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news.bbc.co.uk — The Senate has approved a nuclear deal with India, ending a three-decade ban on nuclear trade with Delhi. The 86-13 vote was the last legislative hurdle in a process that began when an agreement was reached in 2005. The deal will give India access to U.S. civilian nuclear technology and fuel in return for inspections of its civilian, but not military, nuclear facilities. India says the accord is vital to meet its rising energy needs. Critics say it creates a dangerous precedent. They say it effectively allows India to expand its nuclear power industry without requiring it to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty as other nations must.

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washingtonpost.com — The Defense Department will pay private U.S. contractors in Iraq up to $300 million over the next three years to produce news stories, entertainment programs and public service advertisements for the Iraqi media in an effort to "engage and inspire" the local population to support U.S. objectives and the Iraqi government. The new contracts — awarded last week to four companies — will expand and consolidate what the U.S. military calls "information/psychological operations" in Iraq far into the future, even as violence appears to be abating and U.S. troops have begun drawing down.

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ipsnews.net — New evidence from former U.S. officials reveals that the George W. Bush administration failed to adopt any plan to block the retreat of Osama bin Laden and other al Qaeda leaders from Afghanistan to Pakistan in the first weeks after 9/11. That failure was directly related to the fact that top administration officials gave priority to planning for war with Iraq over military action against al Qaeda in Afghanistan. As a result, the United States had far too few troops and strategic airlift capacity in the theater to cover the large number of possible exit routes through the border area when bin Laden escaped in late 2001.

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ipsnews.net — The U.S. is failing to rein in its primary target in the "global war on terror" — al Qaeda — according to a new poll of 23 countries across the globe. Conducted for the BBC World Service by the University of Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes and Globescan, the poll reveals that in every country surveyed but one, respondents think that the U.S.'s actions have failed to weaken the international terror group. "Despite its overwhelming military power, America's war against al Qaeda is widely seen as having achieved nothing better than a stalemate and many believe that it has even strengthened al Qaeda," PIPA director Steve Kull said in a statement that accompanied the release of the report.

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news.bbc.co.uk — George W. Bush has accused Russia of violating the UN's charter by invading Georgia, in his final speech to the world body as U.S. president. Mr Bush urged world leaders gathered at UN in New York to "stand united in our support of the people of Georgia". In a wide-ranging speech, Mr Bush also urged the international community to continue the fight against terrorism. He also gave an assurance that the U.S. was taking decisive action over the current global economic crisis.

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washingtonpost.com — A former Iraqi official estimated yesterday that more than $13 billion meant for reconstruction projects in Iraq was wasted or stolen through elaborate fraud schemes. Salam Adhoob, a former chief investigator for Iraq's Commission on Public Integrity, told the Senate Democratic Policy Committee, an arm of the Democratic caucus, that an Iraqi auditing bureau "could not properly account for" the money. While many of the projects audited "were not needed — and many were never built," he said, "this very real fact remains: Billions of American dollars that paid for these projects are now gone."

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ipsnews.net — Clandestine gun suppliers, funded by the U.S. and Iraqi governments, have flooded Iraq with a million weapons since 2003, charges a new Amnesty International investigation. Because of faulty or non-existent government tracking systems, many of those guns have gone missing, and some have turned up in the hands of insurgents. Contracts with one of these companies, Taos Industries, account for almost half of the 217 million dollars Baghdad and Washington have officially spent to arm the Iraqi army, police and security forces employed by various Iraqi ministries.

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news.bbc.co.uk — Russia is becoming increasingly authoritarian at home and aggressive abroad, says the US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. In a strongly worded speech, Ms Rice said Moscow was on a "one-way path to isolation and irrelevance." Diplomatic relations between the US and Russia have been strained by the recent conflict in Georgia. Speaking at an event organized by the German Marshall Fund in Washington, Ms Rice acknowledged that Georgia had fired the first shots in the breakaway region of South Ossetia. But Ms Rice said that Russia had escalated the conflict.

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msnbc.msn.com — The Bush administration is looking at possible changes in its war strategy in Afghanistan in light of rising levels of violence and an increasingly complex insurgent threat, Defense Secretary Robert Gates acknowledged. "You have an overall approach, an overall strategy, but you adjust it continually based on the circumstances that you find," Gates said in an interview with a group of reporters at a London hotel. "We did that in Iraq. We made a change in strategy in Iraq and we are going to continue to look at the situation in Afghanistan." He did not reveal whether the White House has launched a formal review of its war strategy. But his remarks indicated that the administration sees a need to make some adjustments as progress there remains slow.

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latimes.com — Once dependent on American support to keep his job, Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has consolidated power and is asserting his independence, sharply reducing Washington's influence over the future of Iraq. Iraq's police and army now operate virtually on their own, and with Washington's mandate from the United Nations to provide security here expiring in less than four months, Maliki is insisting on imposing severe limits on the long-term U.S. military role, including the withdrawal of American forces from all cities by June. America's eroded leverage has left Iran, with its burgeoning trade and political ties, in a better position to affect Iraqi government policies. It also means that whichever U.S. presidential candidate is elected will have less ability to sway Baghdad than did the Bush administration.

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