A top aide to Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides has resigned after an online video was posted recently in which it was suggested that he and others were using their close ties to the leader to earn favors for would-be investors in exchange for cash.

EU leaders are working into the night to reassure Belgium about protection from Russian retaliation if it supports a major loan for Ukraine.

The president of Cyprus says some of the estimated 20 trillion cubic feet of natural gas discovered in waters off the island nation could reach European markets as soon as 2027.

Hopes for a resumption of long-stalled talks to heal Cyprus’ decades-old ethnic rift have been buoyed after Turkish Cypriots elected a leader who campaigned on getting back to negotiating a two-zone federation with rival Greek Cypriots after an eight-year stalemate.

Lebanon's president says his country has no plans to have normal relations with Israel at the present time.

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres will bring the rival leaders of ethnically divided Cyprus together again following a “constructive atmosphere” during an earlier meeting aimed at reviving stalled peace talks.

The rival leaders of ethnically divided Cyprus say they’re ready to take part in a U.N.-led gathering next month that could pave the way to a resumption of formal talks after an eight-year hiatus.

A meeting between the two leaders in ethnically divided Cyprus has ended without an agreement.

Israel’s military says it has carried out new airstrikes on Yemen against what it said were Houthi rebel targets.

Cyprus’ energy minister says ExxonMobil could partner up with a consortium composed of Eni of Italy and Total of France to jointly develop gas deposits they’ve discovered close to each other off the island nation’s southern coast.

The president of Cyprus says his administration is committed to expanding defense and security cooperation with the U_S_ as his meeting with the American President Joe Biden last week charted a course for the “next ambitious steps” in bilateral relations that are currently at a “historic high.”.

President Joe Biden and Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides have discussed a new effort by the U.S. administration and mediators in the Middle East to forge cease-fires to end fighting in Lebanon and Gaza.

Israeli airstrikes pounded the eastern Lebanese city of Baalbek.

The president of Cyprus says he won’t “open another route” for irregular migration by letting through more than two dozen asylum-seekers now stranded in a U.N.-controlled buffer zone that bisects the war-divided island nation.

The remains of recently identified Greek soldiers who fought in Cyprus against invading Turkish troops nearly a half-century ago have been returned to their families.

The European Union has announced an aid package for Lebanon of 1 billion euros — about $1.06 billion — that will mostly go to strengthening border control to halt the flow of asylum seekers and migrants from the small, crisis-wracked country across the Mediterranean Sea to Cyprus and Italy.

Another top donor to the U.N. agency aiding Palestinians says it will resume its funding.

Cyprus' president has required all government ministers to sign a “zero tolerance” declaration on sexist behavior and sexual harassment among employees and anyone visiting a government office.

Official figures obtained by The Associated Press show that Cyprus has made headway in weaning itself off Russian cash and business as it tries to clean up its image.

Cyprus has offered more detail about its initiative to create a sea corridor for the steady flow of humanitarian assistance from Cyprus to Gaza, saying that aid-laden ships would sail directly to the enclave, where United Nations personnel would receive it for eventual distribution.

Cyprus is working out with partners in the European Union and the Middle East the logistics to establish a sea corridor to deliver a stream of vital humanitarian aid to Gaza from the island’s main port of Limassol once the situation on the ground permits it.

Israel’s prime minister is floating the idea of building infrastructure projects such as a fiber optic cable linking countries in Asia and the Arabian Peninsula with Europe through Israel and Cyprus.

The rival leaders of ethnically divided Cyprus have made a joint appeal for information that could lead to the buried remains of people who vanished amid violence and war decades ago, as more eyewitnesses die.

Turkey’s president says any deal resolving Cyprus’ ethnic division of nearly half a century must be based on recognition of a breakaway Turkish Cypriot state in the island nation’s northern third.

Train services in Greece resumed Wednesday for the first time since a deadly rail disaster three weeks ago.

A senior United Nations official says the world body remains committed to helping rival Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots reach an agreement remedying the island nation's ethnic cleave that has been the source of instability in the east Mediterranean for decades.

Cyprus’ new president has affirmed the island nation’s Western foreign policy orientation as a member of the European Union that seeks to further strengthen its bonds with the U.S. President Nikos Christodoulides also said that he stands firmly with others on “the side of justice” to condemn Russia’s war in Ukraine.

The new president of Cyprus has met informally with the leader of the breakaway Turkish Cypriots to test the waters on reviving stalemated talks to end the island’s ethnic division.

Former foreign minister Nikos Christodoulides has been elected as the new president of Cyprus in a runoff election.

Official voting results show that a center-right former foreign minister and a career diplomat backed by a communist-rooted party appear poised to battle it out for the presidency of ethnically divided Cyprus in a Feb. 12 runoff.

Cypriots are choosing a new president, who they’ll expect to decisively steer the small island nation through shifting geopolitical sands and uncertain economic times that have become people's overriding concern, eclipsing stalemated efforts to remedy the country’s ethnic division.

Egypt’s foreign minister has rebuffed a Turkish push for a two-state peace deal on ethnically divided Cyprus.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres hosted a lunch for the leaders of divided Cyprus in hopes of spurring a return to negotiations to reunite the Mediterranean island nations.

The foreign minister of Cyprus says three European Union member nations and three Middle Eastern countries are looking to train personnel in border, customs and cybersecurity techniques at a cutting-edge U.S.-funded facility expected to be ready early next year.

France's Minister for European Affairs Clement Beaune, foreground, and Cyprus' Foreign Minister Nikos Christodoulides take part in a news conference at the Foreign Ministry building in the capital Nicosia, Friday, Sept. 18, 2020. Beaune says the European Union should consider imposing sanctions against Turkey if the country continues a hydrocarbons search inside waters where Greece and Cyprus claims exclusive rights. Turkey triggered a naval standoff with NATO ally Greece after dispatching a warship-escorted research vessel in a part of the eastern Mediterranean that Greece says is over its continental shelf. Turkey doesn’t recognize ethnically divided Cyprus as a state and insists it has every right to search for oil and gas in the eastern Mediterranean. Beaune said the EU cannot accept Turkish actions and that France has “committed" to resolving the issue while making its military presence felt in the eastern Mediterranean in support of its EU partners.

(AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)NICOSIA The European Union will help Cyprus try to negotiate its maritime border with neighboring Turkey in order to end an ongoing wrangle that has raised tensions in the east Mediterranean, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Thursday. Borrell said the the 27-member bloc supports Cyprus call on Turkey to negotiate a maritime border agreement and will assist these efforts with the aim of buttressing regional stability. And on that, we will be also engaging because regional stability is a priority of the European Union." Borrell repeated that the EU fully supports Cyprus' sovereign rights and has taken concrete action to back up its words. Thats why the European Union was invented to foster good neighbors relations and to find solutions through dialogue and negotiations, Borrell said.