Blinken, paying his second visit to the rival country in less than a year, voiced hope for progress but said he would directly raise areas of difference, which are expected to include Russia, Taiwan and trade.

During the telephone call, the two also discussed the US-Indonesia defense relationship, as well as regional and global security issues.

Mahathir has condemned the questioning of his son by the country’s anti-graft agency, calling it “selective” and driven by his political rivalry with the sitting government. 

The decision comes as many young and left-leaning voters, a significant part of the user base for the short-video app, are agitated over Biden's handling of the war in Gaza and protests have escalated across universities around the country.

The growing protests follow mass arrests of demonstrators at some East Coast universities in recent days, and show a deepening dissatisfaction in the United States, historically Israel's most important ally, with the course of the war with Hamas.

Demonstrators blocked traffic around Yale's campus in New Haven, Connecticut, demanding the school divest from military weapons manufacturers.

"Our numbers are growing and we're reaching more and more people every day," said Ballingall, who publishes up to 10 posts a day and has some 540,000 followers.

"There is a risk our Europe could die," Macron said in a speech at the Sorbonne University in Paris, adding that Europe was at a tipping point and needed to do more to compete with rapidly re-arming global rivals.

"Everything we're witnessing over the last 12 months is indicating that the international global system is on the brink of collapse," Amnesty's secretary general Agnes Callamard told AFP as the group released its annual "State of the World's Human Rights" report.

Hours after the bill passed, a French newspaper reported that at least five migrants had died in an attempt to cross the Channel. The French coast guard could not confirm the details but said there were several "lifeless bodies". 

President Vladimir Putin's 2022 invasion of Ukraine has touched off the worst breakdown in relations between Russia and the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, according to Russian and US diplomats.

"What's happening in America's college campuses is horrific," he said in a recorded statement, accusing "antisemitic mobs" of taking over leading universities.

A spokesperson for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government said Israel was "moving ahead" with a ground operation, but gave no timeline.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken hinted at such steps when asked by a reporter in Italy about reports that his department had recommended cuts in military aid to an Israeli unit involved in violent incidents in the West Bank.

The ministry of interior official said the attack had killed one person and wounded eight others, while the military source reported three Iraqi military personnel had been wounded.