Claire Rosemberg

As African and European leaders head to Brussels for the EU-Africa summit, conflict and jihadist turmoil fears in the CAR are set to dominate talks.

EU nations have been working on a deal to reward Harare by lifting some of the bloc's punishing sanctions against members of the regime.

Europe's debt crisis threatens to spill over to Italy, Spain and beyond, throwing up a fresh challenge for EU finance gathered to solve the Greek fix.

The European Union and Japan agreed to start talks towards a multi-billion-euro free trade deallinking the world's third biggest economy to the globe'

Western powers tightened the screws on Muammar Gaddafi on Thursday, reaching out to his opponents and warning time is running out.

Africa squared up to fight for a better economic deal with the EU on Monday as Libya's Moammar Gadaffi opened a summit in Tripoli.

Sudan announced it would boycott the African-European Union summit in Libya to "avoid embarrassment to Libya".

Europe slapped down France on Wednesday over its controversial expulsion of Roma Gypsies, threatening legal action.

A tsunami alert sent terrified Chileans running for higher ground on Wednesday, while a surge of troops finally brought order to Concepción.

Kicking kung-fu pandas and a chilling Brazilian vision of the apocalypse: the Cannes film festival kicked off on Wednesday blending fun with philosophy, and Hollywood blockbusters with arthouse fare. The world release of the latest long-awaited episode of whip-cracking Indiana Jones is set to be the star act of the 12-day film bonanza.

Rembrandt and Rubens may be turning in their graves. The latest show at the venerable Louvre sees blood, bones and beetles cohabiting with the grand masters of the Dutch, Flemish and German schools. France's biggest museum has invited a contemporary artist to show works ''in counterpoint'' with those of the old masters.

In food-obsessed France, distinguishing between the tart and the bitter or the crunchy and the crackly, or even simply sorting good food from bad, became part of the school year nearly two decades ago. So it is almost routine to march a class of 10-year-olds into one of the world's most sought-after restaurants for a morning of munching through platefuls of delicacies whipped up by one of the country's top chefs.