Bashar al-Assad has sent Pope Francis a private message, the Vatican said on Saturday, without disclosing its contents. The Vatican said a delegation headed by Joseph Sweid, a Syrian minister of state, held talks in the Vatican with the pope’s secretary of state, Archbishop...

  Activists say a Syrian government airstrike on a crowded vegetable market in a rebel-held neighborhood of the northern city of Aleppo has killed at least 20 people. For nearly two weeks, President Bashar Assad's warplanes and helicopters have pounded...

Deadly toxins that were to have been removed from  Syria  by December 31 under an international effort to rid the country of its chemical arsenal have not yet been delivered to port to be put on ships, a Russian diplomat was quoted as saying on Friday. The deadline will...

A powerful bombing rocked a central business district of central Beirut Friday, setting cars ablaze and killing five people, including a senior aide to former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, officials said.   The National News Agency said Mohammed Chatah and...