KABUL (Reuters) -Hundreds were feared dead and injured in a earthquake of magnitude 6 that struck Afghanistan's rugged northeastern province of Kunar, authorities said on Monday, as rescuers combed the rubble of homes in a hunt for survivors.

Early reports showed 30 dead in a single village, the health ministry said, but added that accurate casualty figures had yet to be gathered in an area of scattered hamlets with a long history of earthquakes and flooding.

By Laurie Chen and Mei Mei Chu

TIANJIN (Reuters) -China will work with all parties in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation to take the regional security forum to a new level, Chinese President Xi Jinping said on Monday, unveiling his ambition for a new global security order that poses a challenge to the United States.

In the scorched courtyard of Sudan's National Museum in Khartoum, a towering black granite statue of Kush Pharaoh Taharqa now stands alone, surrounded by shards of broken glass and shattered stone.

Since the museum was looted in the early days of Sudan's war between the army and paramilitaries in April 2023, thousands of priceless antiquities, many dating back to the 3,000-year-old Kingdom of Kush, have vanished.

Officials believe that some have been smuggled across borders into Egypt, Chad and South Sudan, but there is no trace of the vast majority of the pieces.

The arid Dawkah valley is home to one of Oman's most prized resources: not oil or gas but frankincense trees, their fragrant sap harvested for millennia by residents who call it "white gold".

Located in Oman's southern Dhofar region, bordering Yemen, the valley is the world's largest such reserve, home to around 5,000 frankincense trees that dot the barren earth, their trunks bearing kernels that exude a distinctive woody scent.

"For us, frankincense is more precious than gold. It's a treasure," said Abdullah Jaddad, a frankincense harvester resting in the shade of a tree.

(Reuters) -The United States has suspended visa approvals for nearly everyone who holds a Palestinian passport, The New York Times reported on Sunday.

The restrictions go beyond those President Donald Trump's administration had previously announced on visitors from Gaza. They would prevent Palestinians from traveling to the United States for medical treatment, attending college and business travel, the newspaper reported, citing unidentified officials.

The United Nations said Yemen's Huthis detained at least 11 workers on Sunday in raids on UN premises, after rebel authorities made numerous arrests following Israel's killing of their prime minister.

The Huthi authorities have not yet commented on the reported raids, but the group has previously arrested international aid workers.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for their "immediate and unconditional release", confirming that 11 UN personnel had been subjected to "arbitrary detentions.. by the Huthi de facto authorities".

The entire population of Gaza would be relocated and the United States would take control of the Palestinian territory under a plan being considered by the Trump administration, the Washington Post reported Sunday.

The enclave reduced to rubble in Israel's war prompted by the Hamas attack of 2023 would be transformed into a trusteeship administered by the United States for at least 10 years, the newspaper said.

Israel said Sunday its forces had killed the spokesman of Hamas's armed wing in a strike on Gaza a day earlier, the latest fatality in the group's senior ranks in the nearly two-year war.

"Hamas terror spokesperson Abu Obeida was eliminated in Gaza," Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said in a post on X, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu earlier said he had been targeted in a strike.

(Reuters) -A post-war plan for Gaza is circulating within President Donald Trump's administration that would see the U.S. administer the war-torn enclave for at least a decade, the temporary relocation of Gaza'spopulation and its rebuilding as a tourist resort and manufacturing hub, the Washington Post reported on Sunday.

The Washington Post said that according to a 38-page prospectus it had seen, Gaza's 2 million population would leave either through "voluntary" departures to another country or into restricted areas within the territory during reconstruction.

By Maayan Lubell

JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Israel is considering annexation in the occupied West Bank as a possible response to France and other countries recognising a Palestinian state, according to three Israeli officials and the idea will be discussed further on Sunday, another official said.