Melbourne: A self-proclaimed spiritual leader from India has been arrested and remanded in custody in Australia for allegedly assaulting two women who invited him to their homes for prayers in Sydney.

 Iran said Wednesday it had stopped respecting limits on its nuclear activities agreed under a 2015 deal with major powers until they find a way to bypass renewed US sanctions.

 Aasia Bibi, a Christian woman who was acquitted by Pakistan's Supreme Court in a blasphemy row last year, has left the country and reached Canada, according to media reports on Wednesday.

Lahore: Pakistan's deposed prime minister Nawaz Sharif has returned to prison to serve his sentence in a corruption case after the end of his six-week bail which was granted to him on medical grounds.

United Nations: In a significant victory, India's Jagjit Pavadia was re-elected to the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) for another term, posting the highest number of votes at 44. Pavadia, in her 60s, has been a member of the INCB since 2015 and her current term is set to expire in 2020.

At least nine persons, including five police personnel, were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up outside a major Sufi shrine in Pakistan's Lahore on Wednesday as the country marks the fasting month of Ramzan, officials said.

Iran on Wednesday will announce it is partially withdrawing from the nuclear deal it struck with world powers, its state-run news agency reported, a year to the day that President Donald Trump pulled America from the accord.

An Indian police officer deployed to the UN mission in Congo and a consultant with the UN development programme killed in the Ethiopian Airlines plane crash are among 115 UN peacekeepers and staff honoured by the global organisation for their sacrifice in the line of duty.