Afghan President Hamid Karzai cut short a European trip and returned to Kabul today to visit the scores of wounded and the bereaved families of those killed in an unprecedented sectarian assault on a Shiite shrine in the capital.

DAVID PETRAEUS, the former general who gained prominence charting US strategy in the Afghan and Iraq wars, has been sworn in as director of the CIA.

CHINESE President Hu Jintao heard concerns about China’s human rights and economic policies as he wrapped up his visit to Washington with meetings on Capitol Hill.

In the light of current difficulties in Afghanistan, it is ironic that the country was very much in the news in 1980, because forces from the Soviet Union were occupying the country.

Whistle-blowing organisation WikiLeaks has set up a private limited company in Iceland for administrative purposes as part of a move to restructure its global operations, a spokesman said today.

The WikiLeaks website appears close to releasing what the Pentagon fears is the largest cache of secret US documents in history – hundreds of thousands of intelligence reports compiled after the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

WIKILEAKS has released a CIA memo analysing the risks of terrorists operating from the United States.

The next leak of secret Afghan war documents being planned by WikiLeaks will be even more damaging to US security and the war effort than the initial release of 76,000 war files, the Pentagon warned tonight.

OPERATIVES in Afghanistan and Pakistan who have worked for the US against the Taliban or al-Qaida may be at risk following the disclosure of thousands of once-secret US military documents, former and current officials said.

The White House accused online whistleblower WikiLeaks of endangering the lives of American, British and other coalition troops after it posted around 90,000 leaked US military records today.

THE general tapped to take over command of US and NATO forces in Afghanistan braced lawmakers yesterday for an escalation in violence, playing down hopes for a swift turnaround after nine years of war.

BRITAIN’S coalition government outlined a joint legislative programme, promising support for the Afghanistan war, a new drive toward Middle East peace and a “close and frank” relationship with the United States.

THE war in Afghanistan will get worse before it gets better, President Barack Obama said yesterday, but he declared his plan to begin withdrawing US forces next year remains on track.

Two children were killed in an explosion which tore through a group of civilians and US soldiers visiting a road construction project, a spokesman for the governor of an eastern Afghanistan province said today.

FAILURE in Afghanistan would mean a Taliban takeover of the country and “have severe consequences for the United States and the world”, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said yesterday as the Obama administration set out to sell its new war strategy on Capitol Hill.

A former US Marine-turned diplomat has become the first American official to resign in protest at the war in Afghanistan.

AL-QAIDA leader Osama bin Laden described President Barack Obama as “powerless” to stop the war in Afghanistan, and Americans’ inability to grasp why the September 11 attacks occurred has “cost you a lot without any result whatsoever”.

President Hamid Karzai and top challenger Abdullah Abdullah both have roughly 40% of the nationwide vote for president with 10 % of polling stations counted, the Afghan election commission said today as it announced the first official returns.

A Brussels judge today ordered 13 people to stand trial on charges of aiding and abetting terrorists, including those suspected in last year’s Madrid train bombings and in a 2003 bomb explosion in Casablanca.

AMERICAN warplanes pounded a suspected Taliban safe haven in the mountainsides of southern Afghanistan in an assault that left up to 60 insurgents, five policemen and seven Afghan soldiers dead and five US soldiers wounded, officials said.

Fierce fighting between Taliban rebels and Afghan security forces left 18 insurgents and three others dead, a day after the US military pounded suspected rebels in airstrikes that killed as many as 20, officials said today.

Afghanistan’s interim leader Hamid Karzai emerged a clear winner when vote counting ended today after the presidential election, a senior official said.

A convoy carrying Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s vice presidential running-mate came under attack today in north-eastern Afghanistan, the presidential palace said.

Hundreds of US and allied Afghan fighters swept into the mountains of eastern Afghanistan today, moving tanks into position for a final push to eradicate al-Qaida fighters making a last stand.

The Pentagon says the war in Afghanistan will go on, even if Osama bin Laden is killed or captured.

A British military leader has said the Afghan campaign could last 50 years. Admiral Michael Boyce says it is the most difficult military operation since the Cold War.

The Government here is watching developments as they unfold in Afghanistan.