Intense fighting is taking place in north-eastern Syria after Islamic State (IS) fighters tried to break inmates out of a Kurdish-run prison. Kurdish-led forces backed by US air strikes have been battling militants in the city of Hasaka since Thursday. The assault on Ghwayran prison is one of the group’s most ambitious since its defeat in Syria nearly three years ago. The overcrowded site houses 3,500 suspected IS members including some of its leaders, a monitoring group says. Hundreds of jihadists have been recaptured since the breakout, but some are still on the run, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Kurdish security forces have surrounded the prison and are fighting for control of nearby neighbourhoods. Residents have been fleeing their homes.(BBC)…[+]

At least 16 people have been killed in a fire at a nightclub in Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé, the government has said. The blaze was caused by fireworks that were lit while champagne was being served in the club, it added. At least eight others were seriously injured in the fire in the early hours of Sunday at Liv’s Night Club.

The fire engulfed the main room of the venue in the capital’s upmarket Bastos district. “The tragedy, which was caused by explosions from the fireworks often used in these places, first consumed the building’s ceiling, resulting in two very loud explosions, causing panic and a stampede,” the communications ministry said in a statement. The emergency services were still searching the venue, and the number of dead could rise, it added.(BBC)…[+]

A Dutch tourist has been detained in Poland for giving the Nazi salute at the site of the former Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, local police say. The 29-year-old woman made the gesture in front of the Arbeit Macht Frei (Work Sets You Free) gate. The woman – who has not been named – was later charged with engaging in Nazi propaganda. Prosecutors issued a fine, which she agreed to pay. The woman said the act had been a bad joke, Poland’s PAP news agency reports. She had been posing for a photo taken by her husband at the time. Nazi Germany built the death camp in the southern Polish town of Oswiecim after occupying Poland at the start of World War Two in 1939.(BBC)…[+]