Fresh protests are expected at U.S. airports Sunday, following President Donald Trump's order to suspend refugee arrivals and impose tough controls on travelers from seven mostly Muslim countries.

When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 there were 16 major walls protecting borders around the world. In 2016 that number had grown to 66, according to researcher Elisabeth Vallet of the University of Quebec.

Six years after Hosni Mubarak was forced from power, the activists behind Egypt's 2011 uprising are facing a new crackdown and struggling to see much reason for hope.

Rights groups accuse President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi of cracking down on freedoms won during the revolt, with many activists now facing prison, asset freezes and travel bans.

Since the start of Syria's war in 2011, several diplomatic initiatives have stumbled over the future of President Bashar al-Assad. Here is a recap:

- End of Arab solutions - In January 2012, two months after an initial bid to end the violence, leading Arab diplomats adopt a fresh plan that would transfer power from Assad to a coalition cabinet. The Damascus government rejects the proposal and vows to crush rebel movements.

Donald Trump's all-but-dismissal of human rights as a foreign policy principle could land like an earthquake across a Middle East landscape beset by warring factions and beleaguered governments, with some players eyeing the prospect of once unimaginable new alliances.

Syria is the foremost test of Trump's promise of a return to a hard-headed realpolitik and could quickly show whether America is truly abandoning promotion of democracy and the rule of law in a way that could reshape much of the region's post-Cold War, post-9/11 order.

The Islamic State group lost nearly a quarter of its territory in Iraq and Syria last year, according to a report released Thursday by research firm IHS Markit.

Iraqi government forces launched a major offensive to recapture the city of Mosul from the Islamic State jihadist group on October 17, 2016.

Regime and rebel figures will head to Kazakhstan on Monday for negotiations on ending Syria's brutal war, but are arriving with diametrically opposed approaches to the aims of the talks.

If Barack Obama was elected on a wave of optimism, eight years later, hopes of a post-racial America have soured amid recognition that it takes more than a black president to overcome centuries of racism.

A recent poll confirmed findings of a number of studies published in the final months of the Obama administration: 52 percent of Americans questioned by Gallup said the country had taken a step backwards on issues of race. Just 25 percent thought things had improved since 2009.

An international conference being held in Paris on Sunday is the latest of many bids to forge peace between Israel and the Palestinians.