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Construction has begun on approximately 60 new homes in a Jewish settlement in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem, the Israeli campaign group Peace Now says. The work, in East Talpiot settlement, is aimed at creating a belt around East Jerusalem that would sever it from the rest of the West Bank, the group says.

Settlements on occupied land are illegal under international law. Israel disputes this and also argues that East Jerusalem is not subject to its pledge to freeze settlement work. Israel's claim is based on its annexation of East Jerusalem, unrecognised by the international community, which it captured along with the West Bank and other Arab territory in the 1967 war.

Israelis view settlements such as East Talpiot as neighbourhoods of Jerusalem. Such areas tend to be well integrated into the city's infrastructure.

Ever since the Congress party and the Gandhi family lost their grip on power in 1989 no single party has been able to run India. At the last election the Congress party took only 145 seats out of 543, with 26% of the vote. It took office by sharing power with partners.

Despite the arrival of coalition politics, turnout has remained stable at around 60% and poor minorities are more likely to vote than anyone else.

There are three main groupings: the United Progressive Alliance, dominated by the Congress party; the National Democratic Alliance, built around the Bharatiya Janata Dal; and the Third Front, centred on the Communists

Trapped inside a tiny coastal strip no larger than 20 sq km, the last fighters of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) are almost out of time. Since the start of the year, the Sri Lankan military has stepped up its campaign. Outgunned, they have fallen back to an area designated a "no-fire zone", where civilians were told to gather to escape the fighting. In the past week, more than 500 rebel fighters were reported killed.

Alongside the LTTE fighters are tens of thousands of civilians, unwilling or unable to leave. The Sri Lankan government says they are being used as human shields, and independent humanitarian workers say there is no doubt that many who tried to escape have been shot by the Tigers. One UN worker described how a five-year-old boy was shot in the head as he tried to flee

The military says that, even when surrounded, many Tigers refused to surrender. Asked to explain how more than 500 Tigers had been killed in the most recent fighting, against an official military death toll of just 11, Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara, the military spokesman, said the rebels had been cut off and were unable to get fresh supplies: "They were pretty much out of ammunition, but they were determined to fight to the end. It was hand-to-hand fighting."

Is that what former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder said to you when you met with him here in Tehran in February? Ahmadinejad: Yes, he said it, as well.

We now hope to see concrete steps. This is good for everyone, but it is especially beneficial to the United States because the American position in the world is not exactly a good one. No one places any trust in the words of the Americans.

During my more than three years in office, I have visited more than 60 countries, where I was received with great affection by both the people on the street and those in the government. We have the support of 118 countries in the Non-Aligned Movement

US President Barack Obama has approved measures that will allow Cuban Americans to travel more freely to Cuba, his spokesman has said. Cuban-Americans will also be allowed to send more money to relatives in Cuba.

"The president has directed the secretaries of state, treasury and commerce to carry out the actions necessary to lift all restrictions on the ability of individuals to visit family members in Cuba and to send them remittances," said Mr Gibbs.

Restrictions would also be lifted on US telecommunications companies applying for licences to operate in Cuba, Mr Gibbs added.

Stanislav Belkovsky, the Russian political analyst and insider, gave sensational interviews in November 2007 to Die Welt and The Guardian, stating that Putin was worth approximately $40 billion. He said Putin was the beneficial owner of 37 percent of Surgutneftegaz ($18 billion), 4.5 percent of Gazprom ($13 billion), and half of a Swiss-based oil-trading company Gunvor ($10 billion)

Stanislav Belkovsky, the Russian political analyst and insider, gave sensational interviews in November 2007 to Die Welt and The Guardian, stating that Putin was worth approximately $40 billion. He said Putin was the beneficial owner of 37 percent of Surgutneftegaz ($18 billion), 4.5 percent of Gazprom ($13 billion), and half of a Swiss-based oil-trading company Gunvor ($10 billion).* If true, this fortune would make Putin one of the richest people in Europe and probably the world. It would also make him one of the most corrupt.

The legislation prohibits conflicts of interest, requires government workers to report income and property, and mandates them to report on coworker noncompliance. It is tailor-made for a behind-the-scenes assault on Putin's power and legitimacy.

Obama had promised in the presidential campaign to ease some restrictions on travel and remittances to Cuba, but insisted he would not end the trade embargo until Cuba showed progress toward democracy.

Until now, Cubans living in the United States had been allowed to travel to the island once a year and could send only $1,200 per person in cash to family members in Cuba.

President Obama, seeking to thaw long-frozen relations with Cuba, told a gathering of Western Hemisphere leaders on Friday that “the United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba,” and that he was willing to have his administration engage the Castro government on a wide array of issues.

in another twist, Cuba’s strongest ally at the summit, President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, no fan of the United States, was photographed at the meeting giving Mr. Obama a hearty handclasp and a broad smile.

Cuba is not on the official agenda here; indeed, Cuba, which has been barred from the Organization of American States since 1962, is not even on the guest list. But leaders in the hemisphere have spent months planning to make Cuba an issue here.

A new law signed by President Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan requires Shiite women to ask their husband's permission before leaving the home and forces them to have sexual intercourse. The West is outraged, and German politicians are mulling restrictions in development aid

The Afghan constitution provides for Shiites, which represent between 10 and 20 percent of the population, to pass their own family law based on their legal traditions. But the new law is particularly restrictive. Article 132, for example, mandates that "the wife is bound to give a positive response to the sexual desires of her husband." Furthermore, if her husband is not travelling or sick, the wife is required to have sex with him at least every fourth night. The only exception is if the wife herself is ill.

Article 133 is just as problematic. "The husband can stop the wife from any unnecessary act," it reads. Furthermore, the law requires wives to get the permission of their husbands before they leave the house, except in cases of emergency. In addition, the legal age of marriage for Shiite women has been lowered from 18 to 16.

One would be hard-pressed not to express astonishment at the speed and efficiency demonstrated by the Military Advocate General, Brigadier-General Avichai Mendelblit, and the Military Police investigation unit in probing the "combat soldiers' testimonials affair" that took place at the Rabin pre-military training academy.

the military advocate general needed just 11 days (including two Saturdays) to probe the accounts of combat soldiers in order to completely dispel the allegations.

The military advocate general picks apart the testimonials brick by brick. Not only does he present alternative versions to the two most damning claims - the alleged shooting of a Palestinian mother and her children as well as the killing of an elderly Palestinian woman - but he also expends great effort in concealing a series of other allegations of improper behavior, from spitting on home photographs of Palestinian families to uprooting orchards to the use of white phosphorus bombs. Apparently, soldiers informed military police investigators of two more incidents in which civilians were mistakenly shot to death. Mendelblit retroactively provides a rationale for the soldiers' predicament in these cases as well.

The recent surge in the Washington area's defense-contracting workforce would begin to ebb under Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates's latest budget proposal as the Pentagon moves to replace legions of private workers with full-time civil servants.

The budget would reverse a contracting boom, beginning after the 2001 terrorist attacks, in which the proportion of private contractors grew to 39 percent of the Pentagon's workforce. Gates said he wants to reduce that percentage to a pre-Sept. 11 level of 26 percent.

Roughly 7.5 percent of metropolitan Washington's labor force -- about 291,000 jobs -- is tied to Pentagon contracting. Defense analysts and government contracting experts said Gates's move could affect companies such as CACI and SAIC, which do large amounts of government contracting work, offering technical services, administrative support, database outsourcing and contract management.