Middle East

The United Arab Emirates said on Saturday it was shutting major tourism and cultural venues, including the Louvre Abu Dhabi museum and the Ferrari World theme park, from March 15-31, as Gulf states stepped up measures against coronavirus. The UAE civil aviation authority also announced a suspension of all flights …

Europe has now become the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic, which has claimed 5,000 lives across the world, “a tragic milestone”, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general, told a virtual news conference that it was launching a COVID-19 solidarity response plan. This would …

Nearly 20 people have been killed in some of the worst storms to hit Egypt in decades, the country’s prime minister said in a statement on Friday. The North African country has been battered by heavy rain and strong winds that began in the earlier hours of Thursday and continued …

Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca confirmed on Wednesday that the first case of coronavirus was detected in Turkey. “A male citizen tested positive for the coronavirus in the evening,” Health Minister Koca said at a press conference in Ankara. “The infected individual – he added – contracted the virus after …

The decision scales back the American presence in Saudi Arabia just months after the Pentagon began a military buildup there to counter threats from Iran. The US is pulling two Patriot missile batteries and some fighter aircraft out of Saudi Arabia, an American official said Thursday, amid tensions between the …

Dubai’s sheikh was allegedly lining up his 11-year-old daughter to marry Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, who is 22 years her senior, a UK court heard yesterday. Sheikh Mohammed Al Maktoum reportedly discussed the agreement in February 2019 which would have seen his daughter Princess Jalila – aged 11 …

Syria’s war-torn northwestern Idlib province has reportedly witnessed “rare calm” following the implementation of a ceasefire agreement allowing the government to secure two strategic routes running through the province. A military source speaking to Russia’s RIA news agency on Friday said the truce, which was implemented at 00:01 am, is …

Greece will transfer migrants who arrived on its territory illegally after March 1 to the northern city of Serres and plans to deport back to their own countries, Greek Migration Minister Notis Mitarachi said late on Wednesday. Thousands of migrants have made for Greece since Ankara said on Feb. 28 …

Moscow says Ankara has failed to live up to its commitments under a deal to enforce a demilitarized zone in Idlib, complaining that the Turkish military has allowed its observation posts to merge with terrorist fortifications in the northwestern Syrian province. In a statement released on Wednesday, Russian Defense Ministry …

A Turkish court on Monday remanded in custody four Iraqi nationals after they were arrested for their alleged links to Daesh/ISIS terrorist group, judicial sources said. The suspects were arrested by the provincial gendarmerie command and intelligence officials on Feb. 27 in simultaneous operations held in different parts of the …

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, will hold talks this week in Moscow amid mounting tensions in Syria, Turkey’s presidency said March 2. Turkey confirmed on March 2 that it had launched a full military operation against Russian-backed Syrian forces following increasing clashes in the …

Iraq Iraq detected two new coronavirus patients, both of whom had recently visited Iran, the Health Ministry said on Monday, bringing the total cases recorded so far to 21. The two new cases were detected in Baghdad and had recently returned from Iran, the ministry said in a statement. The …

A member of Iran’s Expediency Council died Monday from coronavirus, according to the official IRNA news agency. Mohammad Mirmohammadi, 76, lost his life from the virus at a hospital in the capital Tehran, IRNA said. Mirmohammadi was a former member of parliament for Qom province. In 2018, he was appointed …

Syria President Bashar al-Assad says Syrians are determined to liberate the whole country from the clutches of foreign-sponsored terrorists, amid a full-scale offensive by the army in the northwestern province of Idlib, the last militant bastion in a nine-year war. Assad made the comment during a meeting with Iran’s Parliament …

At least 30 civilians have been killed and many others injured in fresh air raids conducted by Saudi warplanes on Yemen’s northern Jawf Province, Yemeni media report. The al-Masirah TV channel reported Saturday that the Riyadh regime carried out eight aerial assaults on Jawf’s al-Maslub district. The strikes, it added, …

Commander-in-Chief of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps has warned Israel and the US that if they make any mistake, their forces will be targeted. Referring to a Zionist official’s statement that the job of targeting Iranian forces in Syria and Iraq has been divided between the US and Israel, Major …

Thousands of people have staged nationwide demonstrations across Bahrain on the eve of the ninth anniversary of the popular uprising against the ruling Al Khalifah dynasty. Demonstrators took to the streets in the capital Manama as well as the village of Sanabis, which lies in the suburbs of Manama, the …

The Syrian parliament has overwhelmingly recognized the mass killings of more than 1 million Armenians by the Ottoman Empire that took place a century ago, as tensions run high between Damascus and Ankara over the latter’s military campaign in Syria’s embattled northwestern province of Idlib. “The parliament… condemns and recognizes …

Two members of Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces (ISF) have died after sustaining injuries during a shooting at the Ouzai police station in Beirut yesterday. Major Jalal Shreif, the head of the police station, died in hospital, while first adjutant Ziad Al-Attar succumbed to his injuries this morning after the pair …

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has threatened to target Syrian forces “everywhere” and “by any means” if Turkish troops in Syria are harmed. Erdogan issued the threat during a meeting of the ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party at the parliament in Ankara on Wednesday. The Syrian army and allied …