Where does the actor go after Lester in 'The Wire'? Nelson Mandela, of course

Castro's offer high on agenda at Summit of the Americas in Trinidad

Speaking at a rally to celebrate his 85th birthday, Zimbabwe's President says that the farm seizures will go on. Raymond Whitaker reports

President turns 85 today – but the event will be a pale imitation of previous years

Morgan Tsvangirai told to shore up country’s ravaged economy and expedite the release of political prisoners

Zimbabwe's new Prime Minister 'has 10 days to prove himself' against Mugabe inner circle, as more activists arrested

Despite the junta's crackdown, Phoebe Kennedy finds a new mood of defiance on the streets of Rangoon

Campaigners have called on UN leader Ban Ki-Moon to reverse his decision not to visit Burma, saying that a top level visit is essential if the country's military regime is to consider the release of political prisoners and halt the crackdown on dissidents.

Despite its uncaring response to the disaster that killed 150,000, the military is stronger than ever

I was lucky enough to read Solzhenitsyn in my Soviet schooldays – when it was still forbidden. My older friends – anti-Soviet dissidents – slipped me a copy of The Gulag Archipelago published abroad. If I had been caught reading it at school, the secret services could have arrested me.

The 9-millimetre gun and the letter found next to the lifeless body of Lt-Col Paul Alberto Ravone seemed to indicate suicide. Argentine human rights groups, however, suspect foul play as he is not the first key witness in a baby-theft trial to turn up dead.

Margarete Charlotte Jacoby, playwright and poet: born Berlin 9 December 1909; married 1932 Siegfried Moos (deceased; one daughter, one adopted daughter); died London 3 January 2008