Terrorist attacks across three continents last Friday demonstrate the influence of Islamic State and wide reach, as well as the difficulties of countering its use of the internet to galvanise and inspire global violence.

The director of the US Secret Service has resigned in the face of revelations of security breaches and an erosion of confidence over the safety of president Barack Obama and his family.

Using futuristic photo-analysis tools, federal agents on the Boston Marathon case last night released images of two potential suspects to enlist the public’s help in hunting down the bombers.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said that the FBI wants to speak to two men seen in at least one video from the Boston Marathon.

FBI agents zeroed in on how the Boston Marathon bombing was carried out – with kitchen pressure cookers packed with explosives, nails and other lethal shrapnel - but said they still did not know who did it and why.

Police are reported to be searching a flat in a Boston suburb as part of the investigation into the explosions near the finish line of the Boston Marathon.

Insurgents killed two members of Nato’s mission to Afghanistan in the south of the country today, the multinational force said.

PRESIDENT Barack Obama led a national outpouring of grief, while calling for unity at an emotional memorial after a shooting that unleashed fierce debate about inflammatory political rhetoric.

The use of full-body scanners and invasive pat-downs at airports around the US will not change for the "foreseeable future," Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said in an interview broadcast today.

The no-fly list failed to keep the Times Square suspect off the plane, it has emerged.

THE Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) has written to the Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) over privacy rights concerns regarding the possible introduction of body scanners.

UN-led teams in Haiti yesterday switched their focus away from searching for people trapped in collapsed buildings to providing aid to hundreds of thousands of increasingly desperate survivors.

JUSTICE MINISTER Dermot Ahern said he was in favour of introducing body scanners at Irish airports in the wake of the attempted bombing of a US-bound aircraft on Christmas Day.

THE Nigerian man accused of trying to bring down a US airliner cut off contact with his relatives and vanished from their lives until they awoke to news of the attempted Christmas Day attack, his family said yesterday.

US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano conceded today that the aviation security system failed when a man on a watchlist with a powerful explosive hidden on his body was allowed to board a fight from Amsterdam to Detroit.

World health officials today raced to extinguish a new flu strain that has already spread to five countries and is jumping borders.

The World Health Organisation is working closely with Mexican officials to make sure drugs are available to fight the outbreak of swine flu, but warns other countries may need more as well if the disease spreads, a senior official said today.

AS Hurricane Gustav threatened the Gulf Coast, US President George W Bush was out to show the nation that his government had learned the haunting lessons of Katrina and was ready to act.

The monster storm that has hit California with fierce winds and heavy rain dropped a thick blanket of snow on the Sierra Nevada mountains today and kept thousands of people from their homes in mudslide-prone areas.

HOT, dry Santa Ana winds have fanned the blazes which have ravaged southern California this week.

Weary Californians were today praying changing weather would bring respite from four days of fires that have spread chaos and destruction.

Celebrities like Mel Gibson, Kelsey Grammer and Victoria Principal have been forced to flee their homes in Southern California driven out by unstoppable brush fires that are devastating the region.

THE US government proposed a third version of its airline passenger pre-screening programme yesterday, stripped of controversial data that had aroused privacy concerns and blocked earlier versions.

A secret report by US intelligence experts says al-Qaida has rebuilt its operating capability to a level not seen since just before the September 11 terrorist attacks, it is reported.

US LAW enforcement officials received intelligence reports two weeks ago which warned of a possible terror attack in Glasgow against “airport infrastructure or aircraft”, according to reports.

THE US Government is urging Americans to be vigilant about suspicious activity after British police defused a bomb in London’s West End, but officials said they saw no potential terrorist threat in the United States ahead of next week’s Fourth of July holiday.

EU and US negotiators struck a deal on sharing information about transatlantic flight passengers.

Airline passengers soon will have their names checked against the US “no-fly” list before flights take off for the US, the homeland security chief said.

US government investigators are continuing today to pursue leads related to the alleged foiled plot to blow up flights from Britain.

US President George Bush has hailed the killing of “the most-wanted terrorist in Iraq” but said it would not stop the violence there or bring a speedy withdrawal of US troops.

IN dramatic and sometimes agonising terms, US disaster officials warned US President George W Bush and his homeland security chief before Hurricane Katrina struck that the storm could breach New Orleans's levees.

US disaster officials warned President George Bush and his homeland security chief before Hurricane Katrina struck that the storm could breach levees, risk lives in New Orleans’ Superdome and overwhelm rescuers, according to confidential video footage of the briefings.

AS many as one million people were ordered to clear out along the Gulf Coast as hospital and nursing home patients were evacuated yesterday.

Hospital and nursing home patients were evacuated and as many as one million others were ordered to clear out along the Gulf Coast today as Hurricane Rita intensified into a Category 4 storm with 140mph winds that could batter Texas and bring more misery to New Orleans by the weekend.

Hurricane Rita strengthened into a Category 4 storm packing 135-mph winds as it churned into the Gulf of Mexico early today.

Hurricane Rita strengthened into a Category 4 storm packing 135-mph winds as it churned into the Gulf of Mexico early today.

THE new acting director of the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) yesterday pledged to intensify efforts to find more permanent housing for the tens of thousands of Hurricane Katrina survivors in shelters.

Michael Brown, director of the US Federal Emergency Management Agency, is being removed from his role managing relief efforts for the victims of Hurricane Katrina and is returning to Washington.

US President George Bush today threw more resources at the hurricane-battered Gulf Coast as criticism mounted that a slow response by the government had contributed to the misery of thousands of people in the region.

The orange alert instituted two weeks ago for US mass transit systems is likely to be prolonged after the latest terrorist attacks in London.

Surprisingly calm US investors pushed stocks higher today, helping Wall Street recover from early losses after the London terror attacks.

US Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge is to station a top envoy in Brussels to cooperate with EU officials in the war on terror.

Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge has informed the White House and department staff that he has resigned, US officials said tonight.

Russian President Vladimir Putin performed a U-turn today – apparently responding to wide public dismay over the bloody school siege – and agreed to the formation of a parliamentary investigative commission.