Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested in New York

A number of Wall Street protesters have been arrested in New York during scuffles with police as they marched towards the city's financial district.

The confrontation came after activists averted a showdown with authorities who agreed not to move them from a park. Demonstrators said officials' plan to clean Zuccotti Park, where they have been based for weeks, had been a ploy to evict them. The protests against corporate greed have spread to other US cities.

Several demonstrations are reportedly planned this weekend in Canada and Europe, as well as Asia and Africa.

'Be warned'

Fourteen arrests were made on Friday in Lower Manhattan. The protesters were surprised and delighted by the authorities' decision to delay the clean-up, and celebrated by drumming and chanting. Lindsay Anderson, a young New Yorker, told it was a testament to how effective a non-violent protest can be.

Hip hop magnate Russell Simmons, founder of the Def Jam recording label, told me: "So I'm not going to jail today? I had faith in Mayor Bloomberg to do the right thing." Simmons helped clean up the park overnight with the protesters. In the Colorado city of Denver on Friday, around two dozen demonstrators were detained as police removed their tents in Lincoln Park near the state Capitol.

And 10 Occupy Seattle protesters were held on Thursday when they ignored orders to leave their tents in the city's Westlake Park, said police.

Earlier, New York deputy mayor Cas Holloway released a statement from Zuccotti Park's owners, Brookfield Properties. "They are postponing their scheduled cleaning of the park, and for the time being withdrawing their request from earlier in the week for police assistance during their cleaning operation," it said. The statement said Brookfield hoped to "work out an arrangement with the protesters that will ensure the park remains clean, safe [and] available for public use".

An estimated 3,000 protesters streamed into the green space earlier. News of the authorities' climbdown prompted cheers. Activists had sent an email to supporters on Thursday asking them to join the group and "defend the occupation from eviction".

Defence Secretary Liam Fox quits

Defence Secretary Liam Fox has resigned after a week of pressure over his working relationship with friend and self-styled adviser Adam Werritty.

Fox was being investigated amid claims he broke the ministerial code. In a letter to David Cameron, Fox said he had "mistakenly allowed" personal and professional responsibilities to be "blurred". Cameron said he was very sorry to see him go. Transport Secretary Philip Hammond will replace Fox.

Labour said Fox had not upheld the standards expected of ministers and his departure had been "inevitable".

The defence secretary has been under pressure since it emerged that Werritty, a lobbyist, had met him on 18 foreign trips despite having no official role.

Werritty, a former flatmate of Fox and the best man at his wedding, handed out business cards suggesting he was his adviser and was present at meetings Fox had with military figures, diplomats and defence contractors.

Raj Rajaratnam's insider trading

Nobody likes a know-it-all. But that's exactly what Raj Rajaratnam, the former boss of the hedge fund Galleon, was. He made it his business to know about corporate events before they happened, tapping his wide network of tipsters and coworkers for details, and then buying or selling short the stocks. In May he was found guilty of 14 counts of securities fraud and conspiracy. Today a judge sentenced him to 11 years in jail. That is the longest sentence ever handed out for insider trading. Previously, the record was ten years-held by another Galleon employee, Zvi Goffer, and Hafiz Muhammad Zubair Naseem, a former Credit Suisse banker sentenced in 2008. Government prosecutors alleged that Rajaratnam "is arguably the most egregious insider trader to face sentencing in a federal courthouse in the United States." It's the biggest insider-trading ring that regulators have ever uncovered, involving at least 20 people and $72m in gains and losses avoided.

The government was hoping to see Rajaratnam go to jail for at least 20 years, but his team of well-paid defence lawyers fought fiercely to reduce the sentence he was handed, apparently to some success. They stressed that significant jail-time would be "tantamount to murder" for the 54-year-old Rajaratnam, since he has advanced diabetes. They also said the generous cheques he wrote to charities in New York and his native Sri Lanka should be taken into account. The judge was sympathetic to these points, and factored them into his sentence-a lesson, perhaps, to anyone considering insider trading that they give away much of their gains.