Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said in an interview that Israeli warplanes attacked what he said was an “unused military building” in Syria last month, and that his country reserves the right to retaliate.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown says he believes Iraq can assume responsibility for security in southern Basra province from British forces within two months.

Turkey’s exports in 2007 exceeded $100 billion as of September, according to Turkish Exporters Assembly (TÄ°M) figures announced yesterday during a press conference at the first parliamentary building in Ankara.

A Turkish court on Monday resumed the trial of suspects in the killing of an ethnic Armenian journalist — a case widely seen as a test of whether the judiciary can fully investigate possible negligence by authorities.

Syria began requiring visas for Iraqis entering the country Monday, hoping to stem the flow of refugees fleeing violence in their homeland, a Syrian official said.

An attack by the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) that claimed 13 lives on Saturday was the last throes of terrorism, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan said in a statement on Sunday.

In the framework of the UN General Assembly’s 62nd session in New York, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad agreed to build a railroad connecting Iran and Turkey.

  Syria’s State Security Court on Sunday convicted two Syrians and a Jordanian of belonging to extremist Islamic groups and sentenced them to prison, a local human rights group said.

   Even if the Kazak government succeeds in winning greater control of Kashagan, the country’s largest oilfield, NBCentralAsia analysts say it remains unclear when commercial extraction might get under way as the economics of this giant project are uncertain.

At last, after two years of argument about the constitution, President Bakiev is pushing through a quick solution – although not everyone is happy with his vision of how Kyrgyzstan should be governed.