The Taliban have called for a UN and human rights investigation into an air strike in Afghanistan on Friday that killed dozens of people.

The independent Afghanistan Rights Monitor group says up to 70 civilians died in the Kunduz province raid.

The Nato air strike targeted fuel tankers hijacked by the insurgents.

The BBC's David Loyn in Kabul says the Taliban call is a change to its usual policy of opposing all foreign involvement in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, US forces are facing new criticism from a Swedish organisation which claims US soldiers forced their way into a hospital, searching for insurgents.

Unprecedented TV appeal

A Sudanese woman has been jailed for a month after refusing to pay a fine for "dressing indecently" by wearing trousers, her lawyers say.

Lubna Ahmed Hussein did not want to "give the verdict any legitimacy" by paying the fine of about $200 (£122), her lawyer, Nabil Adib, told the BBC.

Ms Hussein, a journalist in her 30s, could have been given up to 40 lashes.

Before the verdict, she had said she wanted her trial to become a test case for women's rights, correspondents say.

Ms Hussein had resigned from her job at the UN, which would have given her immunity.

Read more @ BBC News

Three men have been found guilty of plotting to kill thousands of people by blowing up planes flying from London to America with home-made liquid bombs.

A Woolwich Crown Court jury convicted Abdulla Ahmed Ali, 28, Tanvir Hussain, 28, and Assad Sarwar, 29, of conspiring to activate bombs disguised as drinks.

Four other men were found not guilty of involvement in the suicide bomb plot.

The men's arrests in August 2006 led to new airport restrictions on liquids and brought chaos to travellers.

A new study in the US suggests that women have a genetic aversion to dangerous animals, such as spiders.

The research, published in the New Scientist, says women are born with character traits that were ingrained in our hunter-gatherer ancestors.

As child protectors, they have to shun animals that threaten them or their young off-spring, researchers said.

Previous research suggested women were actually up to four times more likely to be afraid of creatures like spiders.

The new research was headed up by developmental psychologist, Dr David Rakison, from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, 10 baby girls, and 10 baby boys were subjected to a number of pictures of spiders to gauge their reactions.

Chinese authorities in Xinjiang Province have issued a notice that any Uyghur cadres or workers found not eating lunch during Ramadan could lose their jobs.

It is part of the campaign of local authorities in Xinjiang, home to the Muslim Uyghur ethnic group, to force the Uyghur people to give up their religious rituals during the fasting month of Ramadan.

Ramadan is a holy month in the Islamic calendar, which begun this year on Aug. 22. It requires not eating during the daytime.

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu will approve more construction in West Bank settlements before considering a halt to building work, officials say.

The prime minister is expected to back work on hundreds of new homes next week in addition to 2,500 units already being built, a senior aide said.

He will then consider a temporary halt to settlement building, as requested by the US in a bid to restart peace talks.

The news angered the Palestinians who said it was "absolutely unacceptable".

"The only thing suspended by this announcement will be the peace process," Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat told the AFP news agency.

An Arab organisation is to be put on trial in the Netherlands over its publication of a cartoon deemed offensive to Jews, prosecutors say.

The cartoon, published by the Arab European League (AEL) on its website, questions the Holocaust.

It said the decision to prosecute illustrated bias against Muslims.

It said the same standards were not applied to the Dutch MP Geert Wilders, who made a film including cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.

Last month prosecutors said they would not put the far-right MP on trial for distributing the controversial Danish cartoons, which caused a storm of protest after their publication in 2005.

GOVERNMENT Minister Jim Fitzpatrick has called for segregation to be outlawed in Britain.

The controversial East London Labour MP, who hit the headlines last week after walking out of a Muslim wedding for being asked to sit apart from his wife, insists segregation of men and women outside places of worship should be against the law.

Read more @ East London Advertiser

wo Pakistani students arrested over unproven terror allegations in England earlier this year have returned to Pakistan, a British official said.

The duo have landed in Lahore after agreeing to leave Britain voluntarily, the official said.

Rizwan Sharif and Umar Farooq were among 12 people held by police after raids in north-west England in April, but the pair were never charged.

The Home Office tried to deport them, saying they remained a security threat.

The case has strained relations between Britain and Pakistan and also caused embarrassment to Britain.

On arrival in Lahore, the students told journalists that they were investigated by hundreds of policemen during their detention but the British authorities failed to prove any charges against him.

Nato's failing mission is increasingly coming to resemble the Soviets' disastrous campaign

It is deja vu on a huge and bloody scale. General Stanley McChrystal, the US commander in Afghanistan, is about to advise his president that "the Afghan people are undergoing a crisis of confidence because the war against the Taliban has not made their lives better", according to leaked reports. Change the word "Taliban" to "mujahideen", and you have an exact repetition of what the Russians found a quarter of a century ago.