They operate in the green glow of night vision in Southwest Asia and stalk through the jungles of South America. They snatch men from their homes in the Maghreb and shoot it out with heavily armed militants in the Horn of Africa. They feel the salty spray while skimming over the tops of waves from the turquoise Caribbean to the deep blue Pacific. They conduct missions in the oppressive heat of Middle Eastern deserts and the deep freeze of Scandinavia. All over the planet, the Obama administration is waging a secret war whose full extent has never been fully revealed -- until now.

Since September 11, 2001, U.S. Special Operations forces have grown in every conceivable way, from their numbers to their budget. Most telling, however, has been the exponential rise in special ops deployments globally. This presence -- now in nearly 70% of the world's nations -- provides new evidence of the size and scope of a secret war being waged from Latin America to the backlands of Afghanistan, from training missions with African allies to information operations launched in cyberspace.

In the waning days of the Bush presidency, Special Operations forces were reportedly deployed in about 60 countries around the world. By 2010, that number had swelled to 75, according to Karen DeYoung and Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post. In 2011, Special Operations Command (SOCOM) spokesman Colonel Tim Nye told TomDispatch that the total would reach 120. Today, that figure has risen higher still.

Greenhouse gas output of China and elsewhere is increased by making goods that are then used in the US and Europe

The world's richest countries are increasingly outsourcing their carbon pollution to China and other rising economies, according to a draft UN report.

Outsourcing of emissions comes in the form of electronic devices such as smartphones, cheap clothes and other goods manufactured in China and other rising economies but consumed in the US and Europe.

A draft of the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, obtained by the Guardian, says emissions of carbon dioxide and the other greenhouse gases warming the planet grew twice as fast in the first decade of the 21st century as they did during the previous three decades.

Much of that rise was due to the burning of coal, the report says. And much of that coal was used to power factories in China and other rising economies that produce goods for US and European consumers, the draft adds.

Since 2000, annual carbon dioxide emissions for China and the other rising economies have more than doubled to nearly 14 gigatonnes a year, according to the draft report. But about 2 GT a year of that was produced making goods for export.

The picture is similar for other rising economies producing goods for export, the report finds.

As World Economic Forum starts in Davos, development charity claims that growing inequality has been driven by a 'power grab' by wealthy elites

The world's wealthiest people aren't known for travelling by bus, but if they fancied a change of scene then the richest 85 people on the globe - who between them control as much wealth as the poorest half of the global population put together - could squeeze onto a single double-decker.

The extent to which so much global wealth has become corralled by a virtual handful of the so-called 'global elite' is exposed in a new report from Oxfam on Monday. It warned that those richest 85 people across the globe share a combined wealth of £1tn, as much as the poorest 3.5 billion of the world's population.

Since Barack Obama has been in the White House, high ranking military officers have been removed from their positions at a rate that is absolutely unprecedented. Things have gotten so bad that a number of retired generals are publicly speaking out about the "purge" of the U.S. military that they believe is taking place. As you will see below, dozens of highly decorated military leaders have been dismissed from their positions over the past few years. So why is this happening? When I was growing up, my father was an officer in the U.S. Navy. And what is going on right now is absolutely crazy - especially during a time of peace. Is there a deliberate attempt to "reshape" the military and remove those that don't adhere to the proper "viewpoints"? Does someone out there feel a need to get officers that won't "cooperate" out of the way? Throughout world history, whatever comes next after a "military purge" is never good. If this continues, what is the U.S. military going to look like in a few years?

China's Commerce Ministry has condemned a $1.1-trillion spending bill passed by the U.S. Congress last week over clauses that limit technological purchases from the Asian giant, saying they clash with the principles of fair trade.

The bill, signed by President Barack Obama on Friday, included a cyber-espionage review process for federal purchases of technology from China, a measure incorporated last year amid growing U.S. concern over Chinese cyber attacks.

In a weekend statement, China's Commerce Ministry said the move "went against the principles of fair trade" as it sought to curb purchases of Chinese technology and export of satellites and parts to China.

"China is resolutely opposed," the ministry said in comments attributed to an unnamed official in its U.S. trade division.

The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee on Sunday questioned whether Edward Snowden acted alone in leaking details of the National Security Agency's surveillance programs to U.S. and British newspapers last year.

Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., said on NBC's 'Meet the Press' that the former NSA contractor was "a thief whom we believe had some help."

"Let me just say this," Rogers said. "I believe there's a reason he ended up in the hands, the loving arms, of an FSB agent in Moscow. I don't think that's a coincidence."

"I've got a pen," said President Obama early this week.

"I can use that pen to sign executive orders and take executive actions ... that move the ball forward."

"When I can act on my own without Congress, I'm going to do so," the president added Wednesday at North Carolina State.

Thus did Obama signal that he will bypass Congress and use his executive powers to advance his agenda of national transformation.

This dismissal of Congress has gone almost unprotested. In an earlier age it might have evoked talk of impeachment. But not now.

For though Congress may be the first branch of government in the Constitution, with the longest list of enumerated powers in Article 1, its eclipse has been extraordinary.

Congressional powers have eroded or been surrendered. The esteem in which Congress is now held calls to mind Emily Dickinson: "It dropped so low in my regard/I heard it hit the ground."

Congress boasts a 13 percent approval, a surge from its all-time low of 9 percent last fall before the budget deal.

While ex-Secretary of Defense Robert Gates expressed disappointment in Obama and Hillary Clinton in his book "Duty," and was dismissive of Joe Biden, his view of Congress dripped with venom:

"Uncivil, incompetent in fulfilling basic constitutional responsibilities (such as timely appropriations), micromanagerial, parochial, hypocritical, egotistical, thin-skinned, often putting self (and reelection) before country - this was my view of the majority of the United States Congress."

Woman was left terrified by alleged assault and was too frightened to report it to her managers, court hears

A former BBC trainee feared she would have a black mark against her name if she complained to her bosses when Dave Lee Travis groped her breasts live on Radio 4, a jury has heard.

The woman, who was 26 at the time of the incident, told jurors she was frightened by the alleged assault and was too scared to report it to her managers.

"I was on probation [as a trainee newsreader], there was no way I was going to start telling off this big star of Radio 1," said the woman, giving evidence from behind a white curtain in the witness box of Southwark crown court in London on Wednesday.

"If I had gone to the management I imagine it would have been: 'So what? You're a big girl, deal with it.' I think I would have had a black mark against my name on my file - 'this woman can't take a joke she has no sense of humour'."

Incentives for officials who hit target of winning 70% of tribunal cases include vouchers, cash bonuses and extra holidays

Home Office officials are being rewarded with shopping vouchers for helping to ensure failed asylum seekers lose their attempt to stay in the country, new documents reveal.

Official guidance obtained by the Guardian shows that immigration staff have been set a target of winning 70% of tribunal cases in which asylum seekers are appealing against government decisions that they should leave the UK.

These officers are also incentivised by Home Office reward schemes involving gift vouchers, cash bonuses and extra holidays, according to information received under freedom of information laws.

Asked what rewards were given to presenting officers and case owners in the fields of asylum and immigration, the department confirmed high-street vouchers for £25 or £50 were handed out to "recognise positive performance over a short period of time", including when officers "exceed their casework targets for a month".

Critics said it was a new low for officers to be rewarded for outcomes that meant asylum seekers being asked to leave the UK for countries where they claim to be facing persecution or war. The incentives undermine confidence in the fairness of the system, they say.

The president should be regretting not his personal follies but the failure of the French economic model

Of course it matters. A president is not just a professional figure. He is a head of state, briefly the embodiment of his people. If the Queen were sneaking off on a scooter each night to see a toyboy in Pimlico, Britons might regard it as a "purely private affair". But they would be aghast and agog. President Hollande's love life may be private. But is it really of no interest or concern to the French people? Pull the other one.

Behaviour, style, personal relationships may seem tangential to government as a business, but they cannot be divorced from government as an art. Most of the "unanswered" questions swirling around Hollande's press conference struggled to drag his private life into the public domain. Was there a security risk? Was the president vulnerable to attack or kidnap? Was a bodyguard with him at all times? The answers to these questions were trivial.

They were proxies for a different fascination, one that is bound to envelop the private lives of public figures. We all seek in the lives of celebrities some echo of our joys and sorrows. Personal emotion and behaviour may have no imprint on public action. But such is the secrecy of power that we crave any glimpse of the "man behind the mask". In a democracy, "the public interest" is to some degree whatever interests the public.

Hollande has swatted aside his ever deferential press corps with "no comment" on his private life. But he is asking his people to behave differently, to agree a "responsibility pact" to set aside decades of self-indulgence that is in part the legacy of his own French socialist movement. They must come together to liberate employment and accept a reduction in spending and business taxes. His apologists might argue that this is just a matter of laws and austerity. But he is asking for a change in outlook and behaviour. People are less likely to respond if they see the man asking as a fool or an object of ridicule.