According to the Washington Post, Congress must start a formal impeachment inquiry.

"By just about any standard but, apparently, his own, the president pretty plainly lied under oath in a court proceeding and repeatedly in public thereafter about the nature of his relationship with [Monica] Lewinsky," says the paper.

Censure

It dismisses censure as a slap on the wrist, but this is the New York Times' preferred course of action.

Feeding the video round the world

The Times calls the tape "riveting" and picks up on Mr Clinton's "canny use of humour along with winning flashes of charm". It prefers to see the broadcast as serving a "health civic purpose"

"The Clinton Presidency has become such a mess that the public needs to review as much of the evidence as possible in order to respond intelligently," says its Tuesday morning editorial.

The paper "continues to favour, for the time being, a negotiated settlement involving censure by Congress," provided the president abandons "publicly and without qualification" the contention that he did not lie under oath about his sexual relationship with Ms Lewinsky.

USA Today continues to maintain a tough line - calling for the president's resignation - despite publishing a poll which claims two-thirds of respondents do not want him impeached.

"Damning indictment"

"Either Clinton was purposefully abusing the legal process to serve his own needs -- a damning indictment of a sitting president -- or he honestly believes that truth is a fungible commodity whose value is determined solely by the current needs of Bill Clinton," it says in its editorial.

"Either way, his performance is a national embarrassment."

The Times of India's report on the Clinton testimonial is less than forgiving about the president's obvious discomfort while answering prosecutor's questions.

With the headline, "Clinton evades direct replies in testimony", the Times report focuses on the president's failure to be pushed on the meaning of the term "sexual relationship".

His apparent memory lapses also come in for harsh criticism.

Other newspapers in India - where the tape was shown on all networks - said that the broadcast was extraordinary, and looked ahead to the possible repercussions on the psyche of the American public.

Other early editions predicted the president's political survival.

The Internet version of the South China Morning Post said that the long-awaited testimony showed the USA an image of its president acting like a president - an image the publication said the country had "begun to lose sight of".

Lebanon broadcasts live

On TV ... from Times Square

In Lebanon, the private Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation appeared to be the only station in the Middle East carrying the Clinton video coverage.

Elsewhere in the Middle East, viewers were glued to television sets in homes and coffee houses, watching CNN.

"I disapprove of broadcasting the tape because I think it is purely an attack on the Democrats and it will not serve any good for the United States of America," said publisher Usama Sha'shaa, in the Jordanian capital, Amman.

Europe shuns voyeurism

The testimony was broadcast in many European countries on national and satellite channels, often with accompanying voiceover in the local language.

... to a Tokyo bar

In Greece, treatment of the affair was contrasted with the situation when the late Prime Minister, Andreas Papandreou, was reported to be having a relationship with a younger woman, who he eventually married.

"They say the United States is a mature democracy and a serious country and you have a spectacle like this," said Giorgios Dedemadis, a maths teacher.

In Germany, train stations with TVs were ordered to change channels so children waiting for trains wouldn't hear the sordid details.

Among politicians, the broadcast was generally regarded as another unnecessary attempt to drag President Clinton through the mud - with Chancellor Helmut Kohl saying he found the whole business "makes me throw up."

In Italy, where the testimony was broadcast on two channels, one with a voiceover in Italian, the reaction was similar.

"Everything they're doing is ridiculous," said Andrea Amedeo, a student in Rome.