Al Qaida-linked militants in the Philippines are facing a new battle against fellow Muslim insurgents.

Syria’s prime minister has defected to the opposition seeking to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad, marking one of the highest profile desertions from the Damascus government.

North Korea’s top military official — a key mentor to new leader Kim Jong-un — has been removed from all posts because of illness, state media said in a surprise announcement that shakes the core of the authoritarian country’s power structure.

North Korea’s top military official – a key mentor to new leader Kim Jong Un who also served under his late father – has been removed from all posts because of illness, state media has announced.

Libyans, relieved that their first free national election in 60 years had survived violence and protests, celebrated the chance to draw a line under Muammar Gaddafi’s dictatorship and forge a brighter future for their country.

Iraq’s embattled prime minister has fought off an attempt to push him out of office, aided by divisions among his opponents and Iranian intervention on his behalf.

Outrage over a murderous rampage by a rogue US soldier who killed 16 villagers gripped Afghanistan yesterday, as parliament called for a public trial and Taliban insurgents vowed revenge.

Michel "Sweet Micky" Martelly, a pop star known for his bad-boy antics on stage, became earthquake-devastated Haiti's new president and urged his countrymen to set aside their divisions and raise the nation from rubble.

North Korea backed off from its threats to retaliate against South Korea for military drills and reportedly offered concessions on its nuclear programme.

NORTH KOREA backed away from threats to retaliate against South Korea for military exercises yesterday and offered concessions on its nuclear programme.

North Korea backed away from threats to retaliate against South Korea for military exercises today and offered concessions on its nuclear programme.

When presidential hopeful Victoire Ingabire, a Hutu, returned to Rwanda after a long absence she immediately visited a memorial to Tutsis killed in the 1994 genocide and asked why Hutus who also died were not remembered.

NORTH Korea said South Korea fabricated evidence implicating the North in a torpedo attack in order to pick on the North and any attempt at retaliating for the warship’s sinking would be answered with “all-out war”.

In the face of world-wide condemnation North Korea today claimed damning evidence that it torpedoed a South Korean warship was fabricated.

Thailand’s prime minister said today that he had no plans to declare martial law despite growing demands for the government to take firmer measures to end protests that have paralysed parts of Bangkok for seven weeks.

A member of a powerful political clan in the Philippines accused of leading the massacre of 57 journalists and members of a rival's family pleaded not guilty on the first day of his trial.

INDONESIA’S most wanted Islamist militant was killed in a police shoot-out in Central Java, police said yesterday, lifting a major security threat ahead of a planned visit by US President Barack Obama.

An independently written report has said Thailand’s shadowy network of Islamic separatist insurgents carries out much of its recruiting in schools in the country’s deep south, which have become “the battleground for the clash of cultures and ideologies”.

Yes, there is public feeling about the Palestinians and their rotten deal. I’ve never heard Chechnya being discussed on the DART, whereas I have heard Israel being trashed on buses as well as at smart dinner parties. Besides, who’s ever heard of a “Sri Lanka out of Tamil Eelam” march through Cork or calls for a boycott of Russia?

Tens of thousands of civilians fled Sri Lanka's northern war zone ahead of the government's deadline today for separatist Tamil rebels to surrender.

North Korea’s military threatened immediate retaliation today if “even the slightest effort” was made to intercept a rocket it plans to launch in the next few days.

Coup leaders announced a 32-member interim government for Guinea hours after they said were in control of the mineral-rich West African country following the death of its dictator.

A top Zimbabwe army general called on the nation’s soldiers to vote for Robert Mugabe in a presidential run-off or quit the military, the official media reported today.

POLICE in Nepal have shot dead seven Maoists, the party said yesterday, in the worst outbreak of violence ahead of a high-stakes and tense vote on the Himalayan nation’s political future.

A political deal is expected in Kenya today after the government tentatively agreed to form a prime minister’s post for the opposition, moving the East African country a step closer to ending the deadly post-election crisis.

Rebel soldiers shot and badly wounded East Timor's president and opened fire on the prime minister in what was said to be a failed coup in the recently-independent nation.

Pakistan’s US-allied president must resign before next month’s elections or the country could risk slipping into civil war, opposition leaders and an independent research group said today.

Iraqi soldiers hoisted the nation’s flag over the Basra palace compound today after British troops withdrew from their last garrison in the city.

Kosovo’s prime minister today vowed to declare independence if internationally brokered talks fail to “open a way for us,” staking out a tough position at last-ditch negotiations on the province’s future status.

The leader of the main opposition party was detained by police who shot dead a protester as they broke up a “Save Zimbabwe” prayer meeting in the capital today.

Islamic leaders today ordered Somalis to hand in their weapons, but did not say how they would enforce the directive in a heavily armed country some fear is about to go to war with its neighbour.

Militants used machine guns to ambush a police patrol in western Afghanistan, killing six policemen and wounding three others, an official said today, as a think tank warned more foreign troops are needed to secure the country.

Pakistan’s military had to destroy an Islamic school, killing 80 people in the process, with helicopter-fired missiles to prevent trainee terrorists escaping the building, the army said today as critics denounced the government for using disproportionate force.

North Korea today boasted that it successfully tested a nuclear weapon, sparking a barrage of global condemnation and threats of harsh sanctions over an underground blast that appeared to thrust the volatile communist state into the elite club of nuclear-armed nations.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice today said the United States is “very concerned” about the plight of the Palestinians and pledged to improve living conditions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

The Sudanese government has launched a major offensive against rebels in war-torn Darfur in recent days, human rights activists and African Union officials said tonight.

GUNFIRE broke out yesterday near the home of a leading Congolese politician, prompting the UN to send scores of peacekeepers in armoured vehicles to remove foreign diplomats trapped inside.

The bombers who targeted Mumbai’s rail system had support from inside neighbouring Pakistan, India’s prime minister said today, warning that the nuclear-armed rivals’ peace process could be derailed unless Islamabad reins in terrorists operating from its territory.

Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has warned that Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip could cause an “explosion” in the Islamic world. So far, however, Arabs have staged only small and sporadic demonstrations and their governments have made few complaints.

Residents of Mogadishu attended Friday prayers after a week of relative calm under the control of an Islamic militia, but many wondered if the peace can last in the hands of radicals accused of links to al-Qaida.

An Islamic militia that seized Somalia’s capital this week began talks with the country’s largely powerless UN-backed government today, the latest sign of the fundamentalists’ growing influence as Somalia tries to emerge from 16 years of anarchy.

Afghanistan’s top Islamic organisation today called for an end to three days of deadly rioting over drawings of the Prophet Mohammed, as police shot four protesters dead to stop hundreds from marching on a US military base.

The United Nations and the world’s largest Islamic grouping appealed for calm after more clashes linked to global protests over Danish cartoons of Prophet Mohammad.

South Korea’s president lashed out today at hardliners in Washington seeking to force the collapse of North Korea’s totalitarian regime, as the Foreign Ministry criticised a US account of a meeting on preventing criminal activity by the North.