- DeChambeau says PGA's Ryder Cup decision 'just the start'
- Alcaraz defeated on Laver Cup debut
- Postecoglou embraces 'struggle' to make Spurs a success
- Nice hand 'ashamed' Saint-Etienne 8-0 Ligue 1 mauling
- Boeing CEO says ending strike 'a top priority'
- Harris slams Trump for hypocrisy on abortion as US starts voting
- Academy to host first overseas ceremony to honor young filmmakers
- No doctor necessary: US okays nasal spray flu vaccine for self-use
- Former delivery man Baldwin leads star names at PGA Championship
- Trump shooting: Secret Service admits complacency
- Can an ambitious Milei make Argentina an AI giant?
- Haiti, its suffering growing, in 'race against time': UN expert
- Ibrahim Aqil, the Hezbollah elite unit commander wanted by the US
- Chinese forward Cui signs NBA contract with Brooklyn Nets
- US Fed dissenter calls for 'measured' pace of rate cuts
- Guardiola tells players to lead change over workload as Kompany demands cap on games
- Norway limits wild salmon fishing as stocks hit new lows
- Top Hezbollah commander killed in Israeli strike on Beirut
- Rotterdam fatal knife attacker suspected of 'terrorist motive'
- First early votes cast in knife-edge US presidential election
- Top-ranked Swiatek out of Beijing due to 'personal matters'
- Hard-right Reform UK looks to the future after vote success
- Embiid agrees to NBA contract extension with 76ers
- Joshua aims to complete road to redemption in Dubois bout
- World champion Bagnaia sets pace with lap record at Misano
- Biden says 'working' to get people back to homes on Israel-Lebanon border
- Pope criticises Argentina's crackdown on protesters
- Court limits screenings of videos in France mass rape case
- Gurbaz century takes Afghanistan to 311-4 in 2nd ODI
- Central banks face 'difficult balancing act': IMF chief
- Guardiola tells players to lead change over workload fears
- Paris Olympics sports equipment moves to new homes
- 'Happy' Kinghorn relishing life at Toulouse
- Norris sets Singapore pace as Verstappen only 15th
- Germany to bid to host women's Euro 2029
- Portugal brings deadly forest fires under control
- Postecoglou defends Solanke after slow start to Spurs career
- US nuclear plant Three Mile Island to reopen to power Microsoft
- Arteta urges Arsenal to take next step in Man City showdown
- Stock markets fall after Fed-fuelled rally
- Poland charges Russian over attack on Navalny ally: prosecutors
- Man City have rest 'advantage' in Arsenal showdown: Guardiola
- Maresca has 'no doubt' in Jackson as Chelsea's number nine
- EU chief announces 35 bn euro loan plan for Ukraine before winter
- From TikTok to Hollywood, the irresistible rise of Italy's Khaby Lame
- Verstappen punished for swearing in Singapore press conference
- Sri Lanka lead by 202 in first New Zealand Test
- Brook 'not too fussed' by England's batting in heavy Australia loss
- India's Ashwin 'happy' to embrace pressure
- A modern 'Trojan Horse': two days of mayhem in Lebanon
World's oldest known person dies aged 118: spokesman to AFP
The world's oldest known person, French nun Lucile Randon, has died aged 118, a spokesman told AFP on Tuesday.
Randon, known as Sister Andre, was born in southern France on February 11, 1904, when World War I was still a decade away.
She died in her sleep at her nursing home in Toulon, spokesman David Tavella said.
"There is great sadness but... it was her desire to join her beloved brother. For her, it's a liberation," Tavella, of the Sainte-Catherine-Laboure nursing home, told AFP.
The sister was long feted as the oldest European, before the death of Japan's Kane Tanaka aged 119 last year left her the longest-lived person on Earth.
Randon was born in the year New York opened its first subway and when the Tour de France had only been staged once.
She grew up in a Protestant family as the only girl among three brothers, living in the southern town of Ales.
One of her fondest memories was the return of two of her brothers at the end of World War I, she told AFP in an interview on her 116th birthday.
"It was rare, in families, there were usually two dead rather than two alive. They both came back," she said.
She worked as a governess in Paris -- a period she once called the happiest time of her life -- for the children of wealthy families.
She converted to Catholicism and was baptised at the age of 26.
Driven by a desire to "go further", she joined the Daughters of Charity order of nuns at the relatively late age of 41.
Sister Andre was then assigned to a hospital in Vichy, where she worked for 31 years.
In later life she moved to Toulon along the Mediterranean coast.
Her days in the nursing home were punctuated by prayer, mealtimes and visits from residents and hospice workers.
She also received a steady flow of letters, almost all of which she responded to.
In 2021 she survived catching Covid-19, which infected 81 residents of her nursing home.
- 'Work kept me alive' -
Randon told reporters last year that her work and caring for others had kept her spry.
"People say that work kills, for me work kept me alive, I kept working until I was 108," she told reporters in April last year in the tearoom of the home.
Although she was blind and relied on a wheelchair, she used to care for other elderly people much younger than herself.
"People should help each other and love each other instead of hating. If we shared all that, things would be a lot better," she said at the same meeting with journalists.
She had rejected requests for locks of hair or DNA samples, saying that "only the good Lord knows" the secret of her longevity.
T.Resende--PC