Region

GENEVA — Syrian authorities and insurgents have allowed the Red Cross to deliver growing amounts of aid under local ceasefires since August, in a possible harbinger of reconciliation in the civil war, an International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) official said on Thursday.

Boris Michel, outgoing head of the ICRC delegation in Syria, also told Reuters in an interview it had made five visits to four government-run prisons last year, the first since May 2012.

"Increasingly and also through the process of local reconciliation, things are opening up," Michel said.

"If you want to de-escalate the conflict, you have to start from the local level and build local truces, arrangements, just to stabilise the situation because people are exhausted after four years of conflict and the human cost of it is huge."

The ICRC has 300 staff in Syria, including 51 expatriates against 35 a year ago.

"There was progress during the course of the year, we received many more visas, we crossed many more [front] lines and opened more offices," Michel said.

"The idea was to negotiate our access from within. We convinced authorities to provide more access to victims so there is more delivery of humanitarian assistance on a needs-based approach, therefore crossing lines across Syria," he said.

"We are increasingly working to support the reconciliation process and offer services to make them [truces] happen," he said. "This is part of the process for a better Syria in the future, whatever the political outcome is."

The organisation played a role in truces in Barzeh, Moadimiya, Yarmouk and Yelda-Babila near Damascus and Al Waer in Homs.

"We have reached ISIS-held areas," Michel said, referring to the Islamic State group.

"These areas are reachable with a lot of constraints and difficulties but still we want to reach them because there are people to be assisted."

Prison visits

In Barzeh, the ICRC is repairing a clinic along the front line to serve people on all sides.

"It is in place but those truces are fragile. It takes just one bullet to make the whole thing collapse," he said.

"We managed to provide surgical assistance on many occasions, we delivered to dozens of hospitals on both sides with surgical assistance which is a breakthrough."

Through resumed prison visits, the ICRC is helping to trace the missing, re-establish family ties and discuss conditions of detention with authorities.

The ICRC has not visited people held by rebel forces, due to problems with security. "But at least we have reached the stage where we can submit requests and try to receive answers, which is already a first step," Michel said.

"Our water and sanitation team doubled since the beginning of 2014. We have some 450 ongoing projects throughout the whole country, all provinces, serving 15 million people with clean water.”

"A lot of power plants or water treatment plants are located in opposition areas. We've been able to cross the lines, convince them wherever the plants are, both in government or on the opposition side, that cutting water or creating problems with water is in the interest of no one."

More than 200,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict since it began in 2011.

KOBANI, Syria — Pulverised buildings, heavily armed fighters roaming otherwise deserted rubble-strewn streets: the ferocious battle for Kobani has left the Syrian border town in ruins, according to a team of AFP journalists who arrived there Wednesday.

Kurdish forces recaptured the town on the Turkish frontier from the Islamic State (IS) group on Monday in a symbolic blow to the jihadists who have seized swathes of territory in their brutal onslaught across Syria and Iraq.

After more than four months of fighting, the streets of Kobani — now patrolled by Kurdish militiamen with barely a civilian in sight — were a mass of debris and buildings that had in some cases been turned to dust.

Kurdish fighters armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles greeted the journalists with a hail of celebratory gunshots into the air and made the "V" for victory sign.

In one street, an injured fighter sat on the roadside next to an unexploded mortar shell, his leg bandaged and crutches by his side. In another, a bright yellow car was left abandoned, riddled with bullet holes, as two men walked by to inspect the damage.

On Tuesday, Kurdish forces battled IS militants in villages around Kobani, with warnings that the fight was far from over.

Still, the recapture of Kobani appeared to be a major step in the campaign against the IS militants who had seemed poised in September to seize the town, whose symbolic importance had far outgrown its military value.

The victory in Kobani comes as Syrian opposition figures and representatives of the regime of President Bashar Assad began talks in Moscow Wednesday.

But there was little hope that they would make a breakthrough in ending the brutal war that has killed close to 200,000 people since 2011.

Analysts said air strikes by the US-led coalition had been key to the success of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Kobani because the bombing had taken out some of the jihadists’ heavier weaponry and hitting their supply routes.

“Our forces fulfilled the promise of victory,” the militia said, but cautioned that fighting was not over yet.

A minister in the regional Kobani government said Tuesday that at least half of the town had been destroyed.

The United States had said on Tuesday that Kurdish fighters were in control of about 90 per cent of the town.

But a State Department official warned that the militants, also known as ISIL, were “adaptive and resilient” and no-one was declaring “mission accomplished” yet.

“IS control over its most important strongholds in Syria and Iraq remains intact and there is a lack of a local military force to challenge IS in places like Mosul,” said Aymenn Jawad Al Tamimi from the Philadelphia-based Middle East Forum.

Observers say IS lost nearly 1,200 fighters in the battle, of a total of 1,800 killed, despite outgunning YPG forces with sophisticated weaponry captured from Iraqi and Syrian military bases.

The combat also sparked a mass exodus, with some 200,000 people fleeing across the border into Turkey.

But Turkish security forces on Tuesday fired tear gas and water cannon to push back people approaching the barbed wire fence.

The border remained closed Wednesday.

“We won’t let any refugees cross until further notice,” an official from Turkey’s disaster management agency AFAD told AFP.

Turkish authorities were working to move hundreds of refugees from Kobani to a new camp in the southeastern border town of Suruc which is able to accommodate up to 35,000 people.

It is the biggest-ever refugee camp opened by Turkey, which has taken in 1.7 million Syrian refugees since the Syrian conflict erupted in 2011 as a popular uprising against Assad.

Idris Nassan, an official with the Kobani regional government, said Tuesday the authorities were urging people not to return to their homes as at least 50 per cent of the city was destroyed.

“There is no food, no medicine. We don’t have electricity or water.”

The US official said many foreign fighters — including Australians, Belgians, Canadians and Chechens — were among the dead jihadists.

With the eyes of the international media watching, the jihadists “wanted to raise the largest flag they ever made over Kobani”, the official said.

THE HAGUE — Many leading backers of the International Criminal Court (ICC) will ignore Israel's call for them to cut funding in response to an inquiry into possible war crimes in the Palestinian territories, officials told Reuters.

The continued support from countries which provide more than a third of the court's cash, including Germany, Britain and France, averts the risk of paralysis at the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal.

The already financially-stretched court in The Hague — set up to hold to account leaders responsible for crimes that go unpunished at home — could have been unable to pay salaries.

It would have struggled to move ahead with cases such as those against Kenyan Deputy President William Ruto, former Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo and Ugandan rebel commander Dominic Ongwen.

Prosecutors incurred Israel's wrath this month when they said they would examine any crimes that may have occurred since June in the Palestinian territories, opening a path to possible charges against Israelis or Palestinians.

Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said the country was lobbying states to cut funding to what he described as a political body. He and other Israeli officials said their efforts would target Germany, Canada, Australia and Japan.

While few of the ICC's 122 member states welcome the diplomatic complications of a case dealing with the politically-loaded Middle East conflict, many of the biggest financial contributors said they would maintain their funding.

The bulk of the court's 141 million euros ($158 million) annual budget comes from the advanced economies of Europe and North Asia. More than half comes from the top seven donors.

'Critically important'

The German government — the second-largest donor, contributing about a 10th of the ICC budget in 2014 — said it "couldn't imagine" cutting funding.

French, British and Italian officials, representing the court's third, fourth and fifth largest contributors, told Reuters their governments would not change policy.

Canada, the seventh-biggest donor whose foreign minister was pelted with eggs for his country's pro-Israel stance in a recent visit to the West Bank, also said it was not reviewing its funding in light of Lieberman's request.

Japan, the top donor having given 20.4 million euros in 2014, and Spain, ranked six, declined to comment.

“The countries that support the court will continue to support the court,” said one European diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. “We respect the independence of the court and the prosecutor.”

An ICC spokesman said it expected all member states to continue to fully cooperate with the court and act according to their obligations under the treaty that established the body.

“Protecting the judicial and prosecutorial independence of the ICC is critically important,” he added.

That many of the states are Israeli allies complicates matters. But backing away from the court, regarded as a successor to the Nuremberg trials of Nazi leaders after World War II, is anathema for many members.

“Part of Germany’s support for the ICC is as a way of atoning for the fact that, 70 years ago, their country was a perpetrator of the kinds of international crimes the ICC is meant to deal with,” said Kevin Jon Heller, a professor at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies.

Little slack

Even so, the 12-year-old court is financially strapped. Its caseload, already including six African inquiries, is growing while member states are unwilling to significantly up contributions as many face economic problems at home.

There is very little slack — redundancies were made last year to create more positions focusing on the caseload and legal aid budgets have been slashed, prompting complaints from defence lawyers.

The budget will be stretched further by the unexpected arrival last week of Ongwen, which could force prosecutors to dip into a contingency fund.

As it stands, the tribunal is unlikely to have the resources to be able to closely investigate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the next three years, a former prosecution lawyer told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The Office of the Prosecutor at the ICC said there were “no timelines” for how long a preliminary examination would last.

The inquiry comes after the collapse of a high-profile case against Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta in December. Prosecutors dropped charges of crimes against humanity due to lack of evidence and said they faced insurmountable state obstruction.

“The prosecutors are getting themselves into a similar case as Kenya and at the end of the day the case is not going to be effective if Israel doesn’t cooperate,” said another diplomat.

But some legal experts said Israel would be wise to cooperate with the preliminary examination, which determines if crimes are serious enough to fall within the court’s statute and have not been investigated already.

If Israel were to conduct credible criminal investigations into possible crimes committed by its forces, the court would not launch a parallel case.

But for Israel, even that could be unpalatable, with a former military lawyer saying that few officials would be comfortable filing domestic charges to prevent an ICC trial.

“Our soldiers will say we are prepared to risk death but we are not prepared to be treated as criminals.”

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM/BEIRUT — Two Israeli soldiers and a Spanish peacekeeper were killed on Wednesday in an exchange of fire between Hizbollah and Israel, one of the most violent clashes between the two sides since a 2006 war.

The soldiers were killed when Hizbollah fired five missiles at a convoy of Israeli military vehicles on the frontier with Lebanon.

The peacekeeper, serving with a UN monitoring force in southern Lebanon, was killed as Israel responded with air strikes and artillery fire, a UN spokesman and Spanish officials said.

Hizbollah said one of its brigades in the area had carried out the attack, which appeared to be in retaliation for a January 18 Israeli air strike in southern Syria that killed several Hizbollah members and an Iranian general.

"Those behind the attack today will pay the full price," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned later on Wednesday, in televised remarks as he met with security chiefs.

The Israeli military confirmed the deaths of the soldiers, saying they had been attacked while driving in unmarked civilian vehicles on a road next to the fence that marks the hilly frontier. Seven other soldiers were wounded.

Andrea Tenenti, spokesman for the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which employs more than 10,000 troops, said the peacekeeper's death was under investigation.

The UN special coordinator for Lebanon urged all parties to refrain from any further destabilisation of the situation, while Lebanon's prime minister said his country was committed to the UN resolution that ended the 2006 war.

The 80km frontier has largely been quiet since 2006, when Hizbollah and Israel fought a 34-day war in which 120 people in Israel and more than 500 in Lebanon were killed.

Since the end of the war with Hamas militants in Gaza last year, Israel has warned of frictions on the northern border and the possibility that Hizbollah might dig tunnels to infiltrate Israel. In recent days it has moved more troops and military equipment into the area.

A retired Israeli army officer, Major-General Israel Ziv, said he believed Wednesday’s assault was an attempt by Hizbollah to draw Israel more deeply into the war in Syria, where Hizbollah is fighting alongside forces loyal to President Assad.

“Israel needs to protect its interests but not take any unnecessary steps that may pull us into the conflict in Syria,” he said.

Netanyahu, who faces a parliamentary election on March 17, said Israel was “prepared to act powerfully on all fronts”.

He accused Iran of trying to establish a “terror front” via Hizbollah from Syria and said Israel was “acting aggressively and responsibly against this attempt”. Iran is a major funder of Hizbollah, a Shiite group headed by Hassan Nasrallah.

In a communique, Hizbollah called Wednesday’s operation “statement number one”, indicating a further response to the Syrian incident was possible. Nasrallah is expected to announce the group’s formal reaction to Israel’s January 18 air strike on Friday.

In Beirut, celebratory gunfire rang out after the attack, while residents in the southern suburbs of the city, where Hizbollah is strong, packed their bags and prepared to evacuate neighbourhoods that were heavily bombed by Israel in 2006.

In Gaza, Palestinian militant groups praised Hizbollah. The United States said it condemned the Shiite group’s “act of violence” and urged all parties to refrain from actions that could escalate the situation.

With an Israeli election looming and Hizbollah deeply involved in support of Assad in Syria, there would appear to be little interest in a wider conflict for either side.

Regional analysts said they did not expect events to spiral.

“Netanyahu most likely realises that a prolonged military engagement in Lebanon could cost him the election,” said Ayham Kamel and Riccardo Fabiani of the Eurasia Group.

SANAA — Rebels who control the Yemeni capital beat back dozens of people marching in protest against them on Wednesday, firing automatic rifles in the air and striking protesters with batons and knives.

The violence highlighted the volatility in leaderless Yemen, after the president resigned last week under pressure by the Shiite rebels, known as Houthis, who had placed him under house arrest and demanded a greater share of power.

Witnesses say the rebels detained several protesters and journalists on Wednesday, and that around 10 people were lightly wounded in the scuffles. Yemeni newspaper Source Online said that one of its journalists had been taken by the Houthis but was later released.

The Houthis seized Sanaa in September and last week put the president, prime minister and top Cabinet members under house arrest, leading to their resignation.

Since then, demonstrations against the Houthis have been held across the country. The rebels detained around a dozen protesters and journalists on Monday, and opponents of the Houthis have called for their release as a sign of good faith.

On Wednesday, the leader of the Houthis called for a “peaceful transfer of power” after his forces released a presidential aide whose abduction had set in motion a violent escalation that led to the government’s resignation.

Abdel-Malek Al Houthi called for a meeting to be held in Sanaa on Friday to work toward resolving political and security issues. He also pledged to take a stand against “anarchists”.

The latest crisis in Yemen has plunged the impoverished country deeper into turmoil and pushed it closer to fracturing along sectarian and tribal lines. The violence and power vacuum has also raised concerns about Washington’s ability to continue targeting Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch, which it sees as the network’s most dangerous franchise.

MOGADISHU — A former top commander from Somalia's Al Qaeda-affiliated Al Shabab rebels, Zakariya Ismail Ahmed Hersi, called on his former comrades Tuesday to follow his lead and surrender to the country's internationally backed government.

"I call on and encourage all my friends to seek out a peaceful way of resolving all conflicts and towards reconciliation, as ... Al Shabab is now in total collapse," Hersi said in his first public appearance since his surrender last month.

Hersi, who was the subject of a $3 million bounty under the US State Department's "Rewards for Justice" programme, spoke to reporters from the information ministry in Mogadishu, where he appeared without guards.

It is not clear if Hersi — described as a former Al Shabab intelligence chief — will face trial, but Somalia's government said in a statement that it had offered surrendering militants the "opportunity to reintegrate with Somali society, and guarantees their safety".

It added that it hoped Hersi's surrender would "inspire others to follow his example and join the peace process".

Al Shabab are fighting to overthrow Somalia's internationally backed government, but have also carried out a string of revenge attacks in neighbouring nations.

Hersi surrendered in late December in the southern Gedo region, where Somalia borders Kenya and Ethiopia.

He was reportedly once close to former Al Shahab chief Ahmed Abdi Godane, who was killed by a US air strike in September. But Hersi suggested he was among a group of commanders who had already fallen out with Godane prior to his death — some of whom were killed in a purge.

"There were a number of us who opposed the leadership's approach and its flawed doctrine," Hersi said.

He said current Shabab leadership, under Godane's successor Ahmad Umar Abu Ubaidah, is carrying out a "distorted form of the holy jihad, which has resulted in countless innocent Somali citizens being killed".

Hersi also said his appearance on Tuesday in public was to put to rest those who said he had been tortured in government custody, or had been handed over to "foreign countries".

DUBAI — Bahraini Shiite opposition chief Sheikh Ali Salman rejected charges that he tried to overthrow the country's Sunni regime, as his trial opened Wednesday, a judicial source said.

Hours later, hundreds of supporters gathered outside Salman's home in a Manama suburb and clashed with riot police, who used tear gas to disperse them, witnesses said.

The judge decided to keep Salman behind bars and set the next hearing for February 25, his influential Al Wefaq bloc said.

Salman, 49, was arrested December 28, sparking near daily protests across the Shiite-majority but Sunni-ruled kingdom.

The Al Wefaq head has been accused of "promoting the overthrow and change of the political regime by force" and of inciting disobedience and hatred in public statements.

He was present at Wednesday's hearing before the higher criminal court, which was held under tight security and attended by representatives of several Western embassies.

Salman's defence team called for his release on bail as the opposition chief pleaded not guilty, judicial sources said.

Lawyer Jalila Al Sayed, a defence counsel, denounced what she called irregularities, saying authorities had manipulated Salman's speeches to build their case by removing peaceful comments.

"The conditions are not there for a fair trial," she told a press conference after the hearing.

Salman's arrest has also sparked condemnation from the United States, Iran and international human rights groups.

In a joint statement Wednesday, 109 parliamentarians from 43 countries called for Salman's "immediate release".

Salman himself, in a letter from prison published on Al Wefaq's website, likened himself to Nelson Mandela, who spent 27 years in South African prisons during his fight against apartheid.

"I am in prison for the same reasons that led to the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela — [the call for] equality, freedom and democracy," he said.

"Do not feel sad for my imprisonment. I am ready to spend my whole life as a prisoner for you and for your children's happiness."

Salman said he had been questioned over his calls for an end to "discrimination" against Shiites and for "a democratic regime" in Bahrain.

He urged the international community to "support the Bahraini people in democratically choosing their government... and protect their peaceful gatherings from [state] brutality".

TRIPOLI — Libyan carrier Buraq Airlines said on Wednesday it had suspended all flights for two days after one of its aircrews was killed in an attack on a luxury hotel in Tripoli.

It gave no details but a Libyan official has said a French national had been identified by his work identity card for the airline. Libyan websites said a crew of three were killed

Libyan carriers have struggled to keep the country connected to neighbouring states since fighting between factions vying for power in Libya damaged Tripoli's main airport last year, causing foreign airlines to pull out.

On Tuesday, gunmen stormed the luxury Corinthia Hotel, one of the last large hotels in Tripoli still open, killing around nine people, among them five foreigners.

"Buraq Airlines informs that all flights will be halted in the next two days due to reasons out of our control," the airline said on its Facebook website.

Turkish Airlines briefly returned last year to fly to Misrata, east of Tripoli, before halting flights this month due to repeated air strikes on that airport, part of a struggle between Libya's two rival governments.

Buraq had been trying to work around a flight embargo by the European Union by leasing planes and crew abroad. Libyan-registered planes are not to allowed to cross EU airspace — lengthening flights to Istanbul, the main foreign connection still available, as planes need to make a detour around Cyprus.

Travel has been further complicated by a ban imposed by Egypt and Tunis on flights to Tripoli and Misrata, which is under control of a rival government since a group called Libya Dawn seized Tripoli in summer.

The main eastern airport Benghazi has been closed since May due to fighting in the city.

The United Nations and most Western and Arab countries evacuated their diplomats in the summer during fighting between factions who are battling for control of the oil-producing state four years after the fall of Muammar Qadhafi.

GENEVA — The United Nations human rights chief said Tuesday he was “deeply disturbed” over the killing of 20 Egyptian protesters by security forces in clashes over the past few days.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights HH Prince Zeid also demanded in a statement that Cairo “take urgent measures to bring an end to the excessive use of force by security personnel”.

Prince Zeid’s comments came after 20 protesters were killed since Friday, including leading left-wing female activist Shaimaa Al Sabbagh, said to have been hit in the back by buckshot.

Two members of the security forces have also been killed.

And on Sunday, the fourth anniversary of the popular uprising that ousted long-time president Hosni Mubarak, Islamists clashed with security forces during rallies against President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi’s government.

Sisi ousted Mubarak’s successor, Mohamed Morsi, in 2013, and his Islamist supporters have regularly clashed with security forces since then.

Sunday’s death toll from clashes marked the highest for a single day since Sisi came to office after a landslide election victory last May.

Prince Zeid said “hundreds of people have died during protests against successive governments since January 2011, and there has been very little in the way of accountability.

“The lack of justice for past excesses by security forces simply encourages them to continue on the same path,” he warned, pointing out that this was “leading to more deaths and injuries, as we have seen in recent days”.

The statement said Sabbagh’s death was caught “on video and in photographs posted on the Internet after she had apparently been shot from behind during a peaceful protest in central Cairo”.

Prince Zeid’s condemnation came after the United States, Britain and Human Rights Watch denounced protesters’ killings.

Egypt brushed off the criticism, saying it was “unbalanced... and far from reality”.

“These statements overlook acts of murder, arson and terrorism that supporters of the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood have carried out,” a foreign ministry statement said.

Egypt has been rocked by wave of militant attacks targeting security forces since Morsi’s ouster, which the authorities blame on his Muslim Brotherhood.

The movement denies carrying out attacks, which have often been claimed by jihadist groups.

Prince Zeid also decried numerous arrests over the weekend.

Authorities said more than 500 backers of the blacklisted Brotherhood were also arrested, in the biggest daily sweep since Sisi came to power.

“All those who have been detained for protesting peacefully must be released,” Prince Zeid said, insisting that the long-term stability of Egypt is only possible if fundamental human rights are respected.

“Otherwise people’s grievances will fester and feelings of injustice will grow, creating fertile ground for further social and political unrest.”

Riyadh — US President Barack Obama led a heavyweight delegation to Saudi Arabia Tuesday to meet new King Salman and discussed the two countries' ongoing fight against the Islamic State (IS) group.

The leaders also tackled the issue of Iran's nuclear programme and human rights in the conservative kingdom, a senior US official said.

Riyadh has been part of the US-led coalition carrying out air strikes against IS since last year and is a long-time regional ally of Washington.

But analysts say Riyadh has grown dissatisfied with what it sees as a lack of American engagement in crises elsewhere, including Yemen and Libya, as the US looks to Asia.

There has also been unease in the kingdom about Obama's pursuit of a nuclear deal with Shiite-dominated Iran, the regional rival of Sunni-majority Saudi Arabia.

Members of the 29-member bipartisan US delegation, which included former Bush-era officials, said they wanted to show support for the US-Saudi relationship.

"I believe it is important that we demonstrate to the Saudis the importance that they represent to us," said James Baker, secretary of state during the first Gulf War against Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

"This is an extraordinarily critical and sensitive time in the Middle East when everything seems to be falling apart. And the kingdom in some way is becoming an island of stability," said Baker.

The Americans arrived for a four-hour stop from India, where Obama cut short a state visit following the death Friday of King Salman's predecessor, King Abdullah.

Saudi television showed King Salman, 79, welcoming Obama and his wife Michelle at the bottom of a red-carpeted ramp before a military band played the US and Saudi national anthems.

In contrast to Saudi women, required to dress head-to-toe in black, Mrs Obama wore dark slacks and a blue top with her hair uncovered.

Crown Prince Moqren and Mohammed Bin Nayef, the powerful interior minister who is second in line to the throne, were among those greeting the Americans.

The US president then boarded a black limousine taking him for talks and dinner with King Salman at central Riyadh's Erga Palace, the king's private residence where the smell of incense hung heavily in the air.

"Good to see you," Obama repeatedly said to his Saudi hosts before they dined on Arabic and Western dishes including shish tawook and baked lobster, before leaving the kingdom.

'Some problems' 

Obama last visited Saudi Arabia in March, when he held talks with King Abdullah.

A senior US official said Obama and King Salman discussed "the campaign against the Islamic State... the need to continue providing support to the opposition in Syria [and] the need to promote unity in Iraq".

Several other topics, including Riyadh's human rights record — heavily criticised by activists — and Iranian nuclear talks, were also broached during Tuesday's visit.

The US official said Obama discussed human rights "in broad terms", but did not raise with King Salman the case of blogger Raef Badawi, who was sentenced to 1,000 lashes for insulting Islam and whose case has attracted international concern.

'Major bulwark' 

against Iran

Former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft and Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state under George W. Bush, joined the US contingent, which included current Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan and General Lloyd Austin, head of US Central Command.

They had all accompanied Obama to India but Secretary of State John Kerry and Senator John McCain joined the president especially for his Saudi trip.

McCain, a Republican who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee, said the kingdom was emerging "as the major bulwark" against efforts by Iran to expand its influence in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen and Bahrain.

The senior US official, who spoke anonymously, said that while King Salman had not raised the topic of nuclear talks, he "did say Iran should not be allowed to build a nuclear weapon".

Obama is the latest leader to visit Riyadh since Friday.

His reception was the most elaborate but sheikhs, presidents and prime ministers from Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas all came to pay their respects.

Australia's Governor General Peter Cosgrove also arrived Tuesday.