There are many questions about the meeting in question. At a time when the rebels were fighting the regime around Damascus, who in his right security mind would assemble the key elements of the security services in one room?

And the president of Syria usually presides over such meetings, and yet he was not harmed, nor were key elements of the military-intelligence apparatus, like the

We are hearing a new concept these days in discussions about Iran — the zone of immunity. The idea, often explained by Ehud Barak, Israel’s defense minister, is that soon Iran will have enough nuclear capability that Israel would not be able to inflict a crippling blow to its program.
Israeli officials explain that we Americans cannot understand their fears, that Iran is an existential threat to

There is little understanding of Pakistan and its internal dynamics in Afghanistan. A recent example is the visit of President Hamed Karzai to Pakistan last week, during which he met with Pakistani leaders – not only those from the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) but also a number of other prominent politicians: the leaders of two Pashtun nationalist and of two religious parties as well as th

The eurozone's unemployment rate rose to a record high of 10.7pc in January, reaching levels of extreme social distress across large parts of Southern Europe.
...
Spain's jobless rate continued its relentless climb to 23.2pc, rising to 49.9pc for youth. Long-term unemployment has increased sixfold since the start of the crisis and now makes up half the total. "This is the terrible cancer of our

"...Jens Stoltenberg, who seemed to be speaking to a foreign audience when he said: I have a message to the people who attacked us, and those behind them. This is a message from all of Norway: You will not destroy us.
You will not destroy our democracy nor our quest for a better world. We are a small nation, but we are a proud nation.
No one shall bomb us into silence or shoot us into silence.

Best photography inspirations on Professional Photography Blog

Associated Press president Tom Curley and News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch both made speeches yesterday in China, focusing on internet thievery. One remembers that AP started cracking down on even scraper sites or news blogs that posted snippets with a link back to an AP story – normal web practice,

Lincoln University students recently decided to descend on a fancy dress party dressed as Nazis and as concentration camp inmates, and to play all sorts of jolly drunken games with batons and gags. As images of the weird sadomasochistic prank flash around the world and prompt apologies from Lincoln

Unitec accommodation is so bad that is is causing serious health problems for students. The conditions there are disgusting, it's a shock that Unitec has done nothing about it.

This type of heater might be dangerous. Hopefully this story is followed up with an investigation so we can see if these heaters needs to be recalled.

A heater still working after 60 years. And modern heaters that burn your house down within two years.

Some company has been calling various businesses and demanding payment for advertising which never happened.

In response to a rather cynical article by Catherine Beard published in the Dominion Post, Robyn Maclolm has replied with the following article published in the same paper this morning.

Marital splits were also named the second-worst thing in the world in the survey of under-10s, behind being fat.

Climate sceptic Vincent Gray, a member of the NZ "Climate Science Coalition" reveals that "Environmentalism" is an attempt to find a replacement for "Darwinism".