Attack on Syria gas line sets off blaze
DAMASCUS, Syria -- Attackers struck a gas pipeline Saturday in eastern Syria, leaving it ablaze but causing no casualties, state news agency SANA reported, the latest incidence of sabotage against Syria's oil and gas infrastructure.
As in the past, no one claimed responsibility for the attack. Syria's nearly 10-year conflict, which has killed about half a million people, also has badly affected oil and gas fields, many of which are outside government control.
SANA said the attack occurred in the area known as Abu Khashab in the eastern province of Deir el-Zour that borders Iraq.
Sleeper cells of the Islamic State group are known to be active in the area and have targeted government forces and U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters in eastern Syria.
Earlier Saturday, Syria's oil ministry said gas leakage in a well in central Syria was quickly controlled. It did not say whether the leakage was the result of an act of sabotage or an accident.
Abducted Nigerians freed after 2 weeks
LAGOS, Nigeria -- An official says 42 people including 27 students who were abducted two weeks ago from a school in northern Nigeria have been freed.
The chief press secretary for the Niger state governor, Mary Noel-Berje, said Saturday that those released arrived in the state capital, Minna.
The students, teachers and family members were abducted by gunmen from the Government Science College Kagara.
Their release was announced a day after police said gunmen had abducted 317 girls from a boarding school elsewhere in northern Nigeria, in Zamfara state. One resident said the gunmen also attacked a nearby military camp and checkpoint, preventing soldiers from interfering with the mass abduction.
Several large groups operate in Zamfara state, described by the government as bandits, and are known to kidnap for money and to push for the release of their members from jail.
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari said Friday that the government's primary objective is to get all the school hostages returned safe and unharmed.
Libyans admit missing reporter detained
CAIRO -- Authorities in western Libya revealed Saturday that they had detained a journalist, two days after he disappeared in the capital, Tripoli, after a news conference with the prime minister.
Libyan television journalist Ziyad al-Warfali disappeared after the conference with newly appointed Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Mohammed Dbeibah late Thursday, the Libyan media authority said in a statement.
The statement said al-Warfali had been arrested but did not mention which of Libya's many security agencies detained him. It also did not reveal his whereabouts, saying only that he would be released "soon."
The statement was issued after al-Warfali's family and employer spoke out about his disappearance.
At the news conference, al-Warfali asked about the fate of Hannibal Gadhafi, the son of Libya's late leader, Moammar Gadhafi, who has been imprisoned in Lebanon, according to the Libyan Organization for Independent Media.
He also asked about the unification of Libya's army, which requires dismantling several militias that have profited from years of chaos in the oil-rich North African country.
The media authority said al-Warfali had not obtained the proper work permit required for journalists in Libya.
The Libyan capital is controlled by an array of armed groups and militias, loosely allied with a U.N.-supported government. Those militias have proved difficult for the Tripoli government to control in the past.
Last week, Fathi Bashagha, the powerful interior minister of Libya's U.N.-backed government, survived an ambush by gunmen on his motorcade in Tripoli. Bashagha's office called the attack an "attempted assassination."
Saudis say missile, drone assaults foiled
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- Saudi Arabia said Saturday that it intercepted a missile attack over its capital and bomb-laden drones targeting a southern province, the latest in a series of airborne assaults it has blamed on Yemen's Houthi rebels.
The Saudi-led military coalition fighting in Yemen's yearslong war announced the Iran-allied rebels had launched a ballistic missile toward Riyadh and several booby-trapped drones toward the province of Jizan. No casualties or damages were initially reported. There was no immediate comment from the Houthis.
A day earlier in the tense Middle East, a mysterious explosion struck an Israeli-owned ship in the Gulf of Oman, renewing concerns about ship security in the same site of a spate of suspected attacks on oil tankers in 2019 that the U.S. Navy blamed on Iran.
The state-owned Al-Ekhbariya TV posted footage of what appeared to be explosions in the air over Riyadh. Social media users also posted videos, with some showing residents shrieking as they watched the fiery blast.
As Yemen's war grinds on, Houthi missile and drone attacks on the kingdom have become increasingly common, only rarely causing damage.