran were attacked during protests over Riyadh's execution of Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.