The US Supreme Court has allowed full enforcement of Donald Trump's travel ban affecting residents of six mostly Muslim countries.

The 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals said the revised travel ban "speaks with vague words of national security, but in context drips with religious intolerance, animus and discrimination".

The fate of a convicted killer from North Carolina, set to become the 1,000th person executed in the US since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, rests today with federal appeals courts and the state’s governor.

THE US Justice Department is defying a court order to produce an al-Qaida prisoner for cross-examination by a man accused of the September 11 bombings.

A US judge has rejected a government compromise proposal and ruled for a second time that terrorism suspect Zacarias Moussaoui needed to directly interview a senior al-Qaida prisoner to prepare his defence.