Refugees head for Europe from Tunisia and Libya

More than 6,000 migrants from North Africa are likely to flood into Europe after Silvio Berlusconi pledged to remove them from a tiny Italian island that has been overwhelmed with an influx of refugees.

Most of the 18,000 migrants who have landed on Lampedusa since the beginning of the year are Tunisian, but Italy fears a far bigger exodus if the situation in Libya deteriorates further.

An Italian assault ship and five ferries will remove the migrants from the island, a speck of land which lies closer to Tunisia than Italy, within the next two days.

They will be taken to tented camps and converted barracks on the Italian mainland but it is expected that most will escape and head for other countries, including France.

Migrants who were transferred to the camps in the past few days were filmed and photographed vaulting wire fences, evading security guards.

Italy faced a diplomatic confrontation with France after an estimated 3,500 Tunisians, most of whom had arrived in Europe via Lampedusa and then escaped from detention centres in recent weeks, massed at the Franco-Italian border yesterday, demanding to be allowed in.

Franco Frattini, Italy's foreign minister, accused Paris of showing "a grave lack of solidarity" in refusing to permit the Tunisians to enter French territory from the border town of Ventimiglia.

Just this week, a group of Eritreans, Somalis and Ethiopians who had been living and working in Libya reached the wind-swept island, which in summer is a popular holiday destination for Italians.

Ministers have warned of a "biblical exodus", saying Italy cannot handle the crisis alone and calling for urgent EU assistance.

Bloggers say they'll have role in new Tunisia

At the height of the Tunisian uprising, dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali tried hard to silence the young bloggers who were driving the protests against him. His security agents arrested, even tortured, some of them and repeatedly shut down their sites.

But two months after Ben Ali's fall, the caretaker government that is to lead Tunisia to summer elections has embraced the very tools its predecessor tried to destroy. It has lifted web censorship. Key ministries - including the Interior Ministry once in charge of the feared political police - now communicate with citizens through Facebook.

Some of the bloggers, once under threat from Ben Ali's secret agents, are courted as heroes. One serves in the interim government, others have been awarded an online media freedom prize and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is to meet with Internet activists during her first post-revolt visit to Tunisia on Thursday.

The bloggers, many of them university graduates in their 20s, believe they have an important role to play in the new Tunisia, as government watchdogs or political activists. "We're not stopping our fight, and we are the first line of defense of freedom," said blogger Wissem Zghaier, 29, who was beaten and tortured during the uprising.

Social media were key to the Tunisian revolt and the anti-government protests it inspired across the Arab world.

Clinton urges reform in post-revolt Egypt, Tunisia

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's trip to the turbulent Middle East highlights the Obama administration's deep concern over developments in Libya and fear that the unrest roiling the Arab world may not produce the changes demanded by increasingly vocal and emboldened anti-government protesters.

Failure to meet those demands for greater economic, political and social freedoms could spark more chaos and complicate the U.S. position in one of the world's most critical regions.

Clinton heads Sunday to Europe and then to the first Cabinet-level U.S. talks with the Libyan opposition and discussions on democratic reform with transitional leaders in post-revolt Egypt and Tunisia.

With Libya embroiled in near civil war and Washington and its NATO allies divided on military intervention, Clinton will discuss options with European officials on Monday in Paris, where she also plans to see foes of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to assess their capabilities and intentions.

The meeting comes as rebels step up calls for the imposition of no-fly zone to deter Gadhafi loyalists from air strikes that have helped the regime retake key opposition-held areas.

Tunisia orders curfew in restive mining town

Tunisia's official news agency says that authorities have ordered a curfew in a central mining town amid simmering unrest following a bout of deadly clashes between police and protesters.

The TAP news agency said Sunday that the 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew has been imposed on Metlaoui, where clashes two days earlier left two people dead and 20 injured.

The military dispersed protesters and made arrests in lingering unrest Saturday, the latest sign of Tunisia's struggle for restore stability after a revolution that deposed an autocratic leader and sparked uprisings in the Arab world.

The protests began amid rumors that the regional phosphate mining company was secretly recruiting in a specific tribal area - instead of opening its jobs to the entire local population. Authorities have denied the rumors.