he issue of Pte Manning's treatment has been raised with President Obama He said he had received assurances that the terms of Pte Manning's confinement were "appropriate".

Bradley Manning's detention at a high security US military prison has seen protests taken to the White House

The huge cache of diplomatic cables made public by WikiLeaks contain frank assessments of many top geopolitical players – and predictions as to how their personalities might affect US politics.

A slew of diplomatic messages from South America, where the United States has had testy relations with several leaders, reveal U.S. concerns over issues ranging from terrorism to a spat over oil between Argentina and Britain. But private messages released by WikiLeaks also highlight Washington's focus on the personalities on a continent largely ruled by leftist presidents, some of them European-style technocrats and others virulently anti-American populists.

Mr. Pascual also may have ruffled feathers in the Mexican government and Mr. Calderon’s National Action Party by dating the daughter of Francisco Rojas, the congressional leader of the former longtime ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party. Mexican officials and the U.S. Embassy have declined to comment on that matter.

Other U.S. Embassy cables released since have reported jealousies and a lack of coordination between various Mexican security forces.Their release has marred a relationship that both the United States and Mexico for years have touted as being stronger than ever.

Mr. Pascual’s resignation — less than two weeks after President Obama met with Mr. Calderon at the White House — appeared to be the biggest fallout yet from thousands of sensitive U.S. diplomatic cables from around the world released by WikiLeaks. It was the first such public departure by a U.S. ambassador during the Obama administration.

The Japanese government has said it is doing all it can to contain the crisis at Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, which was critically damaged in last week's earthquake. But according to U.S. diplomatic papers released by WikiLeaks, that atomic disaster might have been avoided if only the government had acted on earlier safety warnings.

The overall picture that emerges from the cables is of a government afraid of interfering with the powerful nuclear industry, which supplies about one-third of Japan's electricity.

Another cable sent from Tokyo to Washington in October 2008 alleged that the government had hidden past nuclear accidents. In 2008, Taro Kono -- a senior member of Japan's lower house of parliament -- told U.S. diplomats that the ministry of economy, trade and industry was "covering up nuclear accidents, and obscuring the true costs and problems associated with the nuclear industry."