The global police agency Interpol on Saturday said it suspected al-Qaida was involved in recent jailbreaks across nine countries, including Iraq, Libya and Pakistan.

Interpol said in a statement that the jailbreaks "led to the escape of hundreds of terrorists and other criminals" in the past month alone and issued a security alert.

Libyan security forces on Saturday arrested two men for firing at a military patrol in Benghazi, a commander in Libya's special forces told Agence France Presse.

"Two individuals on board a vehicle opened fire on Saturday on a special forces unit stationed in Benghazi city center," Colonel Wanis Boukhamada said.

Moderate cleric Hassan Rowhani assumed Iran's presidency on Saturday promising to work to lift punishing international sanctions imposed on the Islamic republic over its controversial nuclear program.

Rowhani, 64, officially became the Islamic republic's seventh president after receiving a formal endorsement from supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at a Tehran ceremony.

Tunisia's army pressed ahead Saturday with operations against Islamists in a remote mountain range after a deadly ambush on its troops heightened a crisis sparked by a political assassination.

The authorities kept a tight lid on the overland and helicopter raids launched Friday in the Mount Chaambi area near the border with Algeria where Islamist militants including veterans of a revolt in northern Mali are suspected to be hiding out.

A man was killed Saturday in a Turkish town by a stray bullet fired from across the border in war-torn Syria, the private NTV television network reported.

NTV, which cited no sources, said Ramazan Zeybel, a Turk, died in hospital in Ceylanpinar, which lies across the border from the Syrian town of Ras al-Ain that has seen fighting in recent weeks.

Gunmen shot dead a woman and her two daughters in Iraq Saturday and a roadside bomb killed a man and his son as 10 died in other attacks, officials said.

Iraq is witnessing its deadliest violence since 2008, when it was emerging from a prolonged and bloody sectarian conflict between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

Egypt's interior ministry Saturday repeated its call for supporters of ousted Islamist president Mohammed Morsi to end their sit-ins, saying that would allow the Muslim Brotherhood to return to politics.

The ministry, in a televised statement, called on protesters in Cairo's Rabaa al-Adawiya and Nahda squares to return to their homes and work.

Rebels battling Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime captured an arms and ammunition dump in the Qalamun area near Damascus early on Saturday, a watchdog said.

In the north, fighting between Kurds and jihadists raged as the main opposition National Coalition called on armed groups there to "exercise restraint."

Syria's main opposition group called Saturday for the immediate release of an Italian Jesuit priest who went to negotiate with jihadists and who is feared to have been taken prisoner.

The National Coalition said it "expresses its deep concern over the disappearance of Father Paolo (Dall'Oglio) over four days ago in Raqa and calls for the disclosure of any information that could help identify his location and ensure his safety."

The next round of direct Israeli-Palestinian peace talks will take place in the region during the second week of August, Israel's negotiator Tzipi Livni, who is also justice minister, said Saturday.

"These discussions that began in Washington will resume during the second week of August and will take place in the region," Livni told the private Channel 10 television station.