Western backing for the old regimes in the Middle East and north Africa precludes any cosy narrative about popular uprisings.

There has been a tendency among western commentators during the past few weeks of popular uprising in the Middle East and north Africa to interpret the events as occurring along starkly defined fault lines.

There are the people versus the regime; Islamists versus the secular; and autocratic, corrupt rulers pitted against a popular desire for democracy, human rights and economic inclusion. All of which contains some truths, but it remains a partial picture.

In our desire to create a joined-up narrative out of the unrest, from Yemen to Iraq and Bahrain, we have ignored the specifics. In the rush of politicians such as Hillary Clinton to support the new wave of "freedom", western governments seem to be replicating the same errors they made during the "colour" revolutions, mistaking the act of revolt for the outcome of a long period of revolution, and accepting the incomplete in the name of "stability".

For, like Tolstoy's unhappy families, each of the autocracies now embroiled in popular uprisings is autocratic in its own way. What can be said about the events in Tunisia is as inapplicable to Egypt as it is to Bahrain or Yemen.

In truth, there are some broad common strands: each country has a young population with a significant, well-educated segment and many people looking for work. In each, power has been monopolised by a small elite, either drawn from a royal family or from a figure backed by the military and business and the west. Corruption is often rife; a culture of repression is vigorous and deeply ingrained.

What happens when the smartest man in the room (by his own estimation) proves too clever by half? What happens when a one-man band puts on a third-rate show? What happens when a "brilliant strategist" is so full of uncontrollable resentment and meanness that he keeps getting himself in trouble by interfering where he has no business?

Whenever it appears that Stephen Harper may be closer to that elusive goal of majority government, along comes Stephen Harper to remind suspicious Canadians they're dead right to be suspicious. That's what the Bev Oda fiasco is really about.

Every time I hear Michael Ignatieff shrieking at the Prime Minister to fire Ms. Oda I want to scream back: THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH BEV ODA. Of course she baldly lied, just as Jason Kenney lied about Kairos policy on Israel and Tony Clement lied when he claimed Statscan approved his crusade against the long-form census. This government lies as routinely as it maligns, and it never apologizes. But Ms. Oda, like Messrs. Kenney and Clement, is just the organ grinder's monkey. Any CIDA minister would have been in the same boat. She just follows orders. And it's those orders in the Kairos case that remind us of the real Harper agenda.

"At the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Developments hearings in December, International Co-operation Minister Bev Oda testified she did not know who wrote the word "not.On Feb. 14, however, she told the House of Commons that she had ordered the change."

See here to view the altered document.

The issue here is the reversal, by Stephen Harper, of a 60-year consensus shared by all previous governments about the central role of civil society in Canada. Every previous government has funded civil society groups and NGOs even when they espoused policies that contradicted the government's own. Governments might have done so grudgingly and not as generously as some of us hoped. But it has been one of the quiet glories of Canadian democracy that our governments have often backed groups that criticized them or had competing priorities.

No more. With Stephen Harper, you either buy the party line or you get slapped down. That's what happened to Kairos (now ironically receiving proper recognition for its terrific work over the years - eat your heart out, Jason Kenney). That's what happened to the Canadian Council For International Co-operation and Match International. That's what happened, with little media attention, to an astonishing number - in the many, many dozens - of other worthy organizations. (An exact figure will soon be posted by Voices, an important virtual coalition of organizations and individuals formed precisely in reaction to the Harper government's attacks on civil society organizations. I am an enthusiastic supporter.)

Islamabab - A Pakistani intelligence official said Monday that an American in custody for killing two men was an undercover CIA contractor, setting off new friction in a crisis with the United States.

Washington voiced fear for the safety of Raymond Davis, who says he acted in self-defence. The United States has put intense pressure on Pakistan to free him, arguing that he enjoys diplomatic immunity.

But the unpopular government in Pakistan is also feeling heat from the political opposition not to cave in to US demands, with analysts even warning that the case could bring down the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP).

As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave her speech at George Washington University yesterday condemning governments that arrest protestors and do not allow free expression, 71-year-old Ray McGovern was grabbed from the audience in plain view of her by police and an unidentified official in plain clothes, brutalized and left bleeding in jail. She never paused speaking. When Secretary Clinton began her speech, Mr. McGovern remained standing silently in the audience and turned his back. Mr. McGovern, a veteran Army officer who also worked as a C.I.A. analyst for 27 years, was wearing a Veterans for Peace t-shirt.

Blind-sided by security officers who pounced upon him, Mr. McGovern remarked, as he was hauled out the door, "So this is America?" Mr. McGovern is covered with bruises, lacerations and contusions inflicted in the assault.

Mr. McGovern is being represented by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF). "It is the ultimate definition of lip service that Secretary of State Clinton would be trumpeting the U.S. government's supposed concerns for free speech rights and this man would be simultaneously brutalized and arrested for engaging in a peaceful act of dissent at her speech," stated attorney Mara Verheyden-Hilliard of the PCJF.

Mr. McGovern now works for Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington, D.C.

• Protesters appear to have taken control of second city Benghazi
• Up to 400 feared dead after dozens killed in clashes
• Colonel Gaddafi on his way to Venezuela, say William Hague
• Justice minister resigns over 'excessive use of violence'
• Two Libyan fighter jets land in Malta as pilots request asylum
• David Cameron declares regime response is 'appalling and unacceptable'
• Gaddafi's son says: 'We will fight to the last minute, until the last bullet'

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has fled Libya and may be heading for Venezuela, William Hague said today.

The Foreign Secretary said he had seen 'information that suggests he is on the way there [Venezuela] at the moment' - as the North African country was up in flames with reports of around 400 dead.

Gaddafi was said to have fled as the country he has ruled for more than 40 years after anti-government demonstrators breached the state television building and set government property alight.

• British weapons believe to have been used in massacre of over 300
• UN warn that British Government could be guilty 'complicity' in killings
• Tony Blair did deal with Libyan dictator seven years ago
• Gaddafi's son says: 'We will fight to the last minute, until the last bullet'

Britain faces growing condemnation over its courting of Colonel Gaddafi after the Libyan dictator ordered the slaughter of hundreds of his own people.

The United Nations and the U.S. Ambassador to London questioned the UK's cosy trade links with Tripoli yesterday.

British weapons are believed to have been used to murder more than 300 Libyan pro-democracy demonstrators.

• Raymond Davis employed by CIA 'beyond shadow of doubt'
• Former soldier charged with murder over deaths of two men
• Davis accused of shooting one man twice in the back as he fled

The American who shot dead two men in Lahore, triggering a diplomatic crisis between Pakistan and the US, is a CIA agent who was on assignment at the time.

Raymond Davis has been the subject of widespread speculation since he opened fire with a semi-automatic Glock pistol on the two men who had pulled up in front of his car at a red light on 25 January.

Pakistani authorities charged him with murder, but the Obama administration has insisted he is an "administrative and technical official" attached to its Lahore consulate and has diplomatic immunity.

Based on interviews in the US and Pakistan, the Guardian can confirm that the 36-year-old former special forces soldier is employed by the CIA. "It's beyond a shadow of a doubt," said a senior Pakistani intelligence official. The revelation may complicate American efforts to free Davis, who insists he was acting in self-defence against a pair of suspected robbers, who were both carrying guns.

The travel diary of a Roman model has provided a compelling insight into bizarre "cultural visits" arranged by the Libyan leader, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, for scores of attractive young women from Italy.

Maria M, aged 28, declined to give her full name, but allowed the Observer to examine her account of a lavish trip to the Libyan desert in October after she was recruited by the Rome-based agency Hostessweb. In her diary Maria tells of an eccentric week-long tour for which she and 19 other young women were reportedly each paid €3,000.

Six such "cultural" visits to Libya by agency recruits have been organised since Gaddafi visited Rome in 2009. The next is scheduled for next month. On one visit Gaddafi tried to marry off one of his guests to his nephew.

But there also appears to have been a religious motive. "He asked if any of us were interested in converting [to Islam]. We all looked at each other and then, incredibly, two girls rose up, something I never thought they would do," wrote Maria, adding that she believed bonuses had been offered to the "converts".

At least six members of the same family have been killed in an overnight airstrike on a home in the eastern Afghanistan city of Jalalabad, a report says.

The airstrike claimed the lives of six civilians, all members of the same family, including 4 children, in Nangarhar province in Eastern Afghanistan, a Press TV correspondent reported on Monday.

The incident came the day after President Hamid Karzai accused NATO troops of killing some 50 civilians in five days of airstrikes in the neighboring Kunar province.

Civilian casualties in US-led military operations have long been a source of friction between the Afghan government and NATO.

2010 was the deadliest year for Afghan civilians since the US-led invasion almost a decade ago. An estimated 2,400 civilians were killed last year by both US-led forces and militants.

Attack in South Waziristan is first since arrest of Raymond Davis, the US embassy employee who shot two Pakistanis

A US drone attack has killed seven alleged militants, including some thought to be of Arab origin, in a Pakistani tribal region along the Afghan border, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The strike was the first since the arrest of Raymond Davis, a US embassy employee who shot two Pakistanis in late January. There had been speculation that Washington had suspended the use of drones as it wrestled with Pakistan over whether the American has diplomatic immunity and should be freed.

According to the Pakistani intelligence officials, three missiles hit a house overnight in the village of Kaza Panga in the South Waziristan tribal region. Arabs and Turkmen were believed to be among the dead, they said.