Five years since the conflict began, more than 450,000 Syrians have been killed in the fighting, more than million injured and over 12 million Syrians - half the country's prewar population - have been displaced from their homes.

In 2011, what became known as the "Arab Spring" revolts toppled Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Taliban fighters publicly hanged a university student after accusing him of killing a senior intelligence officer.

Twelve civilians are reported to have been killed in a Saudi-led coalition air strike in north-western Yemen.

Residents and an official said the victims were travelling in a pick-up truck that was targeted in the Hiran district of Hajja province.

They had been heading to a local market, according to the residents.

There was no immediate comment from the coalition, which is fighting the Houthi rebel movement in a bid to restore the internationally recognised government.

The coalition says it does not target civilians, but the UN says air strikes have caused the majority of the more than 4,125 civilian deaths recorded since the conflict in Yemen escalated in March 2015.

Wednesday's incident comes two days after a 48-hour cessation of hostilities ended.

Both sides accused each other of repeated violations of the truce, which brought a brief respite from air strikes for residents of the rebel-controlled capital, Sanaa.

Fighting con

Egypt's highest appeal court has overturned a life sentence handed down to ousted President Mohammed Morsi.

Saudi Arabia has denied that the Arab coalition it spearheads violated a 48-hour ceasefire by launching air strikes against the Houthi rebels in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa.

A barrel bomb killed a family of six in rebel-held eastern Aleppo early on Sunday and rebel shelling took the lives of eight children at a school in the west, as one of the heaviest government bombardments of Syria's civil war continues.

The head of the journalists' union in Egypt and his two colleagues have been sentenced to two years in prison for "harbouring fugitives".

A suicide bomber has killed at least 27 people in a suicide attack inside a Shia Muslim mosque in the Afghan capital, Kabul, police say.

Another 35 were wounded in the blast at the Baqir ul Olum mosque.

The attacker was on foot and blew himself up among crowds inside the building, officials said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility but it comes amid mounting sectarian attacks on Afghanistan's Shia community.

This latest bombing took place during a service to commemorate the death of Imam Hussein, the Prophet Muhammad's grandson and Shia martyr.

According to eyewitnesses, the service was almost over when the bomb was detonated on the first floor.

"I was inside the mosque and the Mullah was reading the prayer," Ewaz Ali, 50 who suffered minor injuries, told the Associated Press news agency.

"Suddenly a huge explosion happened, then everywhere was dark."

Local reports suggest there are children among the dead.