Islamic State militants have in recent days executed dozens of prisoners taken from villages the group has been forced to abandon by an Iraqi army advance on the city of Mosul, officials in the region said on Wednesday.

China's ruling Communist Party declared its General Secretary Xi Jinping the "core" of its leadership on Thursday, the official Xinhua news agency reported, elevating his already powerful status.

Fifteen of the 19 Al-Qaeda hijackers who carried out the 9/11 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people were Saudi, but Riyadh denies any ties to the plotters.

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif will travel to Moscow on Friday for three-way talks with his Syrian and Russian counterparts on the situation in Syria, his ministry said.

The offensive to drive the Islamic State group from its Raqa stronghold in Syria will begin in the next few weeks, top US and British defence officials said Wednesday.

Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other Arab states are piling pressure on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to resolve divisions in his Fatah party and with the rival Hamas movement, amid growing concerns about whether Palestinian democracy is under threat.

There is no reason Britain's June vote to leave the European Union should undermine a 1998 Northern Irish peace deal, Prime Minister Theresa May said on Wednesday.

Top European Union officials have voiced concern over the detention of two leading political figures in the largest city in Turkey's mainly Kurdish southeast.

Forces allied to President Bashar al-Assad in Syria warned Turkey on Wednesday against any advance towards their positions to the north and east of Aleppo, saying any such move would be met "decisively and with force".

An initiative for a Yemeni political settlement has been presented to the Houthi faction and ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh loyalists, a source close to Saleh told Ahram Online.

Iraqi forces were inching to within striking distance of eastern Mosul Tuesday as defence chiefs from the US-led coalition met in Paris to review the offensive on the Islamist militant bastion.

Spain's Interior Ministry says police have arrested two imams suspected of promoting the Islamic State armed group on the Mediterranean island of Ibiza.

An explosion outside a chamber of commerce building in Turkey's southern resort city of Antalya wounded several people on Tuesday but the mayor said there were no life-threatening injuries and the blast may have been an accident.

The king of Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil exporter, met Venezuela's president on Sunday in Riyadh and discussed ways to stabilise global oil prices, state news SPA reported.

Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said Monday that Israel's next war with Gaza militants would be their last "because we will completely destroy them," but added he remains committed to a two-state solution.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem will hold talks with Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow on Friday, Russia's deputy foreign minister said Monday.

A Hamas member was killed on Monday when a tunnel collapsed in the Gaza Strip, the group's military wing said in a statement.

Qatar began three days of mourning on Monday after the death of former Emir Khalifa bin Hamad Al-Thani, who oversaw the start of the country's transformation into an energy powerhouse.

Like many people, 23-year-old Emily DiVito was multitasking while watching last week's presidential debate, with a little studying and a little Twitter-surfing. But when DiVito heard Donald Trump say those four words to Hillary Clinton, she shot up in her seat.

The US-led coalition battling the Islamic State group has unleashed an unprecedented wave of air strikes in support of Iraq's operation to retake Mosul, American officials said Monday.