The United States is in discussions with Qatar on the status of five Taliban figures who may be free to return to Afghanistan a year after their release in a U.S. prisoner swap, the head of the CIA said Sunday.

"I want to make sure that they're not going to be allowed to return to the fight," Central Intelligence Agency director John Brennan said on CBS talk show "Face the Nation."

Gas-rich Qatar pledged $50 million on Thursday to help Indonesia shelter Muslim Rohingya migrants from Myanmar, the official QNA news agency reported.

Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand have all prevented vessels overloaded with starving migrants from Bangladesh and from Myanmar's ethnic Rohingya minority from landing on their shores.

A number of Syrian opposition factions will gather in Cairo next month to form a new coalition as an alternative to an exiled West-backed alliance, officials said Saturday.

More than 200 figures from the armed and civilian opposition factions are to attend the June 8-9 gathering and discuss a roadmap aimed at ending the four-year war in Syria.

From a distance it could be a scene from Qatar's ancient past, long before the country's modern-day wealth was secured by the discovery of gas and oil.

Several kilometers (miles) off the coast of southern Qatar, five traditional dhow boats bob gently up and down on the becalmed blue-green waters of the Gulf.

The Afghan Taliban said Wednesday that a delegation from its Qatar-based political office had visited Iran for talks, as Kabul has made repeated overtures to the insurgent group to reopen peace negotiations.

In a statement announcing the visit, the Taliban's spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid presented the talks as if they were a meeting between two governments, rather than that of a militant group and a neighbor.

A delegation from the Afghan Taliban's Qatar-based political office is in Tehran for talks, Iranian media reported Tuesday.

The visitors, headed by Tayyab Agha, head of the political bureau, met Iranian security officials and discussed regional issues, "particularly developments in the Islamic world," Tasnim news agency said.

An Emirati court has jailed five Qatari intelligence officers for insulting the leadership of the United Arab Emirates, local media said Tuesday.

The State Security court sentenced Ali al-Hammadi, who is the only defendant in custody, to 10 years in jail, and fined him one million dirhams ($272,000), Ittihad newspaper reported.

A prominent Qatar-based Muslim cleric said Sunday that death sentences handed down by an Egyptian court against himself and deposed Islamist president Mohamed Morsi violated Islam.

Egyptian-born preacher Yusuf al-Qaradawi said the death sentences handed down on Saturday against more than 100 defendants, who also included Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Badie, ran contrary to Islamic law.

President Barack Obama tried to reassure America's Gulf allies Thursday that engaging with Iran would not come at their expense, at a Camp David summit that proved short on concrete outcomes.

Pledging to counter external threats to Gulf states amid Iran's growing role in the region, Obama said his security commitment to the decades-old allies was "ironclad."  

Qataris have for the first time voted two women in to the Gulf emirate's only directly elected body, the Central Municipal Council, officials announced on Thursday.

Sheikha Jufairi and Fatma Al-Kuwari both won seats in Wednesday's election to the 29-member council, which has advisory but no legislative powers.