Iceland holds some key lessons for nations trying to survive bailouts after the island’s approach to its rescue led to a “surprisingly” strong recovery, the International Monetary Fund’s mission chief to the country said. - Iceland’s commitment to its program, a decision to push losses on to bondholders instead of taxpayers and the safeguarding of a welfare system that shielded the unemployed from penury helped propel the nation from collapse toward recovery, according to the Washington-based fund.

“Iceland has made significant achievements since the crisis,” Daria V. Zakharova, IMF mission chief to the island, said in an interview. “We have a very positive outlook on growth, especially for this year and next year because it appears to us that the growth is broad based.”

Israel kicks out migrants – by changing their nationality and sending them to another country. - Sudanese asylum seekers in Israel are being issued with documents changing their nationality, allowing them to be removed from the country or imprisoned. The Bureau has identified migrants who have recently been issued with documents labelling them as South Sudanese – despite holding passports showing they were born in areas that remain in Sudan. Four migrants from the Republic of Sudan have already been flown from Israel to South Sudan, an entirely different country that was formed last year. The South Sudanese authorities refused to accept them at the border and they were sent back to Tel Aviv.

The United Nations has called on the US to release the footage of its deadly assassination drone strikes in different parts of the globe or face an international inquiry. - UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-Terrorism Ben Emmerson said on Sunday that the US is coming under mounting global pressure over its use of assassination drones, adding that he is preparing a report on the issue for the next session of the Human Rights Council in March. Emmerson also urged Washington to open itself to an independent probe into the legality of such attacks that will "remain at the top of the UN political agenda until some consensus and transparency has been achieved."

Assange is currently under the protection of the Ecuadorean embassy. The Ecuadorean government has found that Mr. Assange has justified in his application and through additional material that he has a well-founded fear of political persecution, and risks torture or the death penalty in the United States in connection with the publication of truthful information of matters of interest to the public through his work with WikiLeaks. [Justice for Assange]

Annie Machon: The Assange Witch Hunt

The diplomatic row over Julian Assange escalated last night when the President of Ecuador warned Britain that any attempt to storm its embassy in London would destroy relations between the two countries. Rafael Correa used his weekly address to the nation to deliver his strongest warning to Britain yet, describing the UK's stance as 'grotesque' and 'intolerant'. He said if British police 'violated Ecuador's diplomatic mission' in London it would destroy ties between the two countries.

The FBI probed a late-night swim in the Sea of Galilee that involved drinking, numerous GOP freshmen lawmakers, top leadership staff - and one nude member of Congress, according to more than a dozen sources, including eyewitnesses. During a fact-finding congressional trip to the Holy Land last summer, Rep. Kevin Yoder (R-Kan.) took off his clothes and jumped into the sea, joining a number of members, their families and GOP staff during a night out in Israel, the sources told POLITICO. The Sea of Galilee, a Christian holy site, is where Jesus is said in the Bible to have walked on water.

More than 30 years ago, a teenager named Jadav "Molai" Payeng began planting seeds along a barren sandbar near his birthplace in India's Assam region, the Asian Age reports.

It was 1979 and floods had washed a great number of snakes onto the sandbar. When Payeng -- then only 16 -- found them, they had all died.

"The snakes died in the heat, without any tree cover. I sat down and wept over their lifeless forms," Payeng told the Times Of India. "It was carnage. I alerted the forest department and asked them if they could grow trees there. They said nothing would grow there. Instead, they asked me to try growing bamboo. It was painful, but I did it. There was nobody to help me," he told the newspaper.

Now that once-barren sandbar is a sprawling 1,360 acre forest, home to several thousands of varieties of trees and an astounding diversity of wildlife -- including birds, deer, apes, rhino, elephants and even tigers. The forest, aptly called the "Molai woods" after its creator's nickname, was single-handedly planted and cultivated by one man -- Payeng, who is now 47.

Jenny Gallagher, a nurse who treated victims of the highly suspicious 'Batman' shooting in Aurora, Colorado last month, is dead at age 46. The reported cause of death: drowning. "She worked the morning after the Batman massacre in a very busy unit of the hospital - so she saw everything really, some really bad injuries," her husband Greg reportedly told Ireland's Herald earlier today... Gallagher was actually found dead ten days ago, on August 7th. Despite recent conflicting and incorrect reports about the location (multiple reports say it was in Colorado, while another says Ohio), The End Run has determined that she was actually found dead in Okoboji Lake, which is in Dickson County, Iowa, about 700 miles from her home town of Denver by car.

A number of Israeli settlers constructed a chicken farm on a privately-owned Palestinian land, in Khallit Ein Masour area, near Al-Khader city in the Bethlehem district. - Ahmad Salah, member of the Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, told the Quds Press news agency that a number of extremist Israeli settlers stole land that belong to members of Sbeih family, and installed their chicken farm. Salah added that the land in question is on a mountain that has no power or water supplies, and no road access.

“The settlers are using primitive means to transport water and other supplies to the land”, he said, “They are eying at occupying 10 Dunams of land that surround the farm”.

Salah further stated that the new outpost is close to the Daniel illegal settlement, and that the settlers will likely try to bring mobile homes in order to officially establish their outpost.

South African platinum miners have continued their strike in the aftermath of the August 16 police massacre of 34 of their comrades in a hail of bullets that left another 78 wounded. Their anger is directed against not only mine-owner Lonmin and the police, but also the African National Congress (ANC) government and the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM). The 3,000 drilling operators at the Marikana mine, northwest of Johannesburg, are striking to demand a more than 300 percent increase in their 4,000 rand ($480) minimum monthly wage to 12,500 rand ($1,500). The police and the ANC are acting as enforcers of the interests of the corporations.

The Himalayan: Lonmin threatens to sack striking SAfrica miners