2020 GMT: Der Spiegel reports on a possible shift in the German position on Libya, with Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle saying military support of humanitarian action, such as relief operations, is possible.
Germany abstained on the UN Security Council resolution for a no-fly zone and measures to protect civilians.
1755 GMT: Four journalists --- James Foley of Global Post, Claire Morgana Gillis, an American freelance journalist; Manu Brabo, a Spanish photographer, and Anton Hammerl, a South African photographer -- have been seized by regime forces near Brega in east Libya.
1750 GMT: Turkey's Prime Minister Erdogan has said Ankara is holding talks with both sides in Libya, seeking a "roadmap" to achieve a cease-fire.
1735 GMT: Back from a break to find lots of chatter about a nationally-televised speech by Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa (video posted on YouTube), generally seen as the most "reformist"-minded member of the monarchy. Looking for a full summary, but one concise interpretation is, "Reforms by government institutes under [direct] CP [Crown Prince] supervision....We need to punish, but be careful to only punish leaders who instigated and mislead citizens. Stay united, don't blame an entire sect."
And another summary: "1- Reforms will happen, not necessarily dialogue. 2-Those disloyal will be punished. 3- The rest must unite."
1610 GMT: Amnesty International is calling on the Libyan regime to reveal the whereabouts of four men, being held in secret after they were arrested and taken away by security officials in a western district of the capital Tripoli on 19 March.
British brothers Zeyad Ramadan and Ghazi Ramadan and Khaled Sury and another unnamed man were seized in a raid on the house were the Ramadans were living.
The Ramadans have been in Libya since late December 2010 working at a software company. Sury and the unnamed man were businessmen visiting them.
1255 GMT: Denmark has appointed an envoy to Benghazi, the base of the Libyan opposition, with a view to establishing relationing with the National Transition Council (NTC).
Danish Foreign Minister Lene Espersen said, "I have appointed a special envoy to help assess the options to support the NTC in promoting the political process."
1220 GMT: Claimed footage of a march in Hodaidah in Yemen, commemorating martyrs of the protests:
1140 GMT: The Syrian regime has taken two notable steps today, granting citizenship to Kurds in Hassake who have sought recognition for 50 years and firing the Governor of Homs, Mohammad Iyad Ghazal.
1120 GMT: A Libyan oil official has said that Qaddafi forces attacked the Sarir oilfield, denying the regime's claim that a British air strike caused the damage.
An opposition official earlier said production at Misla and Waha oil fields, also in insurgent-held east Libya, had stopped because of attacks by Qaddafi's troops.
1115 GMT: Libyan opposition sources are telling media that two tanks and a bus carrying insurgents between Ajdabiya and fighting near Brega have been struck by NATO aircraft. AFP is reporting that at least five opposition fighters have been killed.
0940 GMT: Qatar's Prime Minister Shaikh Hamad Bin Jassem Bin Jabber Al Thani has said that the six states of the Gulf Cooperation Council, leading mediation efforts to end the political crisis in Yemen, "hope to reach a deal with the Yemeni president [Ali Abdullah Saleh] to step down".
Foreign ministers of the GCC agreed Sunday to begin contacts with the Yemeni government and the opposition "with ideas to overcome the current situation".
The call for Saleh to leave office is in sharp contrast to the GCC's intervention in support of the Bahraini monarchy and government, also challenged by protests over legitimacy.
0920 GMT: Medecins sans Frontieres has criticised Bahrain's security forces for "targeting of health facilities and workers",turned the country's largest health centre, the Salmaniya Medical Centre, into an "occupied hospital".
MSF claims, "Wounds are used to identify demonstrators, restricted access to health care is being used to deter people from protesting, and those who dare to seek treatment in health facilities are being arrested....The military took over the hospital and established checkpoints with tanks and masked military personnel all around its perimeter."
0730 GMT: Tunisia has dropped out of the headlines after the fall of the Ben Ali regime, but the questions over its political, economic, and social future are just as significant as those at the height of the protests. Jean-Pierre Cassarino offers a valuable overview, "Confidence-building in Tunisia after the Popular Uprising":
So far, perhaps for the sake of political legitimacy, the current interim government has not proactively addressed the pyramidal structure of the Tunisian private sector sketched above. However, several factors bode for cautious optimism. Firstly, the main trade union, the Union Générale des Travailleurs Tunisiens (UGTT), has gained momentum over the last months. Secondly, growing expectations are emerging from workers in general, in terms of social and labour rights; rights which the former regime gradually suffocated by promoting job flexibility and precariousness in all economic sectors. Thirdly, as explained above, the state is now faced with an unprecedented level of public accountability that it can no longer shy away from. Tunisian citizens are well aware that freedom of expression is more than a value to be treasured; it determines the contours of a changing relationship between themselves and the state and may also contribute to shaping the upcoming social and political developments in the country, since 14th January 2011. Tunisian citizens are gradually organising themselves through vibrant civil and political bodies, freed from the interference of the former ruling party. Fourthly, a growing number of Tunisian entrepreneurs – those who directly or indirectly suffered from tax aggressiveness and administrative harassment in the past – are organizing themselves to monitor the interim government’s willingness to inquire into cases of embezzlement and corruption during the former regime.
0625 GMT: On the front line in Libya, insurgents took back some of the ground claimed by regime forces on Tuesday between Brega and Ajdabiya.
Opposition spokesman Mustafa Gheriani played down Tuesday's advance by Qaddafi troops, saying, "This kind of desert fight is very fluid; advancing 20 kilometres and then retreating 20 kilometres is normal in a desert war....Our forces are at the eastern border of the city [Brega], the [Gaddafi] militias are inside the city and the fight is going on."
0555 GMT: A street vendor in opposition-held Benghazi in eastern Libya combines US-flag fashion with sales of revolutionary symbols:
0520 GMT: In Syria, President Bashar al-Assad has closed the country's only casino and revoked a ban on teachers from wearing the niqab, a veil that hides the face except for the eyes.
Both steps are seen as concessions to religious groups amidst protests against the regime.
Russian President Dmitri Medvedev has praised "the Syrian leadership's intention to begin the internal transformations announced by Bashar al-Assad with the aim of preventing the unfavourable development of the situation and human casualties, for the sake of preserving civil peace."
0500 GMT: We start this morning in Yemen. While mainstream media continue to note the deaths in the political conflict, with at least three protesters killed and several dying in a clash between rival military forces, the mass demonstrations have become so "routine" that even tens of thousands on the streets go without a remark. A bit of video from Taiz on Wednesday:
In Libya, the US and its allies made a couple of expected rebuttals on the political front. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tossed back Muammar Qaddafi's three-page letter to President Obama, calling for intervention to end war against "a small people in a developing country", saying the Libyan leader should impose a ceasefire, withdraw his forces, and go into exile.
And NATO responded to the concern of Abdul Fattah Younis, the head of the opposition's military forces, that the coalition was "too slow" in protecting civilians against the regime (see Wednesday's opening update). Speaking at NATO's southern European headquarters in Naples, Italy, Rear Admiral Russell Harding, the NATO deputy commander of operations in Libya, said: "Libya must be 800 miles [1,290km] wide and in all that air space we are dominating, so perhaps ...in one or two areas if they don't hear us or see us, I can understand how that might lead to a lack of confidence."