The rally, called by a foundation which counts Bilal Erdogan, the son of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, among its members started after crowds performed morning prayers at Istanbul's iconic mosques, including Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque.

"I am gravely concerned by the escalating violence in Syria today," Geir Pedersen, the UN Special Envoy for Syria, said in a statement issued in Geneva. The conflict in Syria has killed more than half a million people since it began in 2011 with a brutal crackdown on anti-government protests,...

A branch of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) -- listed as a terror group by Turkey and its Western allies -- claimed responsibility for the first bombing to hit Ankara since 2016.

Al-Haddadiya, Syria - At his farm in Syria's northeast, Abdullah al-Mohammed adjusts a large solar panel, one of hundreds that have cropped up over the years as farmers seek to stave off electricity shortages in the war-ravaged region. Solar energy has offered a lifeline for the farmers amid drought and power...

Tehran, Iran - Iran on Monday warned Iraq that it would take action if Baghdad does not honor its commitment by mid-September of disarming Iranian Kurdish rebel groups on its territory. "According to a deal reached between the Iranian and Iraqi governments, the Iraqi government has pledged to disarm armed terrorist...

QAMISHLI, SYRIA- A Turkish drone strike killed three employees of northeast Syria's semi-autonomous Kurdish administration on Tuesday, a spokesman said, amid a recent uptick in attacks targeting Kurdish-held areas. The strike targeted "a vehicle transporting civilian employees, killing two Kurdish women and a Christian" man, said Farhad Shami, spokesman for the...

The decision comes after the Supreme Court in May cleared his repatriation to Turkey, where he is expected to serve out a drug trafficking sentence.

TEHRAN, IRAN- Iran has summoned Iraq's ambassador to protest over the presence of Iranian opposition groups at an official ceremony in Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region, media reported on Sunday. Quoting the foreign ministry, ISNA news agency said that during Saturday's meeting Tehran expressed its "strong objection" to the invitation of members...

The Kurdish regional government had for years earned billions of dollars in revenues exporting crude oil to Turkey without the Iraqi federal government's approval. But the exports were suspended in late March when international arbitrators ruled in favor of the Iraqi federal government's right to control oil exports going through...

Iranian police said they will deal with women who violate the Islamic dress code. The number of women defying the dress code that headscarves must be worn in public has risen since a protest movement triggered by the death in custody of Kurdish-Iranian Mahsa Amini, 22, for allegedly flouting it.

BAGHDAD, IRAQ - Iraqi President Abdel Latif Rashid condemned Turkey on Saturday for bombarding an area near Sulaimaniyah airport in the autonomous Kurdish region, a flashpoint between the two governments. "Turkish military operations against the Kurdistan region continue to take place, the last being the bombardment (Friday) against Sulaimaniyah civilian airport,"...

TEHRAN, IRAN - Iran's judiciary on Sunday confirmed a death sentence for a Swedish-Iranian dissident for "terrorism" over two years since his disappearance at an airport in Turkey, the judiciary's Mizan Online website reported. Habib Chaab has been held in Iran since October 2020 after he vanished during a visit to...

Madrid, Spain - Iran has released a Spanish woman who had been detained in the country since November, Spain's foreign minister said Sunday. "She was freed yesterday, but we didn't want to announce it publicly before her plane had taken off from Iran," Jose Manuel Albares told journalists. "I was able...

More than 100 members of Islamic State group have been arrested by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in an eight-day operation dubbed Operation Al-Jazeera Thunderbolt. The sweep was launched after scuttling an IS attempt to free fellow militants from prison in Raqa, the jihadist group's former Syrian stronghold.

Tehran, Iran - A member of Iran's Revolutionary Guards was shot dead outside his house in Tehran, state media reported Wednesday, adding that he may have been killed during a burglary. Qassam Fathollahi of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was shot "four times in front of his house" in southern...

BEIRUT, LEBANON - Six Syrian fighters from a pro-Turkish group died in clashes with regime troops that still raged Monday in northwest Syria, rebel forces and a war monitor said. A pro-Turkey rebel statement said the six were killed and three more wounded in the offensive launched by government forces backed...

TEHRAN, IRAN -  Iran's supreme court has ordered the retrial of two men, including a Kurdish rapper, who were reportedly sentenced to death over protests sparked by Mahsa Amini's death, the judiciary said Saturday. Protests have gripped Iran since the September 16 death of Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin,...

TEHRAN, IRAN - Iran has arrested the lawyer of two female journalists jailed after covering the death in custody of a young woman that sparked three months of protests, a newspaper said Saturday. The Islamic republic has been rocked by protests since Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin,...

While acknowledging Ankara's security concerns in northeast Syria, the US has warned Turkey not to create impediments in its operations against jihadists in Syria. Turkey says it is taking military action in response to a terrorist attack in Istanbul that it blames on Kurdish groups.

A wave of unrest has rocked Iran since the 22-year-old Kurdish woman died on September 16 after her arrest by the morality police in Tehran for allegedly violating the Islamic republic's strict dress code for women.

Violence has intensified on Syria’s northern border with Turkey leaving 21 civilians dead, many of them children. The bloodshed comes amid growing enmity that pits the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) against Turkish troops and their Syrian proxies.

Tension spiked between Turkey and Syria after the former launched air strikes on Syrian border posts, killing 17 fighters. It is still not clear if the victims were affiliated with the government or Kurdish forces. The Damascus government has threatened to launch a retaliatory attack against Turkey.

Another two Turkish soldiers have been killed during military operations against Kurdish militants in the north of Iraq, Turkey's defense ministry and media said Sunday.

Turkey on Monday said it has launched a new air and ground offensive against outlawed Kurdish militants in northern Iraq involving special forces and combat drones. The defense ministry said the operation was meant to thwart a large-scale attack against Turkey by the PKK.

Save the children data showed that 18,000 Iraqi children and 7,300 minors from 60 other countries are stuck in Syrian camps.

Eight hundred Iraqi refugees returned home from northeast Syria on Thursday and hundreds more are to follow, a Syrian official in the region's Kurdish semi-autonomous administration said. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the first group left on buses via the Al-Yarubiyah border crossing. The Iraqi government has "agreed...

Fighting raged for a third day Saturday between the Islamic State group and Kurdish forces in Syria after IS attacked a prison housing jihadists, in violence that has claimed over 70 lives, a monitor said.

The longest Persian novel or the second-longest novel in the world “Kelidar” has been translated into Arabic and published in Cairo, Egypt, Iranian media reports said. Mohammad-Ali Azarshab, a renowned professor of Arabic literature and language, said that since contemporary Persian novels have been welcomed in Arab countries, Mahmoud Dowlatabadi’s...

The writer was jailed in Turkey in 2014 on charges of illegal construction, which he claims were punishment for his outspoken views on the country's politics.

Afghans have joined Kurds, the Laz, Roma and other ethnic minorities and undocumented migrants in doing work others snub. For less than $10 a day, they roam the streets of Istanbul collecting trash — a profession that is illegal in the country, and has led to its practitioners being arrested...

Turkey launched Operation Euphrates Shield in 2016 in order to drive away from its border region Daesh militants and Syrian Kurdish militia forces 

UNSC unanimously approves an extension of humanitarian aid to a rebel-held part of Syria through the Bab Al-Hawa crossing from Turkey in the country’s northeast However, a request to reopen for one year a second crossing point at Al-Yarubiyah, which allows supplies to reach northeastern Syria from Iraq, is dropped...