The children are said to be brought in from China, Bangladesh and Nigeria.

Many are described as being victims of sexual exploitation, street crime, domestic servitude, cannabis production and forced labour.

The report, carried out on behalf of the Children’s Commissioner for Wales, Keith Towler, uncovered 32 cases of children who had been exploited.

He said: “Children and young people who have been trafficked are extremely vulnerable.

“Many will have experienced at least one form of abuse and some have spoken about being raped, beaten, tortured and deprived of their basic needs and enslaved.

“Trafficked children and young people are moved from their country of origin to one or more new countries by individuals or gangs who have tricked or deceived them.

“It is essential that when they are found they receive the full care and protection of the statutory services.”
For child trafficking to be tackled effectively there first has to be an acceptance that it exists.

Keith Towler, Children’s Commissioner for Wales

The study, conducted by children’s protection organisation ECPAT UK said: “Evidence was found of confirmed and suspected cases of child trafficking encountered by social services, the voluntary sector and the police.

“Data was gathered from 41 practitioners who described 32 cases that caused them concern.”

They also discovered proof of at least six children going missing in Wales. Some were in local authority care, others living with apparent family members or friends before they disappeared.

Mr Towler warned this could be the “tip of the iceberg” and, as a result of the report’s findings, has made several recommendations to the Welsh Assembly.

They include a proposal to set up an all-Wales group on trafficking and that the Assembly ensure relevant training is available to all social workers.

He said he hoped the research would “help shift the culture of disbelief” that has surrounded the issue in Wales.

“For child trafficking to be tackled effectively there first has to be an acceptance that it exists,” he said.

Concluding a two-day policy meeting on Wednesday, the central bank said it would buy up to $300bn in longer-term government bonds called treasuries to bring down borrowing costs.

The surprising move to buy its own government’s debt for the first time since the 1960s sparked a rally on Wall Street, with the Dow Jones industrial average, which had been down earlier in the day, rising to close 1.2 per cent higher at 7,486.58.

“Although the near-term economic outlook is weak, the committee anticipates that policy actions … will contribute to a gradual resumption of sustainable economic growth,” the Federal Reserve said on Wednesday.

In addition to purchasing treasury debt, the central bank said it would expand by $850bn an existing programme to buy debt and securities issued by mortgage finance agencies to $1.45 trillion, in an effort to lower mortgage rates.

‘Dramatic move’

The Fed also sent a strong signal that it would keep interest rates low. It decided to leave overnight interest rates unchanged at the 0 to 0.25 per cent range and said  rates would stay low for “an extended period”, a stronger pledge than it has offered in recent months.

In depth
 
 
And it said it would consider expanding another $1 trillion programme that is being rolled out this week that aims to boost the availability of consumer loans for cars, education and credit cards, as well as for small businesses.

The decision to hold rates near zero was widely expected, but the plan to buy government bonds and the size of the injection into the economy was a surprise.

“This is a pretty dramatic move… They are trying to bring down all consumer rates,” said James Caron, head of global rates research at Morgan Stanley in New York.

Rick Meckler, the president of Libertyview Capital Management in New York, explained the central bank’s move as “an attempt to keep rates low, particularly on the mortgage side, which is seen as critical to a big revival of the housing market”.

Having pushed key interest rates to almost zero, the central bank has turned its focus to flooding credit markets with cash in the hope of restarting lending and restoring growth, a policy Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, has dubbed “credit easing”.

Cheaper money

Buying government bonds in such huge amounts would usually have the effect of causing bond prices to soar and yields on the bonds to plunge.

Buying bonds

Buying government bonds from financial institutions in massive amounts increases demand for them, thereby raising their price.

Prices of bonds generally have an inverse relationship with their yields as well as with interest rates, meaning lending rates will fall. Treasury rates tanked dramatically on the Fed’s move.

Lower interest rates mean consumers and businesses can spend less on paying for their loans, freeing up money to spend on other things.

But the Fed buys the bonds by printing new money without real assets to back that up, increasing the risk of inflation.

And increased supply of dollars also means the value of the dollar falls.
 
And the central bank is hoping that by driving down yields on the debt and making it cheaper to borrow money, it will get credit flowing again and from that, economic growth.

The Fed had hinted in January that it was considering buying government debt but in recent weeks had appeared to back off from the move.

William Dudley, the New York Federal Reserve president, said two weeks ago that buying longer-term government debt was not the most efficient way to ease credit market strains.

But the Bank of England, which like the US Federal Reserve had already lowered its key interest rate to a record low – 0.5 per cent, managed to drive interest rates down last week by buying government bonds, and that success may have factored into the US central bank’s decision.

And in a sign that it might just work, government bond prices soared on Wednesday and the yield on the benchmark 10-year treasury note dropped to 2.50 per cent from 3.01 per cent – the biggest daily drop in percentage points since 1981.

Sung Won Sohn, an economist at the Martin Smith School of Business at California State University, said the Federal Reserve’s move was “going to help everybody”.

“This might help the Fed put Humpty Dumpty back together again.”

Inflation fears

But not everyone was cheering, with some warning of long-term inflation with the Fed printing money to buy the bonds.

“It’s overtly inflationary and will inflate most assets,” said Joseph Arsenio, the managing director at Arsenio Capital Management in California.

Greg Salvaggio, a vice-president for trading at Tempus Consulting in Washington, said the “bottom line is the Fed is adding a trillion dollars to their balance sheet and that’s a lot of taxpayer money”.

The dollar fell against other major currencies on Wednesday, a possible signal over concerns that the Fed’s intervention might spur inflation over the long run.

The Fed has said it is mindful of the risks but said on Wednesday that since it last met in late January, “the economy continues to contract”.

“Job losses, declining equity and housing wealth and tight credit conditions have weighed on consumer sentiment and spending,” it said in a statement.

Bernanke had said in recent weeks that if credit and financial markets could be stabilised, the recession could end this year, setting the stage for a recovery next year.

But the Fed’s statement on Wednesday did not have any specific reference to the likelihood of the recession ending this year, saying instead that the near-term outlook was “weak” and only that stimulus measures should lead to a gradual resumption of growth.

Sean Hodgson, 58, was jailed in 1982 for strangling young barmaid Teresa De Simone and leaving her body near the Southampton pub where she worked.

A jury found him guilty after hearing he had confessed the killing to a priest and police, although he retracted those statements with his lawyer arguing that he was a pathological liar.

Other evidence against him included analysis of semen found at the murder scene, which suggested the killer had the blood group A or AB.

Mr Hodgson fell within that blood group – but so did a third of Britain’s male population at the time.
He said he had raped and killed Miss De Simone, 22, and later repeated the confession to police, before denying his involvement during his trial.

Crime correspondent Martin Brunt

DNA tests, which were not available until 1986, have since established the material did not come from Mr Hodgson.

Miss De Simone’s partially-clothes body was found in her car parked underneath the pub in December 1979.

Mr Hodgson made his first admission to a chaplain in prison, where he was serving a sentence for car theft.

He said he had raped and killed Miss De Simone, 22, and later repeated the confession to police, before denying his involvement during his trial.

It is thought he was given a tariff, a minimum sentence, of 12 years but was never granted parole because he continued to deny his guilt.
 
Teresa De Simone was strangled

It is believed an appeal was rejected in 1983.

His new appeal was launched last year after he contacted a lawyer through an advert in a prison newspaper.

The case has been fast-tracked by the Criminal Cases Review Commission which quickly recommended that his conviction was unsafe.

Mr Hodgson suffers from a number of mental health conditions and will need much specialised care to help him get used to life outside prison.

Hampshire police are expected to announce the re-opening of the case based on the new DNA evidence, but they have no new suspect yet.

The Crown Prosecution Service will not challenge the appeal and it has been asked to review dozens of similar cases where pre-DNA scientific evidence played a crucial role in convictions.
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The terminally ill star left hospital last week to go home and spend the time she has left with her family.

“I was knackered after the hour-and-a- half journey back to Essex, so I spent the rest of Wednesday sleeping it off,” she told New! magazine.

“I hadn’t seen (sons) Bobby and Freddy since the christening, so I really wanted to see their faces and give them a big hug.

“They’ve been staying with their dad, Jeff (Brazier).

“He picked them up from school on Thursday and brought them straight to see me.
Jade Goody Gallery
See the ups and downs of Jade’s life since she became famous on Big Brother.

“Little Freddy was so excited. He was the first one in the front door. I was so emotional, I burst into tears. I was so happy to see them.

“They stayed for about three hours and we spent the time playing and cuddling.”

Speaking about not knowing when her final moments will be, Goody continued: “It’s horrible saying goodbye not knowing if I’ll see them again.

“I just want us to spend as much time together as we can.”

Speaking about her message from Michael Jackson and other goodwill gestures, Goody said: “Can you believe I got a message from Michael Jackson?

“The king of pop! I’ve always been a massive fan. I love him.

“He got his people to call the hospital because he wanted to speak to me and wish me well.

“But I was asleep! What am I like? So he recorded a little answerphone message and Jack (husband Jack Tweed) played it to me.”

She has also received goodwill messages from Robbie Williams and Amy Winehouse.

Marc Ravalomanana’s spokesman, Andry Ralijaona, said the president had no intention of fleeing.

“The president plans to stay in Madagascar. He said this to the presidential guard, who told him he should be placed elsewhere, and he replied ‘I will die with you if I have to’. That’s his stand,” Ralijaona said.

He accused the army of staging a coup and added that the president had sought military support from the UN and southern African countries.

Soldiers back by armoured vehicles had on Monday seized one of the president’s palaces along with the central bank, after throwing their support behind Andry Rajoelina, the opposition leader locked in a power struggle with Ravalomanana.

Palace mined

Ravalomanana is holed up in another presidential palace, known as Iavoloha, a few kilometres from the city centre of the capital, Antananarivo.

Al Jazeera’s Haru Mutasa, reporting from Antananarivo, said there was a lot of military deployed in the capital as people woke up on Tuesday morning.

The army had vowed to take the second presidential palace during the night, but no such action had yet been taken and it appeared that Ravalomanana was planning to remain at the palace, she said.

In depth

 Timeline: Madagascar crisis
 Profile: Marc Ravalomanana
 Profile: Andry Rajoelina
 

Meanwhile, the opposition leader prepared to gather his supporters in the centre of the city.

- Rajoelina is going to hold a rally in the centre and it’s then thought he will tell his supporters to follow him on foot towards the administrative offices where he will open the door and walk in, as a a symbolic show that he has taken over, Mutasa said.

The president’s supporters call Rajoelina a troublemaker bent on seizing power illegally, but under growing pressure to resign, Ravalomanana offered on Monday to hold a referendum to let the people decide who should run the country.

Rajoelina, who accuses the president of being a dictator and misusing public funds, rejected the move, saying there was no need for a poll as the people had already made their opinions clear.

Rajoelina, a 34-year-old former disc jockey who was sacked by Ravalomanana’s government as Antananarivo’s mayor last month, then called on the security forces to arrest the president.

He denied ordering Monday’s attack, however, saying: “It wasn’t me who gave the order [to take the palace].”

But he also said: “Do we intend to seize Iavoloha? Many things will take place in the next 48 hours,” adding that “right now Ravalomanana has no power”.

Army backing

Madagascar’s army has traditionally remained neutral during political volatility, but on Monday, Colonel Andre Ndriarijaona, the head of the armed forces, said the military was 99 per cent behind Rajoelina.

“We are there for the Malagasy people. If Andry Rajoelina can resolve the problem, we are behind him,” Ndriarijaona, who led a failed mutiny last week and replaced the previous army chief of staff, said.

“I would say 99 per cent of the forces are behind him.”

But our correspondent said that while Rajoelina enjoyed strong support in the capital because he was formerly mayor there, it remained unclear if he could muster the backing of people and troops in the rest of the country.

The African Union has called the situation in Madagascar an attempted coup and urged the people to respect the constitution.

“The situation in Madagascar is an internal conflict,” Edouard Alo-Glele, Benin’s envoy to Ethiopia, said after an emergency meeting of the AU’s Peace and Security Council.

“It is an attempted coup d’etat. We condemn the attempted coup d’etat.”

At least 135 people have been killed in Madagascar since the country’s political crisis began in January, most of them when security forces cracked down on anti-government protests at the order of Ravalomanana’s government.

The crisis, with Rajoelina leading anti-government demonstrations since the start of the year, has also sent the country’s nearly $400m-a-year tourism sector spiralling.

The troubled star told Sky News how his heart repeatedly stopped after being crippled by alcoholism.

In an amazingly candid interview with Sky’s Kay Burley Gazza also revealed how:

:: he was attacked by a group of women during group therapy in the wake of his bust-up with wife Cheryl.

:: he took sleeping pills and alcohol before trying to kill himself in the bath.

:: he drank four bottles of whisky a day or 30 cans of Special Brew

:: he has now found God

After the interview the fallen idol is filmed sobbing as he plays football on the beach with his nephews.
 
Gazza with nephews Cameron and Joe

Gascoigne seeks to explain why he attacked Cheryl, how his son has used him to “show-off” at school and why he won’t drink again.

Burley met Gascoigne in his native North East where he agreed to talk about his darkest days.

He has been sectioned, arrested and hospitalised on a string of occasions since his heyday as an England hero.

The 41-year-old has recently finished a spell in the rehabilitation centre inspired by ex-Arsenal ace Tony Adams.
And I run the bath and I lay in the bath and just felt myself dropping off and I remember just getting ready, like dozing off you know and then the police burst in.

Paul Gascoigne

And he says he is determined to stay clean and sober.

Asked about whether the rumours he had died and been brought back to life were true Gazza confessed: “Last January, three times they revived us a little bit.

He added: “Well my heart failed on us a few times.”

Burley asks him: “Are you telling me Paul that your heart stopped?”
When Kay Met Gazza
See our gallery of when Kay Burley met Paul Gascoigne.

Gazza replies: “I think so yeah, my sister said it did. My dad collapsed, my dad collapsed with worry I think.”

The star spoke of the moments leading up to his infamous attack on Cheryl.

“Well to be fair Kay, if you are sitting in a restaurant and somebody calls your mum a whore, which she did, and for no reason.
 
Gazza of old

“I don’t like that and yes, I got a hold of her arms and I did put my head against her head, I didn’t head butt her but I threw her to the floor and yes I was disgusted with myself for what I did.”

He went on: “I went to therapy; I sat with 15 -20 women and told them exactly what I did.

“I got punched off a few women for doing what I did but I took the punches and I accepted it.”

Gascoigne was joined during the interview by his father John, sister Lindsay and two young nephews.
My mouth was dry and all I could do was nod in agreement, thrusting out the match programme for him to sign.

Sky’s Richard Conway on the day he met Paul Gascoigne

He spoke of his troubled relationship with his son Regan – who he accused of parading him around his school and in assembly.

“I don’t know, I feel like I am being used by my own son here,” he adds.
 
Under the weather

Gazza also details one of his suicide bids.

“I rang my sister just to say, I am going to run a bath. I think she might have had a clue.

“I don’t know if it was a plea for help but I did have enough anyway so I wasn’t bothered.

“And I just said, look I am in the bath and I will always love you, or something like that, and put the phone down.

“And I run the bath and I lay in the bath and just felt myself dropping off and I remember just getting ready, like dozing off you know and then the police burst in. About six police dragged us out of the bath.”

Yusuf Raza Gilani, the prime minister, said Chaudhry would be reinstated as Pakistan’s supreme court chief justice on March 21, the day his replacement was due to retire.

“I announce the restoration of all deposed judges ,including Mr Iftikhar Chaudhry, according to a promise made by the president of Pakistan and myself,” Gilani said on Monday in a televised address to the nation.

He also ordered all lawyers and political activists arrested over the past week to be freed immediately.

Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr, reporting from outside Chaudhry’s residence in Islamabad, said the “decision really has defused tensions and averted a political showdown”.

She said “a lot of Pakistanis will say that this is the beginning of the end of Zardari. … It is also significant that Zardari did not make the [reinstatement] announcement”.

International concerns

In recent days, US officials, including Hillary Clinton, the secretary of state, had spoken to the country’s leaders, urging them to reach a deal.

Washington and other Western nations have been concerned that the crisis would weaken the country’s battle against Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters operating along its border with Afghanistan.

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Al Jazeera’s Imran Khan, reporting from Lahore, said that Monday’s announcement could be seen as an embarrassing climb-down by the government or a move towards national political unity.

But for the several hundred jubilant lawyers and activists gathered outside Chaudhry’s Islamabad residence to celebrate, it was clear how they were taking it: the government backing down in the face of their protests.

Tariq Mehmud, a retired judge and a leader of the lawyers’ campaign, said it was a “victory for those who fought for independence of judiciary”.

But he cautioned that Chaudhry “has to forget the past. He has to forget the conduct of those who were apparently against him as well as us”.

March called off

The government concession came as thousands of protesters led by Nawaz Sharif, the main opposition leader, held a day of protest in Lahore on Sunday, and set off for Islamabad for the climax of a series of protests they had dubbed “the long march”.

To stop them from driving into the capital, the authorities had beefed up security, put the army on alert and positioned containers and trucks across roads outside the city, with violent confrontation appearing inevitable.

In depth

 Video: Pakistan activists launch long march
 Diary: Round one to Sharif
 

Following Gilani’s announcement, Sharif said he was calling off his protest march.

“We are now calling off this long march,” he said from inside his vehicle amid a sea of jubilant supporters in the central city of Gujranwala on Monday.

“Today the nation has received very happy news. We have said that we will restore the judges and the independent judiciary and by the grace of Allah we have achieved it,” he said, adding that “very soon we will play our role in implementing real democracy in this country”.

Sharif, leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party, had thrown his support behind the protest campaign by lawyers and judges, and senior members of his party were quick to claim an emphatic win for the government’s climb-down.

Genesis of crisis

Sharif latched on to Chaudhry’s cause two years ago but the current crisis began when Asif Ali Zardari, the president, ejected the PML-N from power in Punjab last month, after the supreme court barred Sharif and his younger brother Shahbaz from holding elected office.

Chaudhry, the former supreme court justice, was dismissed by Pervez Musharraf, the former president, on November 3, 2007 along with 60 other judges, when Musharraf declared emergency rule in a move to extend his presidency for another term.
Anti-government protesters fought running battles with police in Lahore [AFP]
Most of the judges had since been reinstated after Zardari took over as president six months ago.

But Zardari repeatedly reneged on promises to return Chaudhry to his post with analysts suggesting that he feared the chief justice could pose a threat to his position.

Gilani’s early-morning announcement on Monday on Chaudhry’s reinstatement concluded a day of dramatic developments.

Before dawn on Sunday, hundreds of police surrounded Sharif’s residence in Lahore, carrying an order for his house arrest.

Sharif rejected the order as illegal and later left the house in a convoy of vehicles as police stood by.

Some of the protesters defied police barricades to gather near the city’s main courts complex and pelted riot police with rocks.

Gillian Merrick, 45, has not been seen since she vanished from her home in Oundle, Northamptonshire, on New Year’s Day.

A specialist underwater search team was deployed, as fears grew for her wellbeing.

But officers have now discovered a woman’s body in the River Nene at Tansor, eight miles north of her home town.
She is the glue that holds us together and brings light to the day.

Mrs Merrick’s husband Nick after her disappearance

A post-mortem is due to take place on Saturday but Northamptonshire Police said it could be some time before the body is formally identified as the mother-of-two.

A force spokeswoman said: “Whilst the body has only recently been recovered, and identification procedures have not even begun, investigators believe there is a strong possibility that this could be the body of Gillian Merrick.”
 
Nick Merrick

The spokeswoman said Mrs Merrick’s family had been informed of the discovery.

Following her disappearance, Mrs Merrick’s husband Nick spoke about how much he and their teenage children, Tom and Charlotte, missed her.

In one message, the 49-year-old said: “She is the glue that holds us together and brings light to the day.”

He had told Sky News: “There might be just somebody who hasn’t heard or a barn or a shed or something that has not been looked in.

“She could just be tucked up in a corner there, freezing cold, just waiting for some help … and, if anyone can help do that, it would be joyful.”

A 49-year-old man was arrested after Mrs Merrick’s disappearance before being released without charge

Robert Gibbs, a spokesman for Barack Obama, the US president, said on Friday: “There’s no safer investment in the world than in the United States.”

Gibbs was responding to comments by Wen Jiabao, China’s prime minister, who voiced concern over the outlook of US government bonds, calling on Washington to ease worries about US assets.

Speaking at his annual news conference on Friday, Wen expressed concern that massive US deficit spending and near-zero interest rates could erode the value of China’s bond holdings.

China is the biggest holder of US government debt and has invested an estimated 70 per cent of its $2 trillion stockpile of foreign exchange reserves, the world’s largest, in dollar assets.

“We have lent a massive amount of capital to the United States, and of course we are concerned about the security of our assets,” Wen said.

“To speak truthfully, I do indeed have some worries … I would like, through you, to once again request America to maintain their creditworthiness, keep their promise and guarantee the safety of Chinese assets.”

China concerns

Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, during her visit to Beijing in February, urged China to keep investing in US assets, and said any big switch by Beijing out of US treasury bonds would drive prices lower, inflicting the very losses Wen fears.

In depth

 China aid plan for jobless migrants
 China’s priorities: Key quotes
 Video: China’s job crisis
Thomas Palley, the former chief economist for the US-China economic and security review committee, told Al Jazeera that there was a political and economic dimension to Wen’s announcement.

“The political aspect is to speak within China to the nationalists, the more hardline constituency, and show that China won’t be pushed around on this issue and China is concerned about it.

“The economic dimension is to try to deter American policymakers from taking any strong action to correct the trade imbalance, and particularly the exchange rate problem.”

Philip Bowring, a Hong Kong-based commentator on Asia, said that China could have avoided investing so heavily in US treasuries if they had adopted a different approach to growth.

“China did have a choice of whether they continued their export-driven growth – focused, often very heavily, on the United States – or being more domestically focused, which would have meant they would have grown almost as fast, but wouldn’t have accumulated a large amount of US treasuries,” he told Al Jazeera.

“Naturally they feel a little bit nervous about [holding US treasuries] because it’s not that they’re illiquid, but the conditions under which China can actually sell them are rather limited and the yield on these treasuries is low and tending to decline.”

‘Enough ammunition’

Despite his concerns over US treasuries, Wen expressed confidence the economic recovery plan of President Obama.

Wen, who took questions for over two hours, also used the news conference to further detail China’s own four trillion yuan ($585bn) stimulus package.
Wen voiced concern over the outlook of US government bonds [Reuters]
He had disappointed investors in his annual report to parliament a week earlier by failing to announce an increase in the size of the package, which aims to boost domestic demand and so take up the slack left by a sharp drop in exports.

China has reported a record decline in exports in February and record-low industrial production growth in the first two months of the year.

Wen reiterated his warning, made to the National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s rubber-stamp parliament, last week, that 2009 would be a challenging year for China.

But he said that the government had “prepared enough ‘ammunition’ and we can launch new economic stimulus policies at any time”.

Wen said the central government share of the already-announced $586bn stimulus plan would be used in “projects for public welfare, technological innovation, environmental protection and infrastructure projects”.

With the bulk of that money already allocated in the government budget, he said he was convinced that recovery was within sight.

The stimulus plan also gives a strong boost to social welfare spending, which the government hopes will boost domestic consumption by encouraging Chinese, who typically save about 20 per cent of their income, to spend more.