The top U.S. military officer said Thursday that Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks, was risking lives to make a political point by publishing thousands of military reports from Afghanistan.

"Mr. Assange can say whatever he likes about the greater good he thinks he and his source are doing, but the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family," Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a news conference at the Pentagon.

Overweight mothers who become pregnant again before returning to their original weight put themselves and their babies at risk of a raft of serious complications, according to new guidelines from the Government health watchdog.

The age-old saying that women should “eat for two” while pregnant and breastfeeding is a myth and women should not be afraid to start dieting soon after giving birth, according to the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).

Winston Churchill’s vast archive – everything from school reports and wagers about his prodigious drinking to a personal copy of the "finest hour" speech – will be digitised and offered online, it will be announced today.

The Churchill Archive Trust has agreed a deal with publisher Bloomsbury to make available more than 1m items. These include about 2,500 archive boxes of letters, telegrams, documents and photographs that are stored in Cambridge and currently viewable only by appointment.

A Spanish man who underwent the world’s first full face transplant appeared before TV cameras for the first time since his surgery, thanking his doctors and the family of the donor.

Identified only as Oscar, the 31-year-old spoke with considerable difficulty at a news conference at Barcelona’s Vall d’Hebron hospital, where he was operated on in late March.

During the 24-hour surgery, doctors lifted an entire face, including jaw, nose, cheekbones, muscles, teeth and eyelids, and placed it masklike onto the man. He has been described as a farmer who was unable to breathe or eat on his own after accidentally shooting himself in the face five years ago.

The head of the surgical team, Dr. Joan Pere Barret, said Monday that Oscar will need between a year and 18 months of physical therapy and is expected to regain up to 90 percent of his facial functions. He is now being released from the hospital and sent home.

Barret Nerin, Juan Pedro Dirección de la consulta: Centro Médico Teknon, Marquesa de Vilallonga 12, Despacho 39-40, 08017 Barcelona Teléfono: 93 417 50 09 Fax: 93 417 33 06

Central defender and Lyon club captain Cris has signed a new deal at Olympique Lyonnais as the French side prepare for an 11th successive UEFA Champions League group stage campaign.

Olympique Lyonnais captain Cris has signed a new contract, extending his stay with the UEFA Champions League group stage entrants until 2013.

President Nicolas Sarkozy vowed Monday that France would avenge the murder of a 78-year-old French aid worker Michel Germaneau who was kidnapped and killed in the Sahara desert by al-Qaida’s North African wing.

"I condemn this barbarous act, this odious act which has put an end to the life of an innocent man who was there to help the local population," he said in a terse televised address.

Sarkozy spoke after al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) declared it had killed the hostage, Michel Germaneau, in revenge after French and Mauritanian soldiers stormed one of the group’s camps in Mali and killed six militants.

Russia’s PM Vladimir Putin said he met the group of Russian spies deported from the US earlier this month. In a transcript published Sunday, he said that they sang patriotic Soviet songs and "talked about life".

The 10 Kremlin agents had been arrested in an FBI swoop that initially threatened to derail a rapid improvement in Russia-US relations championed by President Dmitry Medvedev.

Putin hinted that the agents’ cover had been blown as a result of "treason" and that he knew the names of those responsible.

Marseille coach Didier Deschamps has pledged to give his full cooperation to France coach Laurent Blanc’s efforts to rebuild the national team following its poor World Cup.

With France desperate to rebuild its image after its struggles in South Africa, Deschamps feels that Blanc will need all the help he can get.

Deschamps and Blanc have a closer relationship after having played together when France won the World Cup in 1998 and the European Championship two years later, and Deschamps expects that to help matters during Blanc’s tenure.