Announcing his choices for top intelligence positions on Friday, President-elect Barack Obama was lauded by some for breaking strongly with the policies of the outgoing Pres. George W. Bush administration, while other observers offered sharp criticisms.

As the Israelis try to justify the massive loss of civilian life in Gaza, their arguments and counter-charges continue to be shot down either by the United Nations or by international human rights organisations.

On the phone from Gaza, Zahrah Salem shares the news she has just seen, that so many at the White House were 'deeply saddened' by the death of the cat India Willie. Why, she asks, is nobody at the White House deeply saddened by the death of so many children in Gaza.

International aid organisations, including the U.N. humanitarian agency in Palestine, are calling for the immediate implementation of the Security Council resolution passed late Thursday demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

Chile’s anti-crisis plan, announced this week, is based on windfall copper earnings saved up over the last few years. But soaring copper prices are a thing of the past, due to the global economic meltdown that originated in the United States, say analysts.

As Russia suffers from the financial crisis and Ukraine heads towards bankruptcy, nobody can tell who is to blame for a spat that threatens to freeze Central Europe and the Balkans.

U.S. workers are losing jobs in record numbers, scores of businesses are shuttering and hundreds of thousands of families are newly homeless -- and Congress just gave itself a generous pay raise.

The war that Israel launched on Gaza Dec. 27 is the seventh war of choice Israel has launched against its neighbours since 1973, the last year in which it fought a war that was forced upon it.

Contrary to Israel's argument that it was forced to launch its air and ground offensive against Gaza in order to stop the firing of rockets into its territory, Hamas proposed in mid-December to return to the original Hamas-Israel ceasefire arrangement, according to a U.S.-based source who has been briefed on the proposal.

The global economic crisis apparently has not affected the Peruvian government’s plan to modernise the armed forces, which is to cost 650 million dollars from here to 2011.