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The International Red Cross said Tuesday it suspects the United States is hiding detainees in lockups across the globe, though the agency has been granted access to thousands of prisoners in Iraq and elsewhere.Terror suspects reported by the FBI as captured have never turned up in detention centers, and the United States has failed to reply to agency demands for a list of everyone it's holding, said Antonella Notari, spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross. Read here for more

The Philippines has begun pulling its troops out of Iraq , a move seemingly being made to satisfy demands by kidnappers of a Filipino hostage.Eight of the 51 Philippine humanitarian troops in Iraq have already left the country, Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Delia Albert said early Wednesday.In Washington, the Bush administration expressed concern and confusion regarding the decision by the Philippine government.Read here for more

Iraq: A Bulgarian truck driver taken hostage in Iraq has been beheaded by his captors, the Arab satellite television al-Jazeera said on Tuesday. The Doha-based station said it had received a video of the execution purportedly by the Tahid wal Jihad group of suspected al-Qaeda operative Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi. Read here for more

TONY Blair has been cleared by the Butler inquiry of manipulating intelligence to make the case for war, according to a senior government source who has seen the report.However, the unnamed source told Channel 4 News that the prime minister would face criticism for his informal style of decision-making in the run-up to the invasion.Read here for more

A suggestion that terrorism might delay the November election raised loud cries of "no" yesterday from both Republicans and Democrats. The chairman of the House committee that oversees federal election law said devising a plan to postpone the Nov. 2 presidential election in case of a terrorist attack creates "serious and complex" constitutional problems. Read here for more

A confidant of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden surrendered to Saudi diplomats in Iran and was flown to the kingdom Tuesday, a potentially valuable asset in the war on terrorism because of his closeness to bin Laden. The man, Khaled bin Ouda bin Mohammed al-Harby, also known as Abu Suleiman al-Makky, was shown on Saudi TV being pushed in a wheelchair through the Riyadh airport. He is the most important figure to surface under a Saudi amnesty promising to spare the lives of militants who turn themselves in.

The US government's deficit ballooned to $326.6 billion in the first nine months of the 2004 budget year, according to a snapshot of U.S. balance sheets released Tuesday. hat's more than 20 percent larger than the $269.7 billion shortfall for the corresponding period last year. For the current budget year which began Oct. 1, this spending has totaled $1.73 trillion, 6.4 percent more than the same period a year ago. Revenues came to $1.40 trillion, 3.5 percent more than the previous year. Read here for more

Israel's other wall is not so visible as the controversial "security barrier" Israel is building around itself, but it is as real. It divides thousands of Palestinians from one another, and it does not look like it is going to come down. The name of this wall is The Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law that bars Israelis married to Palestinians from the occupied territories from living with their spouses in Israel. Read here for more

Amnesty International asked Israel on Tuesday to repeal a year-old law that bans Palestinians who marry Israeli Arabs from living in Israel. The law was passed for an initial one-year period on July 31, 2003 and is under review. Arabs make up about 20 percent of Israel's population of 6.6 million, while about 3 million Palestinians live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Many families were divided by cease-fire lines after Mideast wars, and over the years, marriage between the two groups has been common. Read here for more

United Nations spokesmen in New York indicated on Tuesday that the UN will hold an emergency session on Friday to discuss last week's International Court of Justice advisory opinion questioning the legality of the West Bank separation fence. Delegates from dozens of countries are expected to participate in the session. Sources in New York told Haaretz that Israel's decision to ignore the ICJ's ruling is likely to prompt a storm of criticism at the meeting.On Tuesday, a draft resolution on the fence, sponsored by the PLO mission to the UN and Arab states, circulated among diplomats in New York. The draft resolution called on Israel to cease construction of the fence immediately.Read here for more

Residents of the Palestinian village of Hirbat Atwana near Hebron are claiming that settlers have thrown dead chickens into their water wells in an attempt to poison them. Police are investigating the claims. A Palestinian woman arrived this (Tuesday) morning at the police station in Hebron and reported that she had earlier discovered that dead chickens were thrown into the water wells of her village. Police officers went to investigate the matter but did not manage to find anything in the water well. They passed on a warning to the locals not to drink from the wells.Read here for more

If you're looking for reasons to be disgusted with George W. Bush, here are the top 10: Read here for more

US health officials released tough new cholesterol guidelines, which may raise the number of patients on cholesterol-lowering drugs, as well as the dosage they take.The new guidelines affect patients at high risk for heart attack, whose maximum for the so-called bad cholesterol is 70 (mg/dL), down from 100.To that end, researchers recommend more rigorous treatment for patients already suffering from heart disease, at risk of brain hemorrhage or with high blood pressure, according to the revised treatment guidelines published in Circulation magazine on July 13. Read here for more

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