Catalonia’s leader Carles Puigdemont indicated that the region could declare independence next week, as he criticised a speech by Spain’s King Felipe VI.

Mr Puigdemont told the BBC on Tuesday that his government would declare independence "at the end of this week or the beginning of next" after a referendum marred by police brutality led to 90% of voters backing a separate Catalan state.

Hundreds of thousands marched through the streets of Catalonia on Tuesday,  in protest of Spain’s violent crack-down during the Catalan independence referendum.

At least 300,000 took to the streets of Barcelona, in protest of the Spanish police actions which saw voters dragged by their hair and shot at by rubber bullets.

Responding to the protests, Spain’s Interior Minister, Juan Ignacio Zoido said,

Iraq’s central bank told the Kurdish Region Government that it would no longer sell dollars to four of Kurdistan’s leading banks and stop all foreign currency transfers on Tuesday.

The announcement came as the KRG announced it will be holding presidential and parliamentary elections on November 1, a move that to consolidate its power in the Kurdistan region following the results of the independence referendum.

The United Nations Human Rights Chief Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein called for an independent probe into Spain’s violent crack-down on the Catalan independence referendum in a statement made on Monday.

Calling for political dialogue to address the unrest, the human rights chief said,

Catalanonia’s president Carles Puigdemont called for international mediation in resolving his parliament’s independence dispute with Spain following a violent crackdown by Spanish authorities during the Catalan independence referendum.

Spanish police have stormed polling stations in Catalonia as voting began this morning in an independence referendum. 

Riot police have seized ballot papers and boxes and physically restrained people trying to vote. 

The United States Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley called for nations to suspend weapons supplies to Myanmar until there were adequate accountability measures in place to deal with the ongoing military violence against the Rohingya Muslims.

Speaking at the United Nations on Thursday, Ms Haley said,

The UN Security Council this week condemned an attack on a UN convoy in Mali on September 24, killing three Bangladeshi UN peacekeepers.

In a statement issued on Tuesday, the Council said its members "condemned in the strongest terms the attack" and added that "attacks targeting peacekeepers may constitute war crimes under international law". 

Kurds in Iraq have voted overwhelmingly in favour of independence, with Monday's referendum results showing 92.73% voted for secession. 

The referendum saw a large vote turnout at 72.61 percent. 

As the final results came through Kurds poured onto the streets of Erbil to celebrate. 

The result was however condemned by Iraq's prime minister, Haider al-Abadi. 

A court in Croatia has convicted a former Serbian paramilitary commander and Australian citizen iof war crimes, sentencing him to 15 years in jail.

Dragan Vasiljkovic, known as Captain Dragan and Daniel Snedden, was found guilty of torturing and murdering civilians during his time as paramilitary leader during the 1991 to 1995 Croatian war. Mr Vasiljkovic holds dual Serbian-Australian citizenship and was working as a golf instructor in Perth.

Myanmar’s security forces are committing crimes against humanity against the Rohingya population in Myanmar, said Human Rights Watch in a statement released Monday.

The rights organisation said the military had committed forced deportation, murder, rape and persecution against Rohingya Muslims in the northern Rakhine State.

An Australian SAS corporal has been cleared of war crimes by the country’s federal police after it emerged he cut the hands off two suspected Taliban fighters during a military operation in 2013.

The soldier was part of a joint Afghan national security service and Australian Special Operations Task Group operation to kill or capture a senior Taliban commander. The mission, in which the target was not captured, left four alleged insurgents dead.

At least 86 skulls have been uncovered by forensic experts in Bosnia last week as they exhumed the site of a mass grave.

Forensic experts found the skulls alongside other body parts in Mount Vlasic, reports Reuters. Serbian security forces summarily executed dozens of Bosnian Muslim and Croat prisoners at the site on 21 August 1992. Survivors told of how they were lined up at the edge of the ravine before being shot.

Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan denounced the Independence referendum in Iraqi Kurdistan and threatened to close the Turkish border with the region this week.

Pledging to stop all exports from the Kurdish Rregional Governemnt (KRG) that passed through the Turkish border, Mr Erdogan said,