The defence minister in Yemen survived an assassination attempt that left 12 people dead, when a bomb exploded near his office in the capital Sana’a.

Tareq Al-Hashemi, Iraq’s vice-president, was sentenced to death in absentia for alleged murder. He blames the prime minister Nuri Al-Maliki, denouncing the trial as being politically motivated.

A group of jihadists killed 16 Egyptian soldiers in an attack near the border with Gaza and Israel. Egypt later launched air strikes against suspected jihadists nearby an claimed to have killed over 20.

Fierce battles continued in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo. Syria’s prime minister Riyad Hijab defected to Jordan.

Opposition leaders in Syria met in Moscow to discuss a political solution to the crisis. Nawaf al-Fares, the Syrian ambassador to Iraq, defecting.

Egypt’s Supreme Constitutional Court rejected President Mohamed Morsi’s move to reinstate the parliament. It was dissolved last month after the court ruled the election was partially unconstitutional.

Preliminary results suggested that a party deemed to be secular and fairly liberal won the most votes in Libya’s firt post-Qaddafi general election.

Syria agreed to an April 10th deadline to start implementing a peace plan drafted by the UN-Arab League, but it still insists it will not pull its troops out of cities until opposition forces disarm.

Syria’s deputy oil minister resigned and joined the side of the rebel opposition. Abdo Hussameldin is the most senior figure to leave Bashar Assad’s regime. More than 8,000 people have died in the violence since the uprising began.

Militants linked to Al-Qaeda in Yemen have killed more than 100 people in clashes in southern Yemen.

A wave of bombings in Iraq killed scores of people. Shia neighbourhoods in Baghdad and other cities were the primary targets.

Voters in Yemen were asked to rubber-stamp the promotion of Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi, the vice-president, to the presidency. He was the only candidate in the presidential vote.

Egypt celebrated its first anniversary of the protests which led to Hosni Mubarak’s departure from power. In the country’s first free parliamentary elections, the Muslim Brotherhood and their hardline Salafi rivals won a joint 70% of the seats.

A report by the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry said the authorities had used ‘excessive force’ in a crackdown earlier this year against mostly Shia pro-democracy protesters.

Saif Al-Islam Qaddafi was caught in southern Libya, as was Muammar Qaddafi’s security chief Abdullah al-Senussi. Both are wanted by the International Criminal Court.

Yemen’s president Ali Abdullah Saleh signed an agreement brokered by the GCC, saying he would stand down and hand power to his vice-president.

Dozens of people were killed in Yemen during protests against President Saleh. Though he has promised to step down, he showed no sign of actually doing so.

More than 20 people were killed as protests broke out in the Syrian city of Homs. According to the UN, over 3,000 people have been killed since the Syrian unrests began in March.

Israeli solider Gilad Shalit, who had been held captive for more than five years by Hamas, was freed in exchange for 1,027 Palestinian soliders.

Russia and China vetoed a European-sponsored resolution in the UN Security Council condmening a crackdown on pro-democracy protesters by the Syrian government that has killed some 3,000 people.