Rebel News - Independent News and Analysis

Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi has lost his parliamentary majority after 33 lawmakers abandoned his ruling Freedom People party, reports say.

The lawmakers say they now support Berlusconi's former ally, Gianfranco Fini, who had also split from the ruling party.

In France, rights groups plan to file a complaint about police brutality, after a video surfaced showing officers using excessive force to evict African immigrants from a Paris suburb.

The footage shows police dragging away women with their babies as well as young children.

A Polish human rights group says it has records showing that seven CIA planes landed in Poland between 2002 and 2003.

The independent Warsaw-based Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights said five of the planes arrived at a northeastern airfield with passengers on board but later left with only crew members, the Polish news website Thenews.pl reported on Friday.

Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Ali Akbar Salehi says Iran has yet to receive an official response from the Vienna group regarding nuclear fuel swap negotiations.

"So far we have not received an official and written response; however, we have heard through the media that the US, France and Russia have expressed their readiness [for negotiations]," Mehr News agency quoted Salehi as saying on Friday.

Greek truckers have rejected to obey a government emergency order and end their nation-wide strike that has almost paralyzed the EU nation.

The country's 33,000 licensed truck drivers stopped working on Monday to protest against the government's plans to cut the price of new trucking licenses.

The European Union (EU) might include Turkey and Brazil in discussions over Iran's civilian nuclear program, a spokesperson for the EU's foreign affairs chief says.

The decision for the inclusion of the two countries in Iran nuclear talks would be made after consultations with all sides within the P5+1 group, Ria Novosti reported an unnamed spokesperson for Catherine Ashton as saying on Wednesday.

In Spain, a judge has re-issued arrest warrants for three US soldiers over the killing of a Spanish TV cameraman who died in US tank fire in Iraq in 2003.

Spain's National Court announced Thursday that it has re-issued an the arrest warrants because the soldiers are implicated in an attack on Baghdad's Hotel Palestine, where Jose Couso along with dozens of other journalists were based during the Iraq war, the Time reported.

The British Ministry of Defense (MoD) has appointed General Peter Wall to take over as the new Chief of the General Staff in September this year.

The 55-year-old general will replace General David Richards, who becomes chief of the defense staff in October.

Britain's Labour shadow cabinet plans to vote against a "voting reform" bill -- the flagship policy of the coalition government -- at the House of Commons.

A backbench Tory-Labour alliance has also been designed to kill the bill either at its second reading or by rejecting the proposed date for holding the referendum which will be on the same day as elections in Scotland and parts of England and Wales next May.

The UK's Trident nuclear deterrent policy should be scrapped or cut back so that the government will be able to afford its costs in future, a think tank says.

The Royal United Institute (RUSI) has called on the government to reconsider the law that requires one nuclear missile submarine be patrolling at sea at all times.