21 May 2023; MEMO: Nearly 500,000 million Turkish nationals have cast their votes abroad in the country's foreign missions and customs gates in the second round of Turkiye's presidential election scheduled for May 28, Anadolu reports.

Since overseas voting began Saturday, 452,257 voters cast ballots at Turkish diplomatic missions, while 19,477 voted at customs gates, for a total of 471,734 people, according to figures from the Supreme Election Council (YSK).

GENEVA, May 22 (Reuters) - The head of the World Health Organization urged countries on Monday to carry out reforms needed to prepare for the next pandemic, hailing their "historic" decision to accept a major budget hike at the U.N. agency's annual assembly.

Speaking at the assembly weeks after ending the global emergency status for the COVID-19 pandemic, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said it was time to advance negotiations on preventing the next pandemic.

ISLAMABAD, May 22 (APP): Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Monday said that the country would not survive if any leniency was shown to the perpetrators of the arsons on May 9 involving the desecration of the martyrs, monuments, and damaging the security installations.

NEW YORK (AP) — Jonnifer Neal’s Kia was stolen twice in one day — first from in front of her Chicago home and later from outside the mechanic shop where she took it to get fixed.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Although Russia claims it has won control of Ukraine’s eastern city of Bakhmut after a grinding nine-month conflict in which tens of thousands of fighters have died, top Ukrainian military leaders say the battle is not over.

Ukrainian officials acknowledge they now control only a small part of Bakhmut. Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said Monday that Ukrainian troops hold some areas in its southwestern outskirts, while fighting continues for the strategic heights in the northern and southern parts of the suburbs.

MOSCOW, May 22 (Xinhua) -- The Group of Seven (G7) summit in Hiroshima showed that the alliance has irreversibly deteriorated and turned into an "incubator of destructive initiatives" in the world, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Sunday.

The outcome of the G7 meeting in Hiroshima was a set of statements filled with "odious passages" directed against China and Russia as the G7 members tried to prevent non-Western states from developing ties with Moscow and Beijing, the ministry said.

BEIJING, May 22 (Reuters) - State-backed Chinese mouthpiece Global Times called the G7 an "anti-China workshop" on Monday, a day after Beijing summoned Japan's envoy and berated Britain in a fiery response to statements issued at the group's summit in Hiroshima.

Group of Seven (G7) declarations issued on Saturday singled out China on issues including Taiwan, nuclear arms, economic coercion and human rights abuses, underscoring the wide-ranging tensions between Beijing and the group of rich countries which includes the United States.

ISLAMABAD (AP) — A Pakistani court on Monday ordered the release of an associate of former Prime Minister Imran Khan from detention, even as authorities press on with efforts to prosecute thousands of his followers implicated in recent anti-government violence.

Shireen Mazari, who served as rights minister under Khan during his 2018-2022 term in office, was arrested last Thursday in the capital, Islamabad, on charges of inciting people to violence.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran’s president on Monday appointed a new official to take over the post of secretary of the country’s Supreme National Security Council, replacing the longtime powerful official Ali Shamkhani after becoming implicated in a recent spy scandal.

President Ebrahim Raisi issued a decree replacing Shamkhani who has faced persistent corruption allegations — which he denied — as well as scrutiny because of close ties with a British-Iranian man hanged on spying charges earlier this year in Iran.

May 22 (Reuters) - The governor of Russia's Belgorod region said on Monday that a Ukrainian 'sabotage group' had entered Russian territory in the Graivoron district, which borders Ukraine, and was being repelled by Russian forces.

However, the Ukrainian outlet Hromadske cited Ukrainian military intelligence as saying two armed Russian opposition groups, the Liberty of Russia Legion and the Russian Volunteer Corps (RVC), both consisting of Russian citizens, had carried out the attack.

JERUSALEM, May 21 (Xinhua) -- Israeli far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound on Sunday morning, drawing condemnations from the Palestinians and Jordan.

Escorted by heavy police and the internal Shin Bet security agency, Ben-Gvir visited the compound in the early morning hours, according to a video statement released by his office.

He said he was glad to come up to the compound, and thanked the police officers at the site.

BERLIN (AP) — The head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency warned Monday of a rise in anti-government extremism - fueled by authoritarian states such as Russia - that seeks to divide society and topple the government.