The Czech government on Monday approved the sale of 15 combat and training L-159 jets to help Baghdad fight the jihadist Islamic State group, the defense minister told reporters. 

"We are looking at a total of 15 warplanes, four of which come from the Czech air force, while 11 others come from surplus stock," Martin Stropnicky said.

Libya's warring factions must reach a deal on forming a unity government within days, not weeks, EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini said Monday.

Mogherini told the U.N. Security Council that the European Union was "ready and willing to provide all kinds of assistance" once a new power-sharing Libyan government is in place.

Sudan has failed to arrest its long-time leader Omar al-Bashir for genocide and war crimes, the International Criminal Court ruled on Monday, referring the matter back to the U.N. Security Council.

Bashir, 71, is wanted by The Hague-based ICC, the world's only permanent court, for his role in the western Sudanese region of Darfur where insurgents rose up in 2003 in an ongoing conflict that has left more than 300,000 people dead.

Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal was sworn in Monday as a member of King Salman's new cabinet, pressing on in a post he has held for four decades.

Saud, first named in 1975 and the world's longest-serving foreign minister, pledged to carry out his duties "with honesty, integrity and sincerity" as he was sworn in at the Yamamah Palace in Riyadh.

Iran's Navy took delivery Monday of what a top admiral said was a "faster and more agile" domestically produced destroyer which will be used in the Caspian Sea.

The ship, named Damavand after the country's highest mountain, is 90 meters (yards) long, weighs 1,300 tons and is armed with cruise missile systems, torpedoes and electronic warfare equipment.

Palestinian security forces in the West Bank arrested dozens of members of the Islamist movement Hamas on Monday, sources on both sides said.

The Palestinian Authority (PA), which has its headquarters in Ramallah, has regularly detained Hamas members, including MPs, over the past few years.

The retrial of ousted Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and his two sons on charges of corruption will open on April 4, a judicial official said on Monday.

In January, the Court of Cassation overturned Mubarak's conviction on corruption charges and ordered that he and his sons Alaa and Gamal be tried again.

A widely-followed "whistle-blower" who tweeted about the Saudi royal family said Monday he has returned to Twitter after a brief suspension by the social media platform of his account.

"I am back with the same account," the user known as @mujtahidd said in an email to Agence France Presse.

An Omani court has jailed a rights activist for three years after convicting him of sowing unrest in the normally stable sultanate through social media networks, a rights group said Monday.

The court of first instance in Muscat sentenced on Sunday Saeed Jaddad in three cases, the Monitor of Human Rights in Oman organization said.

Three Egyptian soldiers were killed Monday and three others critically wounded in a roadside bomb attack in the restive Sinai Peninsula, police and medical officials said.

Egyptian security forces have been battling an Islamist insurgency in North Sinai since the army ousted president Mohamed Morsi in July 2013.