In a wooded valley close to the Israeli border, United Nations peacekeepers showed AFP journalists a Hezbollah bunker they had uncovered in southern Lebanon, a former bastion of the militant group.

The UN Security Council voted on Thursday to end the mission of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in 2027, with the peacekeeping force facing US and Israeli opposition.

By Ece Toksabay

ANKARA (Reuters) -Senior Kurdish lawmakers in Turkey say a lasting peace with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) requires legal protections for militants who disarm, direct talks with the group's jailed leader and an easing of a crackdown on the opposition.

Turkey's parliament launched a commission earlier this month to oversee the disarmament of the outlawed PKK militant group after its jailed leader Abdullah Ocalan in February called for an end to its insurgency.

By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) -Britain, France and Germany launched a 30-day process to reimpose U.N. sanctions on Iran over its nuclear programme on Thursday, according to a letter sent by the three nations to the U.N. Security Council seen by Reuters.

The trio, known as the E3, has taken the step over accusations Iran has failed to abide by a 2015 deal with world powers that aimed to prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon.

WHAT IS THE 2015 IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL?

Many countries have suspected Iran of pursuing nuclear weapons, which Iran denies.

France, Britain and Germany on Thursday triggered a mechanism to reimpose United Nations sanctions on Iran for failing to comply with commitments over its nuclear programme.

The three countries notified the UN Security Council that they "believe Iran to be in significant non-performance of its commitments" under a 2015 nuclear deal, according to a letter seen by AFP.

Their foreign ministers said they "hereby invoke the process known as the 'snapback' mechanism," which initiates a 30-day process for reimposing sanctions suspended a decade ago.

SYDNEY (Reuters) -Iran ambassador Ahmad Sadeghi, arriving at Sydney Airport before an expulsion deadline, on Thursday rejected as "lies" Australia's accusation that Tehran had directed antisemitic arson attacks in the cities of Sydney and Melbourne, .

Australia gave Sadeghi 72 hours on Tuesday to leave the country, the nation's first expulsion of an ambassador since World War Two. Three other Iranian embassy officials were given seven days to leave.

By Ceyda Caglayan and Ali Kucukgocmen

ISTANBUL (Reuters) -A set of carved stone animals - a fox, a vulture and a wild boar - is shedding light on the way prehistoric people told stories after being unearthed by archaeologists in southeastern Turkey.

Dating back some 11,500 years, the trio of figurines found at the Karahantepe archaeological site is the first known example of objects being arranged in a specific way to convey a narrative, archaeologists say.

(Reuters) -Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune signed a decree on Thursday ending the tenure of Prime Minister Nadir Larbaoui and appointing GhriebSifias acting prime minister, state media reported.

(Reporting by Ahmed Elimam; Editing by Toby Chopra)

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

CAIRO (Reuters) -Israeli forces killed at least 16 Palestinians across Gaza on Thursday and wounded dozens in the south of the enclave, local health officials said, as residents reported intensified military bombardment in the suburbs of Gaza City.

The military is preparing to take Gaza City, the enclave's largest urban centre, despite international calls on Israel to reconsider this over fears that the operation would cause significant casualties and displace the roughly one million Palestinians sheltering there.

By Emma Farge

GENEVA (Reuters) -Hundreds of U.N. staff at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Volker Turk have asked him to explicitly describe the Gaza war as an unfolding genocide, according to a letter seen by Reuters.

The letter sent on Wednesday said the staff consider that the legal criteria for genocide in the nearly two-year Israel-Hamas war in Gaza have been met, citing the scale, scope and nature of violations documented there.

By Olivia Le Poidevin

GENEVA (Reuters) -More food aid is reaching Gaza but it still remains far from enough to prevent widespread starvation, the head of the World Food Programme (WFP) told Reuters on Thursday.

"We're getting a little bit more food in. We're moving in the right direction ... but it's not nearly enough to do what we need to do to make sure that people are not malnourished and not starving," WFP Executive Director Cindy McCain told Reuters in an interview via video link from Jerusalem.