The Pentagon confirmed Friday that Ahmed Abdi Godane, the leader of Somalia's Al Qaeda-affiliated Shabab militants, was killed in a U.S. airstrike that took place early this week.

Godane, 37, was killed Monday after a special-forces strike hit a militant encampment in a town south of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, officials said. The mission illustrated the Pentagon's determination to take down Shabab members responsible for a wave of bombings and suicide attacks throughout the Horn of Africa.

Both manned and unmanned aircraft were used in the attack, which included several Hellfire missiles and laser-guided munitions, officials said. The assault is seen by U.S. officials as a setback for the Islamic militant group, which has struggled in recent years with leadership disputes, military defeats and questions about its direction.

“Removing Godane from the battlefield is a major symbolic and operational loss to Al Shabab,” Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby said in a statement. “The...

An armed Chinese fighter jet conducted what Pentagon officials called an aggressive midair intercept of a U.S. Navy submarine-hunting aircraft during a routine patrol above international waters.

Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby said the incident occurred Aug. 19 about 135 miles east of Hainan island in the South China Sea and involved a Navy P-8 Poseidon plane.

He said the Chinese fighter made three passes dangerously near the U.S. plane. The jet also zoomed directly in front of the Navy plane at a 90-degree angle to reveal its belly, which was packed with weaponry, he said.

At one point, Kirby said, the Chinese warplane flew alongside the Navy aircraft, putting their wingtips as close as 30 feet apart. The encounter ended with the Chinese pilot doing a barrel roll over the top of the U.S. plane.

Kirby called the incident "very, very close" and "very dangerous."

The Obama administration has lodged a protest to China through official diplomatic channels.

"This kind of behavior...

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday warned Americans to avoid all nonessential travel to Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone because of the continuing Ebola crisis in those countries.

The CDC and the World Health Organization have said the risk of travelers contracting the disease was remote, since Ebola doesn’t spread easily through casual contact, and is not airborne or food borne.

But with the West African health system deep in the throes of the outbreak, the CDC is concerned that travelers with medical emergencies unrelated to Ebola – a broken leg or a heart attack – might be exposed to the disease at a hospital.

“What has concerned us is the possibility that healthcare facilities in the region … might be deeply stressed because of the Ebola challenge, and second, there might be a risk that you were exposed to Ebola,” said CDC Director Tom Frieden.

Frieden said the United States is sending a “surge” of about 50 CDC personnel to West Africa, in an effort to...

Britain has announced a plan to fast-track driverless cars, meaning self-driving cars could hit public roads by early 2015.

It is the first sovereign state to make such a large-scale and public commitment to testing the cars, experts said.

“It’s an early statement by a national government that this is a policy priority," said Bryant Walker Smith, an associate law professor at the University of South Carolina who studies the legal implications of driverless cars. “I wouldn’t say we’ve seen a similar announcement, say, by a U.S. federal agency.”

The British government is also promising to review current driving laws to better accommodate driverless car technology, but the country might still have some legal obstacles to tackle.

For one, the 1968 U.N. Vienna Convention on Road Traffic requires that every moving vehicle have a driver, and that the driver must always be in control of a car while it’s moving. 

The treaty has been ratified by more than 70 countries, including the U.K. and...

A young suicide bomber with explosives hidden beneath his cap assassinated a politically influential cousin of Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Tuesday, a provincial official said.

The 24-year-old attacker blew himself up in a reception room at Hashmat Khalil Karzai’s home in the southern province of Kandahar, according to Dawa Khan Minapal, the spokesman for the province’s governor. The bomber was bowing to kiss Hashmat Khalil Karzai’s hand after morning prayers for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, the Associated Press reported.

One other person, described only as a civilian, was wounded by the blast.

The attack was the latest to target an Afghan political leader, and was not the first to claim a relative of President Karzai. Ahmed Wali Karzai, his half brother, was killed in his home in Kandahar in 2011.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack on Hashmat Karzai. The Taliban is waging an insurgency that has targeted other powerful figures in the country, and has...

The body of a teen stowaway was found in the wheel well of a U.S. military plane in Germany on Sunday night, military officials said.

The victim, described as an "adolescent black male, possibly of African origins," was found during a routine inspection of a C-130J military aircraft at Ramstein Air Base, according to a statement issued by the U.S. Department of Defense.

Lt. Col. Vanessa Hillman, a Defense Department spokeswoman, told the Los Angeles Times that the aircraft had been on a support mission in Africa and had stopped in several countries during the last few days.

It was not clear where or when the teen climbed in, and the cause of death was not immediately known, Hillman said.

"We have no way of knowing, right now, at what point the child entered the plane," she said.

The teen's body has been taken to a German medical facility for an autopsy. 

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The French government confirmed Thursday night that wreckage from an Air Algerie flight carrying 116 people that disappeared from radar earlier in the day had been found.

Wreckage from the flight was found in Mali's Gossi region, according to a news release from French officials.

The debris was “clearly identifiable” as the Air Algerie flight, officials said. 

A French military detachment was deployed to secure the site and collect initial information, officials said.

The plane crashed during a storm over northern Africa early Thursday.

The flight took off from Burkina Faso at 1:17 a.m. Thursday but its disappearance was not made public until several hours after it didn't make its 6:10 a.m. scheduled arrival in Algiers.

Shortly before the plane vanished from the screens, the captain asked permission to depart from his planned route because of heavy storms and poor visibility over northern Mali. The plane is believed to have crashed shortly after making the diversion.

The passengers...

The Federal Aviation Administration on Wednesday night lifted its ban on U.S. flights to and from Tel Aviv.

The decision was made after the U.S. government determined that Israel had proper measures in place to "mitigate potential risks to civil aviation" during the ongoing hostilities in and around the Gaza Strip, according to an FAA news release.

The FAA "will continue to closely monitor the very fluid situation ... and take additional actions, as necessary," according to the release.  

The FAA ban was imposed Tuesday after a rocket fired from Gaza struck a home about a mile from Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion International Airport, apparently circumventing Israel's Iron Dome missile-defense system.

The ban was greeted with criticism from Israel, where tourism from the United States is a key driver of the economy, especially in the summer. A cutoff of flights to the U.S. was also seen as an important psychological setback in a country that feels isolated in a region where it is surrounded by...

The Federal Aviation Administration has extended its ban on U.S. airlines flying to Israel's Ben Gurion International Airport for up to 24 hours.

The ban, which was ordered Tuesday morning, came after a rocket struck about a mile from the airport in Tel Aviv. 

The ban is applicable only to U.S. carriers, although many other airlines also terminated service to Tel Aviv on Tuesday. 

"The agency is working closely with the government of Israel to review the significant new information they have provided and determine whether potential risks to U.S. civil aviation are mitigated so the agency can resolve concerns as quickly as possible," an FAA statement said Wednesday.

On Tuesday, former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg said he would fly to Israel as a show of support for the nation and in protest of the FAA's ban. John Kerry landed at the airport Wednesday.

At a press briefing Wednesday, the State Department confirmed that rockets had landed near the Tel Aviv airport....

At least 20 people have been killed and seven others injured in a typhoon that ripped through the Philippines, government officials said Wednesday.

Typhoon Rammasun, which made landfall early Tuesday, blasted the island nation with 105-mph winds and heavy rain, knocking down power lines and leading to the collapse of some bridges and buildings.

Officials have begun to survey the damage as the worst of the storm moved west off the coast of the country and toward China.

The storm is the first typhoon to touch down in the Philippines since Typhoon Haiyan, which was one of the most powerful storms ever recorded. It devastated the country in 2013, leaving thousands dead.

The fatalities from Rammasun, which included an 11-month-old baby and were mostly caused by falling trees and debris, were concentrated mainly in the Calabarzon region, just south of the nation’s capital.

“We cannot give a very clear picture yet. We are still awaiting reports from our local governments and councils,”...

Many people fled their homes in the Philippines as Typhoon Rammasun rumbled toward Manila, the capital, where it made landfall early Wednesday.

The storm is the first typhoon to touch down in the Philippines since Typhoon Haiyan, which was one of the most powerful storms ever recorded. It devastated the country in 2013, leaving thousands dead.

More than 168,000 people have been evacuated so far, according to the country's National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council. One person has been killed and two people injured.

Power was out throughout Manila, and the Manila Electric Co. said on Twitter that the blackouts were due to "a sudden plant outage."

Typhoon Rammasun, also known as Typhoon Glenda in the Philippines, first made landfall early Tuesday in the central Visayas region.

The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration said the storm had maximum sustained winds of 93 mph near the center with gusts of up to 115 mph.

Forecasters at the U.S...

Two and a half years after the Costa Concordia’s deadly wreck off the coast of Italy, salvage crews refloated the cruise ship and detached it from its resting spot Monday so it can begin its final journey.

The ship, which smashed into rocks and tipped over off the Tuscan island of Giglio in January 2012, will be towed to the Italian port city of Genoa to be dismantled. The journey of about 200 nautical miles is expected to begin this month and take about four days.

About 4,200 passengers and crew members had to scramble into lifeboats or plunge into shallow water after the ship capsized. Thirty-two people drowned. The body of one victim, Indian waiter Russel Rebello, is still missing. During the salvage operation, a diver also died.

The captain, Francesco Schettino, is standing trial on charges of manslaughter, causing the shipwreck and abandoning ship. Five other employees of the cruise company were convicted of manslaughter last year.

The 950-foot-long, 114,000-ton vessel was impaled...