South Sudan’s government and rebels are set for New Year’s Day peace talks in Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa, to thrash out a ceasefire to end weeks of bloodletting in the world’s newest state.

Giving the peace process another try, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz government on Tuesday tasked JUI-S chief Maulana Samiul Haq with initiating talks with the Taliban.

Twenty-six Palestinian prisoners have been released from Israeli jails, as part of a US-brokered deal to restart Middle East negotiations.

The Taliban and other militant groups will have the upper hand in Afghanistan by 2017 even if the United States maintains a small military presence in the country, says a new US intelligence report.

As the year of withdrawal begins, a majority in America wants the US president to pull out his troops from Afghanistan even before the December 2014 deadline, shows a national survey released on Monday.

The Syrian government has evacuated about 5,000 people from an embattled industrial town near the capital Damascus, where rebels linked to al-Qaeda have been battling government troops for more than two weeks.

Iraqi security forces arrested a Sunni Muslim member of parliament in the western city of Ramadi and clashed with his bodyguards on Saturday, killing at least five people, police sources said.

At least five people have been killed and 265 others arrested as Egyptian riot police deployed water cannon and tear gas against hundreds of rock-throwing supporters of former president Mohamed Morsi, government officials said.

Former Lebanese minister and opposition figure Mohamad Chatah has been killed by a car bomb in central Beirut.

Egypt’s interim government has declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organisation, a move that gives authorities greater freedom to crack down on the group.