China announced today an 11.6% increase in military spending for 2004, a bigger increase than last year in an age when the People’s Liberation Army is racing to make itself competitive and adapt to a hi-tech world.

Saddam Hussein loyalists rioted in Baghdad, ambushed a US patrol in Samarra, stormed the office of a US-backed mayor in Fallujah and battled American troops in Ramadi as cities in Iraq’s “Sunni Triangle” region seethed over the ex-dictator’s capture.

American special forces today raided the Baghdad home of the female microbiologist nicknamed Dr Germ who ran Iraq’s secret biological laboratory.

A GENERAL from Saddam Hussein’s army has been captured in southern Iraq and is being pressed to provide strategic information, British officers said yesterday.