Ahmed Chalabi was once the Pentagon’s favourite Iraqi – seen as a possible president following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

US senators are pulling in top generals from Iraq to tell what they know about the prisoner abuse scandal over strong criticism from a Republican committee chairman in the House.

The Bush administration has asked Congress for a €23.6bn downpayment for next year’s US operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, despite the White House’s earlier plans not to seek the money until after the November elections.

US troops began clearing razor wire from the main entrance to Fallujah today as their commanders met local officials to work out details of a deal aimed at lifting the month long siege of the city.

US Marines began pulling back from some positions around the besieged Iraqi city of Fallujah today, according to unconfirmed reports.

TWO suicide bombers struck the offices of two US-backed Kurdish parties in near-simultaneous attacks yesterday as hundreds of Iraqis gathered to celebrate a Muslim holiday.

Two suicide bombers struck the offices of two US-backed Kurdish parties in near-simultaneous attacks today as hundreds of Iraqis gathered to celebrate a Muslim holiday.

American officials have received useful information from direct interrogation of Saddam Hussein, a senior military official in Iraq said today.

An audiotape said to be from Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida deputy warned that the terror group would target Americans “in their homeland” and drive the military from US bases.

IF revenge is a dish best eaten cold, then George Dubya Bush is making a meal out of freezing ‘old Europe’ out of the lucrative contracts on the table for the reconstruction of Iraq.

The US has formally barred companies from countries opposed to the Iraq war from bidding on more than €14.25 worth of reconstruction contracts.

AN adviser to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon urged Washington yesterday not to meddle in Israeli politics in the latest show of displeasure over planned US talks with authors of a symbolic Middle East peace pact.

The American plane maker Boeing’s unconventional deal to supply air refuelling tankers for the US Air Force has been postponed by the Pentagon while a probe is carried out into the company’s conduct.

A TEAM of suicide car bombers, bent on death for “collaborators,” devastated the Red Cross headquarters and three police stations yesterday, killing 36 people and wounding more than 200 in the bloodiest day in Baghdad since the start of the US occupation.

Multiple car bombings have rocked Baghdad today, including a suicide attack on the Red Cross headquarters that killed at least 10 people.

A suicide bomber rammed an ambulance packed with explosives into security barriers outside the Iraqi offices of the international Red Cross today, killing about 10 people, an American general said.

IN a daring strike, anti-American forces unleashed a barrage of rockets yesterday against the Al Rasheed Hotel, a symbol of the US presence, where visiting Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying.

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is questioning whether America has failed to take “truly bold moves” in Iraq and Afghanistan and asking the Pentagon to rethink its strategy.

The Pentagon’s number two official has backed down after saying that key lieutenants of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden were plotting with Saddam Hussein loyalists to kill Americans in Iraq.

REBELS attacked government forces in Liberia’s second-largest city yesterday, stepping up war against President Charles Taylor on a second front as insurgents in Monrovia pressed their siege of the bloodied capital.

West African, US and UN military representatives deliberated again today on a long-promised peace force for warring Liberia.

The US has called upon Liberia’s neighbours and the United Nations to take the lead in dealing with the political turmoil in the West African nation.

The US may have to release graphic photos of the bullet-ridden corpses of Saddam Hussein’s sons to convince sceptical Iraqis that they are dead, Bush administration officials said tonight.

A LEADING Pentagon architect of the US war on Iraq was in Baghdad yesterday as a panel of experts warned Washington had three months to create law and order or risk descent into chaos.

THE United States says it is taking conflicting North Korean statements on its nuclear capability very seriously despite the South’s insistence that there was no real proof its neighbour had such weapons.

Germany’s development minister today accused the US of deceiving the world over its reasons for waging war on Iraq.

THE US military has begun flying Iraqi opposition fighters to join in the war, a top general said, as the Pentagon warned the military may have to run the country for more than six months after the conflict.

The US has indications that the men arrested in Britain with traces of the poison ricin are linked to a terrorist group in northern Iraq, a senior official said today.

The Pentagon is stepping up the hunt for al-Qaida fighters in Yemen, the ancestral home of Osama bin Laden, which remains a terrorist hornets’ nest despite efforts of US and Yemeni authorities over the past two years.

US and Afghan officials believe the assassination attempt against Afghan president Hamid Karzai was probably the work of fugitive members of the country’s ousted Taliban regime rather than al-Qaida terrorists, defence officials have said.

World experts warn of nuclear peril. Defence experts at a conference in Asia have said that there is a very real threat that terrorists might use dangerous weapons.

Tens of thousands of demonstrators, gathered in Washington to support Israel’s war on terrorism, shouted down a Bush administration official who suggested Palestinians have suffered too.

Afghan soldiers have discovered a video tape related to Osama bin Laden in a village south of Kabul, officials said today.

Tribal commanders fighting al-Qaida troops in Afghanistan’s White Mountains said today they had abandoned another plan for bin Laden’s men to disarm and surrender.

The American captured with Taliban fighters is being held by Marines in Afghanistan and will be handed over to US civilian authorities as soon as possible, the Pentagon has said.

British Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith was today visiting the US to attend a top level conference on the war against terrorism.

US Air Force jets were scrambled to intercept the hijacked jets but arrived too late, according to reports.

Millions fell silent today in a public act of mourning for the victims of the US terror attacks.

President Bush, pouring over options for war, may call up 30,000 to 50,000 members of the National Guard and Reserve to active duty in the next few days, a defence official said.