FIFA are investigating how celebrity chef Salt Bae gained "undue access" to the pitch after the World Cup final where he enthusiastically posed for photos with surprised Argentina players including a bemused and irritated Lionel Messi.

Salt Bae, whose real name is Nusret Gokce, was pictured holding and kissing the trophy after Argentina beat France in Sunday's final in Qatar.

The Turkish entrepreneur was widely criticised for twice grabbing the arm of Messi, who tried to sidestep the unwanted attention.

The chairman of Egypt's Suez Canal on Thursday affirmed the waterway is "not for sale", in a bid to allay fears over a draft law under discussion in parliament.

On Tuesday the legislature approved in principle a bill proposed by the government seeking to establish a sovereign wealth fund "that can carry out all economic and investment activities" for the Suez Canal Authority.

Lebanese investigators have identified suspects in the fatal shooting of an Irish United Nations peacekeeper whose vehicle came under fire earlier this month, a judicial official told AFP on Thursday.

Private Sean Rooney, 23, was killed and three others injured on December 14 when their UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) vehicle was attacked near the village of Al-Aqbiya in Lebanon's south.

The area is a stronghold of powerful Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah.

One of the injured was medevaced home to Ireland on Wednesday for further treatment.

Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu has formed a coalition government but concerns are growing at what power he will exercise over his far-right allies, as violence surges in the occupied West Bank.

The incoming government, which veteran hawk Netanyahu announced he had formed late Wednesday, is expected to be the most right-wing in Israel's history.

It has sparked fears of military escalation in the West Bank amid the worst violence in the Palestinian territory for nearly 20 years.

The Greek MEP at the centre of a scandal over corruption allegations linked to Qatar that have rocked the European Parliament was denied release from pre-trial detention on Thursday, prosecutors said.

Eva Kaili, 44, was one of four suspects arrested in Belgium earlier this month. She has protested her innocence and had asked the custody hearing to grant her release under electronic surveillance -- a request that was denied.

Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said Thursday that sweeping reforms remain vital to rescue the stricken economy, despite a return to modest growth this year.

Mikati said the economy had grown by nearly two percent in 2022 after two straight years of severe recession that saw Gross Domestic Product fall by 25.9 percent in 2020 and by 10.5 percent in 2021, according to World Bank figures.

He said increased revenues from tourism and a rise in remittances from Lebanese living abroad were factors behind the modest growth.

Three lions were shot dead in Sudan after trying to escape from their cages inside a base of Sudan's feared paramilitary forces, an animal shelter official said Thursday.

The lions -- a species ranked as "vulnerable" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature -- were born two years ago at Sudan's Animal Rescue Centre, south of the capital Khartoum, said Moataz Kamal, an official at the centre.

Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian militant linked to Hamas during clashes in the West Bank city of Nablus early Thursday, the Palestinian health ministry said.

The exchange of fire came just hours after veteran Israeli hawk Benjamin Netanyahu announced he had formed a new government, returning to power as the head of the most right-wing coalition in Israel's history.

The Palestinian health ministry said Ahmed Atef Daraghmeh, 23, a footballer from the nearby town of Tulkarem, sustained bullet wounds to the back and foot.

Yemeni student Abir al-Maqtari dreamt of studying abroad but amid a tightening of restrictions on women echoing religious regimes in Iran and Afghanistan, Huthi forces blocked her from leaving.

The Iran-backed Huthis, who have controlled swathes of the Arab world's poorest country since seizing the Yemeni capital Sanaa in 2014, have increasingly enforced travel restrictions on women over the past eight months, residents and activists say.

A Greek MEP at the centre of a graft scandal rocking the European Parliament and linked to Qatar protested her innocence in a Belgian court on Thursday and asked to be released from detention.

Eva Kaili, 44, was "cooperating in an active manner" with the Belgian federal prosecutor's investigation and was requesting to be released under electronic surveillance, her lawyer, Andre Risopoulos, said outside the Brussels courtroom.

The judge, who was only deciding custody terms and not weighing the case itself, was expected to give a decision later in the day.