This year was supposed to be a good one for Spanish builders but the lack of a government three months after an inconclusive general election has put the brakes on economic activity.

"Everything that has to do with construction in this country is blocked," said Carlos Luaces, director general of Spain's association of sand and gravel producers, Anefa.

Beyond the public animosity, stark statements and a trade embargo, there is another side to U.S.-Cuba relations: exploratory missions, discreet negotiations and hands extended -- in hotel hallways, airport waiting rooms and even the Vatican.

Barack Obama, who arrives in Havana on Sunday for the first visit by a sitting U.S. president in nearly 90 years, will be the one remembered for opening a new chapter in ties between the United States and Cuba.

Speaking in an old fort and prison from South Africa's era of white domination, a former anti-apartheid leader hinted that he would like to see the country's scandal-hit president quit by referring to the 1974 resignation of U.S. President Richard Nixon.

"I wish we can have a long nightmare over in this country," said Mathews Phosa, echoing a similar phrase by Gerald Ford, the vice president who replaced Nixon after the Watergate scandal.

European fears are mounting that Libya could once again become a hotspot in the migrant crisis, with several thousand people who fled from the troubled country rescued in the southern Mediterranean this week alone.

U.S. President Barack Obama's historic visit to Havana on Sunday will cap the launch of a new era in relations between the United States and Cuba.

Their troubled relationship has been marked by more than a century of U.S. dominance and Cold War hostility.

The Kurds, whose representatives on Thursday declared a unified, federal region in northern Syria, number an estimated 25-35 million people in four countries.

- Mountain people -

Jorge Frometa sometimes wakes up to a sound most Cubans never hear: the U.S. national anthem, which plays out every morning at the nearby Guantanamo naval base, far removed from the blossoming U.S.-Cuban reconciliation.

As President Barack Obama prepares to jet in to Cuba next week for an historic visit, the American base at the eastern tip of the island stands as testament to the bad old days in U.S.-Cuban ties.

Podemos has risen at meteoric speed to become Spain's third political force in just two years, but rifts and tensions are starting to bruise the far-left party's image of watertight unity.

Led by the charismatic Pablo Iglesias, the party has been shaken by resignations and increasingly vocal regional discontent, just as it engages in delicate political maneuverings following inconclusive elections in December.

Sunday's suicide car bombing in Ankara has raised fears of an escalation in Turkey's long-running Kurdish conflict, as the country grapples with the Islamic State threat while relying on a security system weakened by a political crackdown, analysts say.

No-one has claimed responsibility for the blast which killed 35 people in the heart of the Turkish capital, but the government has pointed the finger at the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), against which Ankara has waged a relentless assault since late last year.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said his forces have "on the whole" completed their task in Syria as he ordered the surprise withdrawal of the bulk of Moscow's forces.

But questions remain over why the Kremlin has chosen this moment to scale back its intervention in Syria and what the move could mean for the protracted conflict, now entering its sixth year.