Eight people were killed in isolated clashes in Turkey on Sunday during municipal elections that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan hopes will validate him in his battle against a corruption scandal. The voting may have become a crisis referendum on the rule of Mr Erdogan and...

Dozens of troops loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad were killed in two attacks carried out by rebels in Aleppo, opposition sources reported on Sunday. Ziad Hajj Obeid, a commander for the rebel Free Syrian Army, said their forces carried two “special operations’ in the city,...

Over 50 million eligible voters cast their ballots in Turkey's local elections, amid corruption allegations and damaging security leaks that have shaken the 12-year rule of the  Justice and Development Party  (AKP) government.   The municipal elections have become a...

The emir of Qatar, a key backer of Sudan's Islamist regime, is to visit cash-strapped Khartoum for talks on bolstering ties, days after the  UN and African Union raised an alarm  over the upsurge in violence in Darfur. Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani's one-day trip on...