President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who triggered outrage in the West two years ago when he said Israel should be "wiped off the map", has often referred to the destruction of the Jewish state but says Iran is not a threat.

"With God's help, the countdown button for the destruction of the Zionist regime has been pushed by the hands of the children of Lebanon and Palestine," Ahmadinejad said in a speech."By God's will, we will witness the destruction of this regime in the near future," he said. He did not elaborate.

Iran often praises the Palestinians for what it says is their resistance against Israeli occupation. Tehran also described the war last summer between Hezbollah in Lebanon and Israel as a victory for the Iranian-backed group.

"If you make a mistake and create another war against the oppressed Lebanese nation, this time the angry ocean of the nations of the region will remove your rotten ... roots from the region," the president said in another speech on Sunday night.

ROME (AP) - Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that U.S. plans to build a missile defense system in Eastern Europe would force Moscow to target its weapons against Europe. The threat, in an interview published Sunday in Italy's Corriere della Sera and other foreign media, marked one of Putin's most strident statements to date against the U.S. plans and came just days before he is to join President Bush and other leaders at a Group of Eight summit in Germany.

In the interview, Putin was asked whether the proposed missile defense shield would compel Moscow to direct its own missiles at locations and U.S. military sites in Europe, as during the Cold War. "If the American nuclear potential grows in European territory, we have to give ourselves new targets in Europe," Putin said, according to Corriere. "It is up to our military to define these targets, in addition to defining the choice between ballistic and cruise missiles."

Russia has not overtly targeted Europe since agreeing after the fall of the Soviet Union not to direct missiles against specific countries, according to Pavel Felgenhauer, an independent military analyst based in Moscow. He added however, that that was simple technical matter, since a missile can be given a target within minutes.

Previously, some Russian military officials have said Moscow could aim Russian weapons at Europe-based missile systems. Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek accused Russia on Sunday of misleading the public about the planned missile defense bases in the Czech Republic and Poland to hide Russia's internal problems.

"Russia needs an outside enemy to hide problems at home," Topolanek said.

Take a look in the average supermarket trolley and the food there will probably have travelled farther than most people clock up in a decade. A selection of just 26 items can have covered a total of 150,000 miles before reaching the British kitchen.

With beef from Brazil, beans from Kenya, apples from New Zealand, chicken from Thailand and strawberries from Spain, shoppers can enjoy year-round produce. But with such astonishing "food miles" being accumulated, it is little surprise that their environmental impact is coming under scrutiny and sparking a backlash.

Already, the major supermarkets are crawling over each other to highlight their "locally sourced" produce, while Marks and Spencer has begun labelling air-freighted products with logos of aircraft. Yet some startling research is emerging that shows food miles might not be as bad as consumers have been led to believe.

Analysis of the industry reveals that for many foods, imported products are responsible for lower carbon dioxide emissions than the same foodstuffs produced in Britain. Even products shipped from the other side of the world emit fewer greenhouse gases than British equivalents.

The reasons are manifold. Sometimes it is because they require less fertiliser; sometimes, as with greenhouse crops, less energy; sometimes, as with much African produce, the farmers use little mechanised equipment. The findings are surprising environmental campaigners, who have, until now, used the distance travelled by food as the measure of how polluting it is.

One study by Lincoln University, in New Zealand, found that 2,849kg of carbon dioxide is produced for every tonne of lamb raised in Britain, while just 688kg of the gas is released with imported New Zealand lamb, even after it has travelled the 11,000 miles to Britain. Researchers and farmers in Britain have raised doubts over the accuracy of the New Zealand figures, but they concede that sheep farming in New Zealand is more efficient than in our own country.

"They have slightly better weather," said Prof Gareth Edwards-Jones, from the department of agriculture at Bangor University, in Wales. "This means their grass can grow for longer and they don't have to give their sheep as much feed as they do in the UK.

"With meat in the UK, there is also a supermarket issue. Each of the supermarkets runs its own abattoir, so if you sell your lamb to Tesco, you have to send your lamb to Tesco's abattoir, even if you pass several local abattoirs on the way. As a result, the meat picks up a huge amount of 'in-Britain' food miles from farm to abattoir then to packaging before it gets to its final destination.

"If we could sort it out so that meat was slaughtered and packaged locally, it could make the whole process far more efficient." On the extensive rolling fields of Pigeon Hills sheep farm, 40 miles from Nelson on New Zealand's South Island, the lush grassland needs little fertiliser to provide food for the livestock. Farmer David McGaveston, 55, rears more than 10,000 sheep and 500 beef cattle for export to the UK.

The style of farming in New Zealand is considered to be less intensive than in Britain because of the large areas of land. Mr McGaveston uses small amounts of hay to help supplement his sheep through the cold winter months and sends his lambs to be slaughtered and packaged at a plant just 40 miles away. Most of the electricity used is also supplied from a hydroelectric plant, which has minimal carbon dioxide emissions.

He said: "I understand the debate that is going on over food miles in the UK at the moment, but if we really are producing meat with less carbon dioxide then that is surely a good thing."
Prof Caroline Saunders, who led the research, said: "Food miles are a very simplistic concept, but it is misleading as it does not consider the total energy use, especially in the production of the product."

When you talk to people in the countryside, as I do, they see Russia in a very different light. True, they did see some sort of stability in the early Putin years, which was a relief after the very hectic and tumultuous Nineties.
But for the past two or three years they have seen a steady deterioration in living standards, and the gap between rich and poor is growing. Everybody can see it.

So people are starting to come out on to the streets in Moscow, St Petersburg and elsewhere. Change is not going to happen overnight but it will happen relatively quickly, and much sooner than anybody expects because this regime is built on sand - it has no real foundation in political or economic structures. Just look at how many repressive measures have been taken lately. The Constitutional Court decided you can be tried a second time for the same crime. Then parliament approved, at a first reading, a new amendment to the law on extremism.

Now your prison term will be longer if they see 'extremist intention' behind your crime. And they are adding something quite ridiculous - people can face criminal charges for 'sympathising with or excusing extremism'. That applies to journalists as well, of course. The FSB, the successor to the KGB, interrogated me for four hours. They were investigating a case of extremism based on interviews I had given.

As far as I could tell, the lieutenant colonel was not ecstatic about having to question me. There was one telling detail. In his office he had two portraits, one of Putin and one of Felix Dzherzhinsky, the founder of the Cheka secret police.

Call a spade a spade: Putin is a dictator. And we want the West to be blunt about it too. I am not saying the West should break off economic ties with Russia. Western corporations make billions of pounds by trading with China and nobody talks about breaking off relations with the Chinese Communist government. But neither do people have any illusions that the Chinese Communists are democrats.

So deal the same way with Putin. You cannot invite Putin to meetings of the world's properly elected leaders. He doesn't belong to G7 - I don't call it G8 because G7 stood for seven great industrial democracies. The G8 is utter nonsense. When Western politicians and experts say the West has no bargaining chips in dealing with Putin, this is not true. The money of his ruling clique is kept abroad, and they won't be indifferent if they are refused entry visas. They will pay attention if the West is serious.

I am not suggesting outright hostility, but simply that the West should recognise who they are dealing with: the Russian elite are rich, they're loaded with money, but they are not the same as Westerners because they do not respect the rule of law.

And so you should make it clear, when Putin is part of a group such as at the Summit between Russia and the EU last month, you should say: 'Mr Putin, your country is a police state and you have to understand that, if you continue down this path, you will be treated as a rogue leader.'

A Gallup poll at the time reported that 53% of scientists actively involved in global climate research did not believe global warming had occurred; 30% weren't sure; and only 17% believed global warming had begun. Even a Greenpeace poll showed 47% of climatologists didn't think a runaway greenhouse effect was imminent; only 36% thought it possible and a mere 13% thought it probable.

Today, Al Gore is making the same claims of a scientific consensus, as do the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and hundreds of government agencies and environmental groups around the world. But the claims of a scientific consensus remain unsubstantiated. They have only become louder and more frequent.

More than six months ago, I began writing this series, The Deniers. When I began, I accepted the prevailing view that scientists overwhelmingly believe that climate change threatens the planet. I doubted only claims that the dissenters were either kooks on the margins of science or sell-outs in the pockets of the oil companies.

Now, after profiling more than 20 deniers, I do not know when I will stop -- the list of distinguished scientists who question the IPCC grows daily, as does the number of emails I receive, many from scientists who express gratitude for my series.

Somewhere along the way, I stopped believing that a scientific consensus exists on climate change. Certainly there is no consensus at the very top echelons of scientists -- the ranks from which I have been drawing my subjects -- and certainly there is no consensus among astrophysicists and other solar scientists, several of whom I have profiled. If anything, the majority view among these subsets of the scientific community may run in the opposite direction.

Not only do most of my interviewees either discount or disparage the conventional wisdom as represented by the IPCC, many say their peers generally consider it to have little or no credibility. In one case, a top scientist told me that, to his knowledge, no respected scientist in his field accepts the IPCC position.

Surely, I can't have been the only Catholic to listen in open-mouthed disbelief as the leader of the Church in Scotland used a sermon to mark the 40th anniversary of the Abortion Act TO INSIST MPS WHO CONTINUE TO SUPPORT IT RISK LOSING THE RIGHT TO HOLY COMMUNION.

BY PRESSURISING CATHOLIC MPS IN THIS WAY, THE CHURCH IS SWAPPING ITS ROLE AS LOBBYIST FOR SOMETHING ALTOGETHER MORE SINISTER. IF IT GETS AWAY WITH THIS, HOW LONG BEFORE THE THREAT OF "EXCOMMUNICATION" IS EXTENDED TO THE POSITION OF CATHOLIC MPS AND MSPS ON OTHER ISSUES SUCH AS CIVIL PARTNERSHIPS OR SEX EDUCATION?

It doesn't take a great leap, either, to imagine it dangled over ordinary church-goers. If Catholic MPs who support the abortion law should surrender the right to Communion then why not the Catholic voters who endorse them?

But the most offensive aspect of the Cardinal's attack is the way it reduces Communion - believed by Catholics to be a sacred gift from God - to a bargaining tool in the political process. And they say MPs are cynical.
In the meantime, the Church continues to be inconsistent in its approach to how political it should be. Earlier this month, Pope Benedict took the opportunity to attack "liberation theology", which emphasises the Christian mission to bring justice to the poor through activism. "IF THE CHURCH WERE TO START TRANSFORMING HERSELF INTO A DIRECTLY POLITICAL SUBJECT, SHE WOULD DO LESS, NOT MORE, FOR THE POOR AND FOR JUSTICE."

But if it's not within its remit to be active on social justice issues, HOW CAN IT JUSTIFY ITS BLATANT ATTEMPT TO HIJACK THE POLITICAL PROCESS OVER ABORTION?

Catholic leaders expect ordinary people to take their lead from the top not the other way around. It has been said Pope Benedict would rather have a Church that consisted of a handful of 'true believers' than one that embraced 'cultural relativists' like me. If he and his cardinals keep up these hardball tactics, if they continue in this affront to democracy, they may well get their wish.

The far-reaching measures include boosting police powers to hold and question suspected terrorists, and allowing wire-tap evidence to be used in British courts for the first time. Brown will also push for an increase in the length of time police can hold terror suspects - one of the most controversial elements of Tony Blair's anti-terror blueprint and one that has consistently been rejected by MPs.

But the Prime Minister-in-waiting also wants to reinforce scrutiny of the way the new powers are used, in an attempt to buy off concerns that human rights are suffering in the drive to protect Britain from the increasing risk of international terrorism.

In the first significant disclosure of one of the key planks of his manifesto for government, Brown told party workers in Glasgow yesterday that ministers "must be vigilant for the benefit of security in this country". "Our security must be strengthened, but we must also strengthen the accountability of our institutions." But Brown's attempts to buy off the civil rights lobby looked destined to fail last night, as pressure groups complained that he was proposing too many powers to tackle the terror threat.

Shami Chakrabarti, director of the human rights group Liberty, said: "We have proposed the use of wire-tap evidence and post-charge questioning as proportionate alternatives to extending pre-charge detention, not in addition to it." "We don't understand why Gordon Brown would even consider reintroducing internment before fully implementing these other measures," said Chakrabarti.

The report has been sent to the pope and church leaders. IT IS THE FIRST TIME THE SECRET INTELLIGENCE SERVICE HAS SHARED ITS INFORMATION WITH RELIGIOUS LEADERS. "We do so because we believe the situation is extremely serious," said an MI6 source.

The report is based on details from MI6 agents stationed in the countries. North Korea is identified as the world's worst repressor of Christians. More than 50,000 Christians are incarcerated in work camps because they refuse to submit to the extreme views rigorously enforced by the country's dictator, Kim Jong-il.

An estimated 40,000 Christians are imprisoned in China for their beliefs. The MI6 analysis calculates there are some 70 million "active Christians" in the People's Republic, all living in a climate of fear because of their beliefs.

Hamas' Al-Aqsa TV reported the ceremony of kindergarteners of the Islamic Association in Gaza. The video, with translation, was made available by the Middle East Media Research Institute, or MEMRI, in Washington, D.C. The host of the show urges viewers, "Stay with us to watch this performance by the children of Palestine."

The boys chant: "ALLAH AKBAR. PRAISE BE TO ALLAH. ALLAH AKBAR. PRAISE BE TO ALLAH. ALLAH AKBAR. PRAISE BE TO ALLAH. ALLAH AKBAR. PRAISE BE TO ALLAH. WHO IS YOUR ROLE MODEL? THE PROPHET. WHO IS YOUR ROLE MODEL? THE PROPHET. WHAT IS YOUR PATH? JIHAD. WHAT IS YOUR PATH? JIHAD. WHAT IS YOUR MOST LOFTY ASPIRATION? DEATH FOR THE SAKE OF ALLAH. WHAT IS YOUR MOST LOFTY ASPIRATION? DEATH FOR THE SAKE OF ALLAH."

Hamas, which won a majority in the Palestinian parliament in January 2006 elections, officially is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. government. Responsible for scores of suicide bombings, shooting attacks and rocket firings, the group's official charter calls for the destruction of Israel.

As 'WND reported earlier this month, Palestinian children are being entertained and indoctrinated on television by a Mickey Mouse-knockoff WHO TEACHES THEM TO FIGHT FOR ISRAEL'S DESTRUCTION AND ISLAM'S DOMINATION OVER THE ENTIRE WORLD.

"We, tomorrow's pioneers, will restore to this nation its glory, and we will liberate Al-Aqsa, with Allah's will, and we will liberate Iraq, with Allah's will, and we will liberate the Muslim countries, invaded by murderers," the mouse character says.

WND reported in March an online forum tied to the website of Hamas posted a photo of a little girl in a combat vest and the head band of the terrorist Al-Qassam Brigades. "Have you seen the new child martyr who will soon shake Israel [to the core]?" says the caption, according to the Middle East Media Research Institute blog

The message accompanying the photo on the Shabakat Falastin Lilhiwar online forum says the girl "is part of the Muslim generation which will go down in history as a generation that refused to accept humiliation and defeat."

Hamas launched a children's website in 2002, encouraging kids to follow the example of terrorist suicide bombers.

Full article and video see http://www.worldnetdaily.com

The epicentre was in the city of Pu'er, and thousands are now being evacuated from the region, which is near the border with Laos and Burma. Some buildings collapsed, and communications are difficult, the state news agency Xinhua reported. We estimate 120,000 people will have to be evacuated," a local official at told the AFP news agency.

About 30,000 people live in the old city of Pu'er, and tremors were felt up to 200km (120 miles) away.

Three men were arrested and one was being sought in Trinidad on Saturday. In an indictment charging the four men, one of them is quoted as saying the foiled plot would "cause greater destruction than in the Sept. 11 attacks," destroying the airport, killing several thousand people and destroying parts of Queens, where the line runs underground.

One of the suspects, Russell Defreitas, a U.S. citizen native to Guyana and former JFK employee, said the airport was a symbol that would put "the whole country in mourning.""It's like you can kill the man twice," Defreitas said, according to the indictment.

The plot never got past the planning stages. It posed no immediate threat to air safety or the public, the FBI said Saturday. "The devastation that would be caused had this plot succeeded is just unthinkable," U.S. Attorney Roslynn R. Mauskopf said at a news conference, calling it "one of the most chilling plots imaginable."

The arrests mark the latest in a series of alleged homegrown terrorism plots targeting high-profile American landmarks. A year ago, seven men were arrested in what officials called the early stages of a plot to blow up the Sears Tower in Chicago and destroy FBI offices and other buildings. A month later, authorities broke up a plot to bomb underwater New York City train tunnels to flood lower Manhattan. And six people were arrested a month ago in an alleged plot to unleash a bloody rampage on Fort Dix in New Jersey.

The first point is that it would never happen. There are no Israeli organisations - governmental or freelance - that would contemplate such a thing. That fact is itself significant. But just suppose that some fanatical Jews had grabbed Mr Johnston and forced him to spout their message, abusing his own country as he did so. What would the world have said?

There would have been none of the caution which has characterised the response of the BBC and of the Government since Mr Johnston was abducted on March 12. The Israeli government would immediately have been condemned for its readiness to harbour terrorists or its failure to track them down. Loud would have been the denunciations of the extremist doctrines of Zionism which had given rise to this vile act. The world isolation of Israel, if it failed to get Mr Johnston freed, would have been complete.

If Mr Johnston had been forced to broadcast saying, for example, that Israel was entitled to all the territories held since the Six-Day War, and calling on the release of all Israeli soldiers held by Arab powers in return for his own release, his words would have been scorned. No one would have been shy of saying so. THE CAUSE OF ISRAEL IN THE WORLD WOULD HAVE BEEN IRREPARABLY DAMAGED BY THUS TORTURING HIM ON TELEVISION.

BUT OF COURSE IN REAL LIFE IT IS ARABS HOLDING MR JOHNSTON, AND SO EVERYONE TREADS ON TIP-TOE. Bridget Kendall of the BBC opined that Mr Johnston had been "asked" to say what he said in his video. ASKED! IF IT WERE MERELY AN "ASK", WHY DID HE NOT SAY NO?

Throughout Mr Johnston's captivity, the BBC has continually emphasised that he gave "a voice" to the Palestinian people, the implication being that he supported their cause, and should therefore be let out. One cannot imagine the equivalent being said if he had been held by Israelis.

Nobody yet knows the precise motivations of Mr Johnston's captors, but it is surely not a coincidence that they held him in silence until the 40th anniversary of the Six-Day War approached, and only then made him speak. They wanted him to give the world their historical explanation - Israeli oppression - for their cause.

YET THAT WAR TOOK PLACE BECAUSE PRESIDENT NASSER OF EGYPT LED HIS COUNTRY AND HIS ALLIES DECLARING "OUR BASIC AIM WILL BE TO DESTROY ISRAEL". He failed, abjectly, and Egypt and Jordan later gave up the aspiration. But many others maintain it to this day, now with a pseudo-religious gloss added.

WE KEEP GIVING SYMPATHETIC AIR-TIME TO THEIR DEATH CULT. In a way, Mr Johnston is paying the price: his captors are high on the oxygen of his corporation's publicity.

As for Israel, many sins can be laid to its charge. But it is morally serious in a way that we are not, because it has to be. Forty years after its greatest victory, it has to work out each morning how it can survive.

"There are massive assaults on police officers at the city's harbor right now," police spokeswoman Cordula Feichtinger said. "The situation is currently very chaotic and we have to get it under control before I can tell you how many people have been arrested." Feichtinger said one police officer was injured slightly but remained on duty.

The officially permitted march in the northern town of Rostock comes four days before world leaders gather at nearby Heiligendamm for the G-8 summit. The march began without violence, and most of the demonstrators remained peaceful. But some taunted members of the 13,000-strong police detachment from around Germany, and several hundred wore the bandanas across their faces with sweat shirt hoods pulled down low to obscure their identities.

The protesters from around Europe and the rest of the world gathered at two locations early in the day for rallies, then marched in two groups along 4-kilometer (3 mile) routes to converge on the harbor for the main demonstration - the biggest so far against the June 6-8 summit in the northern resort town of Heiligendamm. Police put the size of the demonstration at 20,000. Police with body armor and riot helmets lined the path, and helicopters swirled overhead.

The protest was organized by several dozen groups under the motto "another world is possible." "The world shaped by the dominance of the G-8 is a world of war, hunger, social divisions, environmental destruction and barriers against migrants and refugees," organizers said in leaflets handed out on the streets. "We want to protest against this and show the alternatives."

Khaled Mashaal's political deputy, Moussa Abu Marzouk, was one of several senior Hamas leaders who were in Cairo over the past week for talks with Egyptian officials on ways to calm Palestinian infighting and ongoing fighting with Israel.

"We may agree to a one-year cease-fire," Abu Marzouk was quoted as saying in an interview with the state-owned daily Al-Ahram." Both parties have to abide by it."
Abu Marzouk, who along with Mashaal lives in exile in Syria, demanded that Israel also agree to a truce with Hamas, saying the only way for success was calm on both sides.

Over the past two weeks, Hamas has launched more than 250 Kassam rockets that have a range of about 10 kilometers (six miles), many slamming into the border town of Sderot. Three Israelis have been killed by the rockets. In a telephone interview from the Hamas political office in Syria, Mohammad Nazal confirmed that Hamas is considering a truce. "Some private ideas were presented to Hamas (by Egyptian mediators) to reach a truce with Israel, and Hamas is about to undertake the suitable decision," Nazal said.

Earlier Saturday Vice Premier Shimon Peres said that "IN SPITE OF THE PERCEPTION IT IS TRYING TO CREATE, HAMAS'S SITUATION IS BAD."
Peres told Israel Radio that the economic situation in Gaza was difficult, chaos was ongoing and that governance in Gaza is carried out through "a rule of gangs." "We are talking about a war of nerves," said Peres, "and Israel has strong nerves."

Lord Winston claimed the vast profits being made have led doctors to exploit women desperate for a baby, offering them unnecessary or overpriced treatments. More than 30,000 women sought IVF help last year, with each cycle of treatment costing up to £8,000, in a sector estimated to be worth £500million a year.

Lord Winston, professor of fertility studies at Imperial College London, said: "One of the major problems facing us in healthcare is that IVF has become a massive commercial industry. "It's very easy to exploit people by the fact that they're desperate and you've got the technology which they want, which may not work."

Lord Winston said: "Amazing sums of money are being made through IVF. It is really rather depressing to consider that some IVF treatments in London are charged at ten times the fee that is charged in Melbourne, where there is excellent medicine, where IVF is just as successful, where they have comparable salaries.

"So one has to ask oneself what has happened. What has happened, of course, is that money is corrupting this whole technology." Lord Winston also criticised the fertility watchdog, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, for failing to protect vulnerable women and adequately inform couples of the treatments available. He said: "The regulatory authority has done a consistently bad job."