Nearly 90,000 Iranian nationals are expected to attend the hajj in Medina this year, and were due to start arriving on Sunday, after Tehran boycotted the pilgrimage last year amid tensions with Saudi Arabia. Around 800 pilgrims were due to leave Iran on three flights to Medina on Sunday, the...

An Egyptian man who stabbed three foreign tourists to death and wounded three more earlier this month at a Red Sea resort had tried to join Daesh (ISIS), according to a police investigation, two security sources said on Sunday. Officials say Abdel Rahman Shaban Abokorah killed two German...

 A committee tasked with writing a constitution for Libya voted on Saturday in favor of a draft, paving the way for parliament to approve a referendum and causing an uproar among opponents. Critics, including secessionists and people in favor of the country's 1951 constitution, called...

 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's ruling bloc avoided an embarrassing defeat on Sunday as an ally won reelection as mayor of Yokohama, with the premier planning to reshuffle his cabinet this week in an effort to boost his sagging support ratings. Mayor Fumiko Hayashi, backed by...

Polls opened in Venezuela on Sunday for the election of a new, all-powerful "Constituent Assembly" that President Nicolas Maduro promised would end his country's political and economic crisis by rewriting the constitution. The vote has been fiercely opposed by months of deadly street...

Iraqi intelligence officials say they have foiled an attempt by Daesh (ISIS) to attack revered Shiite shrines and the sect's spiritual leader. Two officers spoke to The Associated Press on Sunday on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media. They said the...

President Vladimir Putin on Sunday oversaw a pomp-filled display of Russia's naval might as the Kremlin paraded its sea power from the Baltic Sea to the shores of Syria. Some 50 warships and submarines were on show along the Neva River and in the Gulf of Finland off the country's second city...

Chinese President Xi Jinping told the military on Sunday to transform itself into an elite force, as he oversaw a parade with flybys of advanced jets and a mass rally of troops to mark 90 years since the founding of the People's Liberation Army. China's armed forces, the world's largest, are...

A 34-year-old man opened fire in a nightclub in the southern German city of Konstanz on Sunday, killing one person and seriously injuring three others, police said. The suspect suffered life-threatening injuries in a gunfight with police officers outside the music venue after they had rushed...

More than 40 troops and rebels have been killed in several days of clashes between Yemen's Saudi Arabia-backed army and insurgents allied with Iran near the Red Sea port of Mokha, officials said Sunday. Sixteen Huthi rebels and seven soldiers were killed in overnight clashes east of Mokha, a...

The United States flew two supersonic bombers over the Korean Peninsula on Sunday in a show of force against North Korea following the country’s latest intercontinental ballistic missile test. The B-1 bombers were escorted by South Korean fighter jets as they performed a low-pass over an air...

More than 22,000 people were evacuated Saturday when the stage at an electronic music festival near Barcelona erupted in flames, sending revellers running. Firefighters rushed to the Tomorrowland festival in Santa Coloma de Gramenet in northeastern Spain, and eventually managed to extinguish...

( The New Arab )- Yemen's cholera epidemic has killed 1,992 people, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Saturday, with north-western province of Hajjah and the Red Sea port city of Hodeida being particulary hit-hard by the waterborne disease. It added that 419,804 suspected cases of the...

Air France Saturday announced it was suspending flights to crisis-hit Venezuela ahead of a controversial weekend election called by President Nicolas Maduro that has provoked deadly violence and international criticism. The carrier said it was monitoring the situation and that flights would...

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday pardoned two women who were sentenced to prison terms for sending text messages to Georgian acquaintances about the movement of Russian military equipment on the eve of a war in 2008. Two orders published by the Kremlin said Annik Kesyan and...

The Saudi-led coalition backing Yemen's government said Shiite Huthi rebels on Saturday used a remote-controlled boat packed with explosives to attack the Red Sea port of Mokha, but without causing casualties. "On Saturday at dawn, Huthi militiamen targeted the port of Mokha with a remotely...

Barcelona captain Andres Iniesta said he would rather have Neymar at the club than a massive transfer fee, with speculations linking the Brazilian to Paris Saint-Germain in a world record deal. PSG have reportedly held discussions with Barcelona about a transfer for the 25 year-old that...

Suspected Boko Haram members released a video on Saturday that shows three kidnapped members of an oil exploration team in northeastern Nigeria, one of whom asks the government to reduce the use of force against the militants. The team, which included university staff and employees from...

 Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' spokesman says the 82-year-old leader has been hospitalized for a routine checkup and will be discharged in a matter of hours. Nabil Abu Rudeineh says Abbas is undergoing regular examinations Saturday at a Ramallah hospital. Abbas, a smoker, has...

Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard said Saturday a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier fired a warning shot in an "unprofessional" confrontation with Iranian vessels, the official IRNA news agency reported. IRNA quoted a statement from the Guard as saying that the USS Nimitz and an accompanying ship...