French President Emmanuel Macron apologised for France’s role in the Holocaust during a speech in Paris today, as he called for acknowledge of the role the country played during the massacres.

Mr Macron stated that “it was indeed France that organised this,” referring to the deportation of tens of thousands of Jews to Nazi camps during World War II.

“France organized the roundups,” he said. “Not a single German participated.” And so France “in almost every aspect organised the death” of the victims.

A prominent Rwandan academic has been convicted of genocide and handed a life sentence, reports the Washington Post.

Leopold Munyazakazi was convicted by a court in the south of Rwanda on Friday and will be held under solitary confinement according to the verdict.

An ethnic Hutu, Mr Munyakazi was accused of playing a key role in the 1994 genocide in which over 800,000 Tutsis, and some moderate Hutus, were massacred.

Having fled Rwanda in 2004, Mr Munyakazi taught at a college in Baltimore, USA until he was suspended in 2008 following his indictment by the Rwandan government.

Benghazi’s international airport, Benina, has reopened for commercial flights after a three year closure due to fighting in the city.

The first outward flights were from the airport to the Lybian capital Tripoli reports Reuters.

Benina is just east of Benghazi, Libya’s second largest city, where fighting escalated in the summer of 2014.

Benina airport continues to facilitate military operations as well as commercial flights. 

Parliamentarians in Sweden have filed a lawsuit against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, accusing him of carrying out genocide against Kurds.

"We are five lawmakers handing in a complaint... (requesting) punishment for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes," said Left party MP Annika Lillemets at a press conference in Stockholm.

The lawsuit also names several other Turkish politicians, including Prime Minister Binali Yildirim. Backed by Green Party lawmakers, it accuses Turkey of carrying out genocide and could lead to arrest warrants if pursued by Sweden’s prosecutor.

The leader of the Islamic State in Afghanistan, Abu Sayed was killed in a strike aimed at IS' headquarters along side other IS fighters, the Pengton said on Friday. 

"The significance is you kill a leader of one of these groups and it sets them back ... it is obviously a victory on our side in terms of setting them back, it is the right direction," the US defence secretary, Jim Mattis was quoted by Reuters as saying. 

Human Rights watch on Thursday warned of war crimes being committed by Iraqi forces against families of ISIS fighters following the recapture of Mosul this week. 

The New York based rights organisation accused state forces of foricbly moving over 170 families of ISIS fighters, who mainly comprise women and children, into 'rehabilitation camps' which lack basic necessities as a form of "collective punishment". 

A Serbian appeals court on Thursday halted a landmark trial against eight former Bosnian Serb police officers charged with taking part in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, reports abc news.

The court, on Thursday, said it had accepted the defence’s contention that the charges against the eight officers were invalid, because they were filed at a time when Serbia did not have a chief war crimes prosecutor.

Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir announced that all negotiations with the United States will be frozen in response to a US decree that postponed a permanent decision on lifting sanctions by 3 months.

Commenting on the US decision to delay the lifting of sanctions, a senior state department official said,

“The administration recognises Sudan has made significant progress in these areas in the last six months, but the administration decided it needed more time to review Sudan’s actions.”

The United States called on Myanmar's government to allow a UN Human Rights Council established fact-finding mission into the country to investigate war crimes against the Rohingya population. 

Last month, a Myanmar official said the country would not permit entry to UN investigators, Reuters reported. 

The mission was approved by the Council in March, however it has been rejected by the Myanmar's leader, Aung San Suu Kyi. 

On Monday the prime minister of Iraq declared victory of Islamic State in Mosul, after over three years of IS rule in the city. 

The victory which has been welcomed across the world has however, received criticism from human rights organisations who have accused Iraqi and US led forces of violating international humanitarian law. 

Detailing the extent and horror of the crimes committed by Islamic State, a report published by Amnesty International on Tuesday also criticised the use of force in densely populated areas by Iraqi and US forces.