Photos of the week

When Scotland's nationalist government dropped the voting age to 16 for this year's referendum on independence, it was widely seen as banking on teenage radicalism to ensure a break with the United Kingdom. 

Thailand's anti-corruption agency may decide on Thursday whether to pursue charges against ousted Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra that could see her banned from politics, ending any hopes she may have of staging an electoral comeback.

 Yingluck was thrown out of office on Wednesday by the Constitutional Court for abuse of power, the latest twist of a nearly decade-long struggle for power between Thailand's royalist establishment and Yingluck's brother, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

The service is held every four years and attended by the Prince of Wales, while the Queen attends every second service. The Queen last attended in 2006.

A Thai court found Yingluck guilty of violating the constitution on Wednesday and said she had to step down, throwing the country into further political turmoil, although ministers not implicated in her case can remain in office. 

Putin's visit to Crimea, which was annexed by Moscow in March, is a "flagrant violation" of Ukraine's sovereignty, authorities in Kiev said today.

Around 270 Syrian rebels granted safe exit under a complex deal with President Bashar al-Assad's forces are being held in Homs by the army after insurgents elsewhere failed to uphold their side of the agreement, Syrian officials said on Friday. Following a year of siege, around 1,200 rebels and residents in the Old City of Homs left the city on buses this week in exchange for the release of dozens of captives held by rebels in the northern provinces of Aleppo and Latakia. 

Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk accused Russia on Sunday of engineering clashes in Odessa that led to the deaths of more than 40 pro-Russian activists in a blazing building and pushed the country closer to civil war. 

The multiphase voting across the country runs until May 12, with results for the 543-seat lower house of parliament expected on May 16.

Israel holds some 5,000 Palestinians it accuses of committing or planning violence against it. 

Passions ran high in Odessa before local soccer team Chornomorets was due to play Kharkiv's Metalist. Fans who joined together to sing support for Ukraine's new leaders knew they might attract some trouble in the Russian-speaking city, but no one expected the chain of events that ended in the death of over 40 people.

The United States is considering a request by Nigeria to provide surveillance aircraft and intelligence to find more than 200 schoolgirls abducted by Islamist militants.

Ukrainian security forces killed about 20 pro-Russian rebels who tried to seize control of police headquarters in the eastern port city of Mariupol on Friday, the Interior Minister said.

 As the Egyptian state presses its crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood, the man expected to become president has deployed a new weapon in the battle with the Islamists: his own vision of Islam. Al-Sisi, the former army chief who deposed the Brotherhood's Mohamed Mursi and is expected to be elected president later this month, has cast himself as a defender of religion and taken aim at the doctrinal foundations of Islamist groups the state is seeking to crush.The poster reads "The people are with you. Sweet tribute to the great army of Egypt." 

South Africa goes to the polls on Wednesday in elections which are expected to keep the ANC in power. 

Police said a man was shot dead in clashes between a crowd backing Kiev and pro-Russian activists in the largely Russian-speaking southern port of Odessa, which lies west of Crimea, annexed by Moscow in March.

A state of emergency was declared on Wednesday in Pensacola's Escambia County after being inundated by as much as two feet of relentless rain over a 24-hour period, as severe thunderstorms raced across the northern part of the state. Emergency officials fought to save motorists stranded by flood waters. 

The enamel of the watch was made by Marguerite Koch in 1949 and is expected to reach between USD 560,000 to 1,100,000 when it goes on sale at an upcoming Magnificent Jewels sale in Geneva.

Mango suffers from a slipped disk, impairing his mobility and causing pain and will on Wednesday undergo complicated and unprecedented surgery on his spine in the hope of improving his quality of life, a zoo spokesperson said

The Zoo in Frankfurt is the 2nd oldest in Germany and holds about 4500 individuals from about 500 animals species.

In the wild, the birds of pray from the Falconidae family occur in an area ranging from southern North America to Tierra del Fuego. 

India is in the midst of a nine phase election that began on April 7th and ends on May 12th. Ladakh voters will vote on May 7th.

Platinum Eagle involves basic infantry tactics, advanced marksmanship, company-level command and control familiarization, both static and squad/platoon live fires with their counterparts from Romania, Bulgaria and Armenia. 

The eMerge conference brought together more than 100 speakers from large technology companies and emerging ventures throughout South Florida and Latin America as well as gave people hands on experience with robots, video games and other high tech ventures. 

The elephant is used for blessing devotees in return for alms.