A federal judge has blocked key parts of Arizona’s strict immigration law, hours before it takes effect. The judge issued a temporary injunction against a requirement that police check the immigration status of criminal suspects they had stopped while enforcing other laws. Read the full story

Venezuela has broken off diplomatic relations with Colombia and ordered Colombian diplomats to leave the country by Sunday. President Hugo Chavez said he had “no choice” after Colombia accused Venezuela of being a haven for guerrillas – a charge he denies. Read the full story

President Hugo Chavez has ordered a review of Venezuela’s ties with the Vatican amid tensions between his government and the country’s bishops. Read the full story

CNN has sacked a veteran Middle East editor after she wrote on Twitter that she “respected” a late senior Lebanese cleric said to have inspired Hezbollah. Read the full story

US President Barack Obama has signed into law new sanctions against Iran intended to impede the development of its nuclear programme. The measures, which penalise foreign companies that trade with Iran, were overwhelmingly approved by US Congress last week. Read the full story

Iran’s state television aired what it said was footage of a missing nuclear scientist on Tuesday, the third video to emerge in weeks giving conflicting accounts of the fate of a man Tehran says was kidnapped by the CIA. Read the full story

U.S. authorities said on Monday they have broken up a spy ring that carried out deep-cover work in the United States to recruit political sources and gather information for the Russian government. Read the full story

Celebrated American director Oliver Stone has blasted the US media for playing the “Bush game” and fueling US paranoia towards the Middle East. Read the full story

Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez described Israel on Saturday as a genocidal state that acted as an assassin for the United States, predicting the Middle East nation would one day be “put in its place. Read the full story

Joran van der Sloot has confessed to killing a 21-year-old female student in his Lima hotel room last week, police confirmed Tuesday to the Associated Press. Read the full story

Jamaica declared a state of emergency in two parishes of its capital Kingston on Sunday after shooting and firebomb attacks on police stations by suspected supporters of an alleged drug lord who faces extradition to the United States. Read the full story

President Barack Obama has directed the U.S. military to coordinate with South Korea to “ensure readiness” and deter future aggression from North Korea, the White House said on Monday. Read the full story

Scientists in the US have succeeded in developing the first synthetic living cell. The researchers constructed a bacterium’s “genetic software” and transplanted it into a host cell. Read the full story

Mexico’s president has told the US Congress that he is confident his country will win its fight against drug gangs with cooperation from the US. Read the full story

UAL Corp, parent of United Airlines, said it will buy Continental Airlines Inc for about $3.17 billion in stock, forming the world’s largest carrier and further shrinks the U.S. airline industry. Read the full story

Tens of thousands of people have joined protests in the US against a controversial anti-immigration law introduced in Arizona. Read the full story

Police found a car bomb in a parked sport utility vehicle Saturday evening in New York City’s Times Square, then evacuated buildings and cleared thousands of tourists from the landmark. Read the full story

Leftist Bolivian President Evo Morales said on Saturday he had nationalized four power companies, including a subsidiary of France’s GDF Suez, in his drive to tighten state control over the impoverished economy. Read the full story

Secretary Hilary Clinton says Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will not get a warm welcome at next week’s arms talks in New York. Read the full story

The White House has reportedly called on Congress to provide waivers in the Iran sanction bill that would allow Chinese and Russian companies to do business with Iran. Read the full story

George W Bush’s wife Laura has claimed that she and her husband were poisoned during a G8 meeting of world leaders.
Mrs Bush said the couple and several members of their staff fell ill under mysterious circumstances at the summit in Germany in 2007. Read the full story

Christmas Day airline bomb suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab has been shown on a video training with Al Qaeda in Yemen.
The video, obtained and broadcast yesterday by ABC World News, shows the 23-year-old Nigerian firing weapons and speaking in Arabic about the impending attack in Detroit, Michigan. Read the full story

A family of British holidaymakers were accused yesterday of telling the management of a five-star Florida hotel that they did not want to be waited on by black staff. Read the full story

An anti-immigration law condemned as a licence for racial profiling is expected to come into force in Arizona within the next 48 hours. The law would be the first in the US to give police the power to stop citizens and demand proof of legal residence in the US merely on suspicion of not carrying appropriate papers. Read the full story

It may be too late to stop Iran developing a nuclear weapon, a former senior US defence official has warned. The official, who has long experience with several US administrations, said President Obama had waited too long to take tough action against Tehran. Read the full story

The Pentagon was ratcheting up pressure for military action against Iran last night as America’s top uniformed official said for the first time that a strike on nuclear targets would “go a long way” towards delaying Tehran’s uranium enrichment programme. Read the full story