Berry Picker

When a vivacious Norwegian woman was found raped and strangled in the basement of a London flat, suspicion fell on a fellow student. But two years on, the case remains unsolved. We reconstruct her last night from interviews and previously unseen pictures, and speak to her father about his campaign to find justice for Martine Vik Magnussen

In the early hours of Wednesday 6 February 1985, Odd Petter Magnussen drove through a police roadblock in his haste to get to the local hospital. His wife, Kristin, was in labour and the contractions were coming so rapidly that Odd Petter was anxious she might give birth in the car. He pressed down on the accelerator, ignoring the speed limit. There had been an accident on the motorway leading into Oslo but, when the police tried to flag him down, Odd Petter was having none of it. "I just drove completely through the roadblock," he recalls. "I went through the red lights, everything, until we got to the hospital."

Within three minutes of arriving there, the baby was born. They called her Martine. Their first child, Magnus, born a year earlier, had been a fortnight overdue. By contrast, Martine seemed determined not to hang about. "Her mother has said that Martine came into this world very speedily, very early," says Mr Magnussen, "and she left very early as well." His voice trails off.

Martine Vik Magnussen's life was cut short without warning. Twenty-three years after that morning dash to the hospital, Mr Magnussen had to identify his daughter's body in a police mortuary. She had been living in London when she was killed: the last time anyone saw her alive was when Martine left Maddox, an exclusive nightclub off New Bond Street, between 2am and 3am on the morning of 14 March 2008. She got into a taxi with her friend and fellow student, Farouk Abdulhak, the 21-year-old son of one of the most powerful men in Yemen. Martine was never seen alive again.

Two days after Martine went missing, police discovered her body in a state of undress, dumped in the basement of a block of flats at 222 Great Portland Street, where Abdulhak had been living. A token attempt had been made to disguise her body with bits of rubble. Items of her clothing were missing: snakeskin shoes, a Marc Jacobs handbag, a Guess watch and one of a pair of Christian Dior earrings. Abdulhak was nowhere to be found. The following day, his friends noticed that he had erased his Facebook profile. Later, it would emerge he had boarded a scheduled flight from Heathrow to Cairo on the afternoon of 14 March. From Egypt, it is believed he fled to Yemen on his father's private jet.

The police officers had already tried to prepare Mr Magnussen for the sight of his daughter's body by telling him the worst. They told him that they suspected Martine had been raped and strangled. They warned him he might notice bruising on her face – the discolouration of her skin across the bridge of her nose a testament to the fact that she had fought hard for her life. They told him all of this and yet nothing, in the end, could prepare him for the sheer force of emotional pain that hit him in the pit of the stomach when he saw his beloved daughter lying cold and lifeless in front of him.

Mr Magnussen tries now to put the experience into words as he sits on a beige armchair in the front room of the home where Martine grew up. The house is a squat wooden structure, built into the edge of a hill on the small, picturesque island of Nesoya, a 15-minute drive southeast of Oslo. To Mr Magnussen's left, a broad sweep of window overlooks the snow falling silently into the fjord below, the frozen waters stretching out into an infinite expanse of whiteness dotted by the dark silhouettes of pine trees.

"She still had eyeshadow on," he says after a while, in excellent English. "She still looked very much like herself. I touched her face." He stands up from his chair and walks over to me. "Like this." Gently, he strokes my cheek with the flat of his bent fingers. Before he can stop himself, he is crying, the tears appearing in a sudden flurry. With one hand raised to his mouth, he tries to suppress the half-muffled sobs. For a few seconds he is unable to continue and then, briskly, he wipes his tears away with a paper tissue and apologises. "I get these reality checks from time to time. They come and then they're gone. I don't normally cry very easily." He tries to smile, but the effort it costs him is more upsetting to watch than the tears, because what makes Mr Magnussen's grief incalculably worse is the knowledge that his daughter's killer remains at large.

Next month will mark the two-year anniversary of Martine's death and the prime suspect is believed still to be in Yemen, sheltered from justice by his powerful family and profiting from a legal loophole that means his native country has no extradition treaty with Britain. "This is the oldest and most serious crime known to man: the raping and killing of a woman – in any culture, in any religion, in any nation of the world," says Mr Magnussen. "Why should this family be beyond the law?"

Martine Vik Magnussen had moved to London in February 2007, filled with excitement about what her new life in the city would hold. After leaving school in 2004, she worked for a while in various clothing shops near her home, including the Oslo branch of Massimo Dutti. Two years later, she went to Warsaw to study medicine, but she found it difficult to settle in, and quit her studies after six months.

On her return to Norway, she told her father she wanted a change in direction. Many of her friends had already moved to London to study and Martine looked into the possibility of doing a business degree there. Her father, who had spent time as a student at Herriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, was supportive and eventually she enrolled at the Regent's Business School in Regent's Park, London, a rapidly expanding private college with a multicultural student body. She moved to London in February 2007 and chose to study International Business Relations when term started in September. Among her classmates would be Farouk Abdulhak.

When her friends and family describe their memories of Martine, the word that comes up most often is laughter. Her father recalls that she could make him "double over" merely by altering her facial expression or by walking into the room in a particularly clownish fashion. She was always the most extrovert of his three children – Magnus, 26, and Mathilde, 20, were quieter, more academic. They were a close, loving family – although Martine's parents had divorced amicably in 2000, they continued to spend Christmases and birthdays together. Magnus and Mathilde have been so numbed by her death that neither they, nor their mother, want to speak publicly about what happened.

"If you could have seen what Martine meant to them and how extremely close these children were, what they have lost is beyond comprehension," says Mr Magnussen. "She was a light, jolly, enjoyable person. In any social setting, she could lift any sort of atmosphere. She was pure sunshine."

One of Martine's best friends, Hedda Homme, who knew her from the age of 16, says that she was "so funny all the time. She always made people laugh. She was so happy. Everyone liked her. She was always letting me know what she thought. She was honest, you could trust her."

Every summer in Norway, Martine would throw a party in the beach hut at her family home in Nesøya. In London, she liked to host dinner parties, cooking recipes that her mother had taught her (among her friends, her chocolate brownie cake was the stuff of legend). Sociable, popular and kind, Martine loved meeting people from different backgrounds. She became part of a fun-loving, international crowd who made the most of the cosmopolitan nightlife on offer.

After her murder in 2008, the tabloid press were swift to label Martine as a "party girl" whose favourite haunts were the exclusive London nightclubs that specialised in attracting a hip and glamorous European clientele. At Maddox, which operates a strict members-only door policy, a bottle of vodka can cost £800. But although Martine's family were comfortably off – her father is a marketing manager specialising in IT – and, like most students in their early 20s, she enjoyed a night out, her friends make it clear that she was also street-smart and responsible with money. She took part-time jobs to support herself, including one stint as a shop assistant at the Mulberry clothing store in Mayfair. She was careful, too, about going out at night.

"In London, our friends were our family," says Martine's former flatmate, Thale Lassen. "We had rules: if you don't come home, always text, always stay in touch. Martine had an ability to make everyone feel special," she says. "Within 10 minutes of meeting someone, she knew what their favourite food was and the name of their dog if they had one. She'd mesmerise people around her. She stood out in a crowd. In Norwegian we have this term that means almost like an inner light that shines out from you. That's what she had."

She was beautiful, too, with her blonde hair and hazel-green eyes and her slim, 5ft 4in frame. She was popular with boys, but never had a serious boyfriend. When she moved into a modest flat on the Chelsea Bridge Road in June 2007 with three Norwegian friends – two girls, including Lassen, and one boy – her female flatmates would joke that there were no men left in London for them, because they all had a crush on Martine.

At first, Farouk Abdulhak seemed to be just another of Martine's many admirers. "She saw Farouk all the time," recalls Lassen. "They were good friends. She talked to him on MSN and on her BlackBerry. She made me add him as a friend on Facebook. She would say, 'He's such a nice guy, he's so funny.'" Lassen met him once, when he came round to the flat to pick Martine up. "He didn't seem like a bad guy," she admits. "I only met him for about 10 minutes. He was a bit shy and Martine did most of the talking. We teased her because they were spending a lot of time together: we would say, 'He has such a crush on you!' but she would always deny it." According to Lassen, Martine and Farouk were never romantically involved.

At the Regent's Business School, classmates remember Abdulhak as a shy and friendly presence. "He was supposed to be very nice, actually," says Mr Magnussen. "Some of his friends have said he wouldn't hurt a fly. If he scratched another person's car, he'd leave his name."

Much of his background is sketchy, but the police were able to establish that Farouk Abdulhak was born in Yemen, the son of a billionaire, Shaher Abdulhak, an extremely powerful figure in Yemeni society and a man whose business empire extends into petroleum, sugar, soft drinks, tourism and property. Notoriously publicity-shy, Shaher Abdulhak has never granted a single interview and no photograph has ever been printed of him in the local press.

Farouk attended the Azal Hadda primary school in Yemen before being sent to boarding schools in Britain. He also spent time in the US and is believed to hold an American passport. In London, he rented a £600-a-week flat in Seaford Court on Great Portland Street, and although he came from a strict Islamic background, he drank, smoked and described himself as "agnostic". There were rumours that Farouk's father had urged him to cut back on his partying in order to be groomed to take over the family business. At the time of Martine's death, a friend was quoted as saying that Abdulhak "was under a lot of pressure to uphold his family's honour".

On the night of Thursday 13 March 2008, Abdulhak was one of a group of students from the Regent's Business School who went out to Maddox to mark the end of term. Martine, who went to the club with her flatmate Nina and some other friends, had more reason than most to celebrate: she had come top of the class in her exams.

There is a photograph of Martine and Abdulhak from that night, taken in the midst of an anonymous bustle of clubbers, the two of them picked out by the camera flash in a circle of bright light (the image on the cover of this magazine). Martine is leaning into her friend, one arm around his back, and is smiling, perhaps a little uncertainly. Abdulhak is staring intently at the camera, his mouth set in a straight line, his hand clenched tightly around the neck of a beer bottle. "He has terrifying eyes in this picture," says Sophie Terkelsen, a friend of Martine's from secondary school. "It's like he's angry about something."

At around 2am, Martine's friends decided they wanted to go home. Martine had heard of another party in a different part of town, so she got in a taxi with Farouk. A week earlier, Martine had lost her mobile phone, so when her flatmates noticed on Friday morning that she was not in her bedroom, they tried to contact both her and Farouk through Facebook.

"At first, I was a bit angry and upset because she knew the rules [about getting in touch]," says Lassen. "We went back to Maddox that evening, we were sending her Facebook messages saying 'Contact us, call us, we're here, come and meet us, let us know you're all right.' At midnight, we started to feel really anxious." Lassen and Nina returned to the flat. "I was like 'OK, be in your bed sleeping, make fun of us for worrying,'" Lassen says. "She wasn't there. And that's when we freaked out."

At the same time, they noticed something suspicious about Farouk's Facebook page. There was a status update made at around 4am that read "Farouk is home alone" even though they knew that Martine had left Maddox with him. Martine's flatmates called everyone they could think of who might know of her whereabouts and set up a Facebook group appealing for information. They retraced her steps and handed out flyers with her photograph. No one knew where their friend was.

On Saturday, they reported Martine's disappearance to the police. "Their first reaction was: 'Oh, she's a 20-something girl student in London. She's out partying,'" says Lassen. "We spent the next 24 hours pushing them to go to Farouk's apartment." By Saturday evening, Abdulhak had erased his Facebook profile. His friends said he had been called back to attend to urgent family business. Later that night, Lassen called Martine's parents to let them know their daughter was missing.

Mr Magnussen remembers the phone ringing at about 11pm on the day before Easter Sunday. "After 10 or 15 minutes of conversation and listening to everything they had done, I said to them, 'I think we have a situation where we will never see Martine alive again.'" He says he knew instinctively that Martine was dead.

The following day, the Magnussens flew to London. They were picked up from the airport by officers from Scotland Yard and taken to Belgravia police station. "After half an hour, some police officers came in," recalls Mr Magnussen. "They said: 'We have reason to believe we have found your daughter in the basement of this building. She's dead.' The rest of the family broke down. For me, that was a slight relief. Do you know why? Because there is one thing that would have been worse and that was that we'd never find Martine, that they'd managed to get rid of her body, that we would never have a grave to visit or be able to find out what happened to her."

In a nearby room in the same police station, Martine's flatmates had gathered to be told the shocking news. "It was horrible," says Lassen. "I don't remember the next hour or so. We broke down completely. We all left London the next morning. We took the first flight out."

Later that same day, the Magnussens were taken to the Grosvenor House Hotel in Mayfair. They stayed together, in a family room, under a pseudonym provided by the police to fend off the journalists who had already begun to gather outside. "We said to each other, 'Don't hold back any emotions, get it out, don't be afraid,'" says Mr Magnussen. "During the next 24 hours, Mathilde [then 18], Magnus [then 24], my ex-wife and myself burst into tears and cried completely independently and spontaneously throughout the night. I think it was very good to have that."

On Tuesday, the Magnussens went to identify Martine's body. The cause of death was established as compression to the neck causing strangulation. Two weeks later, Martine's body was flown home to Oslo to be buried in Asker churchyard near her home. At her funeral, her brother Magnus took to the pulpit and thanked his sister for "the time with blue sky".

Back in London, it soon became apparent to Detective Chief Inspector Jessica Wadsworth that all the evidence pointed in one direction. "Very quickly, we knew who we wanted to speak to," she says, sitting in her small, grey-carpeted office in the Homicide & Serious Crime Command unit of the Metropolitan Police in Hendon. In the days after the discovery of Martine's body, an appeal was issued for Abdulhak to come forward with any information relevant to Martine's death. There was no response. In Yemen, the local newspaper printed a statement issued by Abdulhak's uncle through a third party which said they would not associate themselves "with any member of the family connected with any wrongdoing".

The legal situation was complicated by the fact that Yemen has no extradition treaty with the UK and that it would require diplomatic co-operation for officers from Scotland Yard to travel there. The British authorities could not agree to a trial for Abdulhak in the country of his birth on ethical grounds in case he faced the death penalty, and yet there was no way of forcing him to return to the UK without the agreement of the Yemeni government. In a deeply conservative country, where justice is considered a family affair rather than a matter for the state, the fugitive Abdulhak could quite easily be sheltered for months, even years, by a father with extensive financial resources and powerful political connections.

In the first few days of the inquiry, codenamed Operation Debruce, DCI Wadsworth managed to speak to Abdulhak's father, Shaher, over the telephone. "He, at that time, claimed he had no knowledge of his son's whereabouts," she says. "He said he would contact his lawyers and they would get in touch and that's the last communication we had with him."

Instead of co-operating further, Shaher Abdulhak consulted London-based law firm Peter & Peters, experts in extradition law. He then employed David Wilson, the managing director of the public relations firm Bell Pottinger, to act as his spokesman in the UK (an attempt to communicate with the Abdulhak family through Mr Wilson for this article was met with silence). On Thursday 20 March, a week after Martine's disappearance, Shaher Abdulhak met Yemen's interior minister, Rashad al-Alimi, apparently seeking guarantees his son would not be handed over to the UK. Despite the evidence gathered by her team, DCI Wadsworth's hands were tied.

Rumours of Abdulhak's whereabouts have sporadically filtered back from Yemen since his disappearance: at first, he was believed to have been taken to a family property in a village four hours outside the capital Sana'a, in the al-Arooq district of the Taiz region. Then, he was believed to have been moved to a succession of his father's hotels and retreats in the countryside. He is said to have grown a beard in order to fit in more seamlessly with the strict Islamic culture. When a Norwegian documentary crew travelled to Yemen in summer 2009, they filmed the Abdulhak family lawyer on a hidden camera, admitting that Farouk lives at home with his family and studies Arabic at the local university.

In July 2009, the police passed their investigation on to the Crown Prosecution Service, which decided there was sufficient evidence to prosecute Farouk Abdulhak for Martine's murder. He was placed on Scotland Yard's "Most Wanted" list and a European arrest warrant was issued. But now that the police investigation has been completed, the process of bringing Abdulhak to trial is a largely political matter, dependent on the diplomatic oiling of cogs and wheels behind the scenes by the foreign secretary, David Miliband, and his Norwegian counterpart, Jonas Gahr Støre.

And yet, almost two years on, Martine's murder is still unsolved, raising the horrifying spectre of something similar happening again. "It's just that awful feeling that injustice prevails," says DCI Wadsworth. "We will pursue and pursue and pursue… I understand that he [Abdulhak] continues to protest his innocence; well, if you're innocent, then come back, you've nothing to fear." Wadsworth says that she still nurtures "an outside hope" that Abdulhak's family will hand him over, or that he will tire of the restrictive Islamic lifestyle and start hankering after more western pleasures – parties, drink, girls – that are only available outside Yemen.

For Mr Magnussen, the process has been slow and frustrating. Although he has nothing but praise for Scotland Yard and the British authorities, he remains extremely disappointed that his own government has not done more to put pressure on Yemen.

"This is not only a question of a lack of extradition treaties," says Mr Magnussen, who is determined that Abdulhak should face trial in the UK, where the crime took place. "It's a simple matter of right and wrong. This has to do with a moral obligation. People are dying every day throughout the world, but what makes this tragedy challenging to us is that this is not a natural catastrophe.

"The particular tragedy in this case comes from the worst motivation a human can have: to kill a person, to put yourself as a judge over their life, to take that life away because it suits you. That is beyond excuse, that is beyond comprehension." He breaks off, gathering his thoughts. "And he [Farouk] can just lie by the pool down in Yemen and live happily ever after. What sort of a father would I be if I didn't do everything I could to prevent this happening to other children?"

Is he angry? There is a long pause. He is a dignified man, not much given to displays of excess emotion. "Of course I am, and I'm disappointed," he says, finally. "I'm trying not to use up any effort in hating. I'm trying to see justice prevail here for the benefit of Martine." Most of his days are now spent finding new ways of putting pressure on the Norwegian government and the international community to raise the profile of the case. When I ask whether burying himself in this sort of work acts as a form of therapy, he interjects before I can finish the question. "No," he says, blankly. "If I needed positive therapy, I would not be digging in this cellar of disappointment. Everything has been a setback."

What makes it particularly hard for Mr Magnussen to come to terms with his daughter's death is not only the knowledge that the chief suspect in her murder is still at large but that, if Farouk is indeed the killer, there was nothing obvious Martine could have done to protect herself: he was a good friend, a man she trusted and had known for several months. She did not leave the club that night with a stranger, nor did she act wilfully, or take a stupid risk. Her only fault was perhaps to trust too easily, to think too well of others and to imagine that the friends she made would, like her, possess a strong moral code. For DCI Wadsworth, "This was a case where it seems as if there's nothing she could have done differently. It's just not fair. They were good friends and obviously, that night, only the two of them will ever really know what happened." Thale Lassen puts it more bluntly: "It really doesn't make sense. Would you ever suspect a good mate of raping and killing you? It's just crazy."

In the margins, there are nonetheless signs of quiet progress. The Yemeni government is under increasing pressure to co-operate more closely with the international community after it emerged that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the alleged Christmas Day bomber, was radicalised by al-Qaida operatives in Yemen. According to Arne Elias Corneliussen, the Magnussen family spokesman: "It would increase the legitimacy of the [Yemeni] regime if Mr Abdulhak is extradited, as it would be seen as an important step in the direction to remove corruption and to abide by international standards and norms in the face of serious crimes."

In Norway, Martine's friends and family remain determined that her death should not be sidelined. Before Christmas, her childhood friends, Sophie Terkelsen and Hedda Homme, organised a 1,000-strong torchlight procession to highlight awareness of the case. Earlier this month, they launched a new campaign website, justiceformartine.com, and on 10 February Mr Magnussen attended a pre-inquest review in London and met Chris Bryant, the parliamentary under-secretary of state for the Foreign Office, to discuss the possibility of securing a one-off legal agreement to secure Abdulhak's return.

"This murder concerns Martine, but it also concerns the international community because this could happen again," says Terkelsen. "When you can go to your native country and stay there in a safe haven, you know that's a big international safety problem." Homme nods her head in agreement. "We don't want revenge, we just want justice," she adds. "Justice for Martine."

It would have been Martine's 25th birthday this month. On Saturday 6 February her family visited her grave – a quiet, sombre group of four, where once they would have been five. Beyond that, they did not want to mark the day. Their grief is still so immeasurable that sometimes they fear it will engulf them . "It is a survival thing," says Mr Magnussen. "We cannot take it in or think about the consequences on a daily basis, because it will destroy us. When you see me cry, as you have done today, that is barely touching on the scope of this tragedy. In our family, this loss is so big that we try to minimise talking about it."

Before I leave, Mr Magnussen insists on showing me the beach hut at the bottom of the steep-sloped garden. It is a tiny wooden cabin, complete with a small sauna and a terrace built along the frozen shoreline of the sea. It was here that Martine invited her friends each summer for a party when the sounds of high-spirited teenagers laughing and drinking and jumping into the clear water would last late into the evening.

Today, the ground is several inches thick with snow. Mr Magnussen looks around, as if testing the air, and then he walks to the edge of a long jetty, his footsteps making hollow marks on the unbroken snow. He stands there for several minutes, a grey figure looking out across the immeasurable whiteness of sky and sea. For a moment, he seems vulnerable: slight and fragile against the uncompromising enormity of the landscape. But then he turns and walks back to the shore, towards the beach hut that his daughter once loved, letting the vastness recede behind him.

• Crime
• Yemen

Elizabeth Day
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Mark Urban's prose is gripping but lacks perspective on the triumphs of our special forces in Iraq, says Jason Burke

On 30 May last year Operation Crichton, the UK special forces deployment in Iraq, ended. Over the previous six years operatives from the SAS, the Special Boat Service and a range of other elite units had killed or captured 3,500 people. Their own number had rarely exceeded 150 at any one time.

The majority of targets on near-nightly raids were captured. Between 350 and 400 were killed. Most of these were senior Islamic militants including a number linked to al-Qaida. Around 50 civilians were killed as well.

That Mark Urban, a BBC journalist also known for excellent recent books on the Napoleonic Wars, has been able to tell this story is a testament to his determination and investigative skill. Few reporters succeed in cultivating any sources within the closed world of the British special forces; Urban has found dozens who have spoken with unprecedented candour. The result is gripping and troubling in equal measure and an invaluable addition to the increasingly comprehensive literature on the Iraq war.

The author had to battle the Ministry of Defence to have his book published, and one wonders what reception a work more critical of British special forces' operations might have received in Whitehall. The author's personal admiration for the men who constitute his subject is clear. Language veers from the breathless – "Britain's hand-picked troops", the "SAS had got its man"– to the soldierly – firefights are "epic", problems are "aggro". The book reads extremely well – too well in a sense – with almost every chapter starting with helicopters circling at dawn, Land Rovers leaving bases in clouds of dust or C-130 transporters taking off or coming into land. There is a limited lay vocabulary available to describe the intense and complex reality of war but the style occasionally jars in what is otherwise a serious and accomplished work.

The narrow focus of the book sometimes forces the author to either ignore the broader context, local or regional, or condense extremely complex issues. Urban's two-page explanation of who or what was producing the horribly effective "explosively formed projectiles" which started featuring in roadside bombings of coalition troops, and why their source – probably Iran – was controversial, is nicely done and his unpicking of the political and legal labyrinth surrounding issues of prisoner detention and rules of engagements elegant and authoritative.

However, Urban's analysis is more difficult to sustain when he says that British special forces were deployed in the north and west of Iraq in 2003 to take the place of massive bodies of American troops which were prevented from reaching the theatre because "the rulers of certain countries did not want to risk the wrath of the Arab street by allowing overt movements of US troops through their ports towards Iraq" even though "they had been prepared to accede to the launching of highly secret coalition attacks from their territory". This was, Urban states, "a typical double-dealing Middle Eastern approach". Quite apart from recycling a terrible old stereotype about wily, untrustworthy Orientals, the most prominent among "those certain countries" was Turkey, and Ankara's choice was not about double-dealing (nor clearly the Arab street) but, as it was the Turkish parliament that voted to reject the Americans' multi-billion dollar sweeteners, about democracy. Urban does however skilfully communicate a mass of often technical information about his core subject without ever boring the reader.

Nor does Urban spare the rest of the British army. He argues that the UK's special forces effectively saved the nation's military honour in what was otherwise a war marked by early complacency, middling incompetence and finally a spineless lack of will. Urban quotes American commanders diplomatically praising the UK's contribution, though quite how critical the work of the SAS in Iraq was has to be seen in perspective. If the SAS killed or captured around 3,500, then the equivalent figure for the Joint Special Operations Command's US tasks across Iraq were, Urban says, estimated at 11,000-12,000 militants, of whom around 3,000 may have been killed.

In Task Force Black Iraqis rarely feature other than as militants to be killed or captured, civilians who get shot by accident, as corrupt policemen or as weak and venal politicians. There is little sense of the Iraqi people as players in their own destiny. This is perhaps inevitable. David Kilcullen, an Australian counterinsurgency expert, quotes an American special forces operator in Iraq saying he had "never met an Iraqi who wasn't in handcuffs".

Special forces are a high-grade specialised tool to be used sparingly in given circumstances. Their courage and skill is beyond doubt. But I wonder if they are entirely worthy of the enormous attention we lavish on them. Even with excellent books such as this.

• BBC
• Iraq

Jason Burke
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• Book reveals extent of PM's despair in aftermath of war
• Brown's fury at broken promise over leadership succession

Tony Blair descended into such a deep depression after the Iraq war that he told Gordon Brown and John Prescott he would quit No 10 the following summer – only to renege on the pledge within months, a new book by the Observer's Andrew Rawnsley reveals.

The former prime minister's physical and mental decline was so profound that he confided to friends that he "spaced out" several times during Prime Minister's Questions and often woke up in the middle of the night with sweat trickling down the back of his neck.

Rawnsley's explosive account is in The End of the Party, which is published on Monday , extracts from which appear in tomorrow's Observer. It lays bare, for the first time, how Blair was haunted and tormented by the deepening chaos and bloodshed in Iraq at the same time as being worn down by the constant psychological warfare being waged by Brown, his next-door neighbour in Downing Street, who was increasingly desperate to take his job.

While Blair's gift for presentation helped him hide his depression from the public and most of his staff, his private turmoil was so severe that he decided there was nothing for it but to hand over to Brown midway through his second term.

Rawnsley is the first journalist to detail how Blair, in those darkest days, made clear at a dinner with both Brown and Prescott in November 2003, and later in a telephone call to Prescott in spring 2004, that he would step down.

Sally Morgan, Blair's director of government relations, told Rawnsley: "Iraq was a quicksand swallowing him up. The atrocities. Those terrible photos [of Abu Ghraib]. And he started losing people who had supported him throughout. He was stuck in this long dark tunnel and could see no way out of it."

The book relates how Blair's special envoy in Iraq, the former UN ambassador, Sir Jeremy Greenstock, came to No 10 at the end of his service in Baghdad to brief the prime minister. Greenstock knew that his "very gloomy assessment" had made him highly unpopular in the building. Some at No 10 tried to keep him away, fearing the impact on Blair's collapsing morale. In Blair's den Greenstock warned him that the situation looked "unbelievably bad" and would get more desperate in the months to come. "What can we do?" pleaded Blair. "We have told them [the Americans] again and again what we think is necessary. If it doesn't happen, what can we do?" Greenstock was left with the image of the prime minister "tearing his hair" over Iraq and "throwing his hands in the air".

Rawnsley then charts how Blair – urged by his wife, Cherie, and closest political friends to pull back from the brink and deny Brown his chance – gradually recovered his self-belief and decided to fight on. The volte-face caused Brown's frustration to turn to rage.

On one occasion Brown went round to No 10 to get an answer. One of Blair's inner circle who witnessed this says: "Gordon was just losing it. He was behaving like a belligerent teenager. Just standing in the office shouting: 'When are you going to fucking go?' "

Blair's dark period throughout late 2003 and early 2004 was compounded by his heart complaint and anxiety that his young children were suffering at school because of the unpopular war their father had championed in Iraq. His friend and cabinet colleague Tessa Jowell says: "He was very low, he was very lonely and he was very tired."

In November 2003, Prescott, who was acting as "referee" between the prime minister and chancellor, hosted a dinner to discuss their differences and address the succession question. Next morning a visibly excited Brown told his key aides, Ed Miliband, Ed Balls, Spencer Livermore and Sue Nye, that Blair had assured him he was going in the summer. The four were sceptical, having heard about similar promises from Blair before. But by the spring Blair was to telephone Prescott and tell him he had settled on June as his departure date.

Behind the scenes, Blair's allies feared he was wobbling and were hatching a strategy to boost his morale. Jowell went to his study and told him: "You're going to get through this." Blair replied without conviction: "I'm fine, darling. Don't worry about me. I'm fine." Blair's friends noticed that women were better at bolstering him than men.

Peter Mandelson told him: "Come on. Buck up. Buck up. Think of what you've got to achieve. You're the best politician in this country by a mile."

After the June local elections of 2004, which were bad for Labour but not disastrous, Blair's zest for the job returned and he decided to stay to fight the 2005 election, which Labour won, though with a substantially reduced majority.

In autumn 2004, Blair declared he would fight the election but not lead Labour into a fourth one. But the statement led to relentless speculation about his departure date. Rawnsley reveals how, in the summer of 2006, Prescott was so frustrated with Blair's refusal to name a handover date that he threatened to resign as deputy prime minister unless he did so.

• The End of the Party
• Tony Blair
• Gordon Brown
• John Prescott
• Politics and Iraq
• Cherie Blair
• Labour party leadership
• Iraq
• Politics past

Toby Helm
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The political elite in Iraq have to be willing to sacrifice short-term, sectarian gain for the long-term interests of their country

Iraqis will go to the polls again on 7 March to elect 325 members of the country's council of representatives. The election represents another key milestone in the post-2003 development of the country. Although Iraqis have voted several times since the invasion (constitutional referendum, national elections and local elections) with US troops out of the cities and with their numbers below 100,000 for the first time since 2003, the country now has a far larger claim to its own sovereignty.

As Nato troops swarm across southern Afghanistan as part of Obama's surge, there is a crucial American need for quiet on the Iraqi front but, with just over a week before the elections, violence and fierce political disagreements continue to rock Iraq's nascent governmental institutions.

While much has been made of the significant improvement in security in the country, it is worth taking a moment to remember how dangerous Iraq really is. Nearly seven years after the toppling of Saddam it is only the multiple bombings such as the targeting of government ministries and Shia pilgrimages that break into the international media; the constant daily stories of death and destruction are largely unnoticed outside the country.

Indeed, although much of the western media has largely abandoned covering Iraq, McClatchy news publishes an important daily report of violence from police, military and medical sources. But even this fails to tally the actual daily violence, much of which goes unreported. Still, a typical report from last Monday shows, in Baghdad alone, terrifying levels of violence with several bombings, minibuses raked by gunfire, a family of eight massacred in their home, a policeman killed by a sniper and a university lecturer gunned down on the street.

Meanwhile, back in the political arena, Nouri al-Maliki, the prime minister whose "State of Law" coalition has sought to claim credit for the relative improvements in security, has been quick to blame Ba'athists, not al-Qaida, for the recent large-scale attacks.

As the election approaches, the splitting of the Shia United Arab Alliance (UIA) into Maliki's coalition and the National Iraqi Alliance (NIA), led by his former boss, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, has meant that both sides are looking to take a hard line against former Ba'athists to solicit votes from their own sectarian communities.

Such short-term political positioning could have devastating consequences if large sections of the Sunni community boycott the election or find themselves without an effective role in the next governing coalition. This would fatally undermine the legitimacy of the next government and could lead to renewed large-scale fighting along sectarian fault lines.

Maliki in particular is guilty of switching from statesman (when he looked to incorporate Sunni parties into his coalition) to politician (when he decided to largely abandon the Sunni vote by supporting the decision to disqualify some 442 candidates) in order to shore up his own constituency which was under threat from the NIA.

Despite the regularity of all parties boasting their "national" credentials, it appears that Iraq is heading down the road of Lebanon with the primacy of identity-based politics, whether ethnic or sectarian in character. As Professor Juan Cole explained recently, "Iraqis typically are embarrassed by sectarianism and deny its importance. But when they have gone to the polls in the past five years, they have almost always voted for ethnic or sectarian parties once in the privacy of the voting booth".

Lebanon's current government took four months of political wrangling to form, and the US ambassador, Christopher Hill, warned that whatever the result of the Iraqi election it may take some time for a governing coalition to take shape as the parties argue over the allocation of ministries and connections into lucrative patronage networks.

Once the voting is out of the way, however, the leaders of the Shia parties should find it easier to include Sunni groups, such as the Allawi-led Iraqi National Movement (INM) into a unity coalition, the likes of which is seen in Beirut today. The flip side of such national unity governments is that they can easily become paralysed by a lack of agreement on the most fundamental issues.

Despite the apparent success of the Petraeus policy of "surgenomics" (a troop surge combined with simultaneous financial co-option of former enemies), it was designed to create a more peaceful space in which political agreement on key issues could be found. However, there is still no agreement on critical matters such as the nature of Iraqi federalism, an oil law, internal borders and national reconciliation.

If a national unity coalition is Iraq's best bet to prevent large-scale violence erupting, then the only hope to avoid the paralysis of such coalitions is through the emergence of statesmen who are able to leave sectarian politics at the ballot box.

• Iraq
• Middle East

James Denselow
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After investigation into killing of Hamas official emirate's police chief emerges as a star across the Arab world

Until a month or so ago, few people outside Dubai had even heard of the emirate's police chief, Lt Gen Dahi Khalfan Tamim. But after his investigation into the assassination of a senior Hamas official by an alleged Mossad hit squad, Tamim has emerged as a local hero and a star across the Arab world, praised for his relentless pursuit of what he says "with 99% certainty" is an Israeli crime.

"Greetings of love and appreciation for General Dahi Khalfan, God protect you from all evil," an anonymous Iraqi wrote on al-Arabiyya.net website. "Congratulations to the Dubai police for this speedy and professional job, and hoping other Arab states can learn from your example," gushed another blogger. "Inshallah [God willing] Dubai's heroes will bring an end to Israel," went yet another delighted post.

Pundits from Kuwait to Cairo watched in amazement as the little Gulf emirate produced CCTV images of everything but the actual murder of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh on 19 January. Tamim coolly described the suspects wearing false beards, wigs and tennis gear as they shadowed the Hamas man at the airport and the five-star al-Bustan Rotana hotel – and then threatened to issue an arrest warrant for Israel's leader, Binyamin Netanyahu.

"Dubai's government and security apparatus have proved that crimes and murders are not allowed to pass unnoticed," Lebanese commentator Elias Harfoush wrote in al-Hayat. Ahmed Tibi, an Israeli Arab MP, called Tamim "the real hero in this story" – responding to a Jewish colleague's boast that the head of the Mossad deserved that accolade. Hamas and its Fatah rival, blaming each other for betraying Mabhouh, both expressed appreciation for Dubai's sleuths.

Israel has refused to confirm or deny its involvement but has described Mabhouh as playing a key role supplying Iranian rockets and money to Hamas.

In the west Dubai may be a byword for vulgarity, greed and financial meltdown but it also represents modernity and efficiency. These qualities are rare in the Arab world, where secret policemen routinely beat suspects and rely heavily on informers. "Dubai employs modern technology to uncover crimes," said an Egyptian columnist.

Tamim, 59, known as Abu Faris, trained in Jordan shortly after the UAE was created in 1971. He has a reputation for hard work and piety, visiting his mother before work every morning and reporting in person to Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, the ruler of Dubai, before he goes home.

Last year he won plaudits for solving the murder of Suzanne Tamim, a Lebanese singer killed on an Egyptian tycoon's orders in her Dubai Marina flat. He also cracked the assassination of a Chechen warlord and the robbery of jewellery worth $3.8m. The tackling of Israeli impunity is a big reason for Tamim's current popularity, but he has also urged Hamas to investigate its own security breaches and refused to hand over two Palestinian suspects to the group.

Yet Dubai's celebrity police chief may not welcome all the attention: one new Facebook fan is using the name and photograph of a "Peter Elvinger", a French passport holder who was named as one of Mabhouh's assassins and is thought to have commanded the team. "You are doing a very impressive work!" commented (the presumably spoof) Elvinger in a recent message. "I'll be more careful next time."

• Dubai
• The Mossad
• Israel
• Middle East
• Palestinian territories

Ian Black
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Water already causes armed conflict in the capital, but there is worse to come for a hungry country when the oilfields run dry

There's something a bit different about the three Rafik brothers as they show off their fields of lanky green trees, grown from the rich and rare soils of Wadi Dahr.

Unlike three-quarters of Yemeni men on the afternoon of a day off, there are no little green flecks around the teeth of Abdullah, Nabil and Ahmed: they are not chewing qat – they are growing it.

The bitter and mildly narcotic leaf is key to Yemen's economy, and yet its enormous need for water is on course to make the capital, Sana'a, the first in the world to die of thirst. With the problem extending across the nation, the country is almost literally chewing itself to death.

From high on the scorched brown rock face that surrounds the Wadi Dahr valley, half an hour's drive north-west of Sana'a, the fertile carpet of vegetation below looks miraculous. Like most of Yemen, these northern mountains are a dry and barren land. But the irrigation needed to grow qat, coupled with an exploding population, means Sana'a's water basin is emptying out at a staggering rate: four times as much water is taken out of the basin as falls into it each year.

Most experts predict Sana'a, the fastest-growing capital in the world at 7% a year, will run out of economically viable water supplies by 2017. That is the same year the World Bank says Yemen will cease earning income from its oil, which currently accounts for three-quarters of the state's revenues.

The cost of water in some suburbs of Sana'a has tripled in the last year, and armed conflicts over water resources around the city are increasing. Shortages in the summer months leave thousands of families with taps run dry, forcing them to spend a third of their meagre incomes on buying water from trucks.

According to Mahmoud Shidiwah, chair of the Yemeni government's water and environment protection agency, 19 of the country's 21 main water aquifers are no longer being replenished after a long drought and increasing demand. He says Yemen, the poorest country in the Arab world, receives under 200 cubic metres a person a year, well below the international water poverty line of 1,000 cubic metres. The water basin in Taiz, one of Yemen's largest cities, has already collapsed. Neighbouring Amran is close, as is Saada in the north.

The water situation is so serious that the government has considered moving the capital, as well as desalinating seawater on the coast and pumping it 2,000 metres uphill to the capital. A third solution would be to transfer water over the mountains from another basin. Shidiwah says: "We have a very big problem. All options have been found to be unacceptable."

The best solution, everyone agrees, is to reduce qat growing, which sucks up the largest share of water use. But this is also fraught with social and political problems, says Shidiwah, because in a country where half the population earn less than $2 a day it provides many jobs.

A meeting of Yemen's Gulf Arab neighbours this weekend in Riyadh, following a conference in London in January, is expected to make pledges of development assistance to the failing state. However, the UN's appeal for $177m in humanitarian aid this year is so far only 0.4% funded, leading the World Food Programme earlier this month to cut back rations for around 1 million Yemenis. A recent WFP survey found that one out of every three Yemenis – 7.5 million people – suffer chronic hunger.

Once a vibrant farming economy, Yemen today imports up to 80% of its food needs. The residents of Rawda, one of six districts that make up the sprawling suburbs of Sana'a known as Beni al Harith, know why.

"In the 1970s this was all covered with trees. We used to grow the most delicious grapes in the republic. Now they come from outside," says Abdel Latif al Oulofi, a community leader.

"In the 1980s the population was 5,000. Now there are more than 100,000 people. We know of 1,500 illegal wells, most of them now dry. People have been drilling with oil rigs, going down 600 metres to try and find water. But the wells are so polluted we have to rely on trucks. Rawda means paradise. It was very beautiful. Now it's like hell."

A further irony is that Yemen is subsidising its own drought. Officials estimate that a billion litres of diesel were used last year just for pumping water for agriculture. As the government subsidises most of the cost of diesel, the state calculates it spent $700m on depleting its own national water resources.

Oulofi promises to set up a meeting later in the afternoon with Rawda's sheikh, or tribal leader, who will be discussing water issues with local families.

But the view over Wadi Dahr shows why little explanation for Yemen's water woes is needed: the rows and rows of green trees below do not bear fruit and vegetables, but solely the qat leaf.

"You know it's ready to harvest when you see the top stalk has two buds," says the youngest of the three Rafiks, 17-year-old Nabil Ali, as he pulls down the bendy trunk of a hamdani tree, one of Sana'a's most popular qat varieties.

Weaving along the heavily potholed track leading out of Wadi Dahr, and the phone rings. It's Oulofi with bad news. The sheikh has been laid up in the local clinic, put on a drip and told to rest for the next two days. He won't be able to discuss water with his community until at least next week. The reason for the sheikh's sudden collapse? Sunstroke and dehydration.

State of crisis
Saudi Arabia is hosting a meeting on Yemen's most urgent development and financial needs as efforts intensify to boost international support for reforms by President Ali Abdullah Salih. Yemen is often described a state in danger of failing. In addition to its acute water crisis, it is also running out of oil — its main source of revenue — and has to support a rapidly growing and young population with high rates of illiteracy, malnutrition and unemployment. International ­interest was galvanised by the abortive attempt to bomb a US airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day, claimed by the Yemen-based al-Qaida in the ­Arabian Peninsula. Under US pressure, Yemeni authorties have targeted al-Qaida more aggressively.

Ian Black

• Water
• Drought
• Oil
• Farming
• Yemen
• Drugs trade
• Agriculture

Hugh MacleodJohn Vidal
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• Move is provocation, says Palestinian PM
• Disputed areas part of land captured in 1967

Israeli troops and Palestinians clashed for the fifth successive day in Hebron today, the latest fallout from an Israeli government decision to include two sites on the occupied West Bank in a new "national heritage" list.

Salam Fayyad, the Palestinian prime minister, prayed in the Ibrahimi mosque in Hebron today and warned that ­Israel's new plan was a provocation.

"We will not be dragged to violence by the terrorism of the settlers, and the terrorism of the settlement project," he told reporters. "Our objection to this lies in the fact these sites are on Palestinian land that was occupied in 1967, precisely the lands upon which the independent Palestinian state will be established."

The row began at an Israeli cabinet meeting last Sunday, when ministers put together a new list of Israeli national heritage sites which needed protection and renovation. Apparently at the last minute, Israel's prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, decided to include two sites on the West Bank: the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, known to the Palestinians as the Ibrahimi mosque; and Rachel's Tomb, near Bethlehem.

"Our existence here in our country depends not only on the strength of the IDF [Israel Defence Force] and our economic and technological might. It is anchored, first and foremost, in our national and emotional legacy, which we instil in our youth and in the coming generations," Netanyahu told the cabinet.

However, it quickly provoked a political storm as both sites are on land captured and occupied by Israel in 1967. Both sites are important for Judaism, Christianity and Islam, but there are influential Jewish settler communities close to both and Netanyahu's decision seemed a direct challenge to long-held Palestinian aspirations for an independent state.

It also seemed like a nod to the rightwing elements in his cabinet. On the same day dozens of rightwing Jewish settlers marched into the West Bank city of Jericho in a show of strength. Arieh Eldad, an Israeli MP from the rightwing National Union party, visited the Tomb of the Patriarchs and said: "There is no Israeli heritage without the Bible, there is no Zionism without the Bible. This is the real birthplace of the Jewish people, here it all began."

Soon there were clashes in Hebron and Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas warned of a risk of "religious war". The US state department stepped into the row, criticising Israel's decision for being provocative and unhelpful at a time when western governments are trying to restart peace talks between the Palestinians and Israel. Later in the week Netanyahu tried to defuse some of the criticism of his plan, saying there had been a "misunderstanding". By today, the violence had subsided. Israeli troops fired teargas and Palestinians threw stones in the streets of Hebron, but the crowds were smaller.

However, Palestinians attending Friday prayers said they were angered by Netanyahu's plan. "It is an unjust decision and designed to destroy peace," said Osama Abu Sharq, 47, a shopkeeper. "The settlers are being strengthened and the land of 1967 is being confiscated day after day."

"It is not easy for the Palestinians to accept this," said Suleiman al-Qawasmeh, 42. "We consider this site part of our Islamic heritage. These decisions only strengthen the division between Israelis and Palestinians. It encourages radicalism and differences between religions."

The site in Hebron is controlled by Israeli troops, who were out in force today. Inside, part of the building is reserved for Muslim Palestinians and another part, with a separate entrance, for Jewish Israelis. There are around 400 heavily-guarded religious Jewish settlers living in the centre of Hebron, a city of 150,000 Palestinians.

• Israel
• Palestinian territories
• Binyamin Netanyahu
• Judaism
• Islam
• Christianity

Rory McCarthy
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Although the US president has pledged to pull out all combat troops, lingering brigades could become a security fixture

Yesterday came the first signs of the inevitable in Iraq: a prolonged presence of US troops beyond the status of forces agreement deadline of 2011.

President Obama has promised to get all combat troops (ie most of those still in the country) out of Iraq by August this year. But Thomas Ricks of Foreign Policy magazine has revealed that the top US military commander in Iraq, General Ray Odierno, has asked Obama to keep a combat force in the north for longer than that.

Odierno's request suggests that a somewhat flexible approach will be taken towards the remaining 40,000 to 50,000 troops. The general has asked for a combat brigade to remain in Kirkuk, the ethnically mixed, oil-rich and volatile disputed territory. But the problem of Kirkuk will not be resolved by the end of 2011 and it may never be peacefully resolved at all (see the Falklands, the other oil-rich disputed territory that has had historic battles fought over it, where disputes exist over the rights to its oil and also where the UN, as with Kirkuk, has been called to look into).

If Obama does indeed give his approval then it is likely to be a reflection of the US troop presence in Iraq over the next five, possibly 10, years. Yet, we may well be seeing the South Korea-style permanent military presence taking root here, both as a counter-measure against the impenetrable Iranian influence in the country as well as a measure to keep the peace; since Kirkuk could decide whether Iraq collapses or survives, a prolonged military presence in Iraq focused around the province, as well as other northern areas like Mosul and Diyala – where joint US-Kurd-Arab military patrols have been initiated – can be justified.

How will this be sold to the American and Iraqi public? As I explained to the LSE Ideas Middle East programme, the remaining 35,000 to 50,000 troops are expected to carry on in "advisory" capacities, code for "on standby" if things get really bad and a status more acceptable to a public largely critical of any "combative", and therefore seemingly aggressive, military mandate. Iraqis may welcome this so long as the US keeps out of everyday Iraqi life, stays in the background as the Iraqi security forces become more assertive and generally improve, and so long as it leads to improved security.

Politically speaking, there will be some, especially among the Sunnis who deride Iran's influence and the Shia hold on power, that deem a strong US presence a necessary and imperative counter-measure against other domestic and external forces that have a degree of power far superior than their own.

It is election time in Iraq and the nation is gripped with the campaigning process as they prepare to cast their vote in less than 10 days. For this reason, the US administration is doing well to wait before coming out officially to extend the deadline – lest it hurt any allies, potential or otherwise – and it is likely to wait up to two months after the election as the political framework settles. For these reasons, it is unlikely that the revelation will have any bearing on the elections.

• Iraq
• Middle East
• US foreign policy

Ranj Alaaldin
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Sunni MPs call move a blatant ploy to win votes for prime minister Nouri al-Maliki in upcoming election

The Iraqi military will reinstate 20,000 Saddam Hussein-era army officers who were dismissed from their posts after the 2003 US-led invasion for serving under the former dictator, an Iraqi defence spokesman said today.

The announcement, a little over a week before the 7 March parliamentary elections, raised questions about whether it was timed to win votes for the prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki.

The defence ministry spokesman, Muhammad al-Askari, said the move was simply a matter of timing because funding for the jobs became available.

"This measure has nothing to do with elections, rather it is related to budget allocations," he said.

But Sunni MPs called it a blatant ploy by Maliki.

"No doubt, this move is related to the elections and it aims at gaining votes," said Maysoun al-Damlouji, a candidate from a secular block headed by the former prime minister Ayad Allawi, a critic of Maliki.

The ministry said the officers would be reinstated on Sunday, meaning they would be allowed to vote in the election.

What to do with officials from the ruling Ba'ath party has been a cause of concern for postwar Iraq. Hundreds of thousands were purged from government jobs under a programme by the Coalition Provisional Authority and Saddam's army was disbanded, decisions that were widely blamed for setting in motion the Sunni insurgency.

Although many were allowed to return to government service in 2008, the treatment of former Ba'ath party members has increasingly become a source of tension as the election approaches.

More than 440 suspected Saddam loyalists, mostly Sunnis, have been barred from the election. Their disqualification was ordered by a committee led by two prominent Shia MPs who are believed to have ties to Iran and are also standing in the election.

Among them was a prominent Sunni MP, Saleh al-Mutlaq, who said yesterday that his party, the National Dialogue Front, would rejoin the parliamentary elections, less than a week after withdrawing it from the race in protest at the ban.

The decision effectively lifts the threat that minority Sunnis would boycott the vote, which the US hopes will bolster national reconciliation efforts and pave the way for American combat forces to go home.

In another twist today, the spokesman of the Shia-led political vetting committee that drafted the blacklist, Mudhafar al-Batat, said the committee would file a lawsuit against Mutlaq for his alleged involvement in attacks and killings carried out by insurgent groups linked to Ba'ath party.

The Sunni MP, who heads an 11-member bloc in the outgoing legislature, has repeatedly denied any links to the insurgency and claimed he quit the disbanded party in the 1970s.

• Iraq
• Saddam Hussein

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Politiken widely condemned for agreeing to publish apology in return for Muslim organisations dropping legal action

A Danish newspaper apologised today to eight Muslim organisations for the offence it caused by reprinting controversial cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad, in exchange for their dropping legal action against the newspaper.

Politiken reached a settlement with the groups, which represent 94,923 of Muhammad's descendants, in which it agreed to print an apology for the affront the cartoons caused. The newspaper has not given up its right to publish the cartoons and has not apologised for having printed them as part of its news coverage.

In a joint statement, the two sides said they wanted to "express their satisfaction with this amicable understanding and settlement, and express the hope that it may in some degree contribute to defusing the present tense situation".

The decision to issue an apology for the offence caused has been met, however, by widespread condemnation from the Danish media and political parties.

The editor of Jyllands-Posten, which originally printed the cartoons in 2005 and is published by the same media company as Politiken, said that its sister paper had failed in the fight for freedom of speech and called it a "sad day" for the Danish press.

Kurt Westergaard, one of the cartoonists, who earlier this year was the subject of an attempted attack at his home, said the newspaper had betrayed its duty to freedom of speech. "In Denmark we play by a set of rules, which we don't deviate from, and that's freedom of speech," he told the newspaper Berlingske Tidende. "Politiken is afraid of terror. That's unfortunate and I fully understand that."

The leader of the rightwing Danish People's party, Pia Kjærsgaard, called the situation absurd, and said that Politiken had sold out. She urged Danish newspapers to reprint the cartoons as a protest against Politiken's settlement. "It is deeply, deeply embarrassing that [Politiken's editor] Tøger Seidenfaden has sold out of Denmark's and the west's freedom of speech. I cannot distance myself enough from this total sellout to this doctrine," Kjærsgaard said.

The leader of the Social Democrats, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, also criticised Politiken's decision: "It's crazy. The media carries offensive material every day. That is what freedom of speech is about."

The prime minister and the newly appointed foreign secretary have not commented on the settlement.

Last year 11 Danish newspapers were contacted by the Saudi lawyer Faisal Yamani, who demanded that the Muhammad cartoons were removed from their websites, that the newspapers print an apology and that they promise not to use the cartoons again.

Seidenfaden initially refused Yamani's request for an apology, saying it was the paper's duty to print the cartoons as part of its news coverage after Westergaard became the subject of an alleged murder plot.

Yamani, the lawyer who negotiated the settlement on behalf of the descendants, said: "This is a good settlement. It would be wrong to speak of a victory. Both parties have reached the point where they understand the background to what has happened. Politiken is courageous in apologising, even though its was not their intention to offend anyone."

In September 2005 the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published a series of cartoons depicting Muhammad, in what it described as an attempt to promote freedom of expression. The cartoons initially had little impact, but when they were reprinted by Norwegian newspapers a storm erupted, with violent protests across the Middle East.

In February 2006 the violence escalated as newspapers in France, Germany, Spain and Italy reprinted the caricatures. The offices of Jyllands-Posten had to be evacuated several times after security threats.

Protests spread to other Arab countries and Danish goods including Lego and Bang & Olufsen were boycotted by Saudi Arabia, Libya and Syria. The Danish embassy in Damascus was burned down in 2006, others were attacked and death threats forced Westergaard into hiding.

Westergaard's caricature of a bearded man with a bomb in his turban became the most talked about of the cartoons, but he has said the man in the drawing didn't "necessarily" depict Muhammad.

According to Islamic tradition, it is blasphemous to make or show an image of the prophet.

• Muhammad cartoons row 2006
• Denmark
• Islam
• Saudi Arabia
• Press freedom
• Newspapers

Lars Eriksen
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Following attacks on the New Israel Fund, a Knesset bill restricting rights organisations risks eroding democratic culture

The vicious, McCarthyite attack on the New Israel Fund (Nif), which uses philanthropic funds to foster and support Israeli non-profit, civil society organisations, did not come out of the blue. The ultra-nationalist group, Im Tirzu, which blamed Nif for the Goldstone report, falsely claiming, as Jonathan Freedland showed, that more than 90% of the report's information came from groups funded by the Nif, was exploiting a climate of vilification of such groups created by the Netanyahu government since it came to power a year ago.

Following the assault on the Nif, and the personal attack on its president, the civil rights champion Professor Naomi Chazan, the Knesset decided to set up a committee to investigate foreign funding of Israeli civil society organisations. Emerging from the committee was a bill that is supposed "to increase transparency and repair loopholes in legislation in relation to the financing of political activity in Israel by foreign political entities". Supported by members of the Knesset from both the coalition and the opposition, there is every likelihood that this bill will become law within a month.

By using a very broad definition of "political activity", in reality, the measure will severely restrict a wide range of civil society organisations from carrying out their work. First, their tax-exempt status would be removed, which means that they would have to pay tax on donations. Even more damaging, government and private donors are generally legally restricted from paying taxes to a foreign government, so losing tax-exempt status would threaten these groups' ability to receive donations entirely. Second, any representative of one of these groups appearing in public – even for a mere 30 seconds – will be legally bound to state, at the outset, that their organisation receives foreign funding. This would restrict freedom of speech. Third, members of such organisations will face the same legal constraints as the officials, a provision that would almost certainly produce a decline in support.

In fact, the law is unnecessary as not-for-profit organisations already have to be completely transparent about their funding, mission and work. It will affect groups concerned with human rights, women's rights, the environment, migrants, peace and social change. They will be publicly delegitimised and suffer increased state monitoring. Their employees and members will face arrest, prosecution, fines and up to one year in jail.

The law will legitimise a process that is already under way: a wave of assaults on Palestinian and Israeli activists and organisations opposing the occupation has already taken place. Non-violent Palestinian resistance has been quashed by Israeli security forces and Palestinian organisers and activists have faced night-time raids and arrests.

A recent survey seems to suggest that there is the potential for a high degree of tolerance and approval of these actions, especially where human rights groups are concerned. The War and Peace Index of Tel Aviv University last week published results of a poll of Israel's Jewish residents, which showed that 57% agreed that, in the case of an external conflict, human rights are less important than the national security crisis. In such a climate, the incitement against human rights groups by rightwing columnists must surely find a receptive audience. Not to mention the reports and op-eds by rightwing NGOs and thinktanks.

For example, Seth T Frantzman brands human rights activists as fifth columnists, by claiming they are taking EU money, constitute a European lobby and pursue the EU's alleged anti-Israel agenda. Gerald Steinberg of NGO Monitor bizarrely states that the way they operate is a "grotesque distortion of democracy". The influential Reut Institute recently issued a report arguing that Israel is in existential danger of delegitimisation by radical groups abroad. The Netanyahu government already seems to have taken this message to heart and will no doubt see foreign-funded civil society groups as contributing to this process.

Israel's democracy has never been perfect. Nor, for that matter, has the democracy of any other country. But over time, with the liberalisation of politics and the economy, a lively democratic culture began to develop. Nevertheless, the country's claim to be a beacon of western democratic norms has been fatally undermined by the state continuing to treat its Arab population as second-class citizens and by the absence of democratic rights for the Palestinians under its control in the occupied territories. The development of Israel's civil society institutions over the last few decades has come about partly as a response to this democratic deficit.

It's hard to credit that a country that wants to be seen as on a par with EU members doesn't understand that it's a sign of democracy in practice to allow civil society organisations to operate freely. Restricting them in the way the new law proposes will thus undermine Israel's democracy. The political landscape, especially as reflected in the Knesset, is already unreceptive to alternative civil society views. The coalition ranges from pragmatic right to ultra-right; the opposition includes a large pragmatic right; and there are almost no defenders of civil liberties. Laws have been proposed that target minorities, outlaw commemoration of the Naqba and abandon Israel's commitment to the UN convention on refugees.

The further erosion of democracy in Israel will only make it harder than ever to reach comprehensive peace and guarantee the country's future security.

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• Israel
• Middle East
• Palestinian territories
• Human rights

Antony Lerman
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At a meeting in the city of Benghazi to mark the prophet Muhammad's birthday, Gaddafi described Switzerland as an infidel state that was 'destroying' mosques

Under Ahmadinejad's government increasing numbers of journalists have been imprisoned and publications closed down

More than 100 journalists and bloggers have been imprisoned in Iran since the disputed election last June, making it the world's leading enemy of free expression. At least 65 remain in jail – more than any single country has imprisoned since 1996.

Two of those imprisoned, Mehrdad Rahimi and Kohyar Goodarzi, have been labelled "mohareb" (enemies of God) – a heresy charge punishable by death under the Iranian law. One other journalist is on death row.

Recently, the world's leading international journalists' and other human rights organisations announced a mega-campaign for the release of Iran's imprisoned journalists, running through Norooz, the Iranian new year, with events aimed at building pressure on the regime. The campaign is called Our Society Will Be a Free Society, a reference to Ayatollah Khomeini's 30-year-old pledge that Iran would have freedom of expression.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), the International Press Institute, Reporters Sans Frontières, Index on Censorship and the International Federation of Journalists are among the organisations involved. But despite all concerns by the international community, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government seems indifferent. It has shown the same attitude towards the UN's recent review of Iran's human rights record. In fact, Iran's suppression of journalists has accelerated since the anniversary of the Iranian Revolution on February 11.

Last week, Masoud Jazayeri, a commander of the Revolutionary Corps, said that those Iranians who work for foreign media should be sentenced as spies. Few days ago, Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam, the commander of the police, said that "anyone who collaborates with foreign media either by sending pictures or articles to them is monitored and will be dealt with as soon as possible".

At the beginning of this month, CPJ conducted a new survey of the situation of journalists in Iran. This confirmed that the authorities are continuing their aggressive attitude towards independent and opposition journalists. CPJ's survey also found that 26 journalists have been jailed in the last two months. At least 10 more journalists have been jailed since CPJ published its survey on February 1.

The survey also found that the authorities in Iran have filed vague anti-state charges against detained journalists. "Propagation against the regime", insulting authorities and disrupting public order are among the ambiguous charges but many cases are shrouded in secrecy, without even formal charges being disclosed. Some detainees have been sentenced to years of prison, lashes and internal exile – as well as lifetime bans on writing and other social and political activities.

The Association of Iranian Journalists (AoIJ), which for years was the only independent press organisation in Iran, was closed down last August. Now three members of the AoIJ's board, Mofidi Badrossadat, Shamsolvaezin Mashaallah and Mohamad Reza Moghise are in jail.

Since Ahmadinejad took office as president in 2005 he has not let any officials from the UN Human Rights Council go inside Iran and investigate its freedom of expression. Under Ahmadinejad, the government has closed down tens of publications, has put scores of journalists in jail and, since the last election, it has shut down seven newspapers. Last March, Omid Mir Sayafi, an Iranian blogger committed suicide in the notorious Evin prison in Tehran when he was sentenced to 30 months for insulting Iran's supreme leader in his blog.

The Our Society Will Be a Free Society campaign is a good way to draw international attention to the issue but it's not enough. The Tehran regime is currently in no mood for concessions, though a group of Iranian MPs have also called for the release of the imprisoned journalists, which is a good sign. What the situation probably needs, though, is for political leaders in Europe and the rest of the world to put new pressures on the Iranian government.

• Iran
• Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
• Middle East
• Press freedom

Saeed Kamali Dehghan
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Libyan leader labels Switzerland an infidel state, escalating vendetta against country whose police once arrested his son

Libya's leader, Muammar Gaddafi, ­yesterday called for a jihad, or holy war, against Switzerland, in an escalation of his vendetta against the country where police once arrested his son.

At a meeting in the city of Benghazi to mark the prophet Muhammad's birthday, Gaddafi described the country as an infidel state that was "destroying" mosques. Last year he urged the UN to abolish Switzerland and divide it between Germany, France and Italy.

"Any Muslim in any part of the world who works with Switzerland is an apostate – is against Muhammad, God and the Qur'an," Gaddafi said.

Swiss voters last November backed a referendum proposal banning the building of minarets. The proposal was put forward by the Swiss People's party, (SVP), the largest party in parliament, which claims minarets are a sign of Islamisation. The move was opposed by the government, which argued that it would harm Switzerland's image, particularly in the Muslim world.

Gaddafi has nursed a grudge against Switzerland since his son Hannibal and daughter-in-law were arrested in Geneva in 2008 for allegedly beating two servants at a luxury hotel. The Gaddafis were released soon afterwards and the charges dropped. But the Libyan leader was so enraged by his son's two-day detention that he shut subsidiaries of Swiss firms in Libya, had two Swiss businessmen arrested, cancelled most flights between the two states and withdrew about $5bn (£3.2bn) from his Swiss bank accounts.

One of the Swiss businessmen has been freed, but the other was forced this week to leave the Swiss embassy in Tripoli, where he had sought refuge, and move to jail to serve a four-month term, in an apparent bid to appease the Libyan leader.

Libya claims the Geneva arrest and the case of the businessmen are not linked.

"Let us fight against Switzerland, Zionism and foreign aggression," said ­Gaddafi, adding that "this is not terrorism", in contrast with the work of al-Qaida, which he called a "kind of crime and a psychological disease". "There is a big difference between terrorism and jihad, which is a right to armed struggle," he said.

"The masses of Muslims must go to all airports in the Islamic world and prevent any Swiss plane landing, to all harbours and prevent any Swiss ships docking, inspect all shops and markets to stop any Swiss goods being sold," Gaddafi said.

Italy warned that Libya may renege on a deal to control the flow of illegal immigrants because of the rift between Gaddafi and Switzerland.

Tripoli has stopped issuing visas to citizens of 25 European states in the Schengen passport-free zone, in retaliation for a decision by Berne to bar entry to some Libyans, including Gaddafi's family.

Italy, which has close business links with Libya, has accused Switzerland of misusing the Schengen agreement and taking EU members "hostage" with the ban, which had forced other states to bar travel by Libyans as well.

Italy's interior minister, Roberto Maroni, said the row put the Schengen zone at risk and could prompt Libya to end co-operation in controlling illegal immigration to the EU.

• Muammar Gaddafi
• Libya
• Switzerland

Mark Tran
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British army officer says he alerted Red Cross and commanders to prisoners being hooded and forced to kneel in the sun

A senior army officer revealed today that he alerted military commanders and the Red Cross to Iraqi prisoners being hooded and forced to kneel in the sun.

The officer, who can be identified only as S009, was commanding officer of the Queen's Dragoon Guards at the time of the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. He had the task of running an internment facility in Umm Qasr, southern Iraq.

He alerted the authorities, he said, because he found the prisoners' treatment unlawful and "morally objectionable".

He said in evidence to the Baha Mousa inquiry that just days after the invasion he saw up to 20 prisoners under guard kneeling on the ground in the sun, hooded with plastic sandbags and with their hands cuffed behind them.

"I made it clear that it was unacceptable to place plastic hoods upon the prisoners and leave them kneeling in the sun because it was not in keeping with UK law and was morally objectionable," he said. "I also pointed out that it would reflect badly on British troops."

He said he had warned his superiors before the invasion that he had not been given enough resources to run the prisoner-of-war facility properly.

"A lack of manpower runs the risk that prisoners could either harm themselves or cause riots and harm the detaining forces, all of which would have played into the public perception and the global audience."

The officer, a colonel, said an order came down that hooding of detainees was to stop. The inquiry into the death of Mousa, who died in the custody of British soldiers in Basra in September 2003, seven months after the invasion, has shown that the order was ignored.

• A soldier from 4th Battalion The Rifles was shot dead today while on patrol near Sangin in Helmand province, southern Afghanistan, the MoD said.

An airman from the RAF Regiment died on Wednesday night as a result of injuries suffered in a blast north of Kandahar airfield. The deaths take the number of British service personnel killed in the conflict to 265.

• Baha Mousa
• Iraq
• Military

Richard Norton-Taylor
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