Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban administration agreed to a 48-hour cease-fire starting at 6:00 p.m. local time Wednesday, Islamabad announced, following the outbreak of renewed fighting between the neighbors.

Both Pakistan and Afghanistan will make sincere efforts, through dialogue, to find a positive solution to the complex yet resolvable issue, Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

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Officials in Afghanistan claimed on Sunday to have killed 58 Pakistani soldiers during clashes overnight at the border between the two countries. Pakistan says it killed 200 Afghan Taliban soldiers and allies, Reuters reported.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said Afghan troops captured 25 army posts from Pakistan, wounding 30 soldiers in what the Defense Ministry called “retaliatory and successful operations.”

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Madagascar’s presidency said on Sunday that “an attempted illegal and forcible seizure of power” was underway in the African nation, without providing details, a day after some soldiers joined a protest movement that had begun last month.

Troops from the elite CAPSAT unit that helped President Andry Rajoelina seize power in a 2009 coup urged fellow soldiers to disobey orders and back the youth-led protests, which began on September 25 and pose the most serious challenge to Rajoelina’s rule since his reelection in 2023.

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Russia has used more than 450 drones and 32 missiles in an overnight attack on Ukraine’s energy sector, Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.

The president said there were power outages in nine regions - with about 600,000 households thought to have been cut off.

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Israel and Hamas have agreed to the first phase of a ceasefire and hostage release deal, paving the way for a possible end to the conflict in Gaza.

Under the plan, Hamas will release the 20 living hostages it is still holding, while Israel will withdraw its troops to an agreed line and free nearly 2,000 Palestinian detainees, sources told the BBC.

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