French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy leave after casting their votes in Paris, April …

The French presidential election appears to be headed to a runoff.

Exit polls cited by French television in Sunday's first round of voting show President Nicolas Sarkozy losing by a thin margin to Socialist challenger Francois Hollande. According to CNN, Sarkozy captured 25.5 percent of the vote, while Hollande took 28.4 percent.

Marine Le Pen, an extreme conservative, came in third with about 20 percent, exit polls showed. Jean-Luc Melenchon, a liberal, was in fourth with 11.7 percent; Francois Bayrou finished fifth.

If no candidate wins an absolute majority, French law requires a runoff between the top two candidates.

The runoff is scheduled for May 6.

Afghan police moving toward the scene of an attack in Kabul on April 15, 2012. (Getty)

The Taliban claimed responsibility for a series of coordinated attacks on and near several foreign embassies rocked Kabul on Sunday, as gunmen fired rocket-propelled grenades into the residences of Western diplomats near the so-called "green zone" of the Afghan capital.

The Taliban also were said to be behind a raid on a jail in northern Pakistan that freed hundreds of inmates and wounded at least four prison officials.

In Kabul, the Taliban said their "main targets were the German and British embassies and the headquarters of Afghanistan's NATO-led force," according to Reuters. Two rockets hit a British Embassy guard tower near Reuters' Kabul offices, the news service said. A supermarket near the German embassy was also struck.

According to the New York Times, gunfire and "several explosions broke out near the German and British embassies and a major NATO military camp, usually a heavily guarded area of the Afghan capital" just after 1:35 p.m. local time. Rockets landed near the British and Canadian embassies and World Bank office, the paper reported.

CNN reported that attackers took over a central Kabul hotel close to the presidential palace, United Nations office and several foreign embassies--and that the Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in a text message.

Kabul police said there were at least two other attacks in progress near the presidential palace and Parliament.

An Afghan man examines the remains of a car after three suicide bombers were killed before they reached Jalalabad …

A NATO spokesman confirmed the attacks, according to the Times, in as many as seven locations.

U.S. army forces there were seen moving through the area, though the U.S. embassy did not sustain an attack, reports said. However, the embassy was in "lock-down mode," according to CBS News.

In September 2011, suicide bombers led a 19-hour attack on the U.S. embassy. A spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) told Al Jazeera that the ISAF similar tactics were used in Sunday's attacks.

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A massive earthquake struck off the coast of Indonesia on Wednesday, triggering immediate tsunami warnings for the region—and fears for an area devastated by an earthquake almost eight years ago. The tsunami warnings were later lifted.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the 8.6 magnitude earthquake struck 270 miles southwest of Banda Aceh, Indonesia, at a depth of 14 miles.

Two hours later, an 8.2 magnitude aftershock also struck off the coast of the Sumatra island.

According to CNN, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued a tsunami watch for the entire Indian Ocean. According to the New York Times, the earthquake could be felt in Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.

Fearful residents in Banda Aceh fled to higher ground after the quake, and several aftershocks could be felt there.

According to Reuters, power was down in Aceh province.

"The electricity is down, there are traffic jams to access higher ground," a spokesman for Indonesia's disaster management agency told the news service. "Sirens and Koran recitals from mosques are everywhere."

There were no immediate reports of damage, injuries or fatalities, Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said on local television.

In 2004, a 9.1 magnitude earthquake killed an estimated 230,000 people in the region.