Bloomberg China’s President Xi Jinping moved to calm growing tensions over North Korea, telling US leader Donald Trump in a phone call that all sides should maintain restraint and avoid inflammatory comments. Xi’s comments, reported by China’s CCTV, came shortly after Trump added to his recent aggressive tweets by saying that US military options were “locked and loaded” if North …

BEIRUT / Reuters Hezbollah and its allies are pressing the Lebanese state to normalise relations with President Bashar al-Assad’s government in Syria, testing Lebanon’s policy of “dissociation” from the Syrian conflict and igniting a political row. Calls for closer ties with the Syrian government, including on refugee returns and military operations on the Lebanon-Syria border, come as Assad regains control …

Bloomberg President Donald Trump is dispatching a team led by his son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner to Israel in pursuit of a Middle East peace deal. Trump’s sending the delegation to try to take advantage of a period of relative calm following violent clashes last month over Israeli security arrangements at the Jerusalem shrine known to Jews as Temple …