The energy minister for top OPEC exporter Saudi Arabia said Thursday he was optimistic about OPEC's deal to limit oil output and mentioned the lower end of a previously agreed production target, helping spur a rally in the price of crude. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting...

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi pardoned 82 prisoners, mostly university students jailed for protesting, state news agency MENA said on Thursday. Sisi had promised in October to amend a protest law that human rights groups say has severely restricts protest rights and hinted at...

The PYD, the PKK terrorist group’s Syrian affiliate, has captured eight villages between the cities of Manbij and Al-Bab in Syria’s northwestern Aleppo province after Daesh militants withdrew from the area without putting up any resistance. According to Anadolu Agency correspondents in...

Twenty-five fighters and civilians were killed in a car-bomb attack targeting Syrian rebels in the northern province of Aleppo on Thursday, the rebel group said. Yasser Yusef, a senior official of the Nureddine al-Zinki group, told AFP that the attack in the town of Azaz "bore the hallmarks"...

A controversial Israeli bill to limit the volume of calls to prayer at mosques may be revived after it appeared to have been buried thanks to opposition from ultra-Orthodox Jews, reports said Thursday. Health Minister Yaakov Litzman, from the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party, may...

(Zaman Al Wasl)- The Syrian regime military campaign has been for three days on the neighbourhood of al-Waer in Homs, in order to pressurise civilians and fighters  to give up  their demands of releasing detainees from regime’s prisons and to secure the rest of the Syrian...

(The Daily Star)- The General Security Thursday arrested a Lebanese man accused of links to militant groups. In a statement, the General Security identified the militant suspect by the initials Aa. M., saying he confessed to working with others in providing arms to an unnamed militant group....

Can Germany, the country that once unleashed Nazism, lead the free world? The idea that the former home of militarism and nationalism could become a beacon for human rights and peaceful international cooperation within one lifetime may seem far-fetched. But with outsider Donald Trump's...

Russia's communications regulator on Thursday ordered Internet service providers to block public access to the website of social networking company LinkedIn to comply with a court ruling that found the firm guilty of violating data laws. Roskomnadzor, the watchdog, said it was acting to...

After losing the popular vote, President-elect Donald Trump has decided that the Electoral College is a pretty smart way to elect a president after all. Despite losing the election, Democrat Hillary Clinton will win the popular vote by more than 1 million votes as she runs up big leads in...

The dollar fell back against other major currencies on Thursday, hit by speculation U.S. Federal Reserve chief Janet Yellen will express concern over the pace of its surge to a 13 1/2-year high in the past week and an accompanying rise in bond yields. The dollar has ground its way higher...

(Zaman al-Wasl)- The General Body in Eastern Ghouta released a second statement regarding, “National Rescue Initiative” and the parties and factions which responded or did not respond to the initiative. According to the statement, the committee assigned to the initiative received a written...

South Korea's parliament on Thursday approved a bill to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate a corruption scandal engulfing President Park Geun-hye, sharply raising political pressure on her to step down. The motion proposed by the main opposition Democratic Party passed by a vote of...

Heavy fighting between government troops and opposition forces in various parts of Yemen has left 51 dead, according to military officials. They said on Wednesday that forces loyal to President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi been engaged in combat with the Iran-allied Houthis and their allies in the...

Islamic State militants probably killed more than 300 Iraqi former police three weeks ago and buried them in a mass grave near the town of Hammam al-Alil south of Mosul, Human Rights Watch said on Thursday. A Reuters reporter visited the site of the mass grave, where residents said the...

Hundreds of survivors stranded by a huge earthquake that struck central New Zealand three days ago reached Christchurch by a naval ship early on Thursday, as engineers in the capital Wellington assessed the state of dozens of damaged buildings. Around 450 tourists and residents from the...

(The Guardian)- UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon has warned of a “very real risk of mass atrocities” in South Sudan and that peacekeepers deployed in the war-torn country will not be able to stop such a bloodbath. Ban told the security council in a report released on Wednesday that the...

Iraqi paramilitary forces announced Wednesday that they had entered the Tal Afar airport west of Mosul and were fighting to clear pockets of Islamic State group jihadists inside it. The airport is located some six kilometres (four miles) south of the town of Tal Afar, the ultimate target of...

(The Guardian)- Outgoing US president Barack Obama and German chancellor Angela Merkel have made an appeal for continued cooperation between the US and the European Union on climate change, anti-terror measures as well as a transatlantic trade deal during Donald Trump’s presidency. In a...

Out of five charges leveled against Egypt’s first freely elected president by Egypt’s post-coup government, one ruling has been overturned, one upheld, two are currently under appeal, and one is awaiting a verdict.  On Tuesday, Egypt’s highest appellate court overturned a death sentence...