AMMAN, Jordan (AP) — Jordan released 16 people detained earlier this month over an alleged foreign-backed conspiracy linked to a former crown prince after King Abdullah II requested they be let go in honor of the holy month of Ramadan. The 16, including tribal leaders and former senior...

It may be hard to believe that there are still many “firsts” left to check off after 93 years of the Academy Awards, and yet this year there were a handful for Asian actors and filmmakers. Steven Yeun ("Minari") became the first Asian American actor to be nominated for best actor. Riz...

The US is investigating what appears to be directed-energy attacks on US troops, and the Pentagon suspects Russia is behind them, Politico reported. Four national-security officials involved in the investigation told Politico that the Department of Defense has been investigating the...

United Nations human rights experts urged Switzerland on Thursday to repatriate two Geneva sisters from a squalid camp in north-eastern Syria five years after the girls were allegedly abducted by their mother who joined Islamic State (IS). A senior Swiss foreign ministry official said...

The Syrian government received a batch of 203,000 COVID-19 vaccines on Thursday, the health minister said, in a move aimed at speeding up a sluggish inoculation process in the war-torn country. The arrival of the United Nations-secured jabs came as a new wave of infections has...

Jordan released 16 people detained earlier this month over an alleged foreign-backed conspiracy linked to a former crown prince after King Abdullah II requested they be let go in honour of the holy month of Ramadan. The 16, including tribal leaders and former senior officials, were...

PRAGUE (AP) — The Czech Republic on Thursday ordered 63 more Russian diplomats to leave the country, further escalating a dispute between the two nations over the alleged involvement of Russian spies in a massive ammunition depot explosion in 2014. Foreign Minister Jakub Kulhanek said...

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia's defense minister on Thursday ordered troops back to their permanent bases following massive drills amid tensions with Ukraine, but said that they should leave their weapons behind in western Russia for another exercise later this year. Ukrainian President...

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesia’s navy ships on Thursday were intensely searching for a submarine that likely fell too deep to retrieve, making survival chances for the 53 people on board slim. Authorities said oxygen in the submarine would run out by early Saturday. The...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Precious relics of Afghanistan’s ancient past are returning home as the nation confronts deepening uncertainty about its future. A collection of 33 artifacts seized from a New York-based art dealer who authorities say was one of the world's most prolific smugglers of...

NEW DELHI (AP) — India reported a global record of more than 314,000 new infections Thursday as a grim coronavirus surge in the world's second-most populous country sends more and more sick people into a fragile health care system critically short of hospital beds and oxygen. The...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is preparing to formally acknowledge that the systematic killing and deportation of hundreds of thousands of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire in modern-day Turkey more than a century ago was genocide, according to U.S. officials. The anticipated move...

Israeli military and police forces were on the search for pieces of a Syrian anti-aircraft missile that landed in southern Israel early Thursday. The missile set off air raid sirens near the country's top-secret nuclear reactor in Dimona, the Israeli military said. In response,...

A missile launched from Syria was fired into southern Israel early Thursday, setting off air raid sirens near the country's top-secret nuclear reactor, the Israeli military said. In response, it said it attacked the missile launcher and air-defense systems in neighboring Syria. The...

Syria's last rebel-held enclave received its first batch of COVID-19 vaccines on Wednesday, with a refrigerated truck offloading over 50,000 of United Nations-secured jabs in the overcrowded province. The AstraZeneca vaccines were delivered to Idlib province through a border crossing...

MADRID (AP) — The Super League is far from dead and its clubs have not given up on the idea of the breakaway competition despite having to shelve the project just a few days after it was announced, Real Madrid president Florentino Pérez said on Thursday. Pérez, who would have been the...

Kurdish security forces said Wednesday that Syrian government-allied fighters killed one of their personnel in an overnight attack on a checkpoint, in a city the two groups share control of in northern Syria. The fighting began when a group known as the National Defense Forces attacked...

MOSCOW (AP) — President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday sternly warned the West against encroaching further on Russia's security interests, saying Moscow's response will be “quick and tough” and make the culprits feel bitterly sorry for their action. The warning during Putin's annual...

Syria's Bashar Assad formally announced Wednesday he will run for reelection in war-torn Syria, and was expected to win a fourth seven-year term in the largely symbolic May 26 vote. The elections would be the second held during the course of the country's 10-year conflict and the...

 In an unprecedented vote Wednesday, member states of the global chemical weapons watchdog suspended Syria's voting rights at the organization as a punishment for the repeated use of toxic gas by Damascus. The vote, which required a two-thirds majority to pass, marked the first...