Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi approved a counter-terrorism law assailed by rights groups as making permanent powers usually reserved for a state of emergency.
Tens of thousands took to the streets of Baghdad to protest economic conditions and corruption. The demonstrations are bringing together Sunnis, Shi'ites and leftists.
Islamist rebels led by al-Qaeda affiliate Nusra Front have seized new territory in northwestern Syria, and issued a pledge to take Damascus and topple the regime.
Protests around the commemoration of Egypt's 2011 revolution may be dominated by Islamist Morsi supporters, but an early demonstration called by a socialist party saw one killed.
An Egyptian court in Baheira governorate sentenced student Karim Ashraf Mohamed al-Banna to three years in prison for announcing on Facebook that he is an atheist.
Blogger Raif Badawi, convicted of "offenses to Islamic precepts" in Saudi Arabia, is to receieve 1,000 lashes at the start of his 15-year prison term.
A sweeping "anti-terrorism" decree and expanded crackdown on opposition come as Egypt's President al-Sisi is making overtures to the Copts and invoking pluralism.
Protests were held in the Bahraini island city of Sitra against an agreement signed between the kingdom and Great Britain to establish a new military base in the Persian Gulf state.
Protesters in military-ruled Thailand have been silently reading 1984 in public to outwit a ban on gatherings—leading to the book itself being banned. Egypt could be next.
French philosopher Bernard Henri Levy was expelled from Tunisia following mass demonsrations that accused him of coming to the country to plot with Libyan jihadists.
Members of Syria's Alawite sect took to the streets of Homs to protest a deadly car bomb attack on an elementary school, for the first time taking up anti-regime slogans.
In a wave of attacks known as "Black Friday," several Libyan army officers and civil activists were assassinated—including two young bloggers who advocated peace and democracy.
