Republican members of the US Congress have consistently blocked legislation that would clamp down on the type of aggressive tax planning that put Ireland in the spotlight over the past number of months, according to Trinity economics professor, Frank Barry.

Senator John McCain said Ireland still faces questions on how corporations use the country to lower taxes after Michael Noonan, the finance minister, moved to calm tensions triggered by Apple’s practices.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has fiercely defended Ireland’s tax regime after Europe’s top competition authority launched a probe into its dealings with multinational companies.

The Government has played an active role in developing the OECD’s base erosion and profit shifting report, according to the organisation’s head of tax policy, Pascal Saint-Amans.

It is believed that the OECD report on taxation, which will have huge implications for Ireland, will be released next week, a week earlier than expected.

A deal on the EU’s multiannual financial framework could be reached at the trilogue scheduled for next week, the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, told an audience in Dublin yesterday.

Ireland has rejected claims by two US senators that Ireland is a tax haven and had handed Apple Inc a special tax deal, a charge the pair stood by last night.

The Government is set to officially reject accusations by US senators this week that the country acts as a tax haven for multinationals.

The Pentagon is asking for nearly $450m to maintain and upgrade the Guantanamo Bay prison that President Barack Obama wants to close.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has dismissed allegations by leading US senators that Ireland is a tax haven that cuts special deals with corporate giants like Apple.

Apple chief executive Tim Cook has defended his company’s use of offshore tax shelters before US senators who castigated the most-valuable technology company for avoiding $9bn and more in payments.

ENDA Kenny started his trip to the US this week with a tongue-lashing from a Boston cardinal and concluded it with the US Senate deriding the country as a tax haven.

Two Irish subsidiaries of one of the world’s richest companies, Apple, paid almost no tax on reported earnings of more than $100bn (€77.6bn) over four years, two US senators claimed last night.

Three top US senators, including John McCain, the former White House hopeful, slammed a new Osama bin Laden manhunt film for suggesting torture helped find the al Qaeda chief.

The head of compliance at British banking giant HSBC resigned in front of a US Senate subcommittee yesterday after it emerged the bank had exposed the US to billions of dollars worth of money laundering, drug trafficking, and terrorist financing.

The head of compliance at British banking giant HSBC resigned in front of a US Senate subcommittee today after it emerged the bank had exposed the US to billions of dollars worth of money laundering, drug trafficking, and terrorist financing.

Lax controls at HSBC allowed Mexican drug cartels to launder billions of dollars through the bank’s US operations, an investigation has found.

America’s biggest bank is expected to accept the resignation of one of the highest-ranking women on Wall Street after it lost $2bn in a trading blunder, a person familiar with the matter said.

THE WikiLeaks website is today expected to release what the Pentagon fears is the largest cache of secret US documents in history – hundreds of thousands of intelligence reports compiled after the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

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.

Goldman Sachs developed a strategy to profit from the housing meltdown and reaped billions at the expense of clients, a US Senate investigation found.

A 98-year-old woman is accused of strangling her 100-year-old nursing home room-mate after making the victim's life "a living hell" because she thought the woman was "taking over the room".

US President Barack Obama will announce his decision on whether to send more US troops to Afghanistan “within days” after he held a final strategy session with top aides, the White House said yesterday.

The Bush administration said today it was ready to step in and prevent the US car industry from collapsing after the Senate refused to pass a rescue bill endorsed by President George Bush and congressional Democrats.

A Pentagon recommendation has suggested that the US Congress should place all armed contractors operating in combat zones under military control.

IRAQ’S beleaguered prime minister yesterday lashed out at US Democrats who have called for his removal, saying senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Carl Levin need to “come to their senses”.

Iraq’s beleaguered prime minister today lashed out at American critics who have called for his removal, saying Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Carl Levin need to “come to their senses”.

Senate Democrats refused to flinch today as the chamber moved towards a rare, all-night session of debate on legislation to bring US troops home later this year.

President George Bush threatened to veto legislation setting a date for a troop withdrawal from Iraq, despite growing bipartisan calls in Congress for an end to US participation in the war and sharp criticism of the Iraqi government.

A draft report to Congress on the Iraq war will conclude that the US-backed government has met none of its targets for political, economic and other reform, an official said today.

A Democrat-driven resolution on Iraq that has attracted the support of at least two Republicans threatens to expose fissures within US President George Bush’s party over the unpopular war.

US President George Bush traded ideas on Iraq with a bipartisan commission and promised to work with the incoming Democratic majority toward “common objectives”.

US President George W Bush yesterday praised a bipartisan commission on Iraq for asking him good questions but said “I’m not going to prejudge” the report the panel will issue.

Bush administration officials, trying to calm a political furore over allowing a United Arab Emirates company to take over a half-dozen US seaports, told Congress today they spent three months reviewing the deal and said all concerns about security were satisfied.

A US military investigation has found evidence of degrading and abusive treatment by interrogators at the Guantanamo Bay base in Cuba, which is being used as a prison for terrorist suspects.

The Iraq prisoner abuse scandal shifted to the question of whether the Bush administration set up a legal foundation that opened the door for the mistreatment.

THE US Army general who first investigated prisoner abuse in an Iraqi prison told the US Congress yesterday, the mistreatment resulted from faulty leadership, a “lack of discipline, no training whatsoever and no supervision.”

The Bush administration is struggling to deal with the unfolding drama in Iraq, says Tom Wright

US CONGRESSIONAL Democrats’ support for President Bush’s $87 billion request comes with a price: they want him to spell out details of his overall Iraq strategy.

The White House did not seek CIA approval before claiming Saddam Hussein could launch a chemical or biological attack within 45 minutes, it was reported today.

US president George W Bush again yesterday insisted Baghdad had a programme to manufacture weapons of mass destruction, seeking to rebut critics who say his administration’s credibility is at stake in the search for illicit arms.

THE US government is considering making new, smaller nuclear weapons that could be used to hit hard-to-reach targets like underground bunkers, according to a nuclear disarmament group.

The Pentagon has announced the US-led air strikes on Afghanistan are slowing down.