A Tunisian court dropped charges against a policewoman whose dispute with a fruit vendor who killed himself sparked a chain of events that unleashed uprisings around the Arab world.

UNREST spread across the Middle East and North Africa yesterday as Bahrain launched a swift military crackdown on anti-government protesters and clashes were reported in Libya and Yemen.

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FOUR ministers quit Tunisia’s day-old government yesterday, undermining its hopes of quelling unrest by sharing power with members of the opposition to the old regime.