Barack Obama promised to make job creation his top priority as he made his first State of the Union address.
The US president forecast the creation of 1.5 million jobs through the ’stimulus bill’.
“People are out of work. They are hurting. They need our help. And I want a jobs bill on my [...]

Gordon Brown is to hold urgent talks over the future of Northern Ireland devolution amid fears the process could stall in the wake of the Iris Robison affair.

The Prime Minister is meeting his Irish counterpart Brian Cowen at Downing Street to discuss plans to hand policing powers from Westminster to [...]

Alleged plotters who tried to kill Guinea’s junta leader Capt Moussa Dadis Camara are being “hunted down” and arrested, the military government says.
Junta spokesman Idrissa Cherif stated that  more than 60 people had been held over last week’s assassination attempt.
Other reports say troops are torturing and killing people and residents of the capital, Conakry, are [...]

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has urged all Nato countries to “unite” behind the US in boosting the number of troops they have in Afghanistan.
President Barack Obama has promised an extra 30,000 personnel will be deployed to the country by August.
Mr Brown promised the UK, which has pledged an extra 500 troops, would “continue to play [...]

An alleged Belgian arms dealer has pleaded guilty to conspiring to illegally export jet engines and parts from the US to Iran, officials say.
The suspect, Jacques Monsieur, now faces a maximum prison sentence of six years and a $250,000 (£150,000) fine.
Mr Monsieur, a resident of France, was arrested in August in New York.
Court documents say [...]

Lawyers at the trial of the Khmer Rouge’s former prison chief in Cambodia are making closing arguments, after months of testimony.
Kaing Guek Eav, better known as Comrade Duch, ran a prison where thousands of people were tortured and murdered in the late 1970s.
The 67-year-old is accused of crimes against humanity and faces a life sentence [...]

Chinese and North Korean defence chiefs have pledged to strengthen their long-standing military alliance.
The Chinese Defence Minister, Liang Guanglie, is visiting North Korea two weeks before the US North Korea envoy, Stephen Bosworth, is due to visit.
North Korea’s neighbours and the US are trying to re-start talks on the ending of Pyongyang’s nuclear programmes.
China has [...]

Four men have been charged with terror-related offences following raids last week in Manchester and near London’s Heathrow airport.
Israr Malik, 21, of Bowdon Avenue, Fallowfield, is charged with intending to commit acts of terrorism, namely violent jihad.
Three other men are accused of intending to assist others to commit acts of terrorism.
They are: Matthew Newton, 27, [...]

A former IRA woman who was jailed for bombing the Old Bailey in London, has been arrested in connection with the shooting of two soldiers in Antrim.
Marian Price, who is 55, was arrested in west Belfast on Tuesday.
She is being held in connection with the Real IRA murders of two soldiers at Massereene Army base [...]

US President Barack Obama has told China that individual rights and freedoms should be available to all.
He told an audience of Chinese students that certain freedoms were universal – and not just limited to Americans.
President Obama added that China and the United States were not predestined to be adversaries.
He was speaking at a question and [...]