Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that Russia's air campaign in Syria will be "temporary" and that the Syrian crisis will be resolved by political means, the pro-Kremlin RIA Novosti is reporting.
Putin met with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei today in Tehran. The issue of the Syrian crisis and the fight against IS were expected to be major issues in the talks, although reports from the discussions have so far focussed on the Syrian crisis and did not mention IS specifically.
Even this RIA Novosti report about Russia's air campaign -- which Moscow has insisted is an anti-IS campaign although most of its air strikes seem not to have targeted IS -- did not mention IS by name.
"This operation will not be continued indefinitely, I initially spoke about it having a temporary character. This is connected with the offensive operations of the National Syrian army to suppress terror organizations," Putin was quoted as saying.
France's security services are overloaded and attacks and planned attacks have been thwarted "by pure luck," according to the country's former top terror investigator.
Judge Marc Trevidic, who spent a decade leading counterterrorism investigations for the French courts, told France Inter radio today that French security and intelligence services are "simply overloaded."
"On the whole, during the last few years, we realized that we are not coping anymore," Trevidic said, according to Reuters.
"Those who were really under surveillance... we were not even able to stop them from going to Syria... we couldn't stop them from coming back."
France has begun to bury the victims of the November 13 Paris attacks, AFP is reporting.
The families of some of the victims have been reaching out on social media in order to personalize tributes for their loved ones, AFP says, noting that the family of one victim, 33-year-old Aurelie de Peretti, "launched a worldwide appeal for an artist to decorate de Peretti's coffin in a manner that befit the rock fan."
The family have received a number of proposals from several street artists.
Of the 130 people who died in the attacks, 105 were French. They ranged in age from 23 to 41.
Belgian Education Minister Joëlle Milquet has given schools a series of security recommendations following the government's decision to close schools in the Brussels region today amid an ongoing security threat, RTBF reports.
The guidelines include suggestions that schools minimize gatherings of people outside schools and that they close access points during the day, leaving only one entrance that can be continously monitored.
Schools have also been asked to consider implementing "safe rooms" where students could protect themselves in the event of any incidents.
Tajik, Algerian and Belgian IS militants have appeared in a new video praising the November 13 attacks in Paris, according to analyst Romain Caillet.
Rita Katz of the SITE Intelligence Group says the video included three Tajik militants and calls for attacks on "Jews and Christians."
Katz also points out that in the days since the November 13 Paris attacks, IS has released 13 videos and three photo reports from its so-called "provinces" commenting on the attacks.
Seven of the videos featured French speakers, according to Katz.
The International Tennis Federation (ITF) says that the Davis Cup final is set to go ahead as planned in Ghent, Belgium on November 27, despite the current security situation in Belgium.
Belgium hosts Britain in the three-day final.
In a statement on the Davis Cup website, the ITF and the Royal Belgian Tennis Federation said that they are "in consultation with the relevant officials and our risk assessment and security advisers, are closely monitoring the situation in Belgium and specifically in Ghent."
Several photos of the French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle, which begins anti-IS air strikes today, have been shared on Twitter.
The U.S. Mission to NATO tweeted these images and pointed out that the Charles de Gaulle is the largest west European war ship in commission.
CNN's security correspondent Jim Sciutto shared these photos of warplanes undergoing test flights on the Charles de Gaulle prior to anti-IS strikes.
The Telegraph shared this AFP photo of a French Rafale jet loaded with bombs catapulted from the aircraft carrier.
RIA Novosti is reporting that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei spent over 90 minutes in talks that included discussion of the Syrian crisis.
In the first comments to reporters after the meeting, however, Putin's press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, did not mention the Islamic State group.
Instead, Peskov said that Putin and Khamenei had stressed that Syria's fate should be decided by the Syrian people.
"There was an extremely detailed exhange of views, and the consensus of Moscow and Tehran was emphasized regardlng it being unacceptable for options for a political solution to be dictated from the outside and that there is no alternative but for the Syrian people themselves to implement this political method," Peskov said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was informed on November 20 about contact between the Russian military and France regarding operations in Syria, Putin's press secretary Dmitri Peskov has told the Russian media today.
No further details were given.
As Belgians and others continue to flood Twitter with amusing pictures of cats following advice from Belgian police not to tweet details of police antiterror operations, the popular spoof account @DarthPutinKGB has shared this photoshopped image of Russian President Vladimir Putin riding a giant kitten.
Putin is currently meeting with the Iranian leadership in Tehran, where he is expected to discuss the Syrian crisis and in particular the fight against IS.