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Xinhua Middle East news summary at 2200 GMT, March 1

Xinhua, March 2, 2015 Adjust font size:

Egypt's Supreme Constitutional Court on Sunday ruled an electoral law article which regulates the division of the electoral districts of the country's upcoming parliamentary elections as unconstitutional, a ruling that may delay the voting set for March 21, state-run Nile TV reported.

Egypt's parliamentary polls are supposed to be held in stages from March 21 to May 7, the first since the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi by then army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in July 2013. (Egypt-Electoral Law)

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CAIRO -- Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ordered Sunday to redraft an electoral law article which was ruled unconstitutional within one month, state-run Nile TV reported.

Sisi also demanded that "legal measures be considered to avoid delaying the elections," a statement from his office said. (Egypt-President-Electoral Law)

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TIKRIT, Iraq -- Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announced on Sunday evening the commencement of major offensive to free the towns seized earlier by the Islamic State (IS) militants in Iraq's northern central province of Salahudin, a provincial official told Xinhua.

The order to launch the offensive came as Abadi, who is also the Commander-in-Chief of the Iraqi armed forces, paid a surprise visit to the provincial operations command in the city of Samarra, some 120 km north of the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, said Sheikh Jasim al-Jbarra, the head of the security committee in Salahudin provincial council. (Iraq-Offensive-IS)

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ALGIERS -- The Malian government and six rebel fractions from the northern Mali on Sunday signed a peace agreement in the Algerian capital of Algiers to put an end to the hostilities in the violent ridden northern Mali.

This peace and reconciliation agreement has been achieved following four dialogue rounds since last July in Algiers under the supervision of Algeria-led international mediation. (Mali-Agreement)

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DAMASCUS -- The Islamic State (IS) militants on Sunday released 19 Christian Assyrians it had kidnapped last month, a monitoring group reported.

The 19 people are the first batch of 29 Assyrians the sharia court of the IS exonerated on Saturday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. (IS-Christian-Release) Endit