As Western countries display increasing alarm at the strength of multinational Islamist extremists among rebels in Syria opposed to President Bashar al-Assad, a Syrian official was quoted on Wednesday as saying Western intelligence agencies had sent representatives to Damascus...

  A series of bomb attacks on Wednesday targeted areas within the Iraqi capital of Baghdad and a village near the northern town of Baquba killing at least 52 people and injuring dozens more, police and hospital sources said, according to Agence France-Presse. In...

French president Francois Hollande told key Syrian opposition “not to go to Geneva if there is no ending for Bashar al-Assad’s rule,” Syrian Deputy Chairman of the National Coalition said in a report was sent to some opposition figures and obtained by Zaman Alwasl....

Kuwait's emir pledged on Wednesday $500 million for Syrians stricken by almost three years of civil war. Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmed al-Sabah made the pledge at an international donor conference in Kuwait city attended by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Delegates...