Iraq's prime minister accused corrupt politicians on Wednesday of plotting to sabotage his plan for sweeping reforms of the governing system, and warned leaders of powerful Shi'ite militias not to use their armed followers for political ends. A year in office, Haider al-Abadi...

A 48-hour ceasefire was declared on Wednesday to halt fighting between Syrian insurgents and the army and its Lebanese militant Hezbollah ally in the rebel-held town of Zabadani and two Shi'ite Muslim villages in Idlib province. The United Nations envoy for Syria said last month...

  Syrian authorities have arrested Suleiman al-Assad, a cousin of the president, on suspicion of killing a military officer in a road rage incident, according to the official news agency Sana. “Suleiman Hilal al-Assad has been arrested and transferred to the appropriate authorities,”...

By Abdullah al-Ghadawi; Translation by Yusra Ahmed) Hassan Abdul-Azim, the General Coordinator for the Opposition Coordinating Committee for Democratic Change said that the National Coalition has tackled the obstacle of Assad’s stepping down in Geneva2, as Kofi Anan’s initiative had not...