The spiritual heart of Shiite Islam and a hub for religious tourism in Iraq is being badly hit as sanctions against neighbouring Iran have resulted in fewer pilgrims with less money to spend. Business leaders, shopkeepers and hotel owners in Najaf, site of a shrine to a revered figure in...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Facebook and Microsoft Corp. representatives said Friday night that after negotiations with national security officials their companies have been given permission to make new but still very limited revelations about government orders to turn over user data. The...

Riot police fired water cannons and tear gas on protesters in Istanbul's Taksim Square and neighboring Gezi Park on Saturday, an intervention that came shortly after the prime minister warned that security forces "know how to clear" the area. Protesters had defied Recep Tayyip Erdogan's...

As a group of rebels gathered in an apartment in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, debating the value of the United States’ decision to provide them with weapons, government forces nearby began pounding an opposition-held neighborhood. The opposing events led the group to focus...