Islamist fighters in Syria have taken over the ancient quarter of the Christian town of Maaloula and are holding several nuns in a monastery there, state news agency SANA said on Monday. Fighting for the town, about five km (three miles) from the main road linking Damascus to Homs, is...

    Denmark’s security service said Sunday it suspects around 80 people have travelled from Denmark to Syria to join the civil war since mid-2012.   In a report, the service known as PET said those who travel to Syria are mainly Sunni Muslim men...

Activists have published pictures of a long wall in Homs, near the water store in al-Zahra, the neighbourhood of Alawite majority, at the junction between Arman and East Cornish neighbourhoods. On that wall, pictures of hundreds of soldiers and members of National Defence Forces...

Tunisian security forces arrested on Tuesday five people suspected of plotting a suicide bombing that shook a tourist resort and a foiled attack on the tomb of independence leader Habib Bourguiba. “The interior ministry’s specialized security units have managed in a short...