The first major truce in Syria’s five-year civil war has come into effect.

A staggering 24 million Pakistani children are out of school, a new government report showed, laying bare the state of education in a country where around a quarter of the population is believed to be under 16.

Twenty-two years have passed since Israeli-American Baruch Goldstein opened fire inside al-Khalil Ibrahimi Mosque, killing 29 and injuring 125.

The Syrian government and the main opposition umbrella group say they accept the terms of a deal to cease hostilities from Saturday.

The US and Russia have agreed on a “cessation of hostilities” between the Syrian government and groups fighting it in a deal that excludes the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group and the al-Nusra Front.

A suicide bomber targeting a police commander has killed at least 13 people, including nine civilians, in Afghanistan’s northern Parwan province, an official said.

A string of suicide bombings near a Shia shrine outside Syria’s capital and in Homs claimed by the militant Islamic State (IS) group killed more than 150 people Sunday, as Washington and Moscow worked to secure a ceasefire.

More than 700 Palestinians are currently being held byIsrael without being charged or put on trial, the Palestinian Prisoners Club said today.

A car bomb detonated in the Turkish capital Wednesday near vehicles carrying military personnel, killing at least 28 people and wounding at least 61 others, officials said.

The Syrian government has approved access to seven besieged areas and UN convoys are expected to travel to them within days, the United Nations said after crisis talks in Damascus.