One of the fifty Arab League observers visiting Damascus called the Assad regime's killings a genocide.

Speaking to Al Arabiya broadcaster on Monday, Mostashar Mahgoub said,

"what's happening in Syria is genocide."

"This is a regime is taking revenge on its people."

The Arab League observers started arriving in Syria on Friday.

The observers will judge whether Syria is implementing a peace plan it agreed to after pressure by the Arab League and Turkey. The plan includes withdrawal of troops from the streets, release of prisoners, and dialogue with the opposition.

Syrian commanders ordered troops to 'shoot to kill' - HRW (15 Dec 2011)

Refer Syria to ICC - Navi Pillay (13 Dec 2011)

An ex-military officer in Argentina's 'Dirty War' has been arrested by authorities in Boliva, on charges of human rights violations.

The officer, Luis Enrique Baraldini, was extradited to Argentina, after Bolivian Interior Minister, Wilfredo Chavez, presented a handcuffed Baraldini at a press conference in La Paz.

Chavez said Baraldini "was a member of the epoch of dictatorship in Argentina and has therefore been charged in that country."

Former Argentine army general, Jorge Videla was sentenced to life in prison last year for crimes against humanity.

The general is accused of being the main architect of what became known as Argentina's ‘Dirty War’ – a period of state-sponsored terror friom 1976 to 1983 in which up to 30,000 people were killed or ‘disappeared’.

Tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets of Moscow on Saturday, condemning election fraud and demanding a repeat election.

Wearing white ribbons and chanting slogans such as "We are the Power!" and "Russia without Putin", protesters called for an end to Putin's 12-year rule.

The protest, with no central leader, is considered to be the most largest show of public condemnation since those against the Soviet Union over 20 years ago. Saturday's protest was larger than the previous protest on 10th December, against vote rigging in the recent elections.

Mikhail Gorbachev, the leader who oversaw the end of the Soviet Union on 25th December 1991, said,

“I’m happy that I have lived to see the people waking up. This raises big hopes."

Speaking to Ekho Moskvy radio, Gorbachev urged Putin to relinquish power peacefully, as he had done.

A delegation from members of the Arab League has arrived in Syria in order to prepare for the arrival of 20 foreign observers over the weekend, a number that will eventually increase to 500.

The observers will judge whether Syria is implementing a peace plan it agreed to after pressure by the Arab League and Turkey.

The plan includes withdrawal of troops from the streets, release of prisoners, and dialogue with the opposition.

However, Bashar al-Assad’s regime has escalated its crackdown on anti-government protestors, with reports emerging that over 200 people were killed over the past two days, with 100 dying in one village alone.

Witnesses in Kfar Owaid described it as an ‘organised massacre’, saying troops surrounded activists and villagers and attacked the crowds with rockets, tank shells, bombs and gunfire.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry said yesterday: "We strongly condemn the Syrian leadership's policies of oppression against its own people, which are turning the country into a bloodbath." The US also harshly criticised the Syrian regime after the attack on Kfar Owaid, accusing Syria of trying to "mow down" its own people.

The French National Assembly has passed a bill outlawing the denial of Genocide and war crimes that are accepted as such by the French government.

The bill has to go before the Senate next year, before becoming law; however it is thought to be unlikely to be passed by the senate.

The Turkish government has reacted by cutting all ties with France after Thursday’s vote.

Turkey has recalled its ambassador to Paris and frozen all diplomatic and political ties and cancelled all economic, military and political meetings.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has also banned the use of French military planes and ships of Turkish facilities.

"This will open very grave and irreparable wounds," he said.

Mr Erdogan told reporters: "This is politics based on racism, discrimination and xenophobia."

"This is using Turkophobia and Islamophobia to gain votes, and it raises concerns regarding these issues not only in France but all Europe."

Erdogan said the bill was "a clear example of how racism, discrimination and anti-Muslim sentiment have reached new heights in France and in Europe."

He said: "President Sarkozy's ambition is to win an election based on promoting animosity against Turks and Muslims."

The president also accused France of committing genocide in Algeria during colonial times.

"What the French did in Algeria was genocide," he said.

"They were mercilessly martyred. If Mr Sarkozy doesn't know there was a genocide, he can ask his father, Pal Sarkozy … who was a legionnaire in Algeria in the 1940s. I'm sure he has a lot to tell his son about the massacres committed by the French in Algeria."

Around 1.5 million Armenians are thought to have been killed during the genocide, which was recognised by the French parliament in 2001.

Over 500,000 ethnic Armenians live in France and most proponents of the bill are from constituencies which have a high proportion of Armenians.

"It has been seven years since the end of the second siege of Fallujah – the US assault that left the city in ruins, killed thousands of civilians, and displaced hundreds of thousands more; the assault that poisoned a generation, plaguing the people who live there with cancers and their children with birth defects.

"I do not see any contradiction in feeling sympathy for the dead US Marines and soldiers and at the same time feeling sympathy for the Fallujans who fell to their guns. The contradiction lies in believing that we were liberators, when in fact we oppressed the freedoms and wishes of Fallujans. The contradiction lies in believing that we were heroes, when the definition of "hero" bares no relation to our actions in Fallujah."

"The same distorted morality has been used to justify attacks against the native Americans, the Vietnamese, El Salvadorans, and the Afghans. It is the same story over and over again. These people have been dehumanised, their God-given right to self-defence has been delegitimised, their resistance has been reframed as terrorism, and US soldiers have been sent to kill them."

"I cannot imagine a more necessary step towards justice than to put an end to these lies, and achieve some moral clarity on this issue. I see no issue more important than to clearly understand the difference between aggression and self-defence, and to support legitimate struggles. I cannot hate, blame, begrudge, or resent Fallujans for fighting back against us. I am sincerely sorry for the role I played in the second siege of Fallujah, and I hope that some day not just Fallujans but all Iraqis will win their struggle."

“The permanent solution to the Pakistan problem … lies in 20th-century history. ... The answer to the current Pakistani train wreck is to continue this natural process [of Bangladesh gaining independence from Pakistan] by recognizing Baluchistan’s legitimate claim to independence.”

- M. Chris Mason, a retired diplomat and a senior fellow at the Center for Advanced Defense Studies in Washington DC.

As relations between the US and Pakistan deteriorate, one US defence expert suggests a potential solution.

“An independent Baluchistan would, in fact, solve many of the region’s most intractable problems overnight. It would create a territorial buffer between rogue states Iran and Pakistan. It would provide a transportation and pipeline corridor for Afghanistan and Central Asia to the impressive but underutilized new port at Gwadar. It would solve all of NATO’s logistical problems in Afghanistan, allow us to root the Taliban out of the former province and provide greater access to Waziristan, to subdue our enemies there. And it would contain the rogue nuclear state of Pakistan and its A.Q. Khan network of nuclear proliferation-for-profit on three landward sides.”

“The way to put the Pakistani genie back in the bottle and cork it is to help the Baluchis go the way of the Bangladeshis in achieving their dream of freedom from tyranny, corruption and murder at the hands of the diseased Pakistani military state.”

His full opinion is in The Globe and Mail.

“Kim Jong-il, the enigmatic North Korean leader, died on a train at 8:30 a.m. Saturday in his country. Forty-eight hours later, officials in South Korea still did not know anything about it — to say nothing of Washington, where the State Department acknowledged “press reporting” of Mr. Kim’s death well after North Korean state media had already announced it.”

“Asian and American intelligence services have failed before to pick up significant developments in North Korea. Pyongyang built a sprawling plant to enrich uranium that went undetected for about a year and a half until North Korean officials showed it off in late 2010 to an American nuclear scientist. The North also helped build a complete nuclear reactor in Syria without tipping off Western intelligence.”

“Modern intelligence gathering, with its satellites and drones operating at the very cutting edge of technology, can often give decision-makers an extraordinary window on the world.

Think of the amazing images earlier this year of US President Barack Obama and his national security team in the White House, watching live video of the raid on Osama Bin Laden's compound in Pakistan as it unfolded.

But the intelligence gatherers do not know everything, and North Korea is a case in point.”

The United States has extradited a Rwandan convicted in absentia for her role in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

In 2009, she was sentenced for 19 years, the complicity in the murder of several children.

The woman, Marie-Claire Mukeshimana, was extradited to Kigali on Wednesday.

Rwanda's chief prosecutor, Martin Ngoga said,

"But we have a number of more identified persons who stand accused of genocide committed in the most brutal manner and claiming so many lives, who remain on US territory,"

"We have a strong feeling that action against them is very slow.

The UN Tribunal for Rwanda has handed life sentences to two senior members of the ruling political party in the country at the time of the 1994 genocide.

The sentences were imposed upon Matthieu Ngirumpatse and Edouard Karemera, for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

Ngirumpatse was the chairman of Rwanda's then-ruling National Revolutionary Movement for Development (NRMD) party and Karemera was his deputy when the genocide took place.

They were also charged for not having prevented or denounced crimes committed in 1994 by the party's youth wing militia, the Interahamwe.

The tribunal found that the two men were part of a "joint criminal enterprise" aimed at exterminating Tutsis, with Judge Denis Byron commenting,

"After considering the gravity of the crimes for which Ngirumpatse has been found guilty as well as all the attenuating and aggravating circumstances, the court has the discretion to impose a single sentence and has decided to do that."

The ruling also found that it was with Ngirumpatse’s approval that arms were delivered to the Interahamwe and stated,

"At that point in the genocide it could be assumed the weapons were going to be used to kill Tutsis."

"The court concludes that the rapes and the sexual crimes carried out on Tutsi girls and women by soldiers and militia, including the Interahamwe, are a natural and predictable consequence of the joint criminal enterprise seeking to destroy the Tutsi ethnic group,"

New leader of North Korea and military mourn the death of late leader, his father, Kim Jong-il. Photograph Reuters

Reports from North Korea indicated that the country's new leader, late Kim Jong-il's youngest son, Kim Jong-un, will share power with his uncle and the military.

Sources in the reclusive state have added that the military pledged its allegiance to Kim Jong-un and dismissed rumours of a military coup. Some reports state that the new leader had begun issuing orders to the military before his father's death.

Power will also be shared by Jang Song-thaek, brother-in-law of the late Kim Jong-il, who was names to the National Defense Commission in 2009 - part of the supreme leadership council the late leader headed.

Speaking to The Sydney Morning Herald, Ralph Cossa, from the US think tank - Pacific Forum CSIS, said,

"All have a vested interest in regime survival. Their own personal safety and survival is inextricably tied to regime survival and Kim Jong-un is the manifestation of this. I think the regime will remain stable, at least in the near-term."

The death of late Kim Jong-il, officially said to be as a result of a heart attack, was announced Monday. Reports have since emerged, his death may have occurred two days earlier.

The United States extradited a former Bosnian soldier to face charges of war crimes in Bosnia.

Edin Dzeko, now a naturalised US citizen, is accused of taking part in the mass murder of Croatian civilians in the South of Bosnia, in 1993.

In a statement, the Bosnian prosecutor's office said,

"Defendant Edin Dzeko was deported from the United States and handed over to Bosnia-Herzegovina authorities on December 20."

See US citizen agrees to face war crimes trial in Bosnia (17 Nov 2011)

Turkish President Abdullah Gul has warned France of ‘grave consequence if the proposed legislation to outlaw the Armenian Genocide is passed by the French lower house of parliament on Thursday.

"It is impossible for us to accept a draft law directed toward eliminating the freedom to reject unjust and groundless accusations against our country and our people," the Turkish president said in a statement issued on Tuesday.

"I hope that France will soon abandon the initiative which will put France in a position of a country that does not respect freedom of expression and does not allow objective scientific research," he said.

"I want to hope that France will not sacrifice the Turkish-French friendship which goes back hundreds of years, its common interests and alliance for petty political calculations," he added.

The proposed bill would make it a crime to deny any genocide, war crime or crime against humanity that has been recognised by the French government.

A French foreign ministry spokesman stressed that Thursday’s debate was a parliamentary initiative and not initiated by President Sarkozy and his government.