International media outlets confirmed that the Saudi authorities had carried out a campaign of arrests that included senior princes of the royal family during the past two days.

Saudi Arabia expanded a rare freeze on pilgrimages to the Muslim holy cities of Mecca and Medina by foreigners to also include Saudi citizens and residents due to concerns about the new coronavirus, state news agency SPA reported.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia and Kuwait decided to suspend the travel of all GCC citizens using the Identity Card until further notice, due to coronavirus outbreak.

The Foreign Affairs Ministry pointed out to the temporary precautionary measures taken by Saudi Arabia to suspend the use of the national identity card for Saudi and GCC nationals to travel to or from Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia on Thursday suspended visas for visits to Islam's holiest sites for the "umrah" pilgrimage, an unprecedented move triggered by coronavirus fears that raises questions over the annual hajj.

Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Bahrain have agreed to resume postal services to Qatar almost three years after they were stopped due to a political dispute, the United Nations said on Monday.

Qatar has accused Saudi Arabia of allowing a protracted dispute to hinder Gulf Arab coordination over the coronavirus outbreak by denying the Qatari health minister timely access to a meeting of regional health ministers in Riyadh.

On Wednesday, the Kuwaiti parliament approved the divided zone agreement with Saudi Arabia by 55 votes and rejected 7 votes.

Two UN officials will report on Wednesday that there is enough evidence suggesting that Saudi Arabia had hacked Amazon.com Inc founder Jeff Bezos' phone and both the kingdom and the United States should investigate, a person familiar with the matter said.

Qatar’s foreign minister said recent talks had broken a protracted stalemate with Saudi Arabia and that Doha would study demands by its Gulf rivals but not turn its back on ally Turkey.

Saudi Aramco's shares begin trading domestically on Wednesday, after the energy behemoth raised $25.6 billion in the world's biggest initial public offering.

Qatar's Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani missed the 40th Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

The Pentagon announced on Tuesday it was halting operational training of all Saudi Arabian military personnel in the United States until further notice after a Saudi Air Force lieutenant shot and killed three people last week at a base in Florida.

The United Nations is "unable to independently corroborate" that missiles and drones used in attacks on Saudi oil facilities in September "are of Iranian origin," Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council on Tuesday.

The United States on Tuesday barred from entering the country Mohammed al Otaibi, the former Saudi consul general in Istanbul in October 2018, when Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was killed there, the U.S. State Department said.

Jackhammers and cranes gather dust at half-built Qatari-funded hotel sites in a Saudi city hit hard by an abrupt diplomatic rupture, but signs of thawing cross-border ties are reviving economic hopes.

Qatar's minister of state for foreign affairs arrived in Saudi Arabia on Monday, state news agency QNA said, for a preparatory meeting ahead of an annual summit of Gulf Cooperation Council leaders that could see a thaw in a 2-1/2-year Gulf crisis.

For decades, criminals in Saudi Arabia were lined up after Friday prayers at a central Riyadh plaza and beheaded by sword in a gruesome public spectacle overseen by the religious police.

The Yemeni government and southern separatists have failed to meet a deadline to establish a power-sharing government, an ominous sign for hopes of a wider deal to end years of war.

Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al Sabah revealed yesterday the date Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE with reconcile with Qatar, the Anadolu Agency reported.