“Reports of abuse, maltreatment and violence are rife in Immigration detention centres where newborns, children and the elderly languish for months, sometimes years, without any avenue for release.

“In recent years, Immigration Enforcement has taken to moving undocumented arrestees into provincial maximum security holding centres. Many of those held are refugee claimants that have just arrived, whose detention is actually illegal under the Geneva Convention on Refugee Rights.”

Egypt's military has begun shipping arms over the border to Libyan rebels with Washington's knowledge, US and Libyan rebel officials told the Wall Street Journal.

The Egyptian shipments are the strongest indication to date that some Arab countries are heeding Western calls to take a lead in efforts to intervene on behalf of pro-democracy rebels in their fight against Mummar Gaddafi, the paper said.

Spain must compensate the radical Basque separatist leader Arnaldo Otegi after wrongly sentencing him to jail for insulting King Juan Carlos, the European court of human rights has decided.

See The Guardian’s report here.

The United Nations has warned Bahrain that its violent crackdown on anti-government protesters might be breaking international law.

See Al-Jazeera’s report here.

Bahrain’s security forces have fired on pro-democracy protestors and are reported to be preventing doctors from treating the injured.

France has recognised the Libyan National Council, a rebel body fighting to oust Muammar Gaddafi, as the legitimate representative of Libya's people.

"France recognises the National Council as the legitimate representative of the Libyan people. There will be an exchange of ambassadors between Paris and Benghazi," an official told reporters.

A French diplomatic source told Reuters: "It's a political signal of encouragement and we hope that the European Union will follow suit."

An often raised objection to secession as self-determination is what about people on the wrong side of border between two new states.

The answer is blindingly simple, if the two new states behave responsibly.

This is what US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Johnnie Carson had to say about today's post-referendum Sudan:

“The language of R2P refers to state inability or unwillingness as the catalyst for the international responsibility to protect being activated. But often the state itself is the perpetrator of atrocity crimes when security forces, meant to protect people, are instead let loose in a killing spree.”

"I felt that the IRA, in the context of Irish history, and Sinn Fein were a legitimate force that had to be recognized and you wouldn't have peace without them ... I [wanted] a peace agreement, a working agreement, where [Northern Ireland’s] nationalist community would feel their rights would be respected. …”