Israelis were prevented from entering Jordanian border enclaves on Sunday after a deal allowing farmers to work land there expired, 25 years after a landmark peace treaty. Since the two countries signed the deal in 1994, Jordan has allowed Israeli farmers access to the territories of Ghumar...

Iran has discovered a massive new oil field, President Hassan Rouhani said Sunday, a find that would boost its proven reserves by about a third in a rare piece of "good news" for an economy battered by US sanctions. In a speech aired on state TV, Rouhani said the country's economy had...

The Islamic State group's Afghan branch has been "defeated" in one of the key eastern provinces where it first sought to establish a stronghold, a top Afghan security official said Sunday. The claim comes after the jihadists first burst into Afghanistan's conflict in 2015, when they overran...

Iraqi protesters clashed with security forces in Baghdad on Sunday, following a deadly crackdown that Amnesty International warned could turn into a "bloodbath". Demonstrators across the south fought to maintain anti-government sit-ins, as security forces fired tear gas to try to keep them...

The United States is “very actively” trying to persuade North Korea to come back to negotiations, South Korea’s national security adviser said on Sunday, as a year-end North Korean deadline for U.S. flexibility approaches. South Korea was taking North Korea’s deadline “very seriously”, the...

Iran should come to the negotiating table with world powers and Gulf countries to seek a new deal that would deescalate regional tensions and revive its economy, a senior United Arab Emirates official said on Sunday. Tensions in the Gulf have risen since attacks on oil tankers in a vital...

The Interior Minister of Libya’s internationally recognized government accused Russia of fueling the ongoing war with mercenaries Sunday and urged the U.S. to increase efforts to resolve the crisis. Fathi Bashagha told the Bloomberg news site ahead of his Washington visit, the U.S....

The Egyptian judiciary decided Sunday to release the former justice minister who served in the Mohammed Morsi government. Prosecutors ruled former Justice Minister Ahmed Suleiman would be released on probation, his son Mohammed, told Anadolu Agency. He said that the his father was held...

Former Secretary-General of Lebanon’s Shia Hezbollah movement criticized Iran’s supreme leader Sunday for being behind corruption in Lebanon and Iraq, where anti-government and corruption protests are ongoing. Subhi al-Tufayli, speaking to Arab and social media, delivered remarks on recent...

Five months before he passed away, the first elected Palestinian President Yasir Arafat had sent a message to the Turkish government to continue defending the holy city of Al-Quds (Jerusalem) and Al-Aqsa mosque.  Arafat, who was also founder of the Palestinian Liberation Organization...

Spain holds its fourth general election in as many years on Sunday with renewed tensions over Catalonia's separatist movement in the foreground, an issue that has fuelled a surge in support for upstart far-right party Vox. Acting Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called the repeat polls after...

Six people have died and more than two million others spent a night huddled in storm shelters as Cyclone Bulbul smashed into the coasts of India and Bangladesh with fierce gales and torrential rains, officials said Sunday. The cyclone packed winds of up to 120 kilometres (75 miles) per hour...

China has said the lack of tough security laws in Hong Kong is a key reason for months of increasingly violent pro-democracy demonstrations and that the enactment of such legislation is an "urgent task". The call -- likely to further inflame protesters angry with a police response seen as...

Seven protesters were killed Saturday in Iraq as security forces cleared protest sites in Baghdad and Basra after political leaders agreed to stand by the embattled government by any means. The leaders, sources told AFP, also agreed to put an end to rallies rocking Iraq's capital and its...

German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier urged the United States to be a “mutually respectful partner” and reject nationalism, in a clear salvo aimed at US leader Donald Trump as Germany on Saturday marked 30 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Recalling the United States’ key role in...

Iran has the capacity to enrich uranium up to 60%, a spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) said on Saturday, far more than is required for most civilian uses but short of the 90% needed to make nuclear bomb fuel. “The organization has the possibility to produce 5%, 20%...

Greek police said Saturday they had arrested three people and seized an arms cache in an ongoing anti-terrorist operation officials likened to high profile arrests of Revolutionary Struggle group members in 2010. Greek police stated two men -- a 41 and a 45-year-old -- and a 39-year-old...

Five candidates, including two former prime ministers under deposed president Abdelaziz Bouteflika, have been selected to run in Algeria's December presidential poll, the country's constitutional council confirmed Saturday. Twenty-three candidates had registered for the election which comes...

Egypt's inflation rate dropped to the lowest level in nearly a decade last month, official figures showed Saturday, as cheaper food offered respite to consumers squeezed by IMF-backed reforms. The annual inflation rate was 2.4 percent in October, compared with 17.5 percent a year earlier,...

Strange men following them. Threats phoned in or muttered in the middle of a crowd. As Iraq's anti-government protests falter, activists and volunteer medics feel the noose tightening around them. Speaking to AFP using pseudonyms, they have described an apparent campaign of surveillance and...