Restaurants and bars will close early in Tokyo and a dozen other areas across Japan beginning Friday as the country widens COVID-19 restrictions due to the omicron variant, which has caused cases to surge to new highs in metropolitan areas. The restraint, which is something of a pre-state...

Islamic State militants attacked a prison in al-Hasaka in an attempt to free prisoners belonging to the group who had mutinied, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said in a statement on Thursday. Islamic State "sleeper cells ... infiltrated from the surrounding neighbourhoods and...

The crowded hospital in Darkush in Syria's rebel-held northwest treats around 30,000 patients every month, for free -- but now foreign aid cuts are threatening its future. Already dwindling funds have caused dire shortages of medicine and equipment in this and other clinics in the Idlib...

BERLIN (AP) — A long-awaited report on sexual abuse in Germany's Munich diocese on Thursday faulted retired Pope Benedict XVI's handling of four cases when he was archbishop in the 1970s and 1980s. The law firm that drew up the report said Benedict strongly denies any wrongdoing. The...