A fire erupted in a landmark building in central Beirut’s commercial district on Tuesday before being put out, a civil defence official and Reuters witness said. The fire erupted in a futuristic seafront building that was close to completion after years of construction. Lebanese broadcaster...

The Americas continue to register some of the worst coronavirus numbers in the world, failing to flatten the curve.   Worldwide, there are nearly 30 million confirmed cases, half of which have been recorded in the region.  Latin America and the Caribbean have surpassed 8...

A Katyusha rocket landed early Tuesday inside Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone, where the US embassy and many other diplomatic missions and government offices are located.  According to security sources, the rocket fell near the American embassy and sirens were heard from the...

President Donald Trump threatened late Monday to deliver a devastating response to any attack by Iran against the US.   "Any attack by Iran, in any form, against the United States will be met with an attack on Iran that will be 1,000 times greater in magnitude!" Trump said on...

Turkish and Russian officials will meet in Ankara this week for a new round of talks on developments in Syria and Libya, where the two countries back opposing sides, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday. “Consultations between Turkish and Russian interagency delegations on Libya and...

At least nine people were killed and 43 injured in a terror blast in northwestern Syria on Monday, according to the governor's office of Turkey’s southern Hatay province. An explosives-laden small truck went off in the opposition-held city of Afrin, Anadolu Agency earlier learned from...

 Iran supports the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) as long as the group protects Iranian interests alongside other members, Iran’s OPEC governor Amir Hossein Zamaninia said on Monday. Sixty years after its formation, OPEC’s founding members, Iran and Venezuela,...

The morning bell Monday marked the first entrance to the classroom for the children of Codogno since Feb. 21, when panicked parents were sent to pick up their children after the northern Italian town gained notoriety as the first in the West to record local transmission of the coronavirus....

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson says his plan to unilaterally rewrite Britain’s divorce deal with the European Union is an insurance policy against the bloc's unreasonable behavior, comments that came as his former attorney general joined a growing number of once-loyal lawmakers condemning...

The United Arab Emirates has issued emergency approval for the use of a COVID-19 vaccine, currently in its third phase of testing in the gulf country, health authorities said on Monday. “The vaccine will be available to our first line of defense heroes who are at the highest risk of...

Working conditions are so bad for some medics in Morocco handling a surging coronavirus outbreak that they have staged protests against inadequate staffing and poorly equipped facilities. The kingdom recorded a record 2,430 cases on Friday and has confirmed more than 1,000 new cases every...

The defense ministers of Bahrain and Israel held their first publicly acknowledged phone call Monday since their countries agreed to normalize ties. Bahraini state news agency BNA and a spokeswoman for Israel's defense ministry said Bahrain's minister of defense affairs, Abdulla bin Hassan...

The Trump administration is hoping to capitalize on agreements to be signed this week between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain by pressing for an end to a dispute that has roiled relations between the Gulf Arab countries. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Monday that the US is...

The United States Monday urged the UN's top court to throw out a bid by Iran bid to lift sanctions imposed by President Donald Trump, saying Tehran remained a "grave threat" to global security. Iran brought the claim to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in 2018, alleging that Trump's...

Neymar's punishment for being one of five players sent off following a brawl at the end of Paris Saint-Germain's defeat to Marseille will be revealed on Wednesday, the French Football League (LFP) said Monday. The world's most expensive footballer was shown the red card in stoppage time of...

The French economy will contract by 8.7 percent this year owing to the Covid-19 pandemic, the central bank estimated Monday, less than originally forecast due to consumer spending. The Bank of France had previously expected a 10.3-percent slump as companies reel from the impact of...

For the first time in more than a quarter-century, a U.S. president will host a signing ceremony between Israelis and Arabs at the White House, billing it as an "historic breakthrough" in a region long known for its stubborn conflicts. But while the optics of Tuesday's event will evoke the...

Germany is considering taking in thousands of refugees from the destroyed Moria camp on the Greek island of Lesbos as a one-off gesture and hopes the camp can be rebuilt and run by the European Union, Bild newspaper reported Monday. Berlin has been facing growing calls from regional and...

An aid worker from Turkey's Red Crescent was killed and another was wounded after masked assailants attacked the group's vehicle near the northern Syrian town of al-Bab, the aid agency said in a statement Monday. It said the attack took place between al-Bab and the Turkish border town of...

 Suspected Israeli air strikes in eastern Syria Monday killed 10 pro-Iran fighters, most of them Iraqis, a war monitor said. The raids against militant positions south of the town of Albu Kamal in Deir Ezzor province took the lives of eight Iraqi and two Syrian combatants, the Syrian...