Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi revealed on Monday that a number of Hizbullah members around the world are involved in corruption and money laundering cases, pointing out that several were detained in Lebanon on the same charges.

“A number of cases have been unveiled related to Hizbullah's illegal activity and evading custom fees and taxes in Beirut's port and airport,” Rifi said in an interview with the Saudi newspaper al-Watan.

The U.S. embassy in Saudi Arabia said it had suspended consular services in the kingdom for two days due to "heightened security concerns", after warning of threats against Western oil workers.

All services in Riyadh and at the consulates in Jeddah and Dhahran have been canceled for Sunday and Monday, it said in a statement posted on its website Saturday.

Western oil workers in Saudi Arabia risk being attacked or kidnapped by "terrorist" groups in the OPEC kingpin, the U.S. embassy in Riyadh said in a warning posted online.

The U.S. mission said it "has information stating that, as of early March, individuals associated with a terrorist organisation could be targeting Western oil workers, possibly to include those U.S. citizens working for oil companies in the Eastern Province, for an attack(s) and/or kidnapping(s)".

The $12 billion pledged by three Arab states to Egypt at an international conference this weekend is a message of "clear political support" to President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, a minister said Saturday.

Sisi, who ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 and brutally crushed his supporters, has sought to persuade allies that his country is on the front lines of a war against regional militants. 

Three British girls who crossed into Syria to join the Islamic State group were helped by a Syrian working as a spy for a country in the U.S.-led coalition, Turkey's foreign minister said Friday.

Meanwhile, video footage emerged purportedly showing the agent helping the girls into a car in southeastern Turkey on their way to Syria.

Talks aimed at pulling Yemen out of crisis are open to the Shiite Huthi militia which seized power in Sanaa last month, Qatar's Foreign Minister Khalid al-Attiyah said on Thursday.

The Huthis have opposed any change in venue for U.N.-brokered talks, which broke down after Western-backed President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi escaped from house arrest in Sanaa last month.

The beheading of a gang leader in Saudi Arabia on Thursday raised the number of executions carried out this year to 44, already more than half the total for 2014.

Amnesty International says Saudi Arabia is "well on track" to far exceed previous annual execution records.

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has said he would visit Beirut mid-April to attend a ceremony on the first shipment of $3 billion worth of weapons paid for by Saudi Arabia.

However, Le Drian told pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat in remarks published on Thursday that the delivery of helicopters, missiles, warships, telecommunications equipment and other defense material will take three years to complete.

Saudi Arabia has recalled its ambassador to Stockholm, the Swedish Foreign Ministry said Wednesday, as a rift between the two countries deepened with Sweden cutting military ties after a row over a human rights speech.

"Diplomatic relations are not broken. But Saudi Arabia's ambassador has been recalled," foreign ministry spokesman Erik Boman told AFP.

Saudi Arabia on Wednesday beheaded three people convicted of smuggling narcotics into the ultra-conservative kingdom, where executions have accelerated this year, the interior ministry said.

Amnesty International warned that the kingdom was "well on track" to surpass its previous annual execution record, on the back of this "unprecedented spike" in killings.