The US military said it has captured more than 200 Afghan juveniles, whose average age is 16, and held them prisoner for about one year without charging them for any crimes. - A report to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child said that more than 200 detainees under the age of 18 were held at a military prison at the Detention Facility in Parwan for being characterized as “enemy combatants”. The teens had not been charged with any crimes, but were each held for an average of one year for the sole purpose of preventing “a combatant from returning to the battlefield”, the report said. Since they were not charged for any crimes, the detainee ab5 s were not provided any legal assistance and could only defend themselves at open hearings. Most of the teens were captured while they were not in uniform – and many were seized from their homes.

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said the government of Benjamin Netanyahu was taking ‘Israel’ into unprecedented isolation with its policy on settlements. - He singled out Zionist entity’s recent announcement that it would build new settlement homes in the E1 corridor near Al-Quds. The plan has sparked international condemnations. Olmert said such plans had been around for years. But making the announcement days after the United States sided with the occupying entity against the Palestinians’ successful bid for de facto statehood recognition by the U.N. General Assembly was a slap in the face to the entity’s main ally. “Bibi Netanyahu,” he said, using the prime minister’s nickname, “is isolating Israel from the entire world in an unprecedented way, and we will pay a high price in every facet of our lives, and the Israeli public should know it.” Olmert, speaking on Israeli “Meet the Press”, said he did not embark on a widely expected bid to run in the upcoming January election due to a lack of unity in the centre-left bloc, as well as lingering legal troubles.

Fears for fishermen after Typhoon Bopha leaves 600 dead and nearly 1,000 missing as flash floods sweep southern Philippines.

Nearly 900 people are now missing after a typhoon devastated parts of the southern Philippines, as families and fishing companies report they have lost contact with more than 300 fishermen at sea, officials said on Sunday. Fishermen from General Santos City and nearby Sarangani province left a few days before Typhoon Bopha hit the main southern island of Mindanao on Tuesday, triggering flash floods that killed more than 600 people. A civil defence chief, Benito Ramos, said the fishermen had been bound for the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea and to the Pacific Ocean. "We have declared them missing," he said. "Maybe they are still alive." Ramos said they may have sought shelter on the many small islands in the Spratlys and the Celebes Sea, and lost battery power and have not been able to call.He said the coast guard, navy and fishing vessels had launched a search. After slamming into the southern Philippines, the typhoon moved out to sea but then veered back toward north-western parts of the country on Saturday, prompting worries of further devastation. Rescuers are continuing to search for survivors and bodies under tons of fallen trees and boulders in New Bataan, the worst-hit town, where rocks, mud and other rubble destroyed landmarks, making it doubly difficult to search places where houses once stood. More Photos

Leaked documents from a recent International Telecommunications Union meeting have exposed several disturbing examples of potential usages of the Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) standard, which was recently adopted by a UN conference in Dubai. - The leaked documents include a full draft recommendation on the ‘Y.2770’ standard for DPI. This technology is used to monitor, filter and manage Internet traffic. It could potentially be used by governments and international telecom companies to easily scan data sent on the Internet. Though the recommendation specifies only the requirements for DPI in next-generation networks, it also suggests that such standards be applicable to the current generation. The draft document does not cover the potential impact of the DPI, but recommends that implementers and users of the described capabilities “shall comply with all applicable national and regional laws, regulations and policies.” DPI will provide functionality to control and inspect Internet traffic – including encrypted and compressed data – in a wide range of possible scenarios.

The airstrikes were initiated under former US President George W. Bush, but have been escalated under President Barack Obama. The United States and its allies invaded Afghanistan in 2001 as part of Washington’s so-called war on terror. The offensive removed the Taliban from power, but insecurity remains across the country. - Recent statistics by the US Air Force show that Washington has carried out at least 447 drone strikes in war-torn Afghanistan so far this year. The United States regularly uses drones for attacks and spying missions in Afghanistan and Pakistan’s northwestern tribal belt near the Afghan border among other locations. Washington claims that the airstrikes target militants, but local sources say civilians have been the main victims of the attacks. The figures further indicate that drone attacks account for 11.5 percent of the entire US aerial assaults in 2012, up from nearly five percent in 2011. During the past three years, the US drone attacks had never exceeded 300 annually.

Israel has deployed special forces units in Syria [allegedly] to track "the regime’s movement of chemical weapons" amid growing international fears that the government might use its stockpile against rebels, British daily The Sunday Times reported on Sunday. “For years we’ve known the exact location of Syria’s chemical and biological munitions,” an Israeli source told the paper claimed. The paper added that operation “is part of a secret war to trail Syria’s non-conventional armaments and sabotage their development.” Syria warned on Saturday that rebels could use chemical weapons in their fight against President Bashar al-Assad's forces, but insisted the regime will never unleash such arms on its own people.

Russia said on Monday plans for Syria's political future must not be forced on it from outside, underlining its hostility to foreign pressure for President Bashar al-Assad's exit and to Western backing for an opposition coalition.

In a statement about talks on Sunday between international envoy Lakhdar Brahimi and Russian and U.S. officials, the Foreign Ministry reiterated calls for an end to violence and the start of talks on "the parameters of a transition period". It said Russia "stressed that fundamental decisions about reforming Syria's political system ... must be made by Syrians themselves, without outside interference or attempts to force prepared recipes for socio-political development" on them. The United States and its NATO allies have pressed for Assad's departure as part of efforts to end the bloodshed in Syria, but Russia and China have blocked action against the Syrian leader at the U.N. Security Council. The ministry statement called for an immediate end to violence and "the start of a national dialogue during which representatives of the Syrian government and opposition should discuss and agree parameters of a transition period." The statement appeared intended to underline that Russia is committed to helping Brahimi seek a solution to the 21-month conflict that would includes talks on a political transition but also continues to oppose making Assad's exit a precondition.

PressTV: Iran offers comprehensive plan to end Syria crisis
Daily Star (Lebanon): Islamist rebels seize key north Syria army base: activists

Excellent despatch from Syria's biggest city. Earlier this year, the rebels burned the souks. Now they're looting factories, kidnapping for ransom, and imposing themselves on residents who've come to fear and loathe both sides. - Outside the city, the rebels launched an all-out assault on the industries that kept Aleppo alive, burning and looting pharmaceutical plants, textile mills, and other factories. This hurts the industrialists, many of whom are waiting out the war in Lebanon, but more so their employees. While the urban unemployed had good reason to support a revolution that might improve their chances in life, the thousands who had jobs at the beginning of the revolution and lost them when the Free Army burned their workplaces are understandably resentful. There are stories of workers taking up arms to protect their factories and risking their lives to save their employers from kidnappers. Aleppo is under siege. Transporting heating oil for people to survive the winter has become a dangerous task.

South African leaders issued assurances about the health of former president Nelson Mandela on Sunday night after the 94 year-old was airlifted to hospital having reportedly stopped speaking amid a deterioration in his condition. - The Sunday Times, a South African newspaper, quoted an unnamed person close to the Mandela family as saying: "He has not been talking ... he is not looking good. It's clear that something is troubling him." Mr Mandela, the country's first black president, spent a second day at the Pretoria hospital where he is said to be undergoing tests. On Saturday he was flown from his rural home in the Eastern Cape to the capital Pretoria to receive medical attention. President Jacob Zuma visited Mr Mandela, whose health has been frail in recent years, and "found him comfortable, and in good care," a statement said. No details have been released about the specific reason for Mr Mandela's admission to hospital, or when he will be discharged. Mac Maharaj, a spokesman for Mr Zuma, on Saturday said the anti-apartheid icon was "doing well".

El tercer juicio sobre los crímenes cometidos en la Escuela Mecánica de la Armada (ESMA), uno de los dos principales centros clandestinos de detención de la última dictadura cívico-militar de Argentina (1976-1983), ha comenzado hace dos semanas, pero aún no se ha acabado la lectura de las acusaciones contra los 68 imputados. Es el mayor proceso judicial que se ha hecho contra el régimen, en el que se juzgarán delitos de lesa humanidad contra 789 personas, la mayoría de ellas víctimas de los llamados vuelos de la muerte. Durará dos años y declararán casi 900 testigos.

Quien caía secuestrado por la dictadura podía tener tres destinos: que lo liberaran después de unos días o unos años, que lo fusilaran o que muriera en plena tortura o como punto final de esta. Los cuerpos eran enterrados como NN, o entregados a sus familiares como guerrilleros muertos en combate o arrojados al Río de la Plata, al Atlántico o al delta del río Paraná.