The fourth anniversary of the start of the battle for Raqqa has just passed, during which time the city was recaptured from the Islamic State (IS). Raqqa had been IS' Syrian capital, and it took over four months for the liberators, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), to wrest back control of...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran's presidential election on Friday, though likely more a coronation for a hard-line candidate long cultivated by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, still carries implications for a wider Middle East already roiled by years of tensions between Tehran...

In July 2018, when US President Donald Trump met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, Putin did most of the talking. Much of it was about Syria. It was clear, Trump told his national security adviser John Bolton after an almost two-hour one-on-one session with his Russian...

Bashar al-Assad, once seen as a reformer but viewed by his many foes as a tyrant after a decade of war and repression, looks set to extend his family's dynastic rule of Syria further with an election on Wednesday. Branded "an animal" by the United States for gassing his people and a...