U.S. President Donald Trump said Tuesday he had spoken with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and been assured that a "full" probe into the disappearance of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi was underway.

A Frenchman held captive in war-torn Yemen for over four months after his boat ran into trouble near the port of Hodeida has been released, the French presidency announced Tuesday.

An influential U.S. Senate ally of President Donald Trump pledged Tuesday that Congress would take decisive action against Saudi Arabia over a missing writer, calling for the ouster of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Around 200 deputies kept Algeria's parliament locked up for several hours Tuesday in a protest action to press demands for the house speaker to step down.

"We're here to demand the speaker resigns," Abdelhamid Si Affif, the head of parliament's foreign affairs committee, told AFP after the protesters blocked the entrance with a chain and padlock.

The Egyptian army said Tuesday that 450 jihadists are estimated to have been killed in its eight-month offensive against the Islamic State group in the Sinai Peninsula.

The military launched a large-scale operation dubbed "Sinai 2018" in February to rid Sinai of IS jihadists after an attack on a mosque in the north of the peninsula that killed more than 300 people.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman told U.S. top diplomat Mike Pompeo that they are "strong and old allies," during talks Tuesday on missing journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Both men were seen smiling and exchanging pleasantries ahead of a closed-door meeting to discuss the case of Khashoggi, a Saudi citizen and U.S. resident, who was last seen entering the kingdom's consulate in Istanbul on October 2.

Saudi Arabia's consul to Istanbul on Tuesday left the Turkish city bound for Riyadh on a scheduled flight, reports said, as Turkey prepared to search his residence in the probe into the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashogghi.

c took off for Riyadh on a 1400 GMT flight from Istanbul, the Haber-Turk newspaper reported on its website.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will hold talks in Turkey on Wednesday, the Turkish foreign ministry said, after a visit to Riyadh where the top American diplomat was discussing the case of missing journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

A high-level Turkish official said Tuesday that police have found "certain evidence" during their search of the Saudi Consulate showing that Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi was killed there.

The Kremlin said on Tuesday a deal to create a buffer zone in Syria's Idlib was going ahead, despite jihadists missing a deadline to leave the area the day before.