UPDATE 1745 GMT: A spokesman at a police press conference this afternoon said that, as he accepted responsibility for the twin attacks last Friday, Anders Behring Breivik said he acted alone.
People pay respects besides a floral tribute outside Oslo Cathedral (photo: Reuters).
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 9:52 | Scott Lucas in Africa, EA Global, EA Middle East and Turkey, Middle East and Iran 2000 GMT: Activists claims Syrian troops have assaulted the village of Sarjeh in Idleb Province in the northwestern Syria. Troops backed by tanks reportedly entered the village, arresting residents as electricity and water supplies were cut off.
Activists also reported reinforcements entering Homs and detentions in the capital of Damascus, especially the Rukn ad-Deen and Qaboun neighbourhoods where protests have escalated.
1950 GMT: A march in Nuwaidrat in Bahrain in support of opposition activist Ibrahim Sharif, who has been sentenced to five years in prison.
Bahrain, Egypt, James Bays, Libya, Muammar Qaddafi, Syria, Yemen 
On Wednesday, the Supreme Leader said, "Iranian officials should encourage the youth to read useful books....Reading should become an everyday habit among all Iranians, and the youth in particular." Pointing to Iran's long history of publishing books, he expressed disappointment at the current figures of book publication and reading.
A quick look at how the Islamic Republic has encouraged reading in recent years....
November 2006: The regime bans thousands of books, including acclaimed works from homegrown novelist Sadegh Hedayat, classics like William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, and best-sellers like The Da Vinci Code. Minister of Culture Mohammad Hossein calls publishers "assistants for evil" and says they should stop serving a "poisoned dish to the young generation."
January 2011: A think tank close to Iranian security forces publishes a leaflet listing publishers, writers, and translators who are “usurpers” intent on overthrowing the regime. The publishers include Cheshmeh, Ghoghnous, Akhtaran, and Kavir. Among the writers listed are Emaduddin Baghi, Ramin Jahanbegloo, and poet Simin Behbahani.
The work of novelist Paulo Coelho is banned.
Mehr reports on the closing of businesses along Tehran's Karim Khan Avenue, renowned for its bookstores.
The head of the Basij militia, Mohammad Reza Naqdi, tells an audience of the dangers for Iran's students of "Western" texts in the humanities and social sciences.
May 2011: Works by leading novelist Ali Ashraf Darvishian and several other writers are ordered off the shelves at the Tehran International Book Fair.
The books which are removed include An Introduction to Heidegger's Existential Philosophy; The Nik-Akhtar Family, a novel by distinguished Iranian satirist Iraj Pezeshkzad; the third volume of The Cambridge History of Iran; and a book about yoga.
July 2011: Six printing houses close because of economic problems, including a shortage of orders and the rise of imported products.
Writer Mostafa Rahmandust notes only one book for each two Iranian children is published annually, "A writer is not able to earn a living, nor is a publisher hopeful about the outcomes of his/her work....Cultural officials have not carried out their duties properly in the field of children's literature."
But there is one positive development in the Iranian book world, with the appearance of a new work titled "Leading Approaches". The subject? A collection of the speeches and statements of an Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Sunday, July 24, 2011 at 7:49 | Scott Lucas in Afghanistan, EA Afghanistan-Pakistan, EA Middle East and Turkey, Iraq 
The U.S. has wasted or misspent $34 billion contracting for services in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a draft report by a bipartisan congressional panel, the most comprehensive effort so far to tally the overall cost of a decade of battlefield contracting in America's two big wars.
The three-year investigation comes from the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan, which was established by Congress in 2008.
Its final report, expected to be sent to Capitol Hill in the next few weeks, lays out in detail the failure of federal agencies to properly manage and oversee grants and contracts set to exceed a total of $206 billion by the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.
1840 GMT: The Slain Scientist --- Confusion Alert. We have been working throughout the day on the initial report that the scientist slain today in Tehran was a 35-year-old "Professor of Physics" named Dariush Rezaei, as initially reported by Iranian media (see 1503 and 1530 GMT).
This led us to Dariush Rezaei, also identified as Dariush Rezaei-Ochbolagh, a faculty member at Mohaghegh Ardabili University (see 1600 GMT). However, there is a curiosity in Rezaei's profile --- he is listed as 46 years old.
(Mehr, however, do seem to have a consistent story, with Rezaei a 45-year-old professor at the University, which is in the city of Ardebil in northwest Iran.)
Now Fars and IRNA that the victim, named Dariush Rezaeinejad, is actually a postgraduate student in electrical engineering at Khaje Nasir University in Tehran. IRNA, from an "informed source", says Rezaeinejad was "cooperating with a number of universities and scientific centers".
We all need to look at how the Norwegian people and Government are dealing with this tragedy, following their lead and admiring their unflinching strength in the face of this gut-wrenching disaster. We need to allow them time to grieve in peace. They deserve the dignity of being able to bury their loved ones, care for their wounded, and find some measure of national solitude before we unleash a barrage of speculation from the impulse that we need to get to the bottom of the truth even if there is insufficient information to back up our ponderings.
Photo: GettyFinally, this case is an example of the dangers of a “rush to judgement” without the full facts. I am as guilty of this as anyone else with my analysis yesterday, potentially linking the attacks to Al Qaeda. Others went even further with media appearances and Twitter messages connecting the attacks to a so-called "jihadist" group that does not appear to exist. In turn, the media were only to happy to lap this up and this groundswell of misjudgements can have real consequences for ordinary people.
Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 10:21 | Scott Lucas in Africa, EA Global, EA Middle East and Turkey, Middle East and Iran Claimed video of military cadets marching for the opposition in Aleppo in Syria on Friday
1925 GMT: The AP is now carrying a story we've been reporting this afternoon, the clashes in Cairo, Egypt:
A crowd estimated at around 10,000 people set out from downtown Cairo's Tahrir Square but was stopped from reaching the military headquarters in the eastern Abbasiyah neighborhood by a line of army barricades. Along the way, they chanted slogans against the military council's delay in implementing their demands.
Bands of men armed with knives and sticks set upon them from side roads, setting off pitched street battles in which both sides threw punches and hurled rocks. Gunfire was heard, but it was unclear who was shooting.
1919 GMT: Bahraini police harass protesters with tear gas in Maameer:
1911 GMT: The situation might be winding down in Egypt:
RT @Sandmonkey: The #abassia battle seems to be over. People are getting out now.
1901 GMT: There are reports of an escalating situation in Egypt. According to Rasha Abdulla:
AlJazeera: More than 70 protesters injured in #Abbasiya clashes #massira
An activist is also sharing this picture, reportedly showing smoke in the air after a car was lit on fire and molotov cocktails were thrown (there appears to be fire in the background as well).
1856 GMT: Al Jazeera reports on events in Homs, where a general strike has been called and thousands protested today alongside the funerals of three people killed yetsreday:
Bahrain, Bashar al-Assad, Syria, Yasser Al-Muolimi, Yemen 
Khamenei's inflexibility has so far served him well. His unwillingness to bend, however, has made it more likely that the Islamic Republic itself will have to break. As a young advisor to opposition leader Mehdi Karoubi recently told me, "We don't want a revolution; we've seen how it turns the country upside down. But they're giving us no other choice."
Machiavelli died in 1527, distrusted by all sides and disliked by the people he aimed to serve. It would be poetic justice if one of his most practiced disciples suffered the same fate.
Anders BreivikUPDATE 1230 GMT: The youth branch of the ruling Labour Party (AUF) has said it will return to the island of Utoeya, where at least 84 of its members were killed, and continue its summer camp to show it will not yield to terror.
The head of the branch, Eskil Perdersen, said, "[We] will not be silenced. In the face of this heinous and incomprehensible attack, we have this message: AUF and its ideas will survive as they always have. We are not abdicating in the fight for our convictions. We will return to Utoeya."
UPDATE 0850 GMT: Back from a break to find that Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg has appeared again on national TV to offer support for the injuries and families of the dead, although he could not express in words "how much I feel for all those affected....Many of those who lost their lives were persons I know. I know the young people and I know their parents." Stoltenberg said Utoeya Island had been "my youth paradise, and now it's been changed to hell".
Police have said Anders Behring Breivik, the main suspect in both the Utoeya shootings and the Oslo bomb appeared to a "Christian fundamentalist" from his websites. They said, "He is cooperating," while holding open the possibility that more than one shooter was involved.
