Lionel Messi has admitted the ill feeling between him and Barcelona over his attempt to leave the club in the close season has affected his form this season, in which he has posted his lowest goal and assist tallies in 13 years. Messi caused consternation at Barca when he sent the club a...

The $900 billion pandemic aid package expected to win Congressional approval on Monday will deliver support to a recession-ravaged economy slowing under a deadly coronavirus surge, and set it up for a stronger recovery next year as vaccines become more widely available, economists said. But...

Ten years have passed since the outbreak of Tunisia's Jasmine Revolution, after Mohamed Bouazizi, a struggling young man who sold vegetables from his street cart, set himself on fire in protest at police injustice under the tyrannical regime of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. The people rose up in...

Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump's son-in-law and advisor, is due to arrive Tuesday in Morocco from Israel on the first direct commercial flight between the two countries since they normalised ties. The flight from Tel Aviv to Rabat is seen as highly symbolic after Morocco announced...

Manchester City's strikers will have to rediscover their scoring touch because reinforcements will not be signed in January, manager Pep Guardiola has said. Guardiola explained that even with the backing of their Abu Dhabi owners, City were subject to the same financial pressures as their...

Hundreds of angry Iraqis protested Monday in several cities against a currency devaluation that has slashed their purchasing power amid a pandemic-fuelled economic crisis. The Central Bank of Iraq (CBI) at the weekend devalued the currency by over a fifth against the US dollar, officially...

Israel's parliament was set to vote Monday on a proposal from its fraught coalition that would temporarily put off a call for a fourth election within less than two years in the pandemic-hit country. Israel's coalition government -- a broken marriage between Prime Minister Benjamin...

A group of 24 members of the European Parliament signed a petition launched Monday by the Geneva-based Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, which called on the Israeli government to lift its siege of Gaza and allow in COVID-19 medical supplies. The lawmakers include Manu Pineda, the...

A slew of countries closed their borders to Britain on Monday over fears of a highly infectious new coronavirus strain, heightening global panic, causing travel chaos and raising the prospect of UK food shortages days before the Brexit cliff edge. India, Poland, Spain, Switzerland, Russia,...

The remaining parties to the ailing 2015 Iran nuclear deal said Monday that they were preparing for the possible return of the US to the pact as President-elect Joe Biden readies to take office next month. Biden, who takes office on January 20, has signalled Washington would rejoin the...

 Demonstrators in Armenia blocked roads on Monday and forced Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to cut short an official visit, as anger in the country grows over a contentious peace deal with Azerbijan. Pashinyan has come under pressure from the opposition to resign after agreeing to the...

President-elect Joe Biden will receive his first dose of the coronavirus vaccine on live television as part of a growing effort to convince the American public the inoculations are safe. Monday's event will come the same day that a second vaccine, produced by Moderna, will start arriving in...

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas on Monday urged Iran not to waste the opportunity offered by the prospect of Joseph Biden’s United States administration returning to the nuclear non-proliferation deal. Speaking after a video conference of officials from the countries in the JCPOA deal,...

Australia said on Monday it had detected cases of the new fast-spreading coronavirus strain identified in the United Kingdom, while Hong Kong and India said they would suspend flights from Britain. Two travellers from the United Kingdom to Australia's New South Wales state were found...

Oman will close its land, air and sea borders on Tuesday at 1 a.m. for one week, state television reported on Monday. The decision follows measures imposed by various countries following the outbreak of a new strain of COVID-19, Oman TV said.  

The Palestinian-Syrian director Mohammed Khamis started his propaganda campaign for his long narrative  film "Exit Visa", a work that was carried out in difficult circumstances, not only because it was filmed in Palestine, but also under the spread of the Covid-19. The film,...

The EU's drug regulator will decide on Monday whether to authorise the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine, with desperate countries hoping for the green light to finally start inoculating their citizens. The Amsterdam-based European Medicines Agency dramatically moved the decision on the...

While he waits for his lesson at an Egyptian music school, Maissara Mohammed plays his oud, its soothing tones dissolving the stress of daily life during the coronavirus pandemic. "I play four instruments, but the oud is certainly my favourite," the 27-year-old Sudanese engineer says,...

South Korea banned gatherings of more than four people in the capital and surrounding areas Monday as the country recorded its highest daily coronavirus death toll since the epidemic began. While South Korea has suffered relatively lightly compared to other nations, officials said a surge...

Hong Kong will ban all flights arriving from the United Kingdom from midnight local time on Monday, becoming the first city in Asia to announce such a halt after a new super-virulent strain of the novel coronavirus was identified in Britain. With authorities in the densely packed financial...