Today I kicked a beggarSukhumvit road is the main artery through Bangkoks business centre. Tourists, ex-pats and busisnesmen abounfd - and so do those who feed off them. For the most part its honest, vendors simply selling their wares - overpriced bu

With the news breaking that the Shia and Kurdish parties have forced a constitution on the Sunni minority there can only be one conclusion. The talks over the last few days have been nothing but a farce, as I write the presses are rolling out 5 milli

In a recent speech to the Police Federation conference in Bournemouth, Home Office minister John Denham told delegates at the  that it was time to 'get down to the nitty gritty' on police training. There was uproar. Senior police officers critice

A woman in Saudi Arabia has finally been issued with an identity card four years after they Saudi government originally decided to issue them to women. There was a snag in this particular case however because one of the conditions for getting an ID c

The finalisation of the new Iraqi constitution was delayed on Monday for one week following disagreement on its wording between Kurdish, Shia and Sunni delegates. Our on the spot ace reporter Roy Rubberplunger managed to interview one of the delegate

Every now and again the entire country seems to close down. For the most part this is for celebrating things like the New Year, religious festivals and so on; in total there are something like 15 public holidays. One of them is quite curious, it's th

It's a strange curiosity that of most of the blogosphere that concern themselves with Iraq, as opposed to diarising their bowel movements for the perusal of voyeurs, tend to be rabid right wingers, neo-con cheerleaders that are very effective in drow

In a move to prevent children feeling bad about themselves, a leading teachers union at their annual conference proposed that instead of using the word 'failure' to descibe a student that had, well, failed a course the words 'deferred success' should

A Taiwanese man is breathing easier today following an operation to remove a set of dentures from one of his bronchial tubes.The man had fallen three years earlier at his home and blacked out. When he awoke, he was apparently none the worse for wear

It was another night in Claytons small bar in Chinag Mai, the usual screaming bar-girls and Clayton's drunken bayings. The night was hot, the rains had ceased and steam was pouring back into the sky off the soaked pavements. A tall, lean, affable Ame

In Britain three years ago there was a landmark ruling when a woman who was suffering from the advanced stages motor neurone disease was refused the right for someone to help her to die, specifically her husband. She is paralysed from the neck down,