President-elect Joe Biden will focus on shaping his core White House team on Tuesday while outgoing President Donald Trump presses on with his increasingly tenuous legal fight to reverse his loss in the U.S. election. Biden's senior campaign staff have been discussing their roles in the...

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo paid a fraught visit to Istanbul on Tuesday that included no official meetings and an agenda focused on religious freedoms that Ankara dismissed as "irrelevant". Ties between Washington and its strategic NATO ally have remained tense despite a personal...

Any U.S. attack on Iran would face a "crushing" response, an Iranian government spokesman said on Tuesday, following reports U.S. President Donald Trump asked for options for a strike on Iran's main nuclear site last week but decided against doing so. "Any action against the Iranian nation...

Russia confirmed on Tuesday a record number of coronavirus deaths and recoveries, which were registered over the last 24 hours. The virus claimed another 442 lives, the highest in Russia since the pandemic began, according to the latest government figures. As many as 439 people had died of...

Attempts by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to increase its role in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem have caused outcry among the Palestinian authorities and researchers. “We think that the UAE is playing a serious role in Jerusalem and the West Bank,” Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri...

At least three terrorists in Syria’s northwestern Al-Bab and Jarablus regions were arrested on Tuesday for their suspected links to the YPG/PKK and Daesh/ISIS terror groups, Turkey’s Gaziantep Governorate said. 
In the [Operation] Euphrates Shield region, local law enforcement officers in...

The United Nations on Tuesday sent 14 truckloads of humanitarian aid to Idlib, a northern province of Syria, where millions of people are living in desperate conditions due to internal conflict. The trucks carrying humanitarian aid passed through the Cilvegozu border gate in Hatay,...

While Sahin was born in Turkey's southern province of Iskenderun in 1965 and moved to Germany as a 4-year-old, Tureci is the daughter of a Turkish physician who emigrated to Germany from Istanbul. Their success story is being hailed far and wide. Kemal Kirisci, a senior fellow at...

The United States' top infectious disease scientist on Monday hailed early trial results from Moderna's Covid-19 vaccine as "stunningly impressive," and said the findings were an emphatic validation of experimental mRNA technology that some had doubted. In an interview with AFP, Anthony...

A senior Chinese official on Tuesday backed calls to "reform" Hong Kong's judiciary, in a landmark speech signalling Beijing's determination to assert more control over the city's independent legal system. Semi-autonomous Hong Kong owes much of its success to a transparent and...

An Islamist group on Tuesday called off violent protests over cartoons of Prophet Mohammad saying the Pakistani government has endorsed boycotting French products, a spokesman for the group said. Thousands of Islamists clashed with police on the main road into Pakistan's capital Islamabad...

The Donald Trump era may be coming to an end. But European Union ministers meeting this week to discuss the future of the continent’s defence will say the lesson has been learned: Europe needs to be strong enough to fight on its own. EU foreign and defence ministers meeting by...

President Donald Trump, with two months left in office, last week asked for options on attacking Iran’s main nuclear site, but ultimately decided against taking the dramatic step, a U.S. official said on Monday. Trump made the request during an Oval Office meeting on Thursday with his top...

Saudi Aramco began marketing a five-tranche U.S. dollar-denominated bond sale on Tuesday, as the world's largest oil producer seeks cash after low oil prices dented its finances. The move is part of an onslaught on international debt markets by Gulf issuers seeking to plug finances hit by...

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — President-elect Joe Biden on Monday outlined his plans to alleviate economic inequality and boost the U.S. economy but said any structural reforms depend first on reining in the coronavirus pandemic. “Once we shut down the virus and deliver economic relief to...

Ethiopia resisted international pressure for mediation in a war in the country’s north on Monday as its air force bombed the Tigrayan capital Mekelle, according to diplomatic and military sources. Hundreds have died, 25,000 refugees have fled to Sudan and there have been reports of...

More than 500 Syrians, some related to alleged Islamic State group members, quit the overcrowded Kurdish-run camp of Al-Hol in the northeast of the war-torn country Monday, Kurdish officials said. An AFP reporter saw dozens of women lugging their belongings onto trucks, and others feeding...

President Donald Trump’s new Pentagon leadership team has not yet signalled an imminent, total withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, raising expectations among allies that Trump might settle for only a partial reduction this year, sources said. Trump fired his defense secretary, Mark...

Novak Djokovic produced a masterclass against Argentina's Diego Schwartzman Monday as he embarked on his campaign for a record-equalling sixth title at the ATP Finals in London. The world number one wobbled at the start of the match against the diminutive eighth seed, making his debut at...

The pro-independence Polisario Front said Monday that conflict in the Western Sahara would only halt once Morocco ends its "occupation" of the disputed territory. "The end of the war is now linked to the end of the illegal occupation of parts of the territory of the Sahrawi Republic," said...