US Secretary of State John Kerry has welcomed a decision by Syria’s main political opposition group to attend next week’s peace talks in Switzerland.

At least 20 soldiers have been killed in north-western Pakistan in a bomb blast that struck an army convoy, sources in the security forces say.

At least 21 people – 13 foreigners and eight Afghans – were killed in an apparent Taliban suicide bomb and gun attack on a restaurant in a heavily fortified area of Kabul.

Human rights activists have accused the Burmese police forces of killing at least 16 Rohingya Muslims and kidnapping 100 more in a village located in an isolated corner of Burma to cover-up a recent discovery of a mass grave.

At least 700 were killed and hundreds others disappeared after fierce fighting between al-Qaeda-linked jihadists and more moderate rival rebel groups in Syria in the past nine days, an NGO said Sunday.

Iran’s interim nuclear deal with six world powers will come into effect on January 20, the Iranian Foreign Ministry and the European Union have confirmed.

Russian police has launched an investigation into a YouTube video showing Russian men burning the Qur’an and humiliating an injured young man on the subway, UPI news agency reported on Saturday, January 11.

Israelis are beginning a short period of mourning for ex-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon who has died aged 85 of heart failure after eight years in a coma.

Iraq’s military and some tribal leaders have struck a deal to drive out al-Qaeda-linked fighters in Anbar amid continued clashes and shelling in the predominantly Sunni Arab western province.

An Egyptian court on Wednesday adjourned the murder trial of deposed president Mohamed Morsi to February 1, citing “weather conditions” that prevented the Islamist’s transport to court from prison.