The “year of wheat” campaign pushed by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is in jeopardy after low rainfall risked leaving an import gap of at least 1.5 million tonnes, according to preliminary estimates by officials and experts. The agricultural blow and lack of funds to finance the imports...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — When U.S. law enforcement officials need to cast a wide net for information, they’re increasingly turning to the vast digital ponds of personal data created by Big Tech companies via the devices and online services that have hooked billions of people around the world....

Lebanon’s economy ministry on Tuesday raised the price of subsidized bread for the fifth time in a year as the country’s multiple crises worsen with no resolution in sight. The ministry said the reason behind the latest increase — an 18% hike from the last raise in February — was the...

(AP) — Britain's newest aircraft carrier, HMS Queen Elizabeth, is helping to take on the “lion’s share” of operations against the Islamic State group in Iraq, U.K. naval commanders said. It has also piqued the interest of Russian warplanes, who try to keep tabs on its cutting-edge F-35 jet in a...

BEIRUT (AP) — Tiny and bowed by age, Marie Orfali makes the trip five times a week from her Beirut apartment to the local church, a charity and a nearby soup kitchen to fetch a cooked meal for her and her 84-year-old husband, Raymond. Their only support — Raymond’s $15,000 one-time...

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un dismissed prospects for early resumption of diplomacy with the United States, saying Tuesday the U.S. expectations for talks would “plunge them into a greater disappointment.” Kim Yo Jong issued the...

The head of the scientific council for the national pharmaceutical industries expected a new adjustment to the prices of some basic medicines, whose losses are still significant in economic terms, despite price adjustment in the last bulletin.   Rashid al-Faisal told Melody, a...

GOUDOUBO, Burkina Faso (AP) — Hollywood actress Angelina Jolie has visited war-weakened Burkina Faso to show solidarity with people who continue to welcome the displaced, despite grappling with their own insecurity, and said the world isn’t doing enough to help. While Burkina Faso has...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Taliban fighters took control of a key district in Afghanistan's northern Kunduz province Monday and encircled the provincial capital, police said, as the insurgent group added to its string of recent victories on the battlefield. Fighting around Imam Sahib district...

Syrian Prime Minister Hussein Arnous stressed the need to benefit from the rubbish sector and launch projects to treat it in partnership with the private sector and turn it into a source of income.   Local media reported that the director of waste treatments in Damascus suburbs, Maurice...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran's president-elect said Monday he would not meet with President Joe Biden or negotiate over Tehran's ballistic missile program and its support of regional militias, sticking to a hard-line position following his landslide victory in last week's election....

Colonel Hassan Haidar, commander of the military police in eastern Deir Ezzor province died from COVID-19, pro-regime media accounts said Monday.   Haidar, originally from Yabroud town in Damascus suburbs, took the post in 2017 after he showed a massive allegiance to the regime and the...

Syrian regime forces and rebel groups exchanged shelling in northwestern Syria on Monday that killed at least 10 people, the vast majority of them in rebel-held areas, state media and opposition activists said. The area has been witnessing acts of violence in recent weeks between...

June 20 of each year marks World Refugee Day, with the symbolism of this day having a painful and harrowing effect on the Syrian people for nearly ten years now, as millions of Syrians have fled the decade-long internal armed conflict, forcing increasing numbers of citizens to seek asylum....

Israel's growing violence, dehumanization, and aggression towards Palestinians have deflated prospects for peace in the region, but even so, there may still be cause for hope, according to renowned neuroscientist and biologist Robert Sapolsky, who has spent years studying the thorny topics of...

A Russian unmanned reconnaissance aircraft crashed on Sunday evening as a result of a technical malfunction in the Jabal al-Zawiya area, while rebels thwarted an incursion attempt by regime forces into southern edges of Idlib province.   A rebel source in the Al-Fateh Operations Room...

A major military campaign launched Sunday by the Russian-backed 25th Special Tasks Division to track ISIS fighters in the Badia desert.   Sources told Zaman al-Wasl that the 25th Division, led by Brig. Gen Suhail al-Hassan, has mobilised more than 1,500 forces in the...

 A Palestinian rights group has focused on the tragedy of Palestinian refugees in Syria, where tens of thousands are still forcibly displaced, facing successive hardships and calamities.   The Action Group for Palestinians of Syria said on the World Refugee Day that during the...

Anas al-Shaarani, 15, was forced to flee Yemen amid a raging armed conflict between Iran-aligned Houthi rebels and Saudi-backed government forces. “The ongoing war in Yemen forced me to leave the country in 2019 as it was no longer suitable for living,” al-Shaarani told Anadolu Agency...

A rocket attack on Sunday targeted the Ain Al-Asad Air Base which houses US forces in Iraq’s western Anbar province, according to the Iraq Defense Ministry. A ministry statement said an investigation has been launched to uncover those behind the Katyusha rocket attack from the direction...