Four months into a battle both believed they would win, Sudan's army has lost its grip on Khartoum to paramilitaries, who are unable to declare victory and instead are accused of waging war on civilians.

When fighting began on April 15, Sudan's army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan was certain it would be over "within two weeks".

His former deputy, turned enemy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, has sworn his Rapid Support Forces will achieve "victory".

Iran has moved five Americans from jail to house arrest, officials and family members said Thursday, in the first step of a delicate deal that would unfreeze billions of dollars in Iranian funds and allow the prisoners to leave the Islamic republic.

The progress on the prisoners -- one of them detained for nearly eight years -- comes after quiet, exhaustive diplomacy between the longtime adversaries whose separate talks on restoring a nuclear deal broke down.

Palaeontologists in Egypt have unearthed an extinct species of whale that lived 41 million years ago when whale ancestors were just completing their move from land to sea.

The team has dubbed the species "Tutcetus rayanensis" after the Egyptian boy king Tutankhamun and the Wadi El-Rayan Protected Area in Egypt's Fayoum Oasis where the type specimen was found.

The US Treasury announced coordinated sanctions with Canada and Britain on Thursday against Riad Salameh, Lebanon's longtime central bank chief, who recently left office without a successor.

Salameh, wanted for alleged financial crimes in several European countries, stepped down at the end of his term in late July after three decades in the post.

The 73-year-old's "corrupt and unlawful actions have contributed to the breakdown of the rule of law in Lebanon," the US Treasury Department said in a statement.

The crash landing on the Moon of Russia's Luna-25 probe is the latest twist in an international push to return to the Earth's natural satellite that has drawn in the world's top powers and new players.

Technology, science and politics are all essential factors in the Moon race.

Here is the latest on various missions:

- Russia's Luna -

The launch of Luna-25 on August 11 was the first such Russian mission in almost 50 years and marked the beginning of Moscow's new lunar project.

Tunisia and Libya agreed Thursday to share responsibility for providing shelter for hundreds of migrants stranded for up to a month at their border, after dozens died in the desert.

The migrants, primarily from sub-Saharan African countries, had been driven to the remote desert area of Ras Jedir by Tunisian authorities and left there to fend for themselves, according to witnesses, rights groups and UN agencies.

Aid groups said three groups of about 300 migrants in total from sub-Saharan African countries remain stranded there in life-threatening conditions.

Lebanon's Hezbollah movement on Thursday buried one of its members who was killed a day earlier when a truck carrying ammunition belonging to the Iran-backed group overturned near Beirut, sparking clashes.

Hundreds turned out for the funeral of Ahmad Ali Kassas in Beirut's southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold, an AFP photographer said, adding that heavy gunfire rang out during the procession.

The office of Lebanon's Defence Minister Maurice Slim said a bullet hit the minister's car as it passed through a district near the area, without harming him.

In the scorching summer heat, an Israeli farmer tends to a dripline taking a mix of ground and recycled water to palm trees -- an approach honed for decades in the arid country and now drawing wide interest abroad.

At the plantation in a desert near Eilat, a coastal holiday resort on Israel's southern tip, the mineral-rich water passes through a plastic tube, nourishing the dates high above.

The Saudi Pro League kicks off on Friday amid unprecedented attention on Saudi football following a year of high-profile transfers and growing accusations of "sportswashing".

Clubs in the oil-rich Gulf state have lured global stars, with Karim Benzema, Jordan Henderson and Sadio Mane among those following in Cristiano Ronaldo's footsteps.

Last month Al-Hilal made a 300-million-euro ($328 million) bid for Kylian Mbappe, though the Paris Saint-Germain striker reportedly refused to meet with officials from the club.

Iraq's rising temperatures and protracted drought are a "wake-up call" for the world, United Nations human rights chief Volker Turk said in Baghdad on Wednesday.

Turk spoke to AFP during a visit to Iraq, which the UN says is one of the five countries in the world most touched by some effects of climate change.

Iraq has been experiencing its fourth consecutive summer of drought, and temperatures in parts of the country including the capital Baghdad, and in the far south, have been around 50 degrees Celsius (120 degrees Fahrenheit).