Middle Orient

Turkey is working with international partners to negotiate both a ceasefire in the Gaza conflict and access for humanitarian aid, the Turkish foreign minister said on Thursday.

Visiting UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stressed here on Thursday the significance of creating a new Iraqi government as a gateway to rebuilding Iraq. Speaking at a short news conference following a just-one-hour meeting with top Shi’ite cleric Ayatollah Al-Sistani in Najaf for the first time, Ban said the formation of …

At least 11 people, including three children and a woman, were killed and eight others wounded when a mortar shell fell on a district of Aleppo city, north Syria, on Thursday. The area is controlled by the regular forces, according to a statement by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights …

Iraqi lawmakers elected a veteran Kurdish politician as the nation’s new president on Thursday, hours after an attack on a prison convoy killed dozens of people, brutally underscoring the challenges faced by the country’s leaders as they struggle to form a new government.

The EU Foreign Affairs Council meeting in Brussels Tuesday decided to add three additional Syrian persons and nine entities to its blacklist in view of the gravity of the situation in Syria. The Council in a statement said Syrian regime officials are involved “in the violent repression of the civilian …

The European Union (EU) has extended the suspension of restrictive measures on Iran over its nuclear programme until November 24, the Council of EU Monday said in a statement. Under the sanction relief specified in the Joint Plan of Action, the Islamic republic could continue parts of its international oil trade, which is the …

Iraqi security forces killed about 117 insurgents in a series of battles with the Sunni militant groups across Iraq on Tuesday as the government is trying to take back the lands seized by rebel fighters recently, security sources said. In Salahudin province, the army forces seized four villages after clashes …

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius called today for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas to end violence in Gaza which has left nearly 600 Palestinians dead.

Syrian government forces have launched a counter-attack to recapture a gas field seized by hard-line extremists, activists said Saturday, as the death toll from three days of fighting there rose to more than 200 people killed.

Egypt summoned the Turkish charge d’affairs to Cairo on Sunday over comments Islamist Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan made, questioning Egypt’s ability to end the latest Israeli offensive in Gaza. On Friday Erdogan called Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi an “illegitimate … tyrant”, adding that Egypt “could not be relied upon” to …