BERLIN (Reuters) -The European Union must look to trade deals with countries like India to reduce dependencies, with higher U.S. import tariffs pushing the bloc to diversity its ties, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Thursday.

"We want to make a deal with India this year," von der Leyen said at a conference with German business leaders, adding that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi had assured her of his commitment to this goal in a phone call on Wednesday.

By Joshua McElwee

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) -Pope Leo will keep Pope Francis' signature policies to welcome gay Catholics, discuss women's ordination and give China input on bishop appointments, but is not planning big changes to Church teaching, he said in his first interview, released on Thursday.

DAMASCUS (Reuters) - Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani was due to arrive in Washington on Thursday on his first official trip to the U.S. capital since the Islamist new rulers took over Damascus last year, two sources familiar with the visit told Reuters.

During the visit, the first by a Syrian foreign minister to Washington in more than 25 years, Shibani will meet U.S. lawmakers to discuss the lifting of remaining U.S. sanctions on his country, Senator Lindsey Graham was quoted as saying by Axios.

By Jonathan Spicer, Suleiman Al-Khalidi and Humeyra Pamuk

ISTANBUL (Reuters) -Some of the most senior U.S. diplomats focused on Syria have been abruptly let go from their posts in recent days, according to five people familiar with the matter, a shake-up that comes as Washington seeks to integrate its Syrian Kurdish allies with the central administration in Damascus.

By Steve Holland, Elizabeth Piper and Andrew MacAskill

LONDON (Reuters) -Donald Trump meets British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Thursday for talks designed to focus the U.S. leader's unprecedented second state visit firmly on global affairs rather than domestic political problems.

After a day of pomp and ceremony in which Trump rode in a carriage with King Charles and feasted at a state banquet, the U.S. president and Starmer will celebrate the unveiling of a 150 billion pound ($205 billion) package of U.S. investment into Britain.

By Sonia Rolley, Jessica Donati and Ange Kasongo

KINSHASA (Reuters) -Congo's army and Rwandan-backed rebels are reinforcing military positions and blaming each other for flouting peace accords in an escalation that experts say risks reigniting the simmering conflict, which U.S. President Donald Trump claims to have ended.

Europe and the Mediterranean basin saw record drought in August, with more than half of the land affected, according to AFP analysis of EU data.

Last month, 53 percent of the region was affected by drought -- an all-time high since records began in 2012 -- according to the EU's Copernicus Climate Change Service.

The figure is far above the 2012-2024 average for August of 30.1 percent.

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Syrian foreign minister Asaad al-Shibani will meet with U.S. lawmakers in Washington this week to discuss the lifting of remaining U.S. sanctions on his country, Senator Lindsey Graham was quoted as saying by Axios.

Shibani's visit - the first by a Syrian foreign minister to Washington in more than 25 years - comes on the heels of remarks by Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Wednesday that Syria's negotiations with U.S. ally Israel to reach a security pact could lead to results "in the coming days."

Russian, Chinese, and Iranian state media are exploiting conservative activist Charlie Kirk's assassination to advance thousands of false claims aimed at undermining the United States and other adversaries, a research group warned Wednesday.

Official media in the three countries mentioned Kirk -- a close ally of President Donald Trump -- 6,200 times since the activist was shot dead last week during a speaking event on a Utah university campus, the disinformation watchdog NewsGuard reported citing data gathered using a social media analytics tool.

The UN investigator who this week accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza said she sees parallels with the butchery in Rwanda, and that she hopes one day Israeli leaders will be put behind bars.

Navi Pillay, a South African former judge who headed the international tribunal for the 1994 Rwanda genocide and also served as UN human rights chief, acknowledged that justice "is a slow process".

But as late South African anti-apartheid icon Nelson "Mandela said, it always seems impossible until it's done", she told AFP in an interview.