Lebanon's political atmospheres tensed up following remarks made by Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil about Speaker Nabih Berri, which “will reflect negatively on the Presidential term and government” amid unconfirmed chances that AMAL ministers “might resign from the Cabinet,” al-Joumhouria daily reported on Tuesday.

Ain el-Tineh sources (residence of AMAL Movement and Speaker Berri) told the daily: “Shall a settlement be reached it must be based on new rules. Former equations have fallen,” they said, referring to a fragile media truce between AMAL and the Free Patriotic Movement led by Bassil.

Jurors are preparing to hear opening statements in a trial for an Oklahoma man accused of first-degree murder and a hate crime in the slaying of his Lebanese neighbor.

Stanley Vernon Majors is expected to be in a Tulsa courtroom when his trial resumes Monday in district court. The 63-year-old is accused in the August 2016 killing of 37-year-old Khalid Jabara.

President Donald Trump's new immigration plan is stirring up controversy with its proposals on legal immigration. Much of the public debate to this point has been about young immigrants brought to this country as children illegally.

But the plan's potential impact on legal immigration has sparked fierce Democratic opposition and appears it may sink chances for a bipartisan deal in Congress.

An ambulance packed with explosives blew up in a crowded area of Kabul on Saturday, killing at least 40 people and wounding 140 others, officials said, in an attack claimed by the Taliban.

Hundreds of Kurds living in Lebanon gathered outside the Turkish embassy in Lebanon on Friday to protest Turkey's ongoing military operation in northern Syria's Kurdish-controlled Afrin region.

Protesters carrying Kurdish flags chanted slogans denouncing Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, including: "Down with Erdogan!"

Justice Minister Salim Jreissati stressed Friday that he did not move the public prosecution against the comedian Hisham Haddad, the host of 'Lahonwbas', the National News Agency reported.

Attacks on Rohingya Muslims appear to be continuing in Myanmar and it is not yet safe for the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees living in Bangladesh to begin returning to their homes, a high-ranking United Nations official said.

Many Rohingya want to return eventually to their villages in Myanmar, said Justin Forsyth, UNICEF deputy executive director, during a Wednesday visit to the immense Kutupalong refugee camp. But they fear for their safety if they were to go back now.

Movies from Lebanon, Chile, Russia, Hungary and Sweden are competing in the Academy Awards race for best foreign-language film.

Five nominees announced Tuesday include Lebanese filmmaker Ziad Doueiri's forceful "The Insult"; Chilean director Sebastian Lelio's drama with a transgender heroine, "A Fantastic Woman"; and Russian director Andrey Zvyagintsev's stark divorce story "Loveless."

Under the supervision of the High Relief Committee and at PM Saad Hariri's orders, trucks have started Tuesday removing the trash that accumulated on the Keserewan shore after rough waves broke down a faulty retaining wall around a coastal dump just east of Beirut, spilling the trash into the sea.

Maj. Gen Mohammed Kheir, the head of the High Relief Committee stressed that the cleaning process "will continue despite bad weather conditions and in commitment to Hariri's directions."

Lebanon's festering trash crisis came crashing ashore this week, after residents woke up to find a powerful winter storm had laid a mantle of waste at a beach just a minutes' drive north of the capital, Beirut.

The scenes were a national embarrassment for a country that once prided itself on its sparkling Mediterranean coastline but appears unable to wean itself off the convenience of throwing its trash into the sea.