RIYADH, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - The stock market in Saudi Arabia rebounded strongly just before the close of trade on Wednesday, eradicating most of the day's earlier losses following a coordinated international rate cut.

With less than half an hour to the close, the Tadawul All-Shares Index (TASI) was down 1.6 percent after it shed more than eight percent in early trading.

RIYADH, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - Saudi stocks slumped by more than 7.5 percent at the opening on Wednesday, trading below the 6,000-point mark for the first time in more than 52 months.

Minutes after opening on the last day of the trading week, the Tadawul All-Shares Index was at 5,782.03 points, its lowest level since July 2004.

RIYADH, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - A Saudi man convicted of drug trafficking was beheaded by the sword in the southern province of Asir on Wednesday, the interior ministry said.

Ali bin Abdullah al-Bishi was found guilty for the third time of peddling drugs and was executed in Bisha in Asir, the ministry said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

KABUL, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - Former Taliban leaders said Wednesday they shared a meal with President Hamid Karzai's brother and other government officials in Saudi Arabia last month but stressed the meeting did not amount to peace talks.

KUWAIT CITY, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - The Saudi stock market, the biggest in the Arab world, tumbled 8.6 percent at the opening of trade on Tuesday.

The Tadawul All-Shares Index (TASI) crashed more than 570 points, or 8.6 percent, after plunging 9.81 percent on Monday.

Other stock markets in oil-rich Gulf states were also trading sharply down.

ISLAMABAD, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Former Pakistani premier Nawaz Sharif is willing to broker talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban, his spokesman said Tuesday, amid reports that Sharif is already playing a key role.

RIYADH, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - The Afghan government held talks with the Taliban in Saudi Arabia last month, a leading Saudi paper reported, despite denials from both Kabul and the Taliban that such talks had taken place.

KABUL, Oct 6, 2008 (AFP) - The Afghan government said Monday it was hoping for peace talks with the insurgent Taliban movement but denied a media report that a first round of negotiations took place in Saudi Arabia last month.

KABUL, Oct 6, 2008 (AFP) - The Afghan government said Monday it was hoping for peace talks with the insurgent Taliban movement but denied a media report that a first round of negotiations took place in Saudi Arabia last month.

RIYADH, Oct 4, 2008 (AFP) - Saudi border guards have seized more than 1.2 tonnes of hashish as well as weapons along the border with Yemen during a shootout with drug traffickers, a senior official said on Saturday.

BEIRUT, Oct 2, 2008 (AFP) - Syria is blocking distribution of the Saudi-owned pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat, the paper's Beirut bureau chief Zuhair Qusaybati told AFP on Thursday.

'The censorship authorities at the information ministry in Damascus asked Al-Hayat's bureau in the Syrian capital on Monday to stop sending its issues to the country until further notice,' Qusaybati told AFP.

KABUL, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Tuesday he had asked the king of Saudi Arabia to help engage the Taliban militia in peace talks but that they had not yet started.

The US-backed Karzai said the negotiations had not started yet but Afghan envoys had made repeated trips to the Gulf kingdom and to neighbouring Pakistan to facilitate them.

RIYADH, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - A young woman in Saudi Arabia who defied ultra-conservative kingdom's ban on women driving was injured when the car span out of control and plunged into a stream, a newspaper reported on Tuesday.

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 27, 2008 (AFP) - Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal on Saturday called on Iran to comply with its nuclear obligations to spare the Middle East region from 'devastating conflicts, futile arms races and serious environmental hazards.'

DUBAI, Sept 22, 2008 (AFP) - Human Rights Watch urged the Saudi government on Monday to end its 'systematic discrimination' of minority Ismaili Shiites, charging that they are treated as second-class citizens.

RIYADH, Sept 21, 2008 (AFP) - Baghdad has sent back to Saudi Arabia eight of its citizens jailed in Iraq ahead of a new extradition treaty between the two countries, a spokesman for the Saudi interior ministry said on Sunday.

DUBAI, Sept 16, 2008 (AFP) - Human Rights Watch called on the Saudi government to lift a four-year-old travel ban on Saudi lawyer Abdurrahman al-Lahem, a winner of the 2008 Human Rights Defender award.

Lahem 'stands for justice and the rule of law in Saudi Arabia,' said Christoph Wilcke of the New York-based watchdog.

RIYADH, September 14, 2008 (AFP) - Saudi Arabia's top judge sought on Sunday to tone down a controversial religious edict sanctioning the killing of owners of television stations that air 'debauchery.'

RIYADH, September 14, 2008 (AFP) - A top Saudi cleric and judge sought Sunday to tone down a controversial religious edict sanctioning the killing of owners of television stations that air 'debauchery,' saying they could only be put to death after a judicial process.

DUBAI, September 12, 2008 (AFP) - A senior Saudi cleric has issued a religious decree saying the owners of television networks broacasting 'depravation and debauchery' may be killed, Al-Arabiya television reported on Friday.

RIYADH, September 11, 2008 (AFP) - Saudi Arabia is poised to sign an extradition treaty with Iraq, where several Saudis who joined the insurgency are believed to be held, an interior ministry spokesman said in remarks published Thursday.

RIYADH, September 10, 2008 (AFP) - Saudi Arabia said on Wednesday it has arrested five people who used the Internet to propagate extremism and incite youths to go to troubled areas, a reference to supporters of Al-Qaeda.

LAGOS, September 4, 2008 (AFP) - Nigerian opposition parties on Thursday demanded information on the health of President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua, amid alarming rumours that have spread for the past 15 days he has been out of the country.

TEHRAN, September 2, 2008 (AFP) - The head of the Tehran bureau of pan-Arab television station Al-Arabiya said on Tuesday that Iranian officials have demanded his departure from the country.

'In a telephone call with the foreign press bureau of the Iranian culture ministry I was informed of my definitive exit from Iran,' bureau chief Hassan al-Fahs told AFP.

LAGOS, September 1, 2008 (AFP) - Nigerian President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua, who has been hospitalised in Saudi Arabia, insisted in a newspaper interview on Monday that he was in good health and expects to be released shortly.

JEDDAH, August 31, 2008 (AFP) - Nigerian President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua has been in a Saudi hospital for several days, a hospital official said on Sunday.

Yar'Adua has been at the King Fahd Armed Forces Hospital in the Red Sea city of Jeddah, the administrative official told AFP without specifying his medical condition or the treatment he is undergoing.

JEDDAH, August 31, 2008 (AFP) - Nigerian President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua has been in a Saudi hospital for several days, a hospital official said on Sunday.

Yar'Adua has been at the King Fahd Armed Forces Hospital in the Red Sea city of Jeddah, the administrative official told AFP without specifying his medical condition or the treatment he is undergoing.

RIYADH, August 31, 2008 (AFP) - A convicted drug trafficker was put to death by the sword in Saudi Arabia's eastern city of Khobar on Sunday, the interior ministry said.

Hussein Muilu, a Saudi national, was condemned to death after being convicted of smuggling hashish into the kingdom, the ministry said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

RIYADH, August 30, 2008 (AFP) - A Malian man convicted of serial robbery and attempted rape was put to death by the sword in Saudi Arabia's holy city of Mecca on Saturday, the interior ministry said.

Hashem Daghali Suma Molla Ismail was found guilty of breaking into a house while drunk and trying to rape a woman before stealing jewellery from her.

LAGOS, August 30, 2008 (AFP) - President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua has been hospitalised in Saudi Arabia, where he is believed to have undergone surgery early in the week, two Nigerian independent dailies said on Saturday.

RIYADH, August 29, 2008 (AFP) - A Pakistani man convicted of murder was beheaded by the sword in Saudi Arabia's holy city of Mecca on Friday after the victim's family refused 'blood money,' the interior ministry said.

WASHINGTON, August 28, 2008 (AFP) - The US military secretly has sent more than 200 foreign detainees captured in Iraq and Afghanistan to be interrogated in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other countries over the past few years, The New York Times reported Thursday.

RIYADH, August 28, 2008 (AFP) - A court in conservative Muslim Saudi Arabia has ruled against a man who had disowned his daughter for 50 years after accepting the results of a DNA paternity test, a report said on Thursday.

KUWAIT CITY, August 25, 2008 (AFP) - Kuwait's Telecommunication giant Zain will launch its mobile phone service in Saudi Arabia on August 26, the group said Monday in a statement.

Last year, a Zain-led consortium won the third mobile phone licence in the oil-rich kingdom after making the highest bid of 6.1 billion dollars.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas met Saudi King Abdullah on Tuesday during a brief visit to Saudi ...

OECD member-states have written to Britain criticising London`s failure to deal with corporate ...

Saudi Arabia`s intelligence chief dashed to Pakistan for talks with the government over its plans ...

Saudi Arabia`s intelligence chief dashed to Pakistan for talks with the government over its plans ...