The sex scandal that led to the resignation of CIA director David Petraeus has widened, with the top US commander in Afghanistan under investigation for alleged “inappropriate communications” with a woman who is said to have received threatening emails from General Petraeus’ former lover.

US JOURNALIST Laura Ling, jailed for three months in one of the world’s most isolated nations, wrote to her family that she “cried so much” her first few days after being arrested by North Korean border guards.

On its first day of full rule in Gaza, the Islamic militant Hamas today announced that it was granting amnesty to senior Fatah leaders, signalling that it is seeking conciliation with the defeated forces of moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Hamas fighters have seized Fatah’s senior field commanders in the Gaza Strip, a spokesman for the Islamic group announced today.

Fatah and Hamas clashed at Cabinet ministries, universities and security headquarters today in defiance of a truce that was to have calmed the seething Gaza Strip.

A Republican candidate hoping to challenge Senator Hillary Clinton this autumn is running a television advertisement that links her to al-Qaida terror boss Osama bin Laden.

A senior FBI official told the Special Criminal Court today that the FBI had withheld certain documents from the Irish authorities in the case of Michael Mc Kevitt, the alleged leader of the real IRA.