A report by New York-based NGO Human Rights Watch has revealed widespread torture by the government.

HRW interviewed more than 200 former detainees, including women and children who were held in an "archipelago of torture centres".

The group says the torture amounts to crimes against humanity and called for UN observers to examine Syrian detention centres and refer the issue to the International Criminal Court.

Pakistan has ended an 11 month dispute that had strained relations between Washington and Islamabad, by agreeing to allow US forces to reopen supply lines across its border into Afghanistan.

The agreement was instigated by an apology issued by the US secretary of state, Hilary Clinton for the killing of 24 Pakistani troops in a Nato airstrike during the November.

Turkey scrambled six F-16 fighter jets on its border with Syria, after Syrian helicoptors flew close to its border on Saturday.

In a statement, the Turkish army said that three such incidents were observed on Saturday, however, there was no violation of Turkish airspace.

On Friday, Turkey began deploying rocket launchers and anti-aircraft guns along the border.

On the 14th day of anti-government protests sparked by rising inflation in Sudan, over 1000 protesters have been arrested and detained in secret locations.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay has termed the conflict in Syria a civil war and appealed for “further militarisation of the conflict [in Syria]” to be “avoided at all costs".

President Assad of Syria was previously considered for an honorary knighthood by the Queen during Tony Blair's era, reports The Times on Sunday.

According to official papers obtained by The Sunday Times under freedom of information laws, discussions took place ahead of Assad's 2002 visit to the UK, where he was granted an audience with the Queen and Prince of Wales.

Speaking to The Guardian from Turkey, exiled members of Syria’s opposition have written off UN diplomacy and talks of peace-brokering as by and large irrelevant to the crisis.

Dissidents have said that talking had simply consolidated and bought time for the Assad regime, and an end to the turmoil could only be arrived at through all-out war.

The Guardian’s Martin Chulov reports that the UN is largely viewed as impotent by the Syrian opposition.

Mali’s Islamist rebel group Ansar Dine (Defenders of Faith) have started destroying sacred shrines, after it declared control over the Northern part of Mali, including the historic town of Timbuktu.

The town’s ancient Sufi shrines face complete destruction, as Ansar Dine considers them idolatrous and incompatible with the group’s interpretation of Sharia Law. According to AFP seven tombs of Sufi saints have been demolished in the past two days.

Ansar Dine’s demolition campaign has horrified and outraged both Mali’s government and the international community.

The Danish government has decided to extradite a man, suspected of taking part in the Rwandan genocide in 1994.

The man, named in Danish media as Emmanuel Mbarushimana, is accused of being one of the ringleaders of massacres by Hutus against ethnic Tutsis.

The Danish Justice ministry said on Friday, the man had been living in Denmark since 2001, but refused to divulge any further information.

Burma’s opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been warned for referring to the country as ‘Burma’ instead of ‘Myanmar’ by government officials.

The comments come in the midst of Suu Kyi’s European tour, during which she has repeatedly used the term Burma in speeches and interviews.

The Burmese electoral commission published a statement in the New Light of Myanmar newspaper saying “as it is prescribed in the constitution that the ‘state shall be known as the Republic of the Union of Myanmar’ no-one has the right to call [the country] Burma.”