Hundreds of Libyans turned over their weapons at collection points in the capital and the eastern city of Benghazi on Saturday following rallies which called for disarmament and the disbanding of militias.
A steady trickle of men surrendered their weapons to national army troops stationed in Tripoli's Martyrs Square and in Benghazi's Freedom Square, Agence France Presse journalists reported.
Full StoryMyanmar's President Thein Sein made an unprecedented tribute to opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi's "efforts for democracy" and vowed to resolve ethnic strife in a landmark U.N. speech.
Thein Sein, the first Myanmar leader to speak to the U.N. General Assembly, also told the annual gathering on Thursday that he wants to "completely end" a long-running war with ethnic rebels in Kachin state.
Full StoryA Saudi charity group will build a container city that can house 10,000 Syrian refugees in Turkey's Kilis province near the border, a Turkish official said Saturday.
The project of the Saudi National Campaign to Support Brothers in Syria is expected to be ready within a month, the official told AFP.
Full StoryThe United States warned on Saturday that U.S. women Christian missionaries in mainly Muslim Egypt face threats of terror attacks and urged vigilance.
"The embassy has credible information suggesting terrorist interest in targeting U.S. female missionaries in Egypt," the American mission in Cairo said in a statement on its website.
Full StoryThe al-Qaida-linked al-Shebab, regarded by the West as a credible threat to global peace, may have pulled out of their last Somalian stronghold of Kismayo, but the new national government must move quickly to make their defeat more than a minor setback.
Analysts however warn that despite the fact that Shebab have withdrawn from the port city, peace is still elusive in the war-ravaged nation.
Full StoryTens of thousands of Georgians joined one of the biggest opposition rallies in the ex-Soviet state in years Saturday on the final day of campaigning before hard-fought parliamentary polls.
Huge crowds packed Tbilisi's central Freedom Square and the capital's main street to cheer billionaire tycoon Bidzina Ivanishvili, whose opposition Georgian Dream coalition is challenging President Mikheil Saakashvili's ruling party in Monday's vote, an Agence France Presse correspondent said.
Full StoryPrime Minister Hisham Qandil on Saturday denied that Copts had fled their homes in Egypt's Sinai peninsula, after officials and residents said the Christians left after receiving death threats from suspected Islamists.
"The instructions given by the Egyptian authorities is to protect the Coptic brothers wherever they may be," Qandil told reporters in remarks carried by the state-run MENA news agency.
Full StoryIsrael has already breached its own red line set by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by acquiring "dozens of nuclear warheads," Iranian Defense Minister Ahmed Vahidi said on Saturday.
"If having the atomic bomb is passing the red line, the Zionist regime, that possesses dozens of nuclear warheads and weapons of mass destruction, has passed the red line years ago, and it has to be stopped," he said, according to the ISNA news agency.
Full StoryThe last Westerner held in the U.S. prison for terror suspects in Guantanamo Bay, who was arrested as a teen in Afghanistan, returned to his native Canada on Saturday, a Canadian cabinet minister and the Pentagon said.
Omar Khadr, now 26, left the prison in Cuba on a U.S. military plane and arrived at a Canadian air base in Trenton in Ontario province at 1140 GMT, said Public Safety Minister Vic Toews.
Full StoryPope Benedict XVI's personal secretary, Georg Ganswein, will be called to testify in the trial of the pontiff's former butler Paolo Gabriele for leaking confidential Vatican documents.
Ganswein, 56, was Gabriele's direct superior and confronted the butler about the leaks early in May after being tipped off by the Vatican police. He has already given investigators evidence about his former charge's conduct.
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