Ashraf al-Atraqji carefully stepped around tufts of weeds sprouting in a mountain of rubble in Iraq's Mosul, found a seat on a sun-soaked rock, and struck a pose for the photographer.

Behind him stretched the ruins of the Prophet Yunus mosque, an ancient monument infamously destroyed by the Islamic State group when it overran Mosul in 2014. 

Abu Dhabi's main stadium was a sea of yellow-and-white Vatican flags on Tuesday as Pope Francis arrived in warm sunlight to lead an open-air mass for tens of thousands of Catholics.

Umra Abbas Ammour, 60, dreamt of safety as she and her family fled jihadists in eastern Syria, but hours after reaching US-backed forces her son, daughter and granddaughter were all dead.

Yemen's Saudi-backed government began a new round of UN-brokered talks with Shiite Huthi rebels in Jordan on Tuesday on a troubled prisoner swap deal that mediators say hangs in the balance.

Pope Francis held a historic public mass for an estimated 170,000 Catholics at a stadium in the capital of the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday, capping the first ever papal visit to the Gulf where Islam was born.

The United States urged other countries Monday to bring home hundreds of Islamic State sympathizers captured in Syria, a delicate issue for allies such as France as Washington withdraws troops. 

After allies grappled for weeks on what to do with the extremists left in Syria, the United States came down clearly on the side of repatriation.

The EU warned Tehran over its ballistic missile program and interference in the Syria conflict Monday, while welcoming a new mechanism to trade with Iran while bypassing U.S. sanctions.

Among thousands fleeing the crumbling dream of an Islamic State group "caliphate" in eastern Syria are alleged jihadists but also survivors of some of their worst atrocities.

French warplanes on Sunday carried out air strikes to halt an armed group that entered northern Chad from Libya in a column of 40 pickups, the French military said, adding it acted at Chad's request.

Pope Francis on Monday called for an end to wars in the Middle East during the first visit by the head of the Catholic church to the birthplace of Islam -- the Arabian Peninsula.