Top diplomats have discussed the possibilities of a Syrian ceasefire, with the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov saying that President Bashar-Al Assad is willing to open aid access to devastated areas. Monday's meeting in Paris, attended by Lavrov and his US counterpart, Secretary...

Syria has become a major amphetamines exporter and consumer as the trauma of the country's brutal civil war fuels demand and the breakdown in order creates opportunity for producers. Drugs experts, traders and local activists say Syrian production of the most popular of the...

 Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif is due to travel to Tehran ally Damascus in the next few days, media reported Sunday, amid preparations for a Syria peace conference. Zarif was Sunday in Lebanon, which neighbours war-torn Syria, and said that his country is not...

A car bomb exploded outside a bus terminal in central Baghdad on Sunday, killing at least nine people and wounding 16, police and medics said. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack at the Allawi al-Hillah bus terminal but Sunni Islamist insurgents have been gaining...