U.S. Special Operations Forces on a training mission in Pakistan are playing an expanded but largely unseen role in the country's counterinsurgency campaign, working with paramilitary units to "hold and build" tribal areas as militants are cleared out.U.S. defence and administration officials say the elite trainers, who currently number more than 100, have not and are not authorized to take part in Pakistani military offensives in the semi-autonomous tribal regions, known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, or FATA, along the Afghan border.
More...




Director James Cameron and actress Sigourney Weaver are in Brazil to protest against a proposed dam in the Amazon that would be the world's third-largest hydroelectric project. The Hollywood celebrities will join about 1,000 demonstrators in Brasilia's streets Monday as they urge the government to halt the planned Belo Monte project.
The US military has warned that surplus oil production capacity could disappear within two years and there could be serious shortages by 2015 with a significant economic and political impact.
The World Health Organisation on Monday conceded shortcomings in its handling of the H1N1 swine flu pandemic, including a failure to communicate uncertainties about the new virus as it swept around the globe.
Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens - who have both written books promoting atheism - have asked human rights lawyers to produce a case for charging Pope Benedict XVI over his alleged cover-up of sexual abuse in the Catholic church.






























