A Lebanese woman and supporter of Hezbollah holds a picture of Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Mashghara, in the western Bekaa Valley, during a ceremony marking the 13th anniversary of Israel’s military withdrawal from Lebanon.  ISTANBUL: Syria’s opposition resumed talks yesterday aimed at closing their fractious ranks, as government forces launched

CAIRO: Egypt’s highest court ruled yesterday that parts of a revised election law setting out terms for a parliamentary election were unconstitutional, casting fresh doubt over a poll that has already been delayed. The Islamist-dominated upper house of parliament had approved the law last month and sent it to the Supreme Constitutional Court to check the legality of the voting procedu

    BEIRUT: The leader of Lebanese guerrilla movement Hezbollah said yesterday his group would stay in the Syrian war “to the end of the road” and bring victory to its ally President Bashar Al Assad. Hassan Nasrallah, head of the militant Shia group, said in a televised speech that Syria and Lebanon were facing a threat from radical Sunni Islamists, which he ar

    AMMAN: More than 15,000 soldiers from 18 different countries will take part in a joint military exercise in Jordan in the coming weeks, a military official said yesterday. Jordan’s armed forces will host the exercise, “Eager Lion 2013”, with troops from “friendly countries”, including the United States, taking part, the official Petra news age

DUBAI: Human Rights Watch yesterday urged the United Arab Emirates not to deport migrant building workers for staging a rare strike to demand better pay and conditions. “It would be scandalous if the UAE deported workers who have taken a courageous stand for their basic rights,” HRW Middle East Director Sarah Leah Whitson said in a statement.  The New York-based group c

Iraqi worshippers during a joint Sunni-Shia Friday prayer at the Martyrs Monument in Baghdad yesterday. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki has called to establish unified Friday prayers in Baghdad, after attacks on Sunni and Shia mosques in recent weeks.

Palestinian protesters throw stones towards an Israeli bulldozer during clashes following a protest against the expropriation of Palestinian land by Israel in the village of Kafr Qaddum, near the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, yesterday. TEL AVIV: Israeli and Palestinian leaders must decide soon on whether to revive long-dormant peace negotiations to end their decades-old conflict, U

  BEIRUT: Lebanon’s President Michel Sleiman cautioned the Shia group Hezbollah yesterday over its militia fighting alongside regime troops in neighbouring Syria. “The resistance is more noble and more important than anything, and should not get bogged down in the sands of dissension, whether in Syria or Lebanon,” he said in a statement, referring to Hezbollah&rsq

Demonstrators wave Syrian opposition flags during a protest against Syria’s President Bashar Al Assad at the courtyard of Fatih mosque in Istanbul yesterday. MOSCOW: Syria’s most powerful ally Russia said yesterday that the Damascus regime had agreed “in principle” to attend an international peace conference on the crisis that world powers hope will take place in

An electron microscope image of a coronavirus, part of a family of viruses that cause ailments including the common cold and SARS, which was first identified last year in the Middle East. Jeddah/GENEVA: The World Health Organisation (WHO) said yesterday that it would help Saudi Arabia dig deeper into deadly outbreaks of a new SARS-like virus to draw up advice ahead of the annual Haj pilg

US Secretary of State John Kerry with Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah yesterday. JERUSALEM: US Secretary of State John Kerry held separate talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials yesterday and acknowledged there was considerable scepticism that the two sides would resume peace negotiations. There were no signs of any breakthrough as Kerry visited Israel for the f

Former leader of the Syrian National Coalition Moaz Alkhatib during a meeting in Istanbul yesterday. ISTANBUL: Syria’s main opposition group met for key talks in Istanbul yesterday to debate whether to join a new US-Russian peace initiative to end the two-year civil war, while the regime vowed to crush the insurgency. Holding its seventh general assembly meeting since its creat

  Cairo: The emergency meeting of the Arab Committee on the Syrian Crisis began yesterday at the Headquarters of Arab League General Secretariat under the chairmanship of the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister H E Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor Al Thani. The meeting will discuss developments in Syria in the light of the proposed call for holding an international conference (Gen

DUBAI: Former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has accused Iran’s leadership of incompetence and ignorance just days after he was barred from standing in an election next month, the opposition Kaleme website reported yesterday. Rafsanjani’s comments appeared to add to the political conflict between those loyal to the leadership and opposition groups who have been marginalised

DUBAI: An international media watchdog has criticised a UAE court decision to uphold a 10-month jail sentence for a user of microblogging website Twitter who posted about the trial of 94 Islamists. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) also called for the immediate release of another man it said was arrested in the UAE this month on similar charges. RSF “expresses outrage at the Abu Dha

BAGHDAD: Seven Iraqi soldiers were killed in clashes with gunmen yesterday, police and hospital sources said, as fears mount that Iraq might slide back into bloody sectarian strife. Ten years after the US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, Sunni, Shia and ethnic Kurdish factions have yet to find a stable power-sharing deal and security is deteriorating. More than 300 people have

  TUNIS: Prime Minister Ali Larayedh yesterday said that Tunisia is making progress in its bid to dismantle “terrorist” cells despite the presence in the country of armed groups and recent clashes with Islamists. “There is progress in dismantling the terrorist networks. We are confronted by small groups who practise terrorism and have links to terrorist parties,&r

Former leader of the Syrian National Coalition (SNC) Moaz Alkhatib speaks during a meeting in Istanbul yesterday. BEIRUT: Syria’s outgoing opposition chief published an initiative yesterday that would grant President Bashar Al Assad a safe exit, and urged dissident factions to adopt his plan. Ahmed Moaz Al Khatib published his initiative on Facebook, as the main National Coalit

Crown Prince of Dubai Sheikh Hamadan Bin Rashid al-Maktoum pats Cavalryman at the Meydan race track on March 30, 2013 (AFP/File, Marwan Naamani) DUBAI: Giving anabolic steroids to horses will become a criminal offence in the UAE, Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who also owns the Godolphin stables where 18 horses have failed tests for the drugs this year, said yes

Saudi Deputy Health Minister Ziad Memish looks on prior to a meeting on the SARS-like virus coronavirus (nCoV) situation yesterday at the World Health Assembly in Geneva. DUBAI: Saudi Arabia has announced another death from the SARS-like novel coronavirus (nCoV) in its central Al Qassim region, bringing the total number of deaths in the kingdom to 17. A non-Saudi, whose nationality a