Browsing: Middle-East News

8 January 2014 – Warning that the critical humanitarian situation in Iraq’s Anbar province is likely to worsen as fighting…

7 January 2014 – The United Nations human rights office today strongly condemned the killing of more than 20 people,…

7 January 2014 – The process of removing Syria’s most critical chemical weapons material outside of the country for destruction…

7 January 2014 – The United Nations and its humanitarian partners today appealed for $1 billion to save millions of…

6 January 2014 – The top United Nations official in Lebanon met today with senior leaders from the Government of…

6 January 2014 – Preparations for the long-sought international conference on Syria are moving ahead, with the United Nations reaching…

Afghanistan on Thursday said it would release scores of suspected Taliban fighters from jail, despite US objections that the men are “dangerous individuals” who could return to the battlefield as NATO troops withdraw. A meeting chaired by Afghan President…

An Al-Qaeda-linked group called on Iraqi Sunnis fighting government forces not to lay down their weapons, saying the choice is between conflict and enslavement, in an audio recording released Tuesday. “Oh Sunni people, you were forced to take up the…

Thousands of African asylum seekers demonstrated outside Western embassies in Tel Aviv on Monday in a second day of mass protests against Israel’s immigration policies. The migrants, primarily from Eritrea and Sudan, marched from downtown Tel Aviv to…

A Saudi court has jailed five people for up to 30 years on charges including plotting to blow up an oil refinery on behalf of Al-Qaeda, state media reported Monday. The official SPA news agency gave no details of when the alleged plot against the refinery…

Syrian rebels in the northern Damascus district of Barzeh on Sunday agreed a local ceasefire with President Bashar al-Assad’s regime after nearly a year of fighting and bombardment, activists said. “After intense negotiation in recent days between the…

Syria’s main opposition National Coalition re-elected Ahmad Jarba as its leader during a general assembly meeting in Istanbul on Sunday, the coalition said in a statement. Jarba won 65 votes, beating his only rival Riad Hijab — the best-known defector…

The seizure by Al-Qaeda-linked militants of a major Iraqi city and parts of another illustrates their resurgence, and harkens back to the darkest days of the insurgency that followed the 2003 US-led invasion. The Al-Qaeda franchise in Iraq fell from…

Jihadists killed at least 31 rival rebels in northern Syria as clashes raged on a new front in the country’s brutal war, a monitor said Sunday, citing insurgents and medics. Fighting flared on Friday between rebels and forces loyal to the Islamic State…

Secretary of State John Kerry Sunday rejected Israeli and Palestinian claims of US bias as he made a whistlestop trip to Jordan and Saudi Arabia to woo support for his peace plan. Kerry promised any agreed plan would be “fair and balanced” and likened…

5 January 2014 – Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today announced the appointment of Jane Holl Lute as his Special Adviser for…

3 January 2014 – The head of the United Nations agency tasked with defending press freedom, expressed alarm today at…

Human body parts fell from the sky in the Saudi city of Jeddah on Sunday, with police saying they could be the remains of someone trapped in an aircraft’s undercarriage bay. “Police received a telephone call at 2:30 am from a witness reporting the fall…

Iraq is preparing a “major attack” to retake militant-held Fallujah, a senior official said on Sunday, spelling a new assault for the western city where US forces repeatedly battled insurgents. Washington said it would help Baghdad in its battle against…

Two days of clashes between Shiite rebels and Sunni tribesmen fighting alongside hardline Salafists in northern Yemen have left at least 23 people dead, sources said on Sunday. Fighting has centred for months on a Salafist mosque and Koranic school…