U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry met with Russian President Vladimir Putin about boosting military and intelligence cooperation against Islamic State and al Qaeda in Syria and told him that without "concrete, near-term steps," diplomatic efforts to end the war could not go on indefinitely....

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry took a proposal to boost military and intelligence cooperation against Islamic State and al Qaeda in Syria to Moscow on Thursday, despite doubts among U.S. defense and intelligence officials. Kerry was due to meet President Vladimir Putin on Thursday evening...

Turkey imposed round-the-clock curfews on 16 villages in its mainly Kurdish southeast on Thursday as security forces tried to root out militants nearby and sacked two co-mayors it accused of supporting the fighters. Authorities in the province of Diyarbakir imposed the lockdown as security...

Writing by Abdullah Al Ghadawi; Translation by Rana Abdul (Zaman al-Wasl)- The issue of forming a military council in Syria was not proposed on table before last June. Zaman al-Wasl rushed to reveal the features of this council after Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu’s visit to Syria...