Four children were among seven civilians killed in Syrian army bombardments of the country's last major rebel bastion on Wednesday, a war monitor reported.

Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum said Tuesday he had received an experimental coronavirus vaccine, becoming the latest United Arab Emirates official to take part in the trials.

Qatar's ruler said Tuesday that a long delayed vote for the country's policy reviewing chamber will be held in October 2021, marking the Gulf emirate's first national election.

Under the autumn Iraqi sun, Abbas Abbud expertly scrambles up the ragged trunk of the palm tree. His mission? Picking the juicy dates overhead, and keeping this ancient profession alive.

Algerians approved a revised version of the North African country's constitution with two thirds of votes cast, the electoral commission said Monday, after record low turnout in the previous day's referendum.

The U.N.'s Libya mission has said that a joint military commission with representatives from the two parties to the country's conflict will meet this week on Libyan soil.

The November 2-4 talks will be the first time the teams have met on Libyan territory, UNSMIL said.

Polls opened in Algeria Sunday for a vote on a revised constitution the regime hopes will neutralize a protest movement which at its peak last year swept long-time president Abdelaziz Bouteflika from power.

A Saudi man rammed a car at high speed into the outer walls of Mecca's Grand Mosque, Islam's holiest site, authorities said on Saturday.

An explosion targeting a gas pipeline in southern Iraq killed two children Saturday after a blast in the north this week forced the closure of another pipeline, authorities said.

Iraqi authorities reopened Baghdad's Tahrir Square and Al-Jumhuriyah bridge on Saturday, symbolically ending more than a year of demonstrations in epicentres of an anti-government protest movement.

Protester tents have been dismantled at the Tahrir roundabout, now again circled by cars, and the towering concrete walls used to close off the Al-Jumhuriyah bridge across the Tigris River have been removed.