Plans for significant cuts in the number of British troops in Iraq were formally put on hold yesterday, dashing hopes among government ministers and defence chiefs anxious to reduce them as fast as possible for both political and military reasons.
Des Browne, the defence secretary, told the Commons the number of UK forces would stay at 4,100 for the forseeable future. Gordon Brown told MPs last autumn he hoped the number could be cut to about 2,500 by late spring. The reductions envisaged then “might not be possible”, Browne said. The decision, he said, was taken as a result of military advice.
– The Guardian
The first signs of a high-level Cabinet split over proposals to extend suspects’ detention to 42 days emerged yesterday as the government faced criticism from Labour backbenchers. Gordon Brown has been counselled by senior colleagues that there is no real need to push ahead with the extension, adding to the pressure from leading figures in the judiciary, including the director of public prosecutions, Sir Ken Macdonald.
It is understood that senior figures in the Ministry of Justice, and law officers have privately expressed concern about pushing ahead with 42 days, saying that recent changes in the law make it unnecessary. The controversial counter terror bill received its second reading yesterday, but it is not likely to go to the crucial key votes on this aspect for two months.
– The Guardian
Two and a half million children aged between 8 and 17 have created profiles on social networking sites, according to research. But parents fail to realise that poor security means that about four in ten personal pages are open for anyone to look at.
Although the three main social networks, Bebo, Facebook and MySpace, claim to have a minimum age limit of 13 or 14, a quarter of all children with internet access and aged between 8 and 11 say that they have a page on a social networking site, according to the communications regulator, Ofcom.
– The Times
Iraq’s prime minister today announced plans to recruit 10,000 security personnel for Basra even as he claimed that his widely criticised military assault on Shia militants in the southern city last week had been a “success”.
Nouri al-Maliki’s announcement that the police and army presence in Basra would be bolstered was tied to a pledge that no one would be arrested without a warrant from the judiciary, a concession to the Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
– The Telegraph
