Asia Iraq In a province bordering Saudi Arabia, a site has been found where captagon, the amphetamine-like stimulant that plagues the Middle East, is produced, a rare find in a country that has become a transit route for illicit drugs
Asia Iraq Iraq has demanded that the UN assistance mission, established after the US-led invasion of the country in 2003, ends its work by the end of 2025, saying it is no longer needed because Iraq has made significant progress towards stability
Asia Iraq Thousands of civil servants demonstrated in Baghdad and the southern Iraqi provinces of Basra and Diwaniyah, demanding a revision of the pay scale and an update of government salaries
Asia Iraq The killing of Iraqi TikTok influencer Om Fahad, shot dead in his car in Baghdad, is being investigated by the Ministry of the Interior; she had been imprisoned last year during an Iraqi government Internet clean-up campaign for offence to public decency
Asia Iraq The consulate of the Netherlands in Erbil has been closed - and so is the embassy to Tehran - amid growing concerns of potential escalation in the Middle East