Facebook’s plan to track every move you make on the internet in order to send you related advertisements has been lambasted by EU and US consumer bodies.

A close aide to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki today sought to play down the significance of any threat to reduce American economic or military support for the Iraqi government as a high-level US commission said American policy in Iraq must change.

Syria and Iran are willing to help try to stabilise Iraq but they will want something in return and neither has a magic solution to the country’s bloodshed, Mideast officials and analysts said today after a US commission recommended such outreach.