John Key has promised the SIS will get more powers and staff to respond rapidly to potential threats by NZ-based supporters of Islamic State.

Iraqi forces have driven militants from Jurf Al-Sakhar, but all that’s left is a shell. The town is now emptied of its 80,000 residents, and building after building has been destroyed.

Prime Minister John Key has laid out his Government' agenda for the next three years, with housing and the fight against terror groups at the top of the list.

A New Zealand exporter has won a $450,000 judgment against the suppliers of "defective" Philippine bananas.

Keith Locke writes: New Zealanders are right to be concerned about the rise of the Islamic State (Isis), but our best contribution would be to provide more humanitarian support.

PM John Key said New Zealand helping to train Iraqi troops was among the options the Government would consider when ruling on its contribution to the fight against Isis.

Islamic State (Isis) militants are believed to be learning to fly three captured fighter jets, which could signal the terrorist group taking to the air for the first time.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott expects Australia to receive Iraqi government approval to send in special forces members within days.

Prime Minister John Key says it would be "odd" if New Zealand did not play any part in action against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria but signalled he was still reluctant to send in....

If New Zealand decides to send forces to support an international response to the "Islamic State" in Iraq and Syria (Isis), the decision will be made by the Government not Parliament, the Prime Minister has explained.

Any commitment of military assistance to counter Islamic State militants in Iraq should not make NZ more of a target for terrorism, Prime Minister John Key says.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott is playing down the prospect of deploying Australian combat troops on the ground in Iraq.

The argument that if we don't join the American crusade to wipe out Muslim fanatics in Iraq and Syria, they'll swoop down to Godzone and behead us all is a rerun of the old Vietnam War domino theory....

PM says any plan to give assistance to efforts against militants will probably be debated in Parliament but the ultimate decision is the Government's alone.

NZ's elite SAS personnel aren't yet on standby for deployment to combat Islamic State militants - but the PM can't rule out sending them in if asked.

The Prince of Wales has written an impassioned letter to Christians in Iraq speaking of his "heartbreak" at their suffering at the hands of Jihadists.

An Iraqi soldier survived a mass execution carried out by Islamic State militants (Isis) by dropping to the floor and pretending to be dead.

A Briton will be the next hostage murdered by Islamist terrorists, the British extremist known as "Jihadi John" threatened in a beheading video released yesterday.

Obama undeterred as air strikes continue even though jihadists say they will execute more US journalists

David Cameron has said that it is "increasingly likely" that a British jihadist beheaded American journalist James Foley

Up to 80 Yazidis have been reported killed by Isis (Islamic State) fighters in the biggest massacre so far of the Iraqi minority.

Hundreds of Yazidi women who were captured by Islamic extremists are being subjected to deliberate attempts to co-opt them into service as the wives of fighters.

The heads are stuck on thin metal poles above a wrought iron fence in the Islamic State's Syria stronghold, Raqqa.

Australia is considering joining the United States in a limited military operation to rescue as many as 30,000 Iraqi refugees trapped on a barren mountain in the north.

America is to supply weapons directly to Kurdish fighters in Iraq for the first time, to help the lightly armed forces in the north push back jihadist rebels, assisted by US air power.

US air strikes are boosting Kurdish morale as they hit Isis fighters, and a road is now open for thousands of Yazidis cut off in the mountains.

Up to 150,000 desperate refugees were still isolated on a barren stretch of mountain in Iraq, surrounded by Islamic extremists despite a major international intervention.