That, and the downturn in emerging markets that many only recently embraced in the hunt for yield caused by those near-zero rates. It’s easy to identify the date that things changed: May 22, the day that the Federal Reserve first alerted markets that it might soon start “tapering” the $85 billion in monthly asset purchases it has been making since December to juice the economy. And soon looks to be getting even sooner.

A steady improvement in US employment figures — unemployment fell from 7.6 percent in June to 7.4 percent in July — has brought into focus the 6.5 percent unemployment target the Fed set as a prerequisite for raising short-term interest rates. On Thursday, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics released yet another piece of good news on the employment front: New applications for unemployment benefits sank to their lowest levels in six years in July.

That’s great news for Americans who happen to be landing new jobs, but not as pleasant for bond investors worried about rising rates.

Spain is willing to restart a dialogue with Britain and it will accept the creation of ad hoc forums that include Gibraltar and the neighbouring Spanish province Andalusia for issues relating to residents on both sides of the border, Garcia-Margallo said.

"But as Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy observed earlier this month to his British counterpart David Cameron, it is first necessary for the UK to show that it intends to undo the damage that has already been caused, in particular by removing the concrete blocks." The Gibraltar government says the concrete reef in the Bay of Gibraltar will regenerate marine life and argues that the Spanish raked for shellfish there illegally in its waters.

But Garcia-Margallo said Spain had "no doubt" about its sovereignty over the waters, arguing that they were never included in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht under which Spain ceded Gibraltar to Britain in perpetuity.

Mr Hague said the situation in Egypt was "very bleak" and there was only a limited amount Western powers like Britain could do to help resolve it. "We have to do our best to support democratic institutions" without taking sides, he added. He is to meet fellow EU foreign ministers later to discuss Egypt.

Hundreds of people have died in five days of violence between supporters of ousted Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi and the Egyptian military. Egyptian security officials have said that more than 20 police officers have been killed in an attack in the north of the country. At least 36 Muslim Brotherhood prisoners have died while trying to escape during their transfer to a prison outside Cairo.

European Union ambassadors are preparing for a meeting to discuss the crisis in Egypt. On Sunday, European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso and European Council president Herman Van Rompuy issued a rare joint statement warning that the EU would "urgently" review its relations with Egypt in the coming days.

"We will not achieve anything through threats," Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, told reporters through an interpreter during a visit to Paris. The prince spoke after meeting French President Francois Hollande, who on Thursday called for a swift end to a state of emergency imposed by Egypt's military authorities.

EU foreign ministers meet in Brussels this week to review what steps to take following a bloody crackdown since Wednesday on supporters of Mursi, deposed by the military on July 3. More than 800 people have died in the violence.

"If the situation calms down, very good. If on the contrary violence continues, then we can and we probably must take decisions," France's Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told France 2 television on Sunday. He said cutting aid would be difficult, as EU money allowed "Egyptians to eat and receive medical treatment". However, "loans are easier to cut," he added.

Riyadh was a close ally of Egypt's former leader Hosni Mubarak, toppled by a popular uprising in 2011 that brought Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood to power, and has long feared the spread of the Islamist group's ideology to the Gulf monarchies. On Friday, Saudi King Abdullah called on Arabs to stand together against "attempts to destabilize" Egypt, in a message of support for Egypt's military and clear attack on the Brotherhood.

The classrooms were then burned to the ground and the women taken away, attracting a crowd of abusive onlookers. Police told Sister Manal that the nuns had been targeted by hardline Islamists, convinced that they had given Muslim children an inappropriate education. ‘We are nuns. We rely on God and the angels to protect us,’ she said. ‘At the end, they paraded us like prisoners of war and hurled abuse at us as they led us from one alley to another without telling us where they were taking us.’

Siblings Wardah and Bedour, two Christian women employed by the school, also found themselves having to fight their way through the mob while being groped, hit and insulted by the extremists. So far two Christians have been killed since the military-backed government moved against protesters calling for former president Mohamed Morsi’s reinstatement. And dozens of churches, homes and businesses owned by Christians have been attacked and razed to the ground.

‘I am terrified and unable to focus,’ said Boulos Fahmy, the pastor of a Catholic church a short distance away from Manal’s school. ‘I am expecting an attack on my church any time now.’ And Bishop Ibram, head of the local Coptic Orthodox church, said he had instructed Christians and clerics not to resist the mobs of Islamists to try and avoid any loss of life.

Not a word in that statement is true. Washington has taken sides in Egypt and the Arab world. It is on the side of terrorism, extremism, and global Jihadism. Washington took sides when it overthrew Gaddafi in Libya, financed and armed Al-Qaeda terrorists in Syria, and looked the other away as Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood consolidated power in Egypt.

Washington was hoping that the Egyptian military and Egyptian society would quietly go along with their own destruction and be submissive towards an oppressive Muslim Brotherhood dictatorship. But, the reverse happened. The Egyptian people were mobilized by the millions, and Egypt's wise generals acted to preserve the Egyptian state against threats from the Muslim Brotherhood and their bloodthirsty allies in Washington.

Chaos is America's beautiful bride, it is who Washington goes to sleep with and wakes up in the morning with. Chaos is what America wants in the Middle East, not stability, not democracy, not prosperity, not independence, not secularism, not political Islam, not anything. It is creating chaos in all the countries surrounding Israel.

Egyptians don't want chaos. They don't want Al-Qaeda. They don't want terrorism. They don't want the Muslim Brotherhood. And they sure don't want the Evil Empire and Obama lecturing them.

After last week’s bloody crackdown by the Egyptian army, fears of a disruption of oil supplies to the West have boosted the oil price. Brent crude prices were propelled to a four-month high of $111.23 on Thursday. If the turmoil gets worse – or unrest spreads to other countries – the risk premium currently factored into the price of crude is likely to increase further.

Egypt plays a vital role in international energy markets through the operation of the Suez Canal and the Suez-Mediterranean (Sumed) pipeline. These are vital pieces of infrastructure in the global oil market. Last year, about 7% of all seaborne traded oil and 13% of liquefied natural gas (LNG) travelled through the Suez Canal, according to data collected by the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).

The Suez Canal, a 101-mile link between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, and the 200-mile Sumed pipeline are strategic routes for Persian Gulf oil and gas shipments to Europe and North America. Closure of these two routes would add an estimated 2,700 miles of transit from Saudi Arabia to the United States around the Cape of Good Hope, increasing costs and shipping time.

It’s the food banks that are popping up all over the place, even in affluent areas amongst the tree-lined squares where the posh au-pairs languish over frothy lattes and even the hired help do their groceries at the local delicatessen tucked away in some secluded cul-de-sac.

The UK has a problem. No, correction the UK has many problems at the present time economically and socially-speaking, but one of the major problems is the complete failure of the social safety net of the inventors of the welfare state and the national health system that inspired hundreds of countries around the world. There is little else that is growing in the UK at the moment, but one thing growing beyond all expectations is: food aid.

Research carried out by the British charity, the Trussell Trust in conjunction with the Citizens’ Advice Bureau points to the fact that 50% of those that are today using food banks are having to do so because benefit payments and financial aid that is provided by the government has either been withdrawn or is being substantially delayed.

It’s not just the delay in benefit payments and withdrawals that are causing problems but also the fact that there are rising numbers of people who are unemployed and also underemployed in the UK. That means that incomes are falling and the food prices are also increasing at the same time.

There are understood to be some official German concerns that the way Britain marks the centenary could cool relations between the two countries, against a backdrop of possible negotiations over the future of the EU and the UK’s membership of it.

Norman Walter, from the country’s London embassy, said that a “less declamatory tone”, which did not dwell on issues such as who was responsible for the conflict, “would be easier”. He also suggested that commemorations should include a focus on the achievements of the European Union in helping to bring peace to the continent.

The tone of Britain’s commemorations has been the subject of debate, with historians accusing the Government of concentrating too much on the carnage of the conflict and depicting it as accidental and futile out of a desire to avoid upsetting the Germans by appearing triumphalist.

The critics argue that the war was a just, necessary fight for survival against a Germany bent on European domination and, as such, its centenary should see greater attention paid to Britain’s achievements.

Abby Wetherell, who apparently saved her life by playing dead, is among at least seven people injured in five states over just four days when hunters, nature-lovers and runners were attacked by bears. The surge in bear attacks this summer has raised concerns about the dangers of increasing encounters with wild animals, as humans move into bears’ natural habitats to live and vacation.

Abby suffered deep puncture wounds, gashes and bruises when a black bear chased her down as she was running along a dirt track in woods near her grandfather’s cabin. Playing dead is in fact not the usual tactic recommended by experts to escape a black bear, but it seems to have worked for Abby. Black bear attacks on humans are extremely rare and there were not believed to be cubs in the area.

Late summer is the time when bears start to forage and devour large quantities of food to bulk up before the hibernation season so there are usually more attacks as autumn approaches and the animals are at their hungriest. Mother bears are of course also fiercely protective of their young.

However, wildlife experts say that the annual preparations for hibernation and the defence instinct of sows do not account alone for this year’s surge in attacks. Officials at Yosemite national park have noted a 64 per cent increase in encounters between bears and humans over the same time period last year.

His campaign promises were so much better sounding than anyone else’s – no lobbyists in his administration, waiting five days before signing all non-emergency bills so people would have time to read them, putting health care negotiations on C-SPAN, reading every bill line by line to make sure money isn’t being wasted, prosecution of Wall Street criminals, ending raids against medical marijuana in states where it’s legal, high levels of transparency.

Obama’s promises of these wonderful things sounded inspiring and sincere. They sounded so much better than the promises of any other President. So when Obama broke these promises, it felt so much worse than when other Presidents broke their promises.

1) Carried out military interventionism in Libya without Congressional approval

2) Gave a no-bid contract to Halliburton – just like Bush did

3) Has an administration full of lobbyists, after promising he wouldn’t have any

4) Has close ties to Wall Street, but pretends to support Occupy Wall Street

5) Broke his promise to close Guantanamo Bay

6) Supported the $700 billion TARP corporate-welfare bailout just like Bush

7) Waged the biggest war against medical marijuana of any president, which was the opposite of what he had promised

8) Nominated a six-time tax cheater to head the government agency that enforces the tax laws

9) Gave tax dollars to AIG executives, then pretended to be outraged about it

10) Expanded Bush’s unconstitutional government faith based programs

Speaking at Westmead Hospital in Sydney on Sunday, Mr Rudd said those who do not vaccinate their children will not get the Family Tax Benefit A end-of-year supplement. The payment is worth $726 per child, per year and is paid when children are vaccinated at one, two and five years of age.

Since last year, parents who have not immunised their children have not received the benefit; however, those registering as so-called conscientious objectors have. Under Labor's policy, exemptions would only be made on religious or medical grounds.

Labor says it wants to boost immunisation rates and prevent children who are not vaccinated from getting diseases like whooping cough and measles, and putting others at risk. The Government says the science of immunisation "cannot be disputed".

The meeting between Tzipi Livni and Saeb Erekat, chief negotiators for Israel and the Palestinians respectively, was the first act of a new American-brokered negotiating process aimed at ending the Middle East’s most enduring conflicts. The session began hours after Israel released the first 26 of 104 Palestinian long-term prisoners it has agreed to free in the coming months as the price of re-starting the long-stalled talks.

That aim has become progressively more difficult as Israel continues to build and expand settlements, with the result that at least half-a-million Israelis now live on land where the Palestinians want to build a future state.

The issue threatened to de-rail last week’s talks before they even started, when Israel approved plans for 2,200 new homes in seven settlements in east Jerusalem and the West Bank, enraging the Palestinians who briefly threatened to withdraw.

Sources close to Mr Netanyahu linked the new homes to the prisoner releases, saying it had been agreed that Israel would be allowed to continue “limited” settlement building as the price of meeting Mr Abbas’s demand to free inmates with “blood on their hands”. The prisoners’ release was only confirmed after Israel’s supreme court rejected a last minute appeal by the victims’ families to block it.

Amid a general clamour against freeing “terrorists”, some commentators suggested that the prime minister had timed the settlements announcement to appease Right-wingers in his coalition, which includes hard-line settlers who oppose a Palestinian state or even peace negotiations at all.

But Mr Netanyahu also sees settlement expansion as necessary to ensure a permanent Israeli presence in the West Bank, regarded as essential for Israel’s security interests. While the Palestinians have insisted that their future state be based on pre-1967 borders, the Israeli leader regards those frontiers as militarily indefensible. He has said repeatedly that large settlement blocs in the West Bank and East Jerusalem will remain part of Israel under any future deal.

Unrest has reawakened in Egypt after a brief period of stabilization, and with protesters taking to the streets and the death toll mounting, oil prices are soaring over fears of instability. Egypt declared a month-long national state of emergency on Wednesday, following deadly clashes between police and supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi. Local news reported Morsi would be held in detention for another 30 days, which could further fan protest movements.

“Investors can’t ignore such a situation, as in the race for power the Suez Canal will be a weighty asset, the ownership of which will give a chance to one of the parties to come to terms with the outside. This is exactly the background against which oil prices are growing,” Aleksey Pukhaev, of Investcafe, wrote in an e-mail.

Traders are most concerned turmoil in Egypt could escalate to a level where protesters could feasibly disrupt oil and commodity shipping through the Suez Canal, situated about 125 kilometers east of Cairo. “Disruptions at the Suez Canal are unlikely, but markets never move on what’s likely. They move on fear. If people are fearful about supply, they buy even if the market is fundamentally well supplied,” said Michael Hewson, an analyst at CMC Markets.

A crucial trade route, the canal handles 800,000 barrels of crude a day. “If there is any disruption or if the violence results in the shutting down of the canal, the impact will be quite severe," said Carl Larry, president of Houston-based consultancy Oil Outlook and Opinions. Egypt’s military has made safeguarding the Suez Canal and the Suez-Mediterranean Pipeline from protesters a priority.