Anissa Haddadi

As Egyptians vote in parliamentary elections Monday, they also are taking to the Web to report violations and attempted fraud at the polls.

Egyptians are voting in Egypt's first parliamentary elections since the ousting nine month ago of former President Hosni Mubarak.

Demonstrations calling for the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to step down are still taking place in Tahrir Square, despite the announcement of the formation of a new salvation government to be led by former Prime Minister Kamal al-Ganzouri.

Tens of thousands of protesters have gathered on Cairo's Tahrir Square to demand the army immediately hands over power to a civilian administration.

An Arab League deadline for Syria to allow an observer mission into the country has passed, with Damascus failing to provide an official response.

A U.N. human rights panel said it had received reports of massive human rights violations in Syria, including the detention and mutilation of children.

Outgoing Libyan Prime Minister Ali Tarhouni has criticized his country's newly established government.

Mona Eltahawy, the award winning Egyptian-American journalist arrested on Wednesday near Tahrir Square, has revealed she suffered a brutal sexual and physical assault at the hand of the state's riot-police.

With neighbours including Egypt and Libya, and after years of tensions and violent clashes with the newly separated South, Sudan finds itself in the middle of a region that is rapidly changing, but President al-Bashir dismissed speculation of an Arab Spring in the country.

Despite the unrest in the Egyptian capital, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas leader Khalid Mashaal met in Cairo as scheduled to implement a unity agreement on Thursday.

Militias groups that have emerged during the Libyan conflict are illegally detaining thousands of people, including women and children, who they say are "enemies of the state", according to a U.N. report.

The legislative elections set to take place in Morocco on Friday, have been marred by calls for a boycott of the vote.

An influential Iranian parliamentary said Tehran had arrested 12 US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) informants, just hours after it was reported that Hezbollah had also uncovered part of a US spy ring in Lebanon.

Zimbabwe's President Rober Mugabe is stepping-up his anti-western rhetoric ahead of the elections, calling the Prime Minister "Satanic" for threatening to withhold aid from countries that do not respect gay rights.

Egyptian-American journalist Mona Eltahawy is said to have been arrested and detained by Egyptian police.

Faced by months of uprising against his regime, Syrian President Bashar al Assad continues to blame much of the unrest on armed groups and Islamist movements.

Three Cameroonian men have been served with a five-year jail sentence for engaging in gay sex, by a court in Yaoundé, their lawyer reported on Wednesday.

Three American students were shown on Egyptian television after being arrested during the protests near Tahrir Square in Cairo, where demonstrators are calling for the Military Council to hand over power to a civilian government.

After months of protests calling for his departure, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh has arrived in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia's capital to sign a transfer deal which would see his deputy Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi take power ahead of early elections.

Lebanon celebrated its 68th independence anniversary with a 50-minute Independence Day military parade in Beirut, but opposition leaders insisted the country's sovereignty is still incomplete.

Confusion over the capture of Abdullah al Senussi, Gaddafi's former head of intelligence, is still growing after the U.S. envoy to the UN said the Libyan authorities were unable to confirm whether he is in custody.

Iraqis loyal to Muqtada al-Sadr, a well-known anti-American Islamic cleric, are fighting in Syria in support of the Assad regime, according to the opposition.

South African MPs have approved a controversial Protection of State Information Bill despite widespread criticism, prompting protesters to call the day "Black Tuesday", the darkest day for South African democracy since the end of apartheid in 1994.

Despite months of protests the Syrian regime, Assad's inner circle has remained loyal and launched a brutal crackdown against the democracy movement, that has left thousands dead.

French ministers held an emergency meeting after a teenager, who had already been convicted of sexual assault on an underage girl in 2010, is accused of raping, killing and burning the body of a 13-year-old girl from his boarding school.

The three defendant on trial in Cambodia before the Extraordinary Chamber in the Courts of Cambodia, a UN-backed Tribunal , Nuon Chea, 85, Kieu Samphan,78, and Ieng Sary, 86, deny charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes for their alleged roles in the deaths of up to 2.2 million people the Khmer Rouge four-year-rule from 1975 to 1979.

Despite three days of clashes between protesters and the security forces, which left at least 33 dead, the Egyptian authorities have announced that the parliamentary elections expected to take place in a week's time will proceed as scheduled.

Fans of Chinese artist and dissident Ai Weiwei have taken to the web and posted nude pictures in protest against the authorities' accusations of pornography over pictures in which Ai poses nude along with four naked women.

For many, the death of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, will confirm the end of an era. For Safia, 22, however, the woman who claims the dictator raped her for five years, the shadow of the colonel will haunt her forever.