Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa said mass killings of members of ousted president Bashar al-Assad’s minority sect were a threat to his mission to unite the country, and promised to punish those responsible, including his own allies if necessary. In his first interview to a global news agency, held after hundreds died in four days of clashes…
The top US diplomat, Marco Rubio, landed in Saudi Arabia’s coastal city of Jeddah on Monday, ahead of talks with Ukrainian officials. Speaking to reporters on the flight, Rubio expressed optimism on the planned meeting, although he added that there were still more details to be worked out on the minerals deal between Washington and Kyiv. National…
A man has been arrested after scaling Big Ben’s Elizabeth Tower at the Palace of Westminster in central London. Emergency services were called at 07:24 GMT on Saturday to reports of a protester who had climbed up the tower holding a Palestinian flag. The barefoot man reached a ledge several metres up the tower and…
US President Donald Trump’s Turnberry golf resort in Scotland has been daubed with pro-Palestinian graffiti, with a protest group claiming responsibility. Local media on Saturday showed images of red paint scrawled across walls at the course with the slogans “Free Gaza” and “Free Palestine” as well as insults against Trump. “Gaza is not for sale”…
Syria’s interim president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, said current developments are within “expected Challenges,” Arab media said on Sunday, as clashes continue between forces linked to the new rulers and fighters from ousted leader Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday that two days of clashes in the country’s coastal region…
Russia on Saturday said its troops had retaken three villages seized by Ukraine in the Kursk border region, where Kyiv’s forces have been losing ground recently. The Russian defense ministry announced the recapture of Viktorovka, Nikolayevka and Staraya Sorochina. Ukrainian soldiers launched an offensive in Kursk last summer but Russia has wrested back control of…
The US has declined to renew a sanctions waiver to allow Iraq to purchase Iranian electricity, officials told Al Arabiya English Saturday night. “President Trump has been clear that the Iranian regime must cease its ambitions for a nuclear weapon or face Maximum Pressure. We hope the regime will put the interests of its people…
China’s military warned Sunday it would tighten its “noose” around Taiwan if separatism over the island escalated, state media reported. “The more rampant ‘Taiwan independence’ separatists become, the tighter the noose around their necks and the sharper the sword hanging over their heads will be,” army spokesman Wu Qian told delegates at an annual meeting,…
An Israeli airstrike killed two Palestinians in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on Saturday, medical sources said, as mediators pushed ahead with talks to extend a shaky 42-day ceasefire agreed in January between Israel and Hamas. The Israeli military said its aircraft struck a drone that crossed from Israel into southern Gaza and “several…
German election winner Friedrich Merz’s conservatives and the Social Democrats (SPD) have concluded preliminary talks on forming a coalition government, Merz told reporters on Saturday in a joint announcement alongside other party leaders. In Germany, where coalitions are the norm, governments are typically formed in two phases, with parties first holding exploratory talks and then…
Local officials from Russia’s ruling party have caused controversy by presenting mothers of soldiers killed in Ukraine with gifts of meat grinders, an appliance widely used to describe Russia’s brutal tactics on the front line. The United Russia party in the northern Murmansk region posted photos on social media showing officials smiling as they visited bereaved…
A Syria war monitor reported on Saturday that more than 300 civilians from the Alawite minority have been killed in recent days by security forces and their allies, as authorities clash with militants loyal to the former government of Bashar al-Assad. Restoring security has been one of the most complex tasks for Syria’s new authorities,…
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said on Saturday that Tehran will not be bullied into negotiations, a day after US President Donald Trump said he had sent a letter to the country’s top authority to negotiate a nuclear deal. In an interview with Fox Business, Trump said “there are two ways Iran can be handled: militarily, or…
