Iran: Deaths As Bus Overturns 'At High Speed'

At least 26 people have been killed after a bus packed with students overturned in southwestern Iran, according to the country's state radio.

The driver lost control because the vehicle was going at high speed in wet conditions, senior police official Colonel Mohammad Reza Mehmandar was quoted as saying.

Some 19 other people were hurt in the accident and have been taken to hospital for treatment.

The crash happened on the Izeh-Lordegan road, about 300 miles southwest of the capital Tehran.

Iran has one of the worst road safety records in the world, with more than 400,000 accidents and about 20,000 deaths every year.

The high death tolls are blamed on high speed, unsafe vehicles, widespread disregard of traffic laws and inadequate emergency services.

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Israeli Navy Boards Gaza-Bound Boat

The Israeli military says its navy has boarded a boat carrying pro-Palestinian MPs and activists that was trying to break the naval blockade on Gaza.

The boarding happened after the passengers' "unwillingness to co-operate" and they "ignored calls to change course", the military added.

Soldiers went on to the Finnish-flagged Estelle in international waters and it was being led to the southern Israeli port of Ashdod, it continued.

The military said the troops boarded the boat peacefully, and there was no harm to the passengers who were offered food and drinks.

When the boat arrives at the Ashdod port, the passengers will be transferred to the custody of the police and immigration authorities.

Victoria Strand, a spokeswoman for Ship to Gaza in Sweden, which sent the Estelle, said armed, masked soldiers boarded the boat and cut their communications 30 miles from Gaza.

She said activists on board told her six naval boats surrounded their vessel. "This is a demonstration of ruthlessness," Ms Strand said.

The Estelle is the latest in a series of activist-manned boats challenging Israel's blockade on Gaza, which was imposed after the militant group Hamas seized power of the territory in 2007.

The boat left Naples, Italy, on October 7 with about 20 people from eight countries, carrying items like cement, basketballs and musical instruments.

An Israeli military statement said: "The boarding was carried out in accordance with international law, with directives of the Israeli government and after all attempts to prevent the vessel from reaching the Gaza Strip were made, both via direct contact and through diplomatic channels, but to no avail.

"The boarding was carried out only after numerous calls to the passengers onboard; as a result of their unwillingness to co-operate and after ignoring calls to change course, the decision was made to board the vessel and lead it to the port of Ashdod."

In 2010, an Israeli naval raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla killed nine Turkish activists on board.

The incident sparked international condemnation that forced Israel to ease much of its blockade, although it maintains restrictions on key exports and imports of raw materials.

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Lebanon: Protests After Beirut Bomb Blast

Protesters in Lebanon have burnt tyres and set up roadblocks amid growing anger over a car bomb that killed eight people, including one of the country's top security officials.

There are fears that the devastating attack threatens to bring Syria's civil war to Lebanon.

Lebanese troops have been guarding road junctions and official buildings in the capital, Beirut, as the Lebanese cabinet held an emergency meeting to decide on what, if any, action to take.

A day of mourning has been declared for the victims of the Beirut blast which included Brigadier General Wissam al Hassan, head of a Lebanese intelligence department and an opponent of Syrian President Bashar al Assad.

Dozens were left wounded in the blast in Beirut's mainly Christian Achrafieh neighbourhood.

Politics in Lebanon and Syria are closely connected

Many observers said the attack appeared to have links to the 19-month civil war in Syria.

Brig-Gen al Hassan, 47, headed an investigation over the summer that led to the arrest of former information minister Michel Samaha, one of Mr Assad's most loyal allies in Lebanon.

Mr Samaha, who is in custody, is accused of plotting a campaign of bombings and assassinations to spread sectarian violence in Lebanon at Syria's behest.

Also indicted in the August sweep was Syrian Brigadier General Ali Mamlouk, one of Mr Assad's highest aides.

Lebanon's fractious politics are closely entwined with Syria's.

The countries share political and sectarian ties and rivalries, often causing events on one side of the border to have a "knock on" effect on the other.

Lebanon's opposition is an anti-Syrian bloc, while the prime minister and much of the government are pro-Syrian.

The civil war in Syria has laid bare Lebanon's sectarian tensions as well.

Many of Lebanon's Sunni Muslims have backed Syria's mainly Sunni rebels, while Shi'ite Muslims have tended to back Mr Assad.

Brig-Gen al Hassan was a Sunni whose stances were widely seen to oppose Syria and Shi'ite Hezbollah, the country's most powerful ally in Lebanon.

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Boy Scouts Of America Publish Sex Abuse Files

Confidential papers showing US scout leaders covered up alleged sexual abuse inflicted on their young members have been published.

The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) has released decades worth of so-called "perversion files", showing how a range of authorities - from police to church pastors - quietly allowed scoutmasters and others accused of molesting children to go free.

In many instances - more than a third, according to the Scouts' own count - police were not told about the reports of abuse. And even when they were, sometimes local law enforcement did nothing, seeking to protect the reputation of scouting.

The Oregon Supreme Court ordered the papers, dating from 1959 to 1985 - and a handful from later years - to be released, despite objections played out in a lengthy legal battle from the Scouts.

The boxes of newly released files containing allegations of sexual abuse

The 14,500 pages of confidential files, including handwritten notes, reveal details of alleged abuses by more than 1,200 scout leaders and other adults.

Officially called the Boy Scouts Ineligible Volunteer Files, some of the papers had been released previously, but others were made public for the first time.

In one case from the files, a distraught mother walked into a Louisiana sheriff's office in 1965 and said a 31-year-old scoutmaster had raped one of her sons and molested two others.

Six days later, the scoutmaster sat down in front of a microphone in the same station and confessed. He admitted to raping a 17-year-old boy on a camping trip and sexually molesting two other boys. The victims corroborated his confession.

Seven days later, the decision was made not to pursue charges against him.

A boy scout statue outside the organisation's American HQ

The man "was asked to leave the parish, and if he was caught around or near any boy or youth organisation, he would be sent to state prison immediately", a scouting executive wrote to national headquarters. "We are indeed sorry that scouting was involved."

The lawyers who unveiled the files said BSA had not done enough to root out paedophiles using the youth movement to prey on minors.

"What these files represent is ... the pain and the anguish of thousands of scouts," said lawyer Paul Mones, while presenting details of the files at a press conference in the northwestern US city of Portland.

Mr Mones said the files "demonstrate the depth and breadth of the BSA's vast knowledge about the threats to scouts by scoutmasters and adult leaders who used their authority ... to sexually molest generations of boys".

The lawyers highlighted a 2010 court case, in which an assistant scoutmaster in a Mormon Church-sponsored troop sexually molested a boy in the 1980s.

A Boy Scouts of America handbook

The abuser involved had previously confessed to molesting 17 other boys in the troop, but was allowed to return to scouting within a few months and then found a new victim.

Responding to the release, BSA national leader Wayne Perry reiterated an apology to the victims.

He said: "There have been instances where people misused their positions ... to abuse children, and in certain cases, our response to these incidents and our efforts to protect youth were plainly insufficient, inappropriate or wrong.

"Where those involved in scouting failed to protect, or worse, inflicted harm on children, we extend our deepest and sincere apologies to victims and their families."

In a statement on its website, BSA also said it has improved its procedures to ensure safety, including now requiring background checks and formal training of its leaders.

The uniform worn by Boy Scouts of America

But Mr Mones said the organisation, founded as part of the international Scouting Movement in 1910, has not done enough.

The BSA has "made some improvements, but we think there's more still to be done," said the lawyer, noting that on average each abuser typically molested between five and 25 scouts.

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North Korea 'Threatens To Strike South'

North Korea has threatened to open fire on South Korea if anti-Pyongyang leaflets are dropped over its territory.

Defectors and human rights activists plan to send giant balloons containing 200,000 leaflets criticising North Korea's government over the country on Monday morning.

Inside the leaflets will be 1,000 $1 notes - highly prized by the impoverished people of the north.

North Korea said if the leaflets were dropped, a "merciless military strike by the Western Front will be put into practice without warning", according to state news agency KCNA.

It said it would target a tourist area in the border city of Paju a few miles from the demilitarised zone that separates the two countries.

"The KPA (Korean People's Army) never makes any empty talk," KCNA quoted military commanders as saying.

North Korea fired about 170 rounds of artillery on Yeonpyeong Island

In November 2010, North Korea fired about 170 rounds of artillery on Yeonpyeong Island and the surrounding waters near the Yellow Sea border, with some 90 shells landing on the island. And in 2010, the North was widely blamed for sinking a South Korean naval ship, although it denied responsibility.

The group planning the leafleting, Fighters for a Free North Korea, said they had no intention of calling it off.

"We had similar threats last year and they did not stop us before and this is not going to stop us this time," said Pak Sang-hak, a North Korean exile who defected to the South 12  years ago.

The threat came a day after South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak made a surprise visit to an island close to the disputed maritime border that was shelled.

There have been widespread concerns in the South that Pyongyang may try to instigate a military clash that would temporarily destabilise the Korean peninsula in the run up to the presidential election in December.

Kim Yong-Hyun, a professor at Dongguk University, said: "I think this is a bluff. I don't think they mean to actually target and shell the area.

"It could be an indirect reaction to what President Lee said (on Thursday) and the North is also seeking to drive wedges between conservatives and liberals ahead of the presidential poll," Kim said.

On Wednesday, South Korea announced an annual, large-scale military exercise aimed at countering threats from North Korea.

The week-long Hoguk exercise beginning on October 25 will involve 240,000 army, navy, air force and marine corps personnel, with 500 US soldiers also taking part.

Some 28,500 US military personnel are stationed in the South, a legacy of the Korean War that ended with a ceasefire but not a peace treaty, leaving the two Koreas still technically at war.

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Fort Hood Suspect 'Can Be Forcibly Shaved'

An Army appeals court has ruled the Fort Hood shooting suspect can have his facial hair forcibly shaved off before his trial.

The US Army Court of Criminal Appeals upheld the military trial judge's decision to order Major Nidal Hasan to appear in court clean shaven or be forcibly shaved.

It also ruled that Colonel Gregory Gross, the judge, correctly ruled the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act does not give Hasan the right to have a beard while in uniform at trial.

Hasan has said the beard is an expression of his Muslim faith. His lawyers will appeal the ruling.

The 42-year-old faces the death penalty if convicted of the 2009 attack that killed 13 and wounded more than two dozen others on the Texas Army post.

The Army has specific guidelines on forced shaving.

A team of five military police officers restrains the inmate "with the reasonable force necessary", and a medical professional is on hand in case of injuries.

The shaving must be done with electric clippers and must be videoed, according to Army rules.

Hasan would not be the first military defendant to be shaved against their will.

It has been done to five inmates since 2005, including one man who was forcibly shaved twice, according to the Army's Office of the Chief of Staff.

Nearly three years after the shooting rampage at Fort Hood, many of those affected are urging the US government to declare it a terrorist attack, saying wounded soldiers and victims' relatives otherwise will not receive the same benefits as those in a combat zone.

A video expressing their frustration was released on Thursday by a group of about 160 people, including relatives of the 13 people killed and some of the wounded and their families.

"The victims are being forgotten and it's frustrating," said Kimberly Munley, one of the first two officers who arrived at the shooting scene.

The group is upset that the Defence Department has referred to the shooting as workplace violence.

They say soldiers injured or killed deserve fair benefits and Purple Heart eligibility.

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China GDP: Economic Growth Slows To 7.4%

Global shares are driven higher by China's economic figures, despite it growing at its slowest pace since the start of 2009.

The country's economy grew 7.4%  between July and September, according to official statistics, compared with 7.6% growth in the previous quarter.

"This is within expectations, the economy is showing signs of stabilising and that is good news," Hong Kong-based Credit Suisse economist Dong Tao said.

"We think that with rebounding property markets, stabilising export orders, resuming consumption, we probably have seen the bottom of the economy.

"The economy can bounce back quickly."

The figures reassured investors, with Asian stock markets rising overnight.

Japan's Nikkei hit a three-week high, rising 2%, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up 0.6%.

In London, the FTSE rose 0.2% and Germany Dax increased by 0.14% in early trading.

But while these GDP figures would be cause for celebration in recession-hit economies like the UK, it marks the seventh consecutive quarter of slowing growth in China, as its main export markets, Europe and the US, continue to battle economic problems.

Beijing has attempted to boost growth this year by cutting interest rates twice in quick succession and slashing banks' capital requirements to encourage lending, but with little success.

It has also shifted its focus to quality growth, rather than quantity, and lowered its target to 7.5% growth in 2012, compared with the 8% target of recent years.

Other data released alongside GDP showed industrial output grew by 9.2% in September compared with the same month last year, and retail sales were up 14.2%.

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Rescued Yachtsman Speaks Of Fears At Sea

A yachtsman rescued by coastguards after his mast snapped and he ran out of fuel has been talking of his fears that he would not be found.

Glenn Ey was left drifting 270 miles off the southeast coast of Australia.

He was sailing from the north of Sydney when he ran into difficulties.

Commercial passenger airliners were asked to fly low over the ocean to help find him.

Air Canada and Air New Zealand planes dropped to 4,000ft to make sweeps of the area and the Air Canada plane was the first to spot him.

Mr Ey spoke of his relief. "At that point, it was absolutely wonderful, beautiful." he said. 

"They flew overhead and I thought: "That's a rescue aircraft.' And I put my head up and sure enough it was.

"It happened at midday ... until dark I was very, very concerned. You do think your number's up....there's no question about that."

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Greek Police Clash With Austerity Protesters

Violence has broken out in the Greek capital Athens, where protesters have clashed with police during an anti-austerity demonstration.

Campaigners threw petrol bombs and rocks at police officers, who responded by firing tear gas to break up groups of troublemakers.

It comes on the day European leaders meet to discuss the future of the single currency.

Millions of Greeks have joined a general strike in a bid to convince politicians to let up on years of crippling austerity.

The 24-hour walkout, organised by the country's two biggest labour unions, is the 20th work stoppage since a devastating debt crisis erupted in the country late 2009.

The financial crisis has since spread to other troubled economies sharing Europe's single currency.

A protest at the Greek finance ministry on Wednesday

The latest action targets a fresh batch of brutal budget cuts which Athens must take to unlock some 31 billion euros in bailout loans it needs to keep the country paying pension, state salaries and running costs.

From taxi drivers to doctors and diplomats, the strike is expected to paralyse an already suffocating economy.

Ships will remain docked throughout the day, hospitals plan to operate on skeleton staff, and dozens of domestic and international flights face cancellation as air traffic controllers agreed to join the protest.

Aircraft will be grounded - and the country isolated from the rest of the world - for three hours.

Most business and public sector activity is expected to come to a screeching halt and government offices will remain shut.

The focus will be in the capital where organisers have called on protesters to rally outside parliament, a venue of frequent, at times, violent, showdowns between demonstrators and police.

Fearing potential violence, authorities have ordered some 4,000 police to the streets to mind demonstrations planned in the capital.

Steel fences and water cannon have been propped outside parliament to shield the sprawling building.

"Just once, the government should reject [international] lenders' absurd demands," said Yannis Panagopoulos, head of the GSEE private sector union.

The Greek parliament has been a frequent venue for protests

"Agreeing to catastrophic measures means driving society to despair and the consequences as well as the protests will be indefinite."

Opinion polls show 8 in 10 Greeks increasingly pessimistic, believing the country was heading down a wrong path of austerity.

Still, with the country running low on cash, the prime minister has said Greece has enough money through November.

But Athens has little leverage against lenders pushing for it to adopt 13.5 billion euro in added austerity.

Earlier this week, demands for drastic labour overhauls, including cuts in wages and severance fees, kicked up a political storm. The government's junior coalition partner threatened to walk out of government if the measures were adopted.

Under the current agreement, Greece has to adopt the cuts through 2014; to ease the pain, however, the government, wants an extra two years, until 2016.

Entangled in its worst economic crisis since World War II, Greece has seen the recession leave a record 1.3 million people, or 25.1%, jobless.

And so unions have vowed to wage rolling strikes to pressure the government to repeal the latest new labour regulations, which include a reported 15,000 public sector sackings.

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US Presidential Race: Obama And Romney Clash

President Barack Obama and his Republican rival Mitt Romney have clashed over both foreign and domestic policy in a feisty live TV presidential debate.

One of the standout moments in the second of three head-to-heads between the candidates came when the pair sparred over last month's attack on a US diplomatic mission in Libya.

The President accused his White House contender of playing politics with national security while Mr Romney hit back by accusing Mr Obama of going on a fundraising tour on the day after the deadly September 11 assault on the Benghazi consulate, and declaring his Middle East policy was "unravelling".

In a television debate that was deemed much more lively and aggressive than the first one, Mr Romney said the President's team either did not know all the details - or did not tell the truth - about the death of four Americans there immediately after the attacks.

Mr Obama admitted for the first time that responsibility for what happened at the consulate in Libya stopped with him and no one else.

But at one point, former Massachusetts governor Mr Romney appeared to get his facts wrong about Mr Obama's handling of the attack and how soon afterwards he described it as an act of terrorism.

In a fierce exchange, Mr Obama called upon transcripts to prove Mr Romney was incorrect and expressed outrage at the Republican's implication that he used the attack to his political advantage.

"The suggestion that anybody on my team, whether it's a secretary of state, our UN ambassador, anybody on my team, would play politics or mislead when we've lost four of our own, Governor, is offensive," Mr Obama said wagging his finger at his opponent across the stage.

Mr Obama was fighting to reverse a slide in the polls

With three weeks to go until the US election, Mr Obama fought to reverse a dramatic slide in the polls that has given Mr Romney a lead for the first time in over a year.

They took questions from 80 undecided voters at a town hall-style forum on New York's Long Island.

The tension between the pair was obvious almost from the start when they clashed over domestic oil production.

During a discussion about immigration, Mr Obama and Mr Romney were side-tracked and ended up making digs at each other over their respective financial arrangements.

In another animated moment, Mr Romney was asked by one voter how he differed from fellow Republican George Bush. The White House hopeful responded by saying he took an alternative stance on energy policy, China and deficits.

But the President said his biggest difference was that his Republican rival is more extreme on social issues than Mr Bush, who left office deeply unpopular.

Mr Romney said that he would govern under different conditions that would allow him to make North America energy independent from Arab and Venezuelan oil.

He also claimed he would crack down on China's currency manipulation and cut the deficit by increasing trade.

The President concluded the debate by bringing up Mr Romney's now notorious 47% remark. The Republican had to apologise earlier in the month after he was secretly filmed making disparaging comments about nearly half of Americans who do not pay income taxes.

The debate, watched by millions, was won by Mr Obama, according to an instant CBS poll at the end.

The final face-off between the candidates before the November 6 election will be held next Monday in Florida.

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Passenger Jets Help To Rescue Missing Sailor

By Jonathan Samuels, Australia Correspondent

Passengers and crew on two commercial jets have helped locate a missing yachtsman off Australia by looking through the windows with binoculars.

An Air Canada plane and an Air New Zealand aircraft swooped down to 4,000ft to assist rescuers in the search for the solo yachtsman who had activated his emergency beacon.

His remote location was out of helicopter range, so rescuers asked the planes' pilots to get involved as they were flying over the yacht's GPS position.

The crew on each plane asked passengers to tell them if they had binoculars in their hand luggage so they could be used to help in the search.

The Air Canada pilot Captain Andrew Robertson said once he determined he had enough fuel to land the plane safely in Sydney after diverting to search for the yacht, he swooped down to 5,000ft and reduced speed while the crew peered out.

"As we got to about two to three miles of this yacht, the first officer said 'there it is, I see it'. I was amazed.

"We didn't know if we were looking for a sunken boat or one that was still floating."

Captain Robertson circled around once more at 3,700ft for a closer look to see if anyone was on board.

It was then they saw the yachtsman.

Captain Robertson said the search was the first of his aviation career.

"A lot of passengers said it was very exciting to be involved in a search like this," he said.

According to Sydney's Daily Telegraph, one passenger wrote on Facebook: "15 hour flight ends up being 17 hours as we descended to 4,000ft to locate a capsized yacht for search and rescue.

"Amazing, and slightly off putting, to see what a Boeing 777 aircraft can do when not on autopilot and flying/circling low over the ocean."

The sailor was picked up 270 nautical miles out to sea.

Air Canada spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick said the crew and a number of passengers on board flight AC033 to Sydney from Vancouver spotted the boat and advised authorities of its location.

He said the yachtsman was subsequently rescued. He said the airline commends the crew and passengers.

"The pilots immediately determined they had sufficient fuel to undertake this, and headed out to the remote area which was over fairly rough seas," he explained.

"After apprising the customers on board that we would assist as we were the only aircraft in the immediate vicinity, all on board became involved in the search efforts," Mr Fitzpatrick said.

"The crew borrowed binoculars from customers and also engaged those sitting on the right hand side of the aircraft to help look.

"As our aircraft flew over the area at 4,000ft, a reflection from a mirror shining upwards was spotted and the crew saw the yacht in question, de-masted with a person standing - which was confirmed by a number of passengers."

The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (Amsa) said the 44-year-old sailor had now been picked up 270 nautical miles out to sea.

He is said to be in good spirits and uninjured after drifting for 16 hours.

Speaking about the involvement of the passenger jets, a spokesperson from the Amsa said: "It's not a regular occurrence, but that's because incidents are (usually) much closer to shore.

"Amsa thanks the captains and crews of the Air Canada and Air New Zealand aircraft for their assistance in the search and rescue operation, and their passengers for their patience."

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Apple Supplier Foxconn Employs 14-Year-Olds

A company which makes products for tech giants Apple and Sony has admitted hiring children as young as 14 to work on its assembly lines in China.

Foxconn, which builds gadgets including the iPhone and iPad, said it employed the underage workers as part of an internship programme at a factory in eastern Shandong province.

It issued a statement saying: "This is not only a violation of China's labour law, it is also a violation of Foxconn policy.

"Immediate steps have been taken to return the interns in question to their educational institutions.

"We have found no evidence of similar violations in any of our other campuses in China, but we will not hesitate to take immediate action in any campus if any violations are discovered."

Foxconn is the world's biggest contract manufacturer

Foxconn employs 1.2 million people in China, around 3% of whom are interns.

Geoffrey Crothall, a spokesman for China Labour Bulletin, described them as a "cheap and convenient source of labour" that some vocational schools are happy to provide, as it helps boost their revenues.

"The enterprises tend to be factories that need more hands on the production line," he said. "There is no real training or apprenticeship involved here."

The discovery of underage workers is a fresh blow for Foxconn, just weeks after a brawl involving nearly 2,000 employees at one of its plants brought production to a halt.

The violence took four hours to bring under control

Earlier this year, the Fair Labour Association found some staff were forced to work more than 60 hours a week, and sometimes for more than 11 days in a row.

In 2010, 13 workers committed suicide amid claims that Foxconn ran a military-style prodution line on which employees were told to work overtime for low wages.

The company denied the claims, but promised to hire more counsellors and set up employee groups to watch for signs of emotional stress among staff.

Earlier this year, Apple chief executive Tim Cook visited Foxconn's Zhengzhou Technology Park, which employs an estimated 120,000 people in the northern province of Hebei.

The company's late founder Steve Jobs once claimed the company was "not a sweatshop".

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Karadzic Denies Atrocities At War Crimes Trial

Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic has told a UN war crimes court he should have been rewarded for trying to stop the conflict in Yugoslavia rather than put on trial.

On the first day of his defence in The Hague, Karadzic said: "Instead of being accused for the events in our civil war I should have been rewarded for all the good things I have done.

"Namely, that I did everything in my human power to avoid the war, that I succeeded in reducing the suffering of all civilians, that the number of victims in our war was three to four times less than the numbers reported in public.

"I proclaimed numerous unilateral ceasefires and military containments and I stopped our army many times when they were close to victory."

Brought to court after his arrest on a Belgrade bus in 2008, the 67-year-old, is charged with masterminding the murder of nearly 8,000 Muslim men and boys by forces loyal to him in the eastern Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica in July 1995.

The massacre, when Bosnian Serb troops under the command of wartime general Ratko Mladic overran Dutch UN peacekeepers, was the worst atrocity committed on European soil since World War Two.

Over the space of a few days, thousands were systematically executed and dumped into mass graves in the area.

The remains of people thought to have been killed during the Bosnian war

Prosecutors say Karadzic, former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic and Mladic acted together to "cleanse" Bosnian Muslims and Croats from Bosnia's Serb-claimed territories after the collapse of Yugoslavia in 1991.

Milosevic died midway through his own trial for genocide and war crimes in March 2006.

But Karadzic told the court that he never considered the possibility that there could be mass atrocities aimed at either displacing or wiping out the Bosnian Muslim and Croat populations.

"Neither I nor anyone I know could ever think there could be a genocide againt any people we consider to be the same as us - Serbs, although of a different confession," he said. 

Karadzic is also charged over his alleged role in the siege of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo between May 1992 and November 1995 in which 10,000 people died under terrifying sniper and artillery fire.

Like Mladic, he has also been charged for his alleged role in taking hostage UN observers and peacekeepers to use them as human shields during a Nato bombing campaign against Bosnian Serb targets in May and June 1995.

Karadzic, who represented the Bosnian Serbs at talks aimed at ending the civil war, told the court "many incidents happened while I was abroad attending negotiations or meetings".

After being indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in 1995, he spent 13 years on the run before being arrested in 2008 in Belgrade where he practised as a doctor of alternative medicine.

Karadzic was indicted in 1995 but was not arrested for 13 years

In his opening statement, he described himself as a "physician, a psychiatrist, a psychotherapist, group analyst and a literary man" as he began to read his statement to the court.

His trial began in October 2009 and prosecutors put their case against him between April 2010 and May this year.

Judges dropped one genocide count in June, saying there was not enough evidence to substantiate the charge for killings by Bosnian Serb forces in Bosnian towns from March to December 1992.

Genocide, the gravest crime in international humanitarian law, is the hardest to prove.

Karadzic has planned a four-hour statement to open his defence, followed by the testimony of Russian colonel Andrei Demurenko, the UN chief of staff in Sarajevo from January to December 1995.

Wives and relatives of victims were looking on from the public gallery as he addressed the court.

Karadzic, who has been allocated 300 hours for his defence, has said he will call 300 witnesses to testify on his behalf.

The names include Greek President Carolos Papoulias, who was Athens' foreign minister during the Bosnian war.

Karadzic has said Mr Papoulias' testimony could prove his innocence for the infamous shelling of Sarajevo's Markale market on February 5, 1994, in which 67 people died.

Meanwhile, the Yugoslavia war crimes tribunal began the trial of its last suspect in a separate courtroom.

Goran Hadzic, president of the self-proclaimed Republic of Serbian Krajina, is accused of the murder, torture and forcible deportation of ethnic Croats from 1992 to 1994.

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Benghazi Attack: Clinton Takes Heat Off Obama

Hillary Clinton has said she is "responsible" for the security of the country's diplomatic staff around the world after criticism of the handling of a deadly attack on a consulate in Libya.

The US ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, was killed along with another diplomat and two security personnel when armed men broke into the US mission compound in Benghazi.

Republicans have used the issue to criticise President Barack Obama's government - particularly after it emerged that requests for additional security at the consulate had been turned down by the State Department.

But Mrs Clinton's remarks, during a visit to Peru, could take the heat off Mr Obama as he prepares to face a grilling on the Benghazi attack during the second televised presidential debate.

"I'm in charge of the State Department's 60,000-plus people all over the world," Mrs Clinton said in an interview with CNN.

"The President and the Vice President wouldn't be knowledgeable about specific decisions that are made by security professionals. They're the ones who weigh all of the threats and the risks and the needs and make a considered decision."

Christopher Stevens, right, died in the attack

Vice President Joe Biden said during last week's debate with republican challenger Mitt Romney's running mate Paul Ryan that the White House had not been told about the request for more security.

Mrs Clinton has launched an internal investigation into whether there were any security failures in Benghazi, while the FBI and Libyan authorities have launched criminal investigations into the killings.

The Obama administration has also been criticised for its original assertion that the assault on the mission appeared to be linked to protests against a film mocking Islam that had been produced in the US.

But it quickly became clear that it was more likely a planned attack by Islamist militants.

Mrs Clinton said the shifting explanations for the attack were simply a consequence of "the fog of war".

"Remember, this was an attack that went on for hours," she said in another interview with Fox News. "There had to be a lot of sorting out ... Everyone said, here's what we know, subject to change."

In a joint statement, Republican senators led by John McCain said Mrs Clinton's acceptance of responsibility "is a laudable gesture especially when the White House is trying to avoid any responsibility whatsoever".

"The security of Americans serving our nation everywhere in the world is ultimately the job of the commander-in-chief. The buck stops there," it added.

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Shot Girl: Duo Stopped By Hospital Security

By David Crabtree, Midlands Correspondent

Two people have been stopped from entering a ward where a teenager shot by the Taliban is being treated.

The pair - described by police as "well-wishers" - turned up at Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital overnight and made efforts to see Malala Yusufzai, 14, who arrived in the UK for treatment on Monday.

At first a hospital spokesman said he understood arrests had been made after people claiming to be family members tried to gain access.

But West Midlands Police later clarified that the two individuals posed no threat to the Pakistani schoolgirl.

A police spokesman said: "They were stopped in a public area of the hospital and questioned by police, who recorded their details and advised the pair that they would not be allowed to see her.

"No arrests were made and at no point was there any threat to Malala."

The shooting of the schoolgirl on a bus provoked outrage

The hospital's medical director Dr Dave Rosser said earlier that the hospital and police are "very comfortable" with security arrangements at the hospital.

Referring to the incident overnight, Dr Rosser said: "We don't believe there's any sort of threat to her personal security - we think it's probably people being over-curious."

Malala was shot on a bus in front of her friends last Tuesday after campaigning for the right to go to school.

She was saved by neurosurgeons in a Pakistani military hospital and has since been in intensive care.

Dr Rosser said medics in Birmingham were "very pleased" with the teenager's progress and that she had a "comfortable" first night in the UK.

He said she was showing "every sign of being just every bit as strong as we've been led to believe that she is".

Experts at the hospital were beginning to plan for reconstructive surgery, he added.

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