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SWAT VALLEY, Pakistan (CNN) -- The boys shuffle into the room in a remote army base high in the mountains of Pakistan's Swat Valley. They are disheveled, disoriented.
These boys say they were kidnapped by the Taliban and trained to be suicide bombers.
There are no smiles, their eyes stare at the floor. These are the lost souls of Pakistan's battle with the Taliban.
Each has a story of terror to tell, but the trauma runs so deep they can't even begin to properly find the words to describe what they have been through.
That task is best left to the psychiatrist who, with her team, was brought in to try to pick through the pieces of this nightmare; to make sense of the brutality here and try to put broken lives back together. Watch Stan Grant's report on the boys »
Dr. Fareeha Peracha describes these boys variously as "psychotic," "depressed," and in some cases, "psychopathic."
"They have been brainwashed. Brainwashed against people like you and me," she said.
CNN was given limited access to about a dozen boys.
They had all been kidnapped by the Taliban and taken to camps where they would be trained to kill; trained to be suicide bombers. source: cnn.com

Like an aspiring indie band, the Cybraphon has many instruments, plays them on an irregular schedule, likes to have an audience around it -- and obsesses over comments on its blog, the number of friends it has on Facebook and how many fans follow it on MySpace.
The Cybraphon plays music based on how well its blog and social networking pages are doing.
The difference is that it is a handcrafted musical robot and one whose emotion meter swings from delirium to desolation based on its online popularity at any given moment.
"The Cybraphon has an almost egotistical desire for fame," says Simon Kirby, one of the creators of the robot.
When the needle hits rapture, the Cybraphon's built-in orchestra of mechanized acoustic instruments clang in harmony to belt out an upbeat tune. But without online attention it slips into dejection and spews out a sad melody.
Three U.K. based artists -- Kirby, Ziggy Campbell and Tommy Pheron -- built the robot over eight months using a £5,000 grant. It's a mechanical marvel that stuns with its attention to detail and construction. An antique wardrobe houses more than 60 robotic components including musical instruments such as cymbals and an organ as well as electronic parts including a PC and a controller. Kirby and his colleagues first created a sketch of what they wanted and then sourced the parts from antique stores, junk shops and donations.

The Cybraphon's emotions are accessible via a Twitter feed but also appear on a on a 100 year-old galvanometer housed in the wardrobe (pictured above).

Kirby says the Cybraphon is devised as a "tongue-in-cheek comment on people's obsession with online celebrity." And it is almost Julia Allison-esque in its quest for attention. The device scours the web all day looking for mentions of itself and tracking how many friends it has on Facebook and MySpace. source: cnn.com

Michael Jackson's mother Katherine will become the permanent guardian of her son's three children, a Los Angeles judge has ruled.
The 79-year-old has been caring for Prince Michael, 12, Paris, 11, and seven-year-old Prince Michael II since the singer's death on 25 June.
The ruling follows an agreement with Jackson's ex-wife Debbie Rowe, mother of the two eldest children.
The pop star nominated his mother to raise his children in a 2002 will.
In a surprise move, a lawyer for Jackson's dermatologist, Arnold Klein, tried to enter objections to the parenting of Jackson's children at the hearing.

Lawyer Mark Vincent Kaplan said Dr Klein wanted to "have a voice" in issues concerning the children's "education, healthcare and welfare".
But Superior Court Judge Mitchell Beckloff quickly dismissed the claim, saying Dr Klein did not have any legal standing.
He added that the dermatologist would have to file a formal request if he wanted to challenge the agreement.
Custody rights
Jackson said in a 2002 will he wanted his mother to raise his children
Dr Klein's objection is likely to stir up fresh speculation following tabloid claims that he is the biological father of Jackson's two children with Rowe.
His lawyer told the judge that biology was not the reason for his client's concern. "Legally, he is not a presumed parent," Kaplan said. source: bbc.com

Four suspects accused of planning to carry out a terrorist attack on a military base in Australia were arrested in early morning busts across Melbourne on Tuesday, authorities said.
Some 400 federal police officers took part in the pre-dawn raids in Melbourne.
Police executed 19 search warrants in nine Melbourne neighborhoods as part of the investigation into the group, which is suspected of having ties to Al-Shabaab, a Somali insurgent group with ties to al Qaeda, authorities said.
The suspects planned to storm the Australian base with automatic weapons and carry out a "sustained attack on military personnel until they themselves were killed," said Tony Negus, deputy commissioner of the Australian Federal Police.
Details about the suspects began to emerge Tuesday afternoon, with police confirming that a 25-year-old man from Glenroy was charged with conspiring to plan a terrorist act. He was expected to appear in court later in the day, authorities said.

A fifth man, a 33-year-old already in custody on other matters, was being interviewed, police said. source: cnn.com

Losses at nationalised bank Northern Rock have grown by 24% amid mounting losses on its mortgage loans.
Losses at the bank totalled £724.2m in the first six months of 2009, compared with £585.4m in the first half of 2008.

The Newcastle-based lender said that 3.92% of its mortgage loans were more than three months in arrears, well above the national average of 2.39%.

The first bank to seek emergency aid, it was nationalised in February 2008, and owes the government £10.9bn.
It had to be bailed out by taxpayers in 2007, when its model of borrowing short-term funds from wholesale markets to lend to mortgage borrowers was hit by the credit crunch.
Taxpayers are currently nursing a pretty hefty loss on their ownership of the Rock
Robert Peston, BBC business editor
Read Robert Peston's blog
BBC business editor Robert Peston said that there were tentative signs that Northern Rock may be over the worst.
But he added that its mortgages were continuing to go bad at an alarming rate and at a faster rate than most of its rivals.
The bank said the total value of all of its loans had fallen by £602.2m in the first six months of the year. source: bbc.com

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton landed in North Korea early Tuesday on a mission to negotiate the release of two American journalists imprisoned there since March, according to the country's state news agency and a CNN source.
Former U.S. President Bill Clinton is shown at an environmental summit in Seoul, South Korea, in May.
1 of 2 The North Korean news agency KCNA did not disclose the purpose of the visit in its three-line dispatch. But a source with detailed knowledge of the former president's movements told CNN late Monday that Clinton was going to seek the release of Laura Ling and Euna Lee, both reporters for California-based Current TV -- media venture launched by Clinton's former vice president, Al Gore.

Meeting Clinton were the vice president of North Korea's Supreme People's Assembly, Yang Hyong Sop, and Kim Kye Gwan, the vice foreign minister, KCNA reported, adding that "a little girl presented a bouquet to Bill Clinton."
The women were arrested while reporting on the border between North Korea and China and sentenced in June to 12 years in prison on charges of entering the country illegally to conduct a smear campaign.
Since the United States has no diplomatic relations with North Korea, efforts to resolve the issue so far have been handled through Sweden, which represents U.S. interests in the reclusive communist state. Watch what may lie behind the pick of Bill Clinton »source: cnn.com

The head of Formula One's leading team faces a court appearance after being charged with speeding.

Ross Brawn's court appearance has been delayed until the start of September.
Ross Brawn, who has guided his British-based Brawn GP outfit to the top of both the drivers' and manufacturers' standings this season, is accused of reaching a speed of 100 miles per hour in his Mercedes on a road limited to 70mph on May 30.

The 54-year-old was clocked by police on England's A30 road at Sourton, near Okehampton, Devon, the UK Press Association reported on Tuesday.

Brawn did not appear at Plymouth Magistrates' Court on Monday as he is out of the United Kingdom during F1's four-week summer break, preparing for his team's next race in Spain on August 23. No plea was entered to the charge, PA said.

The case will be heard on September 4, with Brawn's legal team having been granted an adjournment.

The pilot of a Thai plane has been killed and seven passengers injured as it skidded off the runway while landing on the tourist island of Koh Samui.
The Bangkok Airways flight, carrying 72 people, hit an old and unmanned control tower amid reports of heavy rain.
The plane had taken off from the southern Thai town of Krabi, another popular tourist destination.
Officials said many of the injured were tourists. Hospital sources told the BBC four Britons may be among those hurt. source: bbc.com

Iran confirmed Tuesday the arrest of three American hikers who crossed into the country from neighboring Iraq and said they have been charged with "illegal entry," a semi-official news agency reported.
Sarah Shourd, like the other two hikers, is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley.
1 of 2 The three were arrested in the western Iranian city of Marivan, the deputy governor of Kurdistan province, Iraj Hassanzadeh, told the Fars News Agency.
Earlier, Swiss diplomats in Iran and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington had urged Iran to provide information on the hikers.
"Obviously, we are concerned," she said. "We want this matter brought to a resolution as soon as possible and we call on the Iranian government to help us determine the whereabouts of the three missing Americans and return them as quickly as possible."
The three American friends -- seasoned travelers who are former students at the University of California, Berkeley -- had been hiking along with a fourth companion through parts of Iraq's Kurdistan region last week.
On Friday, when the fourth companion stayed behind at a hotel in Sulaimaniya, Iraq, the three others apparently crossed the unmarked border with Iran and were detained.
source: cnn.com