Consumer advocate Ralph Nader announced on February 24th — three days short of his 74th birthday — that he is launching his third bid to be elected President of the United States, running as the candidate of the independent Green Party. Nader's previous third-party campaigns for the White House in 2000 and 2004 stirred public debate about his motives and the integrity of America's traditional two-party system.

Britain's foreign secretary has kicked off a trip to China with a visit to Hong Kong. He repeated his government's disappointment over Beijing's decision to delay full democracy in the former British colony. Claudia Blume reports from Hong Kong.

Publicly funded science in America traditionally is accountable to the people and their government representatives. However, this arrangement raises questions regarding the effect such oversight has on science.

Mistakes that were made in Iraq and Afghanistan should not ‘obscure our national interest … in supporting movements for democracy’ pleaded the Foreign Secretary, the Rt Hon David Miliband MP on Tuesday 12 February 2008, when he delivered the Aung San Suu Kyi lecture at St Hugh’s College, on ‘The democratic imperative’.

Ever since it invaded Iraq and toppled the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein nearly five years ago, the U.S. military has been promoting a system of democratic governance and civic responsibility. One of the most important players in that effort has been the U.S. Army's Psychological Operations, or PsyOp units, whose soldiers wage daily battle for the hearts and minds of average Iraqis. Adam Allington gets a front-line view of the military's pro-democracy campaign.

"We wouldn't want to see a re-imposition of emergency law and I am not aware that in any of our conversations with Pakistani officials anyone has suggested that emergency law or emergency rule might be re-imposed," State Department Deputy spokesman Tom Casey said here yesterday.

Burma's detained opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, has held her first meeting with a newly appointed government liaison minister. It is a sign that the military junta is following through on its promises to the international community to begin talks with the pro-democracy hero.

Women Nobel Peace Prize winners have urged the United Nations to take decisive action to secure the release of detained Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Twelve thousand Chinese citizens have sent an open letter to their government calling for urgent democratic reform. As China prepares for next week's Communist Party Congress, 12,000 people have reportedly drafted an open letter to the Government demanding widespread reform.

The United Nation's special envoy to Burma, Ibrahim Gambari, is due to arrive in the country shortly to mediate between the ruling military junta and pro-democracy demonstrators.

Former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has been reportedly deported to Saudi Arabia after he was arrested by police on returning to Islamabad Monday morning after seven years in exile.

The Turkish Parliament has held a second round of presidential voting, and leading candidate Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul failed to obtain the two-thirds majority needed for victory.