The growing police drug lab scandal could see San Francisco prosecutors dropping as many as 1,400 cases, as well as, hundreds which have place defendants in drug treatment programmes.

According to Brian Buckelew, a spokesman for District Attorney Kamala Harris, the cases that may be dropped include a 1,000 awaiting trial and 400 relating to defendants in drug rehabilitation programmes.

Serbia is "wasting respect" by altering the conditions it offered for a loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the country's central bank chief said in an interview released Wednesday.

"In the IMF they're surprised at the quick change of position by the Serbian government," Jelasic, a frequent and outspoken critic of government economic policies, told the daily Press.

Three international Red Cross staff held captive by Muslim militants in the southern Philippines are still alive and unharmed after deadly clashes between their captors and government troops, a local Red Cross official said Wednesday.

Senator Richard Gordon, chairman of the Philippine National Red Cross, said all reports from Jolo island, 1,000 kilometres south of Manila, indicate that none of the hostages were hurt in the fighting since Monday.

The Red Cross societies of Taiwan and China are to increase cooperation with the signing of an agreement that follows improved relations across the Taiwan Strait, Taiwan's Central News Agency (CNA) said Wednesday.

Chen Shih-kuei, secretary general of the Taiwan Red Cross, was quoted as saying that a pact was to be signed soon in Taipei with China's Red Cross. Their first agreement was signed 19 years ago.

The new agreement is to include cooperation in the areas of medical assistance and sea rescues, Chen said.

The International Committee of the Red Cross described the treatment of Guantanamo detainees as torture in a confidential report in 2007, according a report on Monday.

The group was allowed access to detainees at the US military prison in Cuba as part of its aid work and interviewed high profile detainees who detailed their abuse in harsh interrogations that the report called "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."