With half the world experiencing water scarcity for at least part of the year, the huge dams being built by some countries to boost their power supplies while their neighbours go parched are a growing source of potential conflict.

Ahead of a UN conference in New York on global access to water, AFP looks at five mega-projects with very different consequences, depending on whether you live upstream or downstream.

- Mega-dam on the Nile -

Too young for a driver's licence at 15, Evelina Christiansen is already cruising in a sleek BMW in Sweden, where teens can drive any car modified to roll no faster than a golf cart.

An almost century-old regulation originally applied to agricultural vehicles allows kids 15 and older to drive without a proper driver's licence, as long as the vehicle has been altered to have a maximum speed of 30 kilometres per hour (18.6 miles per hour).

Iraq on Monday marked 20 years since the start of the US-led invasion that toppled dictator Saddam Hussein, but no official celebrations were held.

The oil-rich country remains traumatised from the years of war, occupation and bloody sectarian turmoil that followed the operation launched on March 20, 2003.

A semblance of normalcy has returned but Iraq still battles a range of entrenched challenges, from political instability to poverty and rampant corruption.

A shooting in the northern West Bank town of Huwara on Sunday seriously wounded an Israeli, the army and rescuers said, as Israeli and Palestinian officials in Egypt agreed to "restore calm".

The attack in Huwara came three weeks after the fatal shooting of two Israeli settlers, also in the same occupied West Bank town, adding to a surge in violence this year and to fears of escalation during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan starting in the coming week.

The UAE's president on Sunday told his Syrian counterpart it was time for diplomatically isolated Damascus to be reintegrated into the wider Arab region during a meeting in Abu Dhabi, state media reported.

The trip by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad -- his second to the oil-rich United Arab Emirates in as many years -- comes after a visit to Oman last month, his only official engagements in Arab countries since the start of Syria's war in 2011.

Kuwait's constitutional court on Sunday nullified last year's legislative elections and ruled to reinstate the previous parliament, state media said, as a political crisis roils the oil-rich Gulf state.

The ruling was made due to discrepancies in the decree dissolving the previous parliament, the official KUNA news agency said.

The September polls were the most inclusive in a decade, and saw opposition members take a parliamentary majority with 28 out of 50 seats.

In the depths of Morocco's Akka oasis, two archaeologists pore over the floor of a synagogue searching for the minutest of fragments testifying to the country's ancient Jewish history.

They are from a team of six researchers from Morocco, Israel and France, part of a project to revive the North African country's Jewish heritage after it was all but lost following the minority's exodus.

The discovery of a fragment of a Hebrew religious manuscript is "a sign from above", jokes Israeli archaeologist Yuval Yekutieli, from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.

Kuwait's constitutional court on Sunday nullified last year's legislative elections and ruled in favour of reinstating the previous parliament, state media said, as a political crisis roils the oil-rich Gulf state.

The September polls -- the most inclusive in a decade -- had seen opposition members clinch 28 out of 50 seats, giving them a parliamentary majority.

The vote marked a victory for opposition figures, many of whom had stayed out of elections in the past decade over what they saw as alleged meddling by the executive authorities over parliament.

Israelis gathered in towns and cities nationwide on Saturday for an 11th straight week of protests against the judicial reform plans of the hard-right government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The protesters fear that the proposed reforms, which are already moving through parliament and would increase the power of politicians over the courts, are a threat to Israeli democracy.

In Tel Aviv's Dizengoff square, thousands of demonstrators waved the blue and white Israeli flag of Israel, as well as the rainbow flag of the LGBTQ community.

Pope Francis on Saturday greeted thousands of refugees brought to Europe by Christian charities, recognising their difficult journeys and hailing their desire to "live free from fear and insecurity".

At the Paul VI hall in the Vatican, the 86-year-old pontiff also thanked those who helped the refugees settle into their new lives, saying that "welcome is the first step towards peace".

The audience included many of the 6,000 people who have been helped to Europe through "humanitarian corridors" run by Christian groups since 2016.