Veteran U.S. diplomats who have tussled with some of the globe's greatest foreign policy challenges warned Wednesday that in a turbulent world American diplomacy remains essential for peace and stability.

President Barack Obama will lead a U.N. Security Council session on the threat of foreign fighters in Iraq and Syria on September 25, a US official said Wednesday.

The meeting will take place at the level of heads of state or government and coincide with the annual United Nations General Assembly, according to U.S. envoy Samantha Power. 

Fiji's army chief on Thursday dismissed as "sick" a suggestion the Pacific nation's Muslim minority will face a backlash if 45 U.N. peacekeepers taken hostage by Islamic rebels in the Golan Heights are harmed.

Brigadier General Mosese Tikoitoga also defended the action of his troops in surrendering to al-Qaida-linked Al-Nusra Front rebels, even though a contingent of 75 Filipino peacekeepers who defied an order to lay down their weapons all escaped unscathed.

Three Canadians were directly involved in the kidnapping of two American journalists by Islamist militants in Syria, Canada's public broadcaster reported Wednesday.

Citing unnamed sources, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation said the trio -- whose identities are unknown -- forced captives Theo Curtis and Matt Schrier to reveal their computer passwords, then drained their bank accounts and racked up credit card bills.

The U.N. Security Council on Wednesday demanded the release of 45 Fijian peacekeepers held in the Golan Heights by Syrian al-Nusra Front rebels.

The 15 members of the council unanimously approved a declaration condemning "in the strongest terms" the detention of the Fijians.

The Syrian army has bombed and destroyed explosive-rigged vehicles that were “destined for Lebanese territory” as part of a plot aimed at waging simultaneous attacks on “civilian and military places,” a media report said on Wednesday.

A car carrying a license plate of the U.S. state of New Jersey appears in the TV report, which was filmed in an unspecified location in the countryside of the Syrian Qalamun border region and broadcast by Hizbullah's al-Manar television.

Sixteen people, among them 10 children, were killed in a government air raid in east Syria on Wednesday, a monitor said, but state media blamed the deaths on jihadist militants.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor, said an air strike hit a bus on the road between eastern Deir Ezzor province and Damascus as it passed through the Shula area.

Britain joined the United States on the frontline against the Islamic State on Wednesday after a British hostage's life was threatened in a gruesome video, with the government saying it would not rule out taking part in air strikes if necessary.

The March 8 alliance and Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat completely reject any bargain in the case of the abducted Lebanese security personnel, As Safir newspaper reported on Wednesday.

“No agreement (with gunmen) will be made,” sources close to the March 8 coalition told the newspaper, warning of the risks posed by such a demeanor.

A young French mother whose daughter had been smuggled out of the country by her father arrived home with the two-year-old girl on Wednesday after they were reunited earlier in Turkey.