All eyes are on Egypt this week as the democratic birth-pangs that began with last year’s Tahrir Revolution undergo their final convulsion. Two days of voting May 23 and 24 mark the main event – the heavily anticipated presidential election, [...]

Millions of Egyptians are casting ballots this week in the first truly contested presidential election in almost six decades. About 50 million people are eligible to vote in the two-day process that began Wednesday, a process that marks the [...]

CAIRO – Millions of Egyptians stood in long lines Wednesday to cast ballots in the first presidential election since President Hosni Mubarak resigned last year amid massive protests. The buildup to the contentious election has largely pitted [...]

Iran and world powers exchanged proposals Wednesday at a Baghdad meeting aimed at resolving international concerns about potential military dimensions to the Iranian nuclear program. The state-run IRNA news agency says Iranian negotiators presented [...]

Activists say Syrian government forces have pounded targets in the opposition stronghold of Rastan, and at least six people have been killed elsewhere, during violence related to the country’s anti-government unrest. The Syrian Observatory [...]

International donors have pledged $4 billion in aid to Yemen to help the impoverished state boost the fight against Islamist militants and develop the Yemeni economy. British Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt says a group of mostly Arab [...]

Northern Jordan – As violence has intensified in Syria, the smuggling business has boomed. A recent trip to northern Jordan near the Syrian border showed how the dangerous practice of dissidents smuggling food and medicine to injured and [...]

DAMASCUS  – Regime forces launched a fierce assault on the rebel bastion of Rastan in central Syria on Wednesday, raining shells on the town before launching a ground attack, monitors and activists said. The rebel Free Syrian Army, meanwhile, [...]

The State Department – International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Yukiya Amano says he and Iranian nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili have made a “decision to reach an agreement” on access to Iranian nuclear sites “quite [...]

Yemeni soldiers somberly marched in a National Day parade on Tuesday, one day after a suicide bomber killed at least 96 troops and wounded more than 200 during a rehearsal for the parade. Al-Qaida’s wing in Yemen said Monday’s bomb [...]