BBC News with Marion Marshall

The United Nations Security Council is holding an emergency session to discuss the conflict in Mali. Before the meeting, France said it was seeking more international backing for its military offensive against Islamist fighters in the West African country. On the ground, Malian rebels have seized the central town of Diabaly from government troops. Mark Doyle reports from Bamako.

Day four of the French military operation and a mixed picture is emerging. The air campaign has hit several rebel rear bases in the Sahara desert, but the French military admit that an Islamist column pushed on in the centre of the country. The Islamists are still hundreds of miles away from the capital Bamako, and the French say this city would have fallen without their military intervention. But the rebels are well-equipped and apparently determined.

The Iraqi authorities say they’ve started releasing hundreds of detainees in an apparent response to recent protests by the Sunni minority. The Deputy Prime Minister for Energy Hussain al-Shahristani apologised to the prisoners, saying they had been held unlawfully because of bureaucratic delays. He said more than 300 detainees had been released in the past week since he formed a government committee to look into protesters’ demands.

A group of Muslim clerics in Saudi Arabia has called on the government to put detainees held on security charges on trial or release them. The petition by 100 clerics in the ultra-conservative province of Qassim follows the detention of 11 women staging a small protest demanding the release of their relatives. The petition calls for fair hearings for prisoners warning that disaffection is growing, leading to protests and sit-ins.