Local groups in the southern Philippines are demanding an overarching review of U.S. involvement in the region after the death of a Filipino civilian on Wednesday.

Al Qaeda has vowed to launch a new wave of attacks against targets inside the United Kingdom if British officials deport a known terror suspect back to his home country of Jordan. 

The United Nations wants to send 300 observers to Syria after 30 are set to arrive next week, in order to monitor the cease-fire that appears to be faltering, a spokesman for U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan said Friday.

Annan’s spokesman, Ahmad Fawzi, told reporters in Geneva there would be 30 observers in Syria next week, with the goal of ratcheting the number up to 300, according to The Associated Press.

Moving 300 UN observers into Syria would still need to be approved by the UN Security Council.

The Senate Appropriations Committee allocated nearly the same amount for the 2013 Pentagon budget that President Obama has requested, but there’s one caveat: the panel put nearly $5 billion more in the war budget.

The committee said Thursday its Defense Department spending will include $93.3 billion in overseas contingency operations (OCO), which funds the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, an increase of $4.9 billion from the Pentagon’s $88.4 billion request.

With the shift, the committee’s overall $604 billion allocation for the base Pentagon budget and OCO is essentially in line with the Pentagon’s budget request.

Military investigators are still piecing together the circumstances that led to the fatal crash of an Army Blackhawk helicopter in Afghanistan on Thursday. 

The Department of Veterans Affairs is boosting its mental health staff by 1,900 to help the growing number of soldiers returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki announced the new hires Thursday, which include 1,600 mental health clinicians and 300 support staff.

“As the tide of war recedes, we have the opportunity, and the responsibility, to anticipate the needs of returning veterans,” Shinseki said in a statement.

Tehran announced a number of areas in the Persian Gulf would be off limits to U.S. warships in the region, and would treat any incursion into those waters as threat to Iran. 

The Obama administration has called the photos “reprehensible” and condemned them, and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta apologized Wednesday.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told Congress on Thursday that Russia has begun cooperating with the U.S. and its allies to stop Syria's violent suppression of anti-government forces.