BAGHDAD — Iraq will send delegations to Washington and Tehran to help “halt tension” amid fears of a confrontation between the U.S. and Iran, Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi said on Tuesday. His comments came two days after a rocket fired in Baghdad landed close to the U.S. Embassy. No one has claimed responsibility Sunday’s attack on the heavily fortified Green ...

Singapore’s annual economic growth slipped to the lowest in nearly a decade in the first quarter as manufacturing contracted in the wake of a protracted US-China trade war, prompting a downgrade to the Southeast Asian country’s full-year growth forecast. Gross domestic product (GDP) expanded 1.2 percent year-on-year in the three months ending March 31, final official data showed on Tuesday, ...

At least four refugees in Australia’s offshore Pacific camps have attempted suicide since the conservative government’s shock re-election Saturday, according to refugees, advocates and police. Around 800 would-be refugees who tried reach Australia have been sent to live in severe conditions on the remote islands of Nauru and Papua New Guinea’s Manus under a hardline policy from Canberra. Many had ...

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s finance minister said on Tuesday there was no need for more talks over the 2019 draft budget, seen as a vital test of the government’s will to reform, although the foreign minister signalled the debate may go on. The cabinet says the budget will reduce the deficit to 7.6% of gross domestic product (GDP) from last year’s 11.2%. ...

Egypt’s electricity minister announced a further price rise Tuesday, the latest in a series of austerity measures aimed at getting the country’s economy back on track. The latest price hike, which is due to come into effect in July, is tied to a $12 billion bailout loan from the International Monetary Fund that Cairo secured in 2016. “The overall increases ...

Israel has agreed to Lebanon’s conditions to negotiate the countries’ border disputes, a senior U.S. diplomat told Lebanese officials Monday, according to two sources briefed on the conversations. Acting U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs David Satterfield delivered the news in meetings with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, Prime Minister Saad Hariri and Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil. Satterfield ...

The possibility of closing the Bab al-Mandab and Hormuz straits pose a threat no less serious than others coming from Tehran and Hezbollah Israel isn’t involved. That’s the official response to anyone who asks what the recent deterioration in relations between Iran and the United States means for Jerusalem. We’re not involved; we’re not addressing or responding to it. Ramifications? ...

Authorities say raids carried out against the armed Hasm group, a day after bombing in Cairo wounded several tourists. Egyptian security forces have killed 12 suspected fighters in Cairo, the interior ministry said on Monday, a day after an explosion blasted a tourist bus, wounding several people. A rudimentary device containing nails and pieces of metal detonated on the perimeter of ...

At least 10 civilians killed in Russian air attack on town of Kafranbel, Idlib province, say activists and a monitor. Air attacks by Syrian government ally Russia have killed 10 civilians, including five children, in an opposition-held province in northwest Syria, activists and a monitor have said, hours after Moscow announced a ceasefire. The Russian army said the air raids ...

The judicial branch just delivered a sharp jab to the chin of President Donald Trump, in a foreboding omen for his strategy for thwarting investigations that threaten his presidency. When a federal judge ruled Monday that the President’s longtime accounting firm Mazars must hand over his financial records, he did not just deliver a win to stonewalled Democrats. He made ...