North Korean soldiers have shot and wounded a comrade who was crossing a jointly controlled area at the heavily guarded border to defect to South Korea, the South's military said.

Russia's military has said its air strikes in eastern Syria this week killed more than 300 Islamic State militants.

The Russian military has launched drills involving intercontinental ballistic missiles in Siberia.

South Korea has conducted its first live-fire drill for an advanced air-launched cruise missile it says will strengthen its pre-emptive strike capability against North Korea in the event of crisis.

South Korean warships have conducted live-fire exercises at sea as Seoul continued its displays of military capability following US warnings of a "massive military response" after North Korea detonated its largest-ever nuclear test explosion.

Russian bombers have targeted the Islamic State group in Syria with cruise missiles, the military said.

Russia is trying to verify reports that its military has killed the leader of the Islamic State group in an air strike targeting a meeting of militant leaders.

An attack on a military hospital in Afghanistan has killed more than 30 people, the country's Defence Ministry has said.

Search teams have recovered another flight recorder from a military plane which crashed in the Black Sea, killing all 92 people on board, Russia's Defence Ministry said.

A search for bodies is taking place after a Russian military plane carrying 92 people crashed in the Black Sea.

Pilot error or a technical fault is thought to be the cause of Sunday's Black Sea plane crash that killed 92 people, Russia's transport minister has said as the nation held a day of mourning for the victims.

No air defence missile systems have ever been sent from Russia to Ukraine, Moscow military officials insist.

The United States has blamed Russia for an overnight attack on an aid convoy that killed 20 civilians, as the United Nations announced it was suspending overland deliveries in Syria, jeopardising food and medical security for millions of besieged and hard-to-reach civilians.

The Taliban have seized a district in Afghanistan's north-eastern Kunduz province, where the insurgents briefly overran the provincial capital last year before being driven out by a counter offensive, an official said.

A Russian transport helicopter was shot down in opposition rebel territory in northern Syria yesterday and all five crew and officers onboard were killed, the Kremlin said. 

Turkey has dismissed 1,400 more members of its armed forces and stacked the top military council with government ministers. This is designed by President Tayyip Erdogan to put him in full control of the military after a failed coup.

China has said it is closing off part of the South China Sea for military exercises this week.

Three Spanish journalists who were held captive in Syria for nearly 10 months have returned safely to Madrid after being freed.

Indian security forces are trying to secure a major air force base near the border with Pakistan where an attack by suspected militants left at least 11 people dead, amid reports of fresh gunfire at the compound.

Investigators in Moscow said they were unable to retrieve information from the damaged black box of a Russian warplane shot down by Turkey last month, data the Kremlin hoped would support its version of what happened.

Six foreign soldiers were killed in a suicide attack near the US-run Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan, said Nato.

A Russian destroyer has used small arms fire to ward off a Turkish fishing ship and prevent a collision in the Aegean Sea, the Defence Ministry said.

Latest: Turkey says it warned the Russian jet several times before shooting it down.

Six French fighter jets have targeted and destroyed a training camp run by the so-called 'Islamic State' group in eastern Syria, President Francois Hollande has confirmed.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has said his frontline troops are in a "quasi-state of war" and ordered them to prepare for battle a day after the most serious confrontation with South Korea in years.

France is investigating allegations of child abuse in Central African Republic by soldiers that it sent there to stem an outbreak of sectarian killing, officials said.

North Korea has fired two short-range ballistic missiles into the sea and warned of “merciless strikes” against its enemies as Seoul and Washington launched annual military drills Pyongyang claims are preparation for a northward invasion.

Ukraine’s military has said it will start pulling back its heavy weapons from the front line with Russian-backed separatists as required under a ceasefire agreement.

A Greek F-16 fighter jet crashed into other planes on the ground during Nato training in Spain, killing at least 10 people.

A Greek F-16 fighter jet has crashed into other planes on the ground during Nato training in Spain, killing at least 10 people, Spain’s Defence Ministry said.

Indiscriminate rocket fire has hit a market, schools, homes and shops in the eastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol, killing at least 30 people, authorities said.

Separatist forces in eastern Ukraine have deployed large quantities of arms and manpower to an emerging flashpoint, undermining hopes for a new peace initiative taking shape.

Gerry Adams has said Israel has barred him from making a planned visit to the Gaza Strip during a three-day tour of the region.

Nigeria’s government and Islamic extremists from Boko Haram have agreed to an immediate ceasefire, officials said.

Military generals from North and South Korea have met at a border village for talks on how to ease animosities between the rival countries after two clashes last week, South Korean media said.

A cruise ship is trying to rescue hundreds of people stranded aboard a small boat off Cyprus, believed to be refugees who have fled Syria.

Ukraine’s president has vowed to boost military spending by 40 billion hryvnia (€2.25bn) in the next three years as government forces seek to overpower pro-Russian separatists in the east.

Ukraine said its artillery destroyed part of a Russian armoured column that entered its territory on Thursday night and said its forces came under shellfire from Russia yesterday in what appeared to be a major military escalation between the ex-Soviet states.

A Spanish missionary priest who tested positive for the Ebola virus has landed in Spain on a flight from Liberia.

A man dressed in an Afghan army uniform opened fire today on foreign troops at a military base, killing at least one US soldier and injuring 15, including a German brigadier general and “about a dozen” Americans, authorities said.

Poor weather was the most likely cause of the crash of an Air Algerie flight in the West African state of Mali that killed 118 people on board, French officials said.

A plane landing in stormy weather has crashed outside an airport on a small Taiwanese island, with 47 people feared dead.