Gavin Hewitt on the BBC News site.

However, the believers out there are few. Giant hedge funds have placed their bets; the euro will drop further. In their view the euro's inherent weaknesses are not being addressed. Most senior European officials believe some kind of bail-out will be needed.

Novosti report.

Iran's deputy foreign minister has officially apologized for intercepting a Kyrgyz passenger plane in Iranian airspace, Kyrgyzstan's foreign ministry said on Monday.

On February 23, Iranian air force fighter jets forced a Kyrgyz air carrier "Kyrgyzstan" plane on a flight from the United Arab Emirates to Bishkek to land in the Iranian city of Bandar Abbas.

The plane was only released after two of its passengers were reportedly detained by Iranian special services.

Iranian media reported that one of the detainees was Abdolmalek Rigi, the leader of Iranian Sunni insurgent group Jundallah, who was scheduled to meet U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, at Kyrgyzstan's Manas Air Base.

Reuters article.

Iran's accusations that Jundollah operated from bases in Pakistan's Baluchistan province have been a cause of friction with Islamabad and Rigi's arrest -- in circumstances yet to be fully explained -- could go some way to easing tensions.

Pakistan and Iran, which have also competed for influence in Afghanistan, have been trying to improve relations recently as regional players prepare for U.S.-led forces to start withdrawing in 2011.

Editorial in the New York Times.

The cumulative weight of the evidence seems persuasive. But the F.B.I. has a troubling history of building a circumstantial case against suspects who are later exonerated. We are inclined to agree with Representative Rush Holt of New Jersey, who is calling for an independent assessment to validate the findings. Americans need to be sure that the real culprit or possible accomplices are not still at large, waiting to do damage again. And we need to head off conspiracy theories that are apt to be fostered if the only judgment available comes from an agency eager to clear its books.

Letter in the Guardian.

Today, the House of Commons will debate whether the control order system will be renewed from another year. We wish to express serious concerns about its renewal. Control orders constitute permanent punishment without trial, whereby the innocent can be placed under house arrest on the basis of suspicion and secret intelligence. Control orders also fail to protect the public from individuals who may be genuinely dangerous.

Michael O'Hanlon and Bruce Riedel in the Financial Times.

The strike option, however, lacks credibility. America is engaged in two massive and unpopular military campaigns in the region. Given Iran's ability to retaliate against the US in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is simply not credible that we would use force in the foreseeable future. Tehran, Moscow and Beijing know this.

PressTV report.

The captured ringleader of the Jundallah terrorist group, Abdolmalek Rigi, was scheduled to meet US special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke at the Manas Air Base for talks on waging an insurgency against the Islamic Republic of Iran, a journalist says.

Rigi had planned to meet a high-profile US official at the Manas Air Base near Kyrgyzstan's capital Bishkek.

This senior US official must have been Holbrooke, who was in Kyrgyzstan to visit the only US air base in Central Asia, the IRNA news agency quoted journalist Wayne Madsen as saying on Saturday.

Jim Lobe comments.

The question is this: if the neo-conservative hawks, who played such a necessary -- if not quite sufficient -- role in getting the United States to invade Iraq in 2003, so misjudged Chalabi, why should they be taken seriously on what to do about Iran, or just about anything else in the Greater Middle East?

Novosti report.

There is no hard proof that Iran is working on nuclear weapons, but Tehran has to clarify several key issues on its nuclear program to avoid fresh international action, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday.

Reuters report.

Washington's clout over its Middle East ally is under scrutiny after Israel's veiled threats to attack Iran preemptively if international diplomacy fails to rein in Tehran's uranium enrichment, a process with bomb-making potential.

BBC report.

Iranian state television has broadcast a statement by a captured Sunni rebel leader in which he alleges he received support from the United States.

BBC report.

The head of the Lebanese Shia Islamist movement Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, has made a rare public appearance in the Syrian capital, Damascus. Sheikh Nasrallah attended a dinner with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

BBC report.

The suspects, 17 of whom are military officers on active duty, were rounded up in a nationwide operation, CNN-Turk and Haber-Turk TV channels said.

Guardian report.

India tonight reacted angrily to the attack. Officials in New Delhi are convinced a series of previous such strikes -- the Indian embassy was targeted in both 2008 and in 2009 -- were the work of militants sponsored by Pakistan. Islamabad has always denied any connections to militants operating in Afghanistan.

Reuters report.

Senior Chinese military officers have proposed that their country boost defense spending, adjust PLA deployments, and possibly sell some U.S. bonds to punish Washington for its latest round of arms sales to Taiwan.

[...]

China has the world's biggest pile of foreign currency reserves, much of it held in U.S. treasury debt. China held $798.9 billion in U.S. Treasuries at end-October.

But any attempt to use that stake against Washington would probably maul the value of China's own dollar-denominated assets.

Telegraph report.

Evidence is mounting that Chinese sales of US Treasury bonds over recent months are intended as a warning shot to Washington over escalating political disputes rather than being part of a routine portfolio shift as thought at first.

A front-page story in the state's China Information News said the record $34bn sale of US bonds in December was a "commendable" move. The article was republished by the National Bureau of Statistics, giving it a stronger imprimatur.