New figures collected by Global Witness on the killings of activists, journalists and community members who were defending rights to land and forests show the true, shocking extent of competition for access to natural resources. The briefing, A Hidden Crisis?, finds that over 711 people appear to have been killed in the last decade - more than one a week. In 2011 the toll was 106 people, almost doubling over the past three years.

On the eve of the Rio +20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development, the briefing warns of a hidden crisis in environmental protection, highlighting a pervasive culture of impunity around such violence, a lack of information, reporting or monitoring of the problem at national and international levels, and the involvement of governments and the domestic and foreign private sector in many killings.

Billy Kyte, campaigner at Global Witness said,

"This trend points to the increasingly fierce global battle for resources, and represents the sharpest of wake-up calls for delegates in Rio. Over one person a week is being murdered for defending rights to forests and land."

As the Syrian crisis enters its 16th month, the recent massacres in Houla and Hama have revived calls for foreign intervention and the toppling of President Bashar al-Assad. US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice has recently hinted that the United States would soon take action outside of the Annan plan and the authority of the United Nations if the persistent violence in Syria continued unabated. While the Syrian opposition severs its commitment to uphold Kofi Annan's peace plan and openly calls for a UN- no-fly zone to replace the monitoring mission, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has announced a new transition plan that would remove Assad from power completely. As outside forces plan a post-Assad transition strategy, the people of Syria are fast approaching a historic crossroads, of which may lead to a broader sectarian conflict that would forever reshape the Middle East.

Prof. Michel Chossudovsky, Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization weighs in on the insurrectionary nature of the Syrian conflict and its potential to generate a larger regional conflict in the Middle East.

President Obama on Wednesday asserted executive privilege over Fast and Furious documents just as a House panel prepared to push ahead with a contempt vote against Attorney General Eric Holder.

Here's what the president's action means:

-- Executive privilege allows Obama to withhold from Congress documents revealing internal communications and decision-making of the executive branch of government that he believes should remain confidential.

-- A subpoena by Congress cannot override claims of executive privilege. However, the privilege is considered "qualified" and "not absolute," meaning it can be challenged and overturned in the courts, according to the Congressional Research Service.

US radio host Dennis Bernstein and investigative reporter Dave Lindorff illustrate just how much US tax money goes towards the country's war chest.

"People have to realize that 53 cents of every dollar that they are paying into taxes is going to the military to an astonishing figure. There is an enormous, enormous amount of money being blown on war an killing and destruction."

Foreign minister says Ankara will take incident to Nato and dismisses Syria's claim it did not know plane was Turkish

Ahmet Davutoglu says the Turkish jet entered Syrian airspace but quickly left, and was then shot down without warning by Syrian forces.

Nato is to meet on Tuesday at Turkey's request following the shooting down of one of its warplanes by Syria in what it says was international airspace.

Turkey's foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, said Ankara would formally present the incident to its Nato allies to prepare a response under article four of the organization's founding treaty.

The article provides for states to "consult together whenever, in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the parties is threatened". It stops short of the explicit mention of possible armed responses cited in article five.

The Turkish foreign ministry said on Sunday it knew the coordinates of the plane's wreckage 1,300 meters deep in the Mediterranean sea, but had not found it or the pilots. Turkey has filed an official protest to Syria about the shooting down.

Davutoglu told the state broadcaster TRT on Sunday that the plane had entered Syrian airspace but quickly left when warned by Turkey and was shot down in international airspace several minutes later.

He said the plane was clearly marked as Turkish, dismissing Syria's earlier statement that it had not known the plane belonged to Turkey, and that it was shot down over Syrian airspace. He said it was on a training flight to test Turkey's radar capabilities and had no "covert mission related to Syria".

Turkey's president, Abdullah Gül, said on Saturday that it was "routine" for jets flying at high speeds to violate other countries' air spaces for short periods of time.

A statement by the Syrian military said the Turkish plane was flying low 1km off the Syrian coast when it was hit by anti-aircraft fire. The plane fell in Syrian waters seven miles west of the village of Um al-Touyour.

Turkey calls Nato meeting on warplane downed by Syria Syria said it engaged the aircraft in its airspace "according to the laws that govern such situations"

Turkey has called a meeting of Nato member states to discuss its response to the shooting down of one of its warplanes by Syrian forces on Friday.

Ankara has invoked Article 4 of Nato's charter, under which consultations can be requested when an ally feels their security is threatened, officials say.

Earlier, Turkey's foreign minister said the F-4 Phantom was in international airspace when it was shot down.

Syria has insisted the jet was engaged while it was inside its airspace.

It has also said no act of hostility was intended, noting that as soon as the military discovered the "unidentified" aircraft was Turkish its navy joined efforts to rescue the two crew members.

The Turkish foreign ministry said it knew the coordinates of the jet, which was in Syrian territorial waters at a depth of 1,300m (4,265ft), but has not yet found it.

The coast guard is still searching for the crew in the Mediterranean Sea, though hopes are fading of them being found alive.

US policy of using drone strikes to carry out targeted killings 'may encourage other states to flout international law'

The US policy of using aerial drones to carry out targeted killings presents a major challenge to the system of international law that has endured since the second world war, a United Nations investigator has said.

Christof Heyns, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, summary or arbitrary executions, told a conference in Geneva that President Obama's attacks in Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere, carried out by the CIA, would encourage other states to flout long-established human rights standards.

In his strongest critique so far of drone strikes, Heyns suggested some may even constitute "war crimes". His comments come amid rising international unease over the surge in killings by remotely piloted unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).

Addressing the conference, which was organized by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), a second UN rapporteur, Ben Emmerson QC, who monitors counter-terrorism, announced he would be prioritizing inquiries into drone strikes.

Syria shot down a Turkish warplane over the Mediterranean on Friday, risking a new crisis between Middle Eastern neighbors already at bitter odds over a 16-month-old revolt against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said Syria had admitted it had shot down the plane and apologized, BBC Monitoring reported, citing Turkey's state news agency Anatolia.

Turkey said earlier it had lost contact with one of its military aircraft off its southeastern coast after it took off from Erhac airport in the eastern province of Malatya.

Turkish officials said Erdogan, who was returning to Ankara from Brazil on Friday evening, would convene a security meeting with the interior and foreign ministers and the chief of general staff. They did not say what would be discussed.

Turkey's military said a search and rescue operation was under way. Two crew were aboard the F-4 jet, Anatolia said.

© Reuters/Raheb HomavandiIran's Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi

Iran has detected a planned "massive cyber attack" against its nuclear facilities, state television said on Thursday, after talks with major powers this week failed to resolve a row over Tehran's disputed nuclear activities.

Iran's Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi said the country's arch enemies the United States and Israel, along with Britain, had planned the attack.

"Based on obtained information, America and the Zionist regime (Israel) along with the MI6 planned an operation to launch a massive cyber attack against Iran's facilities following the meeting between Iran and the P5+1 in Moscow," Iran's English-language Press TV quoted him as saying.

"They still seek to carry out the plan, but we have taken necessary measures," he added, without elaborating.

Despite a pledged ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel, attacks escalated on both sides of the Gaza border June 23, killing at least three Palestinian men and a 6-year-old boy in Gaza, and wounding an Israeli man in Sderot, officials said.

Ayman Taha, spokesman for the Hamas government, which rules Gaza, said Saturday night that the Egyptian-brokered agreement, reached June 21, did not specify "a certain hour for the ceasefire to take effect."

"We will be committed to the ceasefire as long as Israel does," he said by telephone.

Spokesmen for the Israel Defense Forces and for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would not discuss the ceasefire. But as two dozen rockets rained down on the weary neighbourhoods near Gaza City, the Israeli military chief, Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, called a rare Sabbath meeting of top aides to "determine the next course of action," according to a military spokeswoman.

Netanyahu, meanwhile, was briefed by Gantz and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, and told them "to do what needs to be done to protect Israel's population," a senior aide said.