Islamist cleric Anwar al-Awlaki killed in Yemen

US-born radical Islamist cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, a key al-Qaeda leader, has been killed in Yemen, the country's defence ministry said.

US President Barack Obama said his death was a major blow to al-Qaeda.

Awlaki, of Yemeni descent, has been on the run in Yemen since December 2007.

The US said that as a key figure in al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), he had played a "significant role" in plots to blow up US airliners and had sought use poison to kill US citizens.

Mr Obama is said to have personally ordered his killing last year.

Yemen's defence ministry statement said only that Awlaki had died in Khashef in Jawf province, about 140km (87 miles) east of the capital, Sanaa, "along with some of his companions".

US and Yemeni officials later named one of those as Samir Khan, also a US citizen but of Pakistani origin, who produced an online magazine promoting al-Qaeda's ideology.

Local tribal leaders told the AFP news agency that Awlaki had been moving around within Yemen in recent weeks to evade capture. Local people told AP he had been travelling between Jawf and Marib provinces when he died.

US officials said Awlaki's convoy was hit by a US drone and jet strike.

Mr Obama said that as the leader of external operations for AQAP, Awlaki, born in 1971, had taken "a lead in planning and directing efforts to murder innocent Americans" and was also "directly responsible for the death of many Yemeni citizens".

He said the death marked another "milestone in the broader efforts to defeat al-Qaeda and its affiliates", and paid tribute to US intelligence and the Yemeni security forces for their co-operation.

"This is further proof that al-Qaeda and its affiliates will find no safe haven anywhere in the world, " he said.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Awlaki had "demonstrated his intent and ability to cause mass terror".

One US official told the American network ABC that US intelligence had had "a very intense focus" on Awlaki for some time, waiting for a chance to strike.

The unnamed official said there had been "a good opportunity to hit him" on the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks this year, but that "it never materialised".

'Poison plot'

BBC security correspondent Gordon Corera says the killing is significant because Awlaki's use of modern media meant he was able to reach out and inspire people susceptible to radicalisation.

He is believed to have played a significant role in the Christmas 2009 Detroit airline bomb attempt and in the plot which sent two bombs in printer cartridges on US-bound cargo planes in 2010. They were intercepted in the UK and Dubai.

He has also been implicated in the 2009 US army base killings in Fort Hood, Texas, and a failed bombing in New York's Times Square in 2010.

Washington said he had sought to use poisons including cyanide and ricin in attacks.

When he was imam of a San Diego mosque in the 1990s, his sermons were attended by two future 9/11 hijackers, Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi.

He also lived in the UK from 2002-04, where he spent several months giving lectures to Muslim youth.

In a video posted in November last year he called for the killing of Americans, saying they were from the "party of devils".

Weeks later, he survived an air strike in Shabwa province in which at least 30 militants were killed.

He has been reported dead in the past following US air strikes on southern Yemen in December 2009 and November 2010.

He was the target of a US drone attack that killed two al-Qaeda operatives in southern Yemen on 5 May.

The death comes amid concerns in Washington about the impact of Yemen's political crisis on its ability to tackle al-Qaeda militants.

President Ali Abdullah Saleh is facing a widespread protest movement, along with an armed insurrection by renegade army units and tribal fighters.

Mr Saleh, who was injured three months ago when his residence was shelled, returned last week after treatment in Saudi Arabia.

In an interview published on Thursday, he said he would not stand down, as promised in a deal brokered by Gulf States, if his opponents are allowed to stand in elections to succeed him.

Greek PM presses EU leaders for new bailout tranche

Greeks burned tax notices outside a tax office in Thessaloniki on Friday

The Greek prime minister has been having a day of talks with fellow EU leaders on a new bailout tranche Greece needs to avoid bankruptcy in October.

George Papandreou met French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris after talks with European Council chief Herman Van Rompuy and others in Warsaw.

International inspectors are in Athens to decide whether Greece should receive the 8bn euros (£6.9bn; $10.9bn).

Protesters forced the rescheduling of a meeting on Friday morning.

Anger continues over austerity measures including a new property tax, and demonstrators have publicly burnt copies of emergency tax notices outside a tax office in the country's second city, Thessaloniki.

Meanwhile, the expansion of a general bailout fund for the eurozone looks on track for approval.

Jean-Claude Juncker, head of the eurozone group of finance ministers (Eurogroup), predicted all of the euro states would have endorsed the expansion by mid-October.

'Charm offensive'

Mr Juncker was speaking to Reuters news agency after the lower house of Germany's parliament backed the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) on Thursday in a vote which tested Chancellor Angela Merkel's credibility.

Austrian MPs backed the expansion on Friday, with only the parliaments of Malta, the Netherlands and Slovakia left to cast their votes.

In June, the European Council proposed expanding the size of the EFSF rescue fund from 240bn euros (£209bn; $326bn) to 440bn, and giving it new powers, such as allowing it to buy government bonds.

Analysts have suggested the fund actually needs to expand to 1-2 trillion euros in order to win market confidence, but EU officials have played down such reports.

The BBC's Chris Morris in Athens says Mr Papandreou is on a charm offensive, trying to convince his European colleagues that Greece can meet the demands imposed upon it by a tough austerity programme.

The unpopular reforms are vital to guarantee the international loans offered by a troika of the European Commission, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Since eurozone leaders agreed on a second rescue package for Greece this summer, Athens has fallen behind on its debt reduction targets, raising fears of a Greek default.

Many Greeks believe that austerity measures are pushing the country's crippled economy deeper into recession and strangling any chance of growth.

President Sarkozy has said he will unveil a Franco-German strategy shortly, without giving details.

Germany and France together represent about half of the 17-nation eurozone's economic output.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said that with Thursday's vote in the German parliament: "The signal to our European partners is that you can rely on Germany."

Talks disrupted

Our correspondent says some analysts believe the whole strategy for Greece, with a possible second bailout, needs urgent readjustment.

That is partly because contagion from Greece to other eurozone countries is no longer a threat but a dangerous reality, he adds.

The troika's team of inspectors found its second day of talks in Athens disrupted on Friday after protesting civil servants occupied the transport ministry, where they had been due to meet the minister, Yannis Ragoussis.

"Take the austerity package and get out of here!" the civil servants shouted as they stood in front of the shuttered entrance, according to a Reuters news agency report.

The meeting with the minister was rescheduled as a result.

Angry protesters against the government's austerity measures have been causing disruption in the Greek capital for months.

Man raped woman in Glasgow nanny job lure

A man has been found guilty of raping a woman he lured to Scotland from Latvia with the offer of a job as a nanny.

The High Court in Dundee heard that Indulus Lukstins, 50, attacked the 21-year-old in a lay-by on the A9 south of Inverness in January.

Lukstins, an Inverness prisoner, denied rape and stealing the woman's laptop, charger and bag. He lodged a special defence that the sex was consensual.

He will be sentenced at the High Court in Edinburgh on 21 October.

Judge Lady Clark of Calton placed him on the sex offenders register and remanded him in custody.

Jobs website

A jury found Lukstins, who had previously lived in Nairn, guilty following a six-day trial.

The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court how she had lived in England for about two years, before returning to Latvia after falling pregnant.

But after suffering a miscarriage she began to again look for work in the UK.

She told how she had spotted an advert for a nanny to a Russian family based in Glasgow on a Latvian jobs website.

The woman sent off a CV and pictures to the advertiser and was told a few days later she had been given the job by a man who identified himself as "Ivars".

Been tricked

Lukstins picked her up at Prestwick Airport but drove to Inverness when she thought she would be going to Glasgow.

She was raped on the journey north.

Lukstins later dropped her off at a Tesco store in Inverness where she alerted a security guard to the attack and the police were called.

But despite the attack the woman still believed she may have had a job to go to.

It was only when she called a telephone number Lukstins had given her did she find out it was a fake and she realised she had been tricked.

The court heard Lukstins later threatened the woman by text.

Ex soldier finds Latvian half-brother after 65 years

Andy Valters' father kisses his mother, who is standing next to her sister

A former soldier from Herefordshire said he was "very emotional" after the Red Cross put him in touch with the half brother he had never met.

Andy Valters' family were displaced from Latvia to Germany after World War II.

He was fostered by an English family when he was nine after his mother died. His father, Bernard, stayed in Germany.

Bernard Valters only visited England once before he was killed in a car crash.

Andy Valters learned he had a half brother Egon when he talked to his father's third wife.

Egon Valters was born to Bernard's first wife and Andy to his second wife.

Mr Valters said: "It was very emotional - as one would expect after 65 years - not knowing I had a brother, to actually meet him."

Bernard Valters

He learned that Egon, who is 14 years older than him, had tried to trace him in the past.

"For some reason my father never gave my brother my name or date of birth.

"Shortly after that my father was killed. My brother tried to locate me but without the correct information the Latvian Red Cross were unable to find me," he said.

'Security checks'

After his father was killed in 1965 Mr Valters received a letter from Germany and a photograph of a woman and twin boys.

But he said: "I was in the special forces so I wasn't able to contact anyone that hadn't been checked by the security services.

"When I left the services, so much time had gone by that I left things - I didn't want to upset the apple cart."

After he had left the forces his daughter persuaded him to try and get in touch with the German side of his family.

In 2010 the German Red Cross traced Bernard Valters' widow and put her in touch.

It was then that he learned he had a half brother still living in Latvia. It was another year before he could travel there to meet him.

"He showed me where my father, his mother and himself lived in a terrace house - it still exists after the bombing in 1944," he said.

The meeting helped him appreciate how fortunate he has been, compared to his half brother.

"The life I've led compared to some of the people who were displaced means I have no quarrels," he said.

Source: BBC

Latvian elections to provide win for Russian minority

For the first time since Latvia became independent, a pro-Russian party looks like being the winner of its general election.

The party, known as the Harmony Centre, looks set to win almost a third of the vote which could be enough to put it in government.