AFP - Iraq needs $88.2 billion to rebuild after years of war against the Islamic State group, Planning Minister Salman al-Jumaili said Monday, as an international conference on the country's reconstruction opened in Kuwait.

REUTERS - Twenty nations agreed on Tuesday to consider tougher sanctions to press North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson warned Pyongyang it could trigger a military response if it did not choose negotiations.

AFP - Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Friday US President Donald Trump's latest attacks on the nuclear deal were a "desperate effort" to undermine an accord that cannot be renegotiated.