The sex scandal involving US Secret Service agents and prostitutes in a hotel in Colombia involved at least 20 foreign women, congressional officials say.

A Republican senator who had single-handedly blocked a stop-gap measure to extend help for the jobless finally relented under withering assaults from Democrats and dwindling support within his own party.

The Nigerian accused of the Christmas Day airline bomb attack has been co-operating with investigators and providing fresh intelligence in multiple terrorism investigations, senior US sources said.

Congress approved new laws to step up anti-terror efforts in the US, shifting money to high-risk states and cities and expanding screening of air and sea cargo.

Senate Republicans today scuttled a Democratic proposal ordering US troop withdrawals from Iraq in a showdown that capped an all-night debate on the war.