Tunisian police arrested some 200 members of the hardline Islamist Ansar al-Sharia in weekend clashes that erupted after a ban on their congress, Prime Minister Ali Larayedh said in remarks published on Monday.

"Those who have been arrested number 200," Larayedh said at the Doha Forum in the Gulf state of Qatar, quoted by the Arabic daily al-Hayat.

Qatar's sovereign wealth fund has bought a 40-percent stake in a new 290,000-square meter skyscraper project near the center of Milan with a commercial value of 2.0 billion euros ($2.6 billion), the companies said on Friday.

The project has already involved the construction of the skyscraper headquarters of Italy's biggest bank UniCredit by Argentine architect Cesar Pelli.

Syria's opposition will consult with backers Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey before it decides whether to take part in a peace conference proposed by the United States and Russia, its acting chief said Monday.

"It is too early to decide whether or not we will take part, because the circumstances of this conference are not yet clear. There is no agenda or calendar yet," said the opposition National Coalition's acting head George Sabra.

Qatar has strongly condemned an al-Qaida-linked suicide attack that targeted its officials in Somalia's capital, in a statement on the official QNA news agency.

About 11 people were killed Sunday in Mogadishu when a suicide attacker from the al-Qaida-linked Shebab insurgents rammed a car laden with explosives into a convoy carrying four Qatari officials, police said.

Lebanese pilgrims, who have been held hostage in Syria since May last year, appeared on a videotape broadcast by two television stations on Saturday and Sunday, as their families warned that they "do not want to see any Turk" in Lebanon after May 22 should Turkey fail to secure the release of their loved ones.

The men were seen talking in the footage but the accompanying audio was inaudible when the video was broadcast by al-Jazeera satellite TV station on Saturday.

Some 20,000 Muslims from Croatia and abroad gathered in the Adriatic port city of Rijeka on Saturday to inaugurate an Islamic center and the third mosque in the staunchly Catholic country.

"Multiculturalism and diversity are among basic values on which the European Union is built," the head of EU delegation here, Paul Vandoren, said, a reminder that Croatia was set to join the bloc on July 1.

The families of the pilgrims held in Syria's Aazaz area staged a sit-in near the Turkish Pegasus Airlines in Beirut on Saturday to protest the ongoing abduction of their loved ones, reported the National News Agency.

The protesters prevented the airlines staff from heading to their offices located near the Bourj al-Murr area.

Energy-rich Qatar and a consortium led by Total of France have signed a joint venture agreement to build a $1.5 billion petroleum refinery in the Gulf state, local media reported on Monday.

The refinery will have a daily production capacity of 146,000 barrels of petroleum products, reports said.

Qatar's prime minister on Tuesday called on the international community to support efforts to end the Syrian conflict after talks with the German chancellor who warned the whole region faced destabilization.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani stressed the need for a solution "as quickly as possible", saying the Syrian people had sacrificed a lot during more than two years of violence.

Energy-rich Qatar has agreed to buy bonds from cash-strapped Egypt worth $3 billion over and above a previously announced aid package, Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani said on Wednesday.

The announcement comes as Cairo holds difficult talks with the International Monetary Fund over a loan of $4.8 billion as part of a financing program to lift Egypt's economy out of crisis.