Isis (Islamic State) insurgents faced major assaults on two fronts in both Iraq and Syria yesterday.

She's young, beautiful and studying politics and philosophy. But this young Danish woman isn't your average uni student.

Syria has used sarin nerve gas for the first time since 2013, dropping bombs laden with the chemical agent on Isis fighters outside Damascus.

Nearly 15 years ago, a Canadian citizen, Maher Arar, was forced by Syrian prison guards to live in a dark, three-foot-wide, six-foot-deep underground cell.

Syrians voted in a parliamentary election in government-held areas of the country yesterday in a show of support for President Bashar al-Assad.

Syria's democratic opposition is combing through this week's release of the "Panama Papers" to revitalise efforts to identify and freeze billions of dollars amassed by the family and friends of their country's dictator, Bashar al-Assad.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, with his sudden move to withdraw Russian forces from Syria, once more caught international observers by surprise.

COMMENT: The announcement makes it explicit that Putin has no interest in giving Assad the support he'd need to take on the forces of Isis.

There are over a million refugees living in Europe. Living in squalid and challenging conditions. And witness how that influx of humanity has destabilised Europe, writes Rachel Smalley.

Russian's plan is "the best opportunity the Syrian people have had over the past five years for lasting peace and stability".

As the Syrian conflict approaches its fifth anniversary, not far across the border in Jordan an altogether more hopeful milestone is being celebrated.

Across Syria's battered and blasted landscape, the relief was palpable as an unlikely truce actually took hold.

A cessation of hostilities in Syria has come into effect under a ceasefire warring sides in the five-year conflict have committed to.

The Turkish government, in league with Saudi Arabia, made a tentative decision to enter the war on the ground in Syria, writes Gwynne Dyer.

An airstrike in Syrian destroyed a makeshift clinic supported by Doctors Without Borders, in a series of attacks that hit hospitals and schools killing at least 50.

A cessation is the most basic good-faith requirement as a first step towards discussions about what peace may look like, writes Alexander Gillespie.

Ceasefire means little as rebels hold various factions at bay and children typically become the victims.

Children waved small photocopied Syrian flags as New Zealand welcomed its first extra intake of refugees from the war-torn nation at Mangere today.

NZ is leading urgent talks at the UN on a desperate humanitarian crisis in the Syrian town of Madaya, where besieged residents are reported to be dying of starvation.

Thousands of Syrian families are starving to death as Bashar al-Assad's regime imposes a siege on two mountain towns, despite a United Nations-brokered ceasefire designed to allow in aid.

German scientists think they have found the solution for young refugees who have entered Germany from war-torn countries and are seeking a better life.

In the years since the Syrian civil war broke out in 2011, Alaa Aljaleel has become his hometown's unofficial feline caretaker.

Western countries face the prospect of being dragged further into the war in Syria as it prepares to support a new "ground army" from Muslim nations.

The number of foreign fighters who have travelled to Syria and Iraq to join militant groups such as Isis has more than doubled according to a study.

Corbyn called the plan for strikes an 'ill-fated twist in never-ending war on terror', but lost the support of his caucus.

Special Ops task force will expand US troops' direct involvement in battling Isis commanders.

Twelve years ago, George W Bush gave his "Mission Accomplished" speech from the flight deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, confident that the Saddam Hussein regime had been....

Before the Syrian conflict, the country suffered a severe drought. Resulting crop failures sent over 1.5 million people into urban centres that contributed to the destabilisation of the country and devastating civil war.

The immense human toll is a far more immediate and obvious concern.