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French President Emmanuel Macron will name a new prime minister within 48 hours, the Elysee Palace has said, fending off speculation that fresh elections could be imminent, BBC reported.

Earlier on Wednesday, outgoing Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu said the possibility of dissolving parliament was beginning to fade following talks with political parties over the last two days.

"There is a majority in parliament and that is the majority that is keen to avoid fresh elections," he said.

On Monday, Lecornu - a close ally of Macron - became the third French PM to leave his job in less than a year, driven out by a hung parliament deeply divided along ideological lines, according to BBC.

US President Donald Trump has said he has been informed "we are very close to a deal" to end the war in Gaza, after officials reported progress after a third day of indirect talks between Israel and Hamas in Egypt, BBC reported.

A Palestinian official told the BBC that Egyptian, Qatari and Turkish mediators finished seven hours of talks with the Hamas delegation, which included members of other Palestinian groups.

Mediators are meeting Israel's delegation to seek final answers on remaining issues.

Wednesday's talks focused on the first phase of a US peace plan that includes a ceasefire, the release of all hostages in Gaza in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, and Israel's withdrawal from parts of Gaza, according to BBC.

Singapore’s prison hanged a Malaysian drug trafficker Wednesday, marking the second execution in two weeks and raising the number of executions in the city-state to 12 this year despite pressure to abolish the death penalty, Associated Press reported.

A Singapore anti-death penalty activist, Kirsten Han, confirmed that 38-year-old Pannir Selvam Pranthaman was executed at Changi Prison. Han, who is accompanying his family, said they have collected Pannir’s belongings from the prison.

Pannir was arrested in 2014 for having 52 grams (about 1.8 ounces) of heroin and sentenced to death in 2017. He was originally scheduled for execution in February but received a stay of execution due to pending legal matters, according to Associated Press.

At least 15 people have been killed after debris from a massive landslide hit a bus in India’s northern state of Himachal Pradesh, local authorities have said, Aljazeera reported.

The bus was travelling on a hilly stretch near Bilaspur district when, late on Thursday, a landslide struck following days of torrential rains. At least 20 to 25 passengers were on the bus at the time. Nine men, four women and two children were among those killed, police said.

Three injured children were rescued and admitted to a local hospital for treatment, according to a statement from the office of Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, the state’s highest elected official. Rescue operations continued on Wednesday in an attempt to find other missing passengers who are believed to be dead, police said, according to Aljazeera.