motorcade

of the US ambassador to Damascus, Robert Ford, was pelted with stones, tomatoes and eggs on its way to the office of a leading opposition figure. An angry crowd chanting anti-American slogans then tried to storm the office. Mrs Clinton said it was an attempt to intimidate">intimidate Mr Ford.

"We condemn this

unwarranted

attack in the strongest possible terms. Ambassador Ford and his aides were conducting normal embassy business, and this attempt to

intimidate

our diplomats through violence is wholly unjustified."

China has launched a space

module

in its first step towards creating an orbiting space station. The unmanned capsule called Tiangong-1, or Heavenly Palace, blasted off from a launch site in the Gobi desert in western China. The module will be used for docking practice so China can develop the techniques to build a space lab and later a full space station.

The Prime Minister of Niger, Brigi Rafini, says his country will not hand over Colonel Gaddafi's son Saadi to the new authorities in Libya. Earlier, the international police organisation Interpol issued an

arrest warrant

, or red notice, for Saadi Gaddafi for crimes allegedly committed while head of his country's football federation. Red notices, the equivalent of putting someone on Interpol's most-wanted list, have already been issued for Colonel Gaddafi, another son Saif and the former head of Libyan intelligence, Abdullah al-Senussi.