Internal emails among US military officers indicate that no sailors watched Osama bin Laden’s burial at sea from the USS Carl Vinson and traditional Islamic procedures were followed during the ceremony.

Major stock market indexes have climbed as investors waited for the finish of a closely fought US presidential election.

The WikiLeaks website began publishing yesterday what it said were more than 100 US Defence Department files detailing military detention policies in camps in Iraq and at Guantanamo Bay in the years after the Sept 11 attacks.

Seventy-one people were shot in the Colorado cinema during midnight screenings of the new Batman movie, police said.

The annual US defence department’s Santa-tracking operation broke its own records for phone calls, emails and Facebook and Twitter followers on Christmas Eve.

An investigation into a Nato attack that killed 24 Pakistani troops near the Afghan border has concluded that a combination of mistrust and bad maps led to the air strikes on the two outposts in Pakistan, officials say.

Muammar Gaddafi has apparently vanished after Libyan rebels claimed to be in control of most of Tripoli following their lightning advance on the capital.

THE leader of the Fort Sill Apache Tribe is asking US President Barack Obama for a formal apology for the government’s use of the codename Geronimo for Osama bin Laden.

Afghan government officials have approved a multimillion-dollar contract to mine the wealth of gold under the mountains of northern Afghanistan.

The posting of tens of thousands of secret Afghan war logs by the WikiLeaks website earlier this year compromised no sensitive intelligence sources or practices, the US Defence Department said today.

The US has appealed against its own victory in a landmark trade ruling against European subsidies for plane maker Airbus.

Online whistleblower WikiLeaks vowed to continue publishing more secret files from governments around the world despite US demands to cancel plans to release classified military documents.

The European Union will appeal today against a landmark trade ruling that found it gave plane maker Airbus a wide range of illegal subsidies in its battle with US competitor Boeing.

US President Barack Obama today directed that no new offshore oil drilling leases can be issued unless rigs have new safeguards to prevent a repeat of the explosion that unleashed the massive spill threatening the Gulf Coast with major environmental damage.

An oil spill that is threatening to eclipse the Exxon Valdez disaster spread out of control and started washing ashore along America's Gulf Coast early today.

The top US and Nato commander in Afghanistan said today the coalition depends too much on private-sector contractors.

The US government has denied test-firing a submarine-launched ballistic missile capable of carrying nuclear warheads during a joint military exercise with Saudi Arabia.

Boeing and Airbus expect to find out tomorrow who has won the first round of their epic trade dispute.

The US Defence Department will release a "substantial number" of photos depicting abuse of prisoners by US personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan, the American Civil Liberties Union said.

China dismissed a new report claiming its growing military power was upsetting the world’s power balance as a “gross distortion” by the US today.

EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels today held preliminary talks on informal calls from Washington to grant asylum to as many as 60 Guantanamo inmates against whom America has insufficient evidence to prosecute, but who cannot be sent back to their own countries once Guantanamo closes, for fear of torture and persecution.

Europe’s governments are under pressure today to back their words of support for Barack Obama with action to help the new US President close Guantanamo Bay.

A secret 2004 order gave the US military the authority to attack al-Qaida targets anywhere in the world, according to a US report today.

Iran forced a Western aircraft that accidentally entered its airspace to land, then allowed the plane to continue to Afghanistan after questioning its passengers.

Russian forces and their separatist militia allies are keeping international monitors out of South Ossetia, according to confidential documents today.

A Pentagon jury will consider its a verdict on a former driver and alleged bodyguard for Osama bin Laden today as the US nears completion of its first war crimes trial since the Second World War.

FBI agents raised misgivings about US interrogators’ mistreatment of terror suspects detained in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay during the three years after September 11, but in some cases were slow to report it, a US Justice Department report says.

A US Defence Department analyst pleaded guilty today to delivering classified information about US and Taiwanese military relations to a New Orleans furniture salesman who turned out to be working with the Chinese government.

A US Defence Department analyst pleaded guilty today to delivering classified information about American and Taiwanese military communications systems to a Louisiana businessman who was working for the Chinese government.

CHINA will shut down or punish dozens of video-sharing websites for carrying content deemed pornographic, violent or a threat to national security under rules that tighten internet controls, a regulator said yesterday.

The US Defence Department has banned Google map-making teams from making detailed street-level video maps of American military bases after images of one ended up on the popular internet site.

In a stunning turnaround, the former chief military prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay says he will be a defence witness for the driver of terror chief Osama bin Laden.

The Bush administration is trying to convince foreign countries that the US Defence Department’s plan to shoot down a dying spy satellite is not a military test.

A former Boeing engineer was today charged with stealing space shuttle secrets for China, the US Justice Department said.

IRAN accused the United States yesterday of fabricating video and audio released by the Pentagon showing Iranian boats confronting US warships in the Persian Gulf.

Iran has sent a formal protest note to Washington for “spying” on Iran’s nuclear activities, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said.

The US is pursuing a multibillion-dollar programme to develop the next generation of spy satellites, the first major effort of its kind since the Pentagon cancelled the ambitious and costly Future Imagery Architecture system two years ago, according to US officials.

The White House offered condolences today to victims of the deadly cyclone in Bangladesh and said the government had provided an initial $2.1m (€1.4m) in emergency aid.

A United Nations human rights expert called on the US to put on trial or release all people detained as “unlawful enemy combatants”, move quickly to close the Guantanamo Bay prison camp in Cuba and abolish military commissions.

The target date for putting Iraqi authorities in charge of security in all 18 provinces has slipped back yet again, to at least July.

The Bush administration is nearing a decision to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba and move terror suspects from there to military prisons on US soil, it emerged last night..

The US Defence Department announced the capture of one of al-Qaida’s most senior and most experienced operatives, an Iraqi who was trying to return to his native country when he was captured.

The US Defence Department said today it has custody of one of al-Qaida's most senior and experienced operatives, an Iraqi who was attempting to return to his native country when he was captured.

A Pentagon probe will recommend that nine officers, including up to four generals, be held accountable for mistakes in the aftermath of the friendly-fire death of a former US football star killed by his comrades in Afghanistan.