The Opposition Leader, Malcolm Turnbull, proposed a cigarette tax increase last night as he called the Government's early election bluff by announcing the Coalition would block one of the biggest revenue-raising measures in the budget.

The speaker of the US House of Representatives says she was misled by the CIA about the use of harsh methods during terror interrogations.

Nancy Pelosi has been under pressure to clarify what she knew since one of her aides said she had been briefed in 2003 that the CIA had waterboarded suspects.

Critics say the methods amount to torture and that officials who authorised them should be prosecuted.

Ms Pelosi has herself condemned the use of harsh interrogation techniques.

The blonde joke is dead

Peter Costello yesterday mocked Wayne Swan's claims the Howard government was to blame for the battered budget bottom line.

"Here's Wayne Swan, he inherits a budget that is in surplus - and I don't think he will ever produce a surplus budget - he inherits a financial position which has no debt, and we're now looking at putting the commonwealth $200 billion into debt," the former Treasurer told Melbourne radio.

"So don't blame him for the deficit and debt. The people who are responsible are the people who left the budget in surplus and reduced the debt to zero."

A Pakistani offensive against militants in the Swat Valley has displaced some 200,000 people and 300,000 are on the move or about to flee, the UN says.

As jets and helicopters pounded targets in the valley, the UN said it was threatening to become one of the world's biggest displacement crises.

Troops have killed more than 140 militants in the past 24 hours, army spokesman Gen Athar Abbas said.

He said that measures had been taken to provide for fleeing civilians.

Ten of America's largest 19 banks need a combined $74.6bn (£50bn) of extra funds to boost their cash reserves.

That is the main finding of the so-called "stress tests" to see if the banks have sufficient capital to cope should the recession worsen.

Bank of America is the most at risk, needing an additional $33.9bn.

"Our hope with today's actions is that banks are going to be able to get back to the business of banking," said US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

Shell chairman Russell Caplan says businesses need political consensus over the scheme so they can make decisions to invest with certainty.

"We're taking into consideration what's been disclosed to us about the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme in the investment proposals that we're considering, but I must say that the sooner we get to a position of certainty, the better we'll like it," he said.

"I think that the delay ought to help to get some of the details that need fixing better discussed and ought to contribute to a better outcome."

The Australian government says it will push back a planned carbon emissions trading scheme (ETS) by a year.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said the delay was necessary because of the poor economic climate.

But he also suggested that Australia could pursue tougher emissions reductions targets if an international deal was reached.

Switzerland's largest bank, UBS, has asked a US court not to go ahead with a tax case involving more than 50,000 US customers with Swiss accounts.

UBS told a federal court in Florida it would violate Swiss laws on banking secrecy if it provided the information on its clients.

The US suspects 52,000 Americans of using UBS accounts to hide almost $15bn of assets and unpaid taxes.