Egypt

Thousands converged onto Cairo's Tahrir Square on Friday ahead of mass rallies planned nationwide to push the ruling military council to speed up the pace of reform, an AFP correspondent said.

As the Libyan conflict is dragging on, headlines indicating that Gaddafi is preparing to leave Libya are emerging once again. Could the Lion of Africa really be on his way out, or is this just part of a desperate tactic aiming at retaining public support at a time when both the rebels and Nato are heavily criticised.

Moroccans voted on Friday in a referendum on curbing the near absolute powers of King Mohammed VI, who has offered reforms following protests inspired by pro-democracy uprisings around the Arab world.

After years of repression, intimidation and exploitation, regimes in the Middle East and North Africa became aware they risked being forced out by the people they oppressed.

Eight hundred and seventy people were hurt earlier this week when a planned memorial for people killed in Egypt's revolution turned into an angry demonstration against the country's interim military government, the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights said Thursday.

Israel backtracked on Monday on a threat to bar foreign journalists from entering the country for 10 years if they board a new international aid flotilla that plans to challenge the Israeli naval blockade of the Gaza Strip.

The recent unrest in the Middle East and North Africa has enabled China to take a stand on international issues and reaffirm its own vision regarding conflict resolution.

Last month, when the North Atlantic Treaty Organization declared it would extend the campaign for 90 days, it became clear that an important part of NATO's strategy is based on the hope that Colonel Gaddafi will see the error of his ways and capitulate before his surroundings and his supporters are worn down by the bombings and turn against him.

Two years after Neda Agha-Soltan was killed governments in the Middle East are still using brutality, lies and live ammunition to suppress street protests.

Three months into an airstrikes campaign that has mainly targeted Gaddafi's stronghold, Tripoli, and it seems that the military operation has started to take its toll on Nato and its members countries. .

With news of 35 alleged Anonymous members currently being detained by the authorities, many analysts have come to question just how long it will be until LulzSec finds itself in law enforcement agencies firing lines following its high-profile cyber attack on the U.S. Senate.

The hacker group LulzSec, which has claimed responsibility for several high-publicity attacks on Sony, Nintendo and even the NHS, yesterday posted a message on its website claiming responsibility for a new successful cyber attack on the U.S. Senate.

With Spanish police having just arrested three suspected members of the loose-knit hacking collective Anonymous last week, Turkish authorities have reportedly detained a further 32 suspected members of the Anonymous group.

Just as leaders from Nato members countries maintain that following the operation in Libya, Gaddafi's days in power are numbered, and as Nato officials this week insisted the operation was a success, US defence secretary, Robert Gates, today delivered a blistering attack on European defence complacency, declaring that organisation has "become a "two-tiered" alliance of those willing to wage war and those only interested in "talking" and peacekeeping".

A spokesperson for the Local Coordinating Committees in Syria, an activist coalition that organizes protests and documents the government crackdown, announced on Friday morning that there was heavy gunfire in al-Sarmaneyah, a village located five miles from the town of Jisr al-Shoughour and added that people had fled from both towns and much of the surrounding countryside.

Al Quaeda's second in command yesterday issued a eulogy for Osama Bin Laden, who was killed in a US raid in Pakistan on May 2. Ayman al-Zawahiri, who is tipped to become the terrorist organisation's next leader, had already been perceived by western powers to be Al Qaeda's real operational head for a long time.

Although the transitional council headed by Gaddafi's former Justice Minister has in the space of just under four months made a lot of new friends and with the coalition forces now backing it and countries such as China and Russia slowly opening up to it as well, the would be sucessor to Gaddafi has still made quite a few enemies in the African continent itself. While the African Union is becoming more vocal on the need for Gaddafi to step out of power, tensions between several African govern...

On June 4 China made its first confirmed contact with the Libyan rebels. The meeting was held in Qatar between a Chinese diplomat and the leader of the rebel National Transitional Council and follows a spate of defections by high-profile figures of the Gaddafi regime, including senior oil official and former Prime Minister Shokri Ghanem.In Beijing, a Chinese Foreign Ministry statement said Beijing's ambassador to Qatar, Zhang Zhiliang, had met and "exchanged views on developments in Li...

The National Transitional Council in Libya is slowly trying to establish itself as the legitimate successor to Gaddafi. The West has helped the rebel movement by widely promoting it and calling for countries throughout the world to officially back the new regime. However while the U.S , the U.K, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Canada have officially recognised the political organisation as the new legitimate representative body of the Libyan people, countries in Africa and in the Middle East ...

41 years ago, the Corrective Revolution put Hafez al-Assad, father of current president Bashar al-Assad, in control of Syria, a country he would rule for three decades.

Bernard Henri Levy announced that he delivered a message on Thursday from Libyan rebel leaders to Israel's Prime Minister, saying they would seek diplomatic ties with the country if they came to power.

South African President Jacob Zuma yesterday confirmed that with the Libyan rebels and NATO setting Gaddafi's departure as the main condition for a ceasefire and with Gaddafi still refusing to leave, the talks initiated by the African Union did not lead to any breakthrough.

A senior Egyptian general has admitted that "virginity checks" were performed on women arrested during the demonstrations of the Arab Spring in Egypt. The confirmation of the allegations, that were first brought up by Amnesty International, comes after the military authorities had repeatedly and firmly denied such claims.

Democracy has in the last few months seen its popularity soar in all corners of the planet. With Egypt and Tunisia both managing to chase their dictators out of town and Gaddafi still insisting that Libya is the only democratic country on the planet, masses and leaders alike have been fighting to grab a piece of the democratic pie. Last week it was the turn of rising giant China to take us all by surprise as the country made a push for democracy...in the IMF.

G8 countries which include leaders from brings together the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, with the leaders of the US, Britain, Germany, Japan, Russia, Canada and Italy have today come up with a pledge of £12bn in aid, loans and debt relief in an attempt to support and enhance pro-democratic regimes in the region. While the full details of the package are yet unknown, the money will come from international financial institutions and members of the G8.Both the leaders of Egypt and Tunisi...

Us President Barack Obama's trip to Europe is indeed quite a trip as it will include visits to Ireland, Britain, France and Poland and a G-8 summit. The visit will start with Ireland, and finish with Poland.

The first death penalty following the revolution that ousted former president Hosni Mubarak, has been handed down as a police officer found guilty of killing protesters was sentenced to death.

Obama's speech was of broad scope, with the US leader tackling different issues in different countries while using this as an opportunity to give the US response to the Middle East uprisings and regime changes. He pledged international economic support for countries undergoing democratic change, notably Egypt and Tunisia and warned Syria's President Bashar al-Assad to lead transition in his country, or to "get out of the way".

US President Barack Obama’s discourse, yesterday marked a “new chapter" in diplomacy after the Arab Spring uprisings, the leader explained. Talking from the state department, shifting from a military to a diplomatic emphasis, Mr Obama insisted on the interrelated nature of the US-Middle East relationship: “ though these countries may be a great distance from our shores, we know that our own future is bound to this region by the forces of economics and security; history and faith”, he said.

A recording allegedly made by former Al-Qaeda number one Osama Bin Laden shortly before he died has been released. The 12 minute long message sees him praise the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt and speak of a "rare historic opportunity" for Muslims to rise up against the "tyrants". He repeatedly refers to and encourages the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt but does not mention Bahrain, Syria, Libya or even Yemen.