NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory spotted the summer's first 'X' solar flare on Friday - a huge outburst from the sun right at the top of the scale.

This came on the back of 12 'M' flares in just six days, with an M6.1 flare knocking out radio signals across the planet on Thursday - hinting at the destruction the sun could reign on our technology if Earth takes a full blast across its bow.

The sunspot group behind the flares - named as AR1515 - stretches across 118,681 miles (191,000km) of the sun's surface. This makes it's width more than 15 Earths set end to end, said NASA solar astrophysicist C Alex Young

In a biennial speech to Russian ambassadors, Putin also took a shot at the West by condemning any unilateral actions to solve international disputes and underlined the importance of resolving such conflicts through the United Nations.

His remarks suggested that Russia, a veto-wielding permanent member of the Security Council, would keep on defending ally Syria at the United Nations over its military crackdown on a popular uprising that has evolved into an armed insurgency.

Speaking in Tokyo, Clinton said an admission by UN mediator Kofi Annan that his peace plan was failing should serve as a "wake-up call for everyone". As to the future of Assad, the state secretary said it should be clear that "the sand is running out of the hourglass". Meanwhile the Syrian president accused Washington on Sunday of fuelling the bloody uprising in his country by partnering with "terrorists".

President Francois Hollande said Monday that growth in the first half of this year is expected to be "nil." Yields, or borrowing rates, have been falling on French medium and long-term bonds in auctions over the past couple of months, as investors flock to the perceived safety of Europe's larger economies.

After ignoring the sanctions and then receiving their exemption, PressTV reports tonight that China is to invest in developing north and south Iranian oil fields (which will produce 700,000 barrels per day of crude).

One of the oil fields, Azadegan, has one of the world’s largest oil deposits, with in-place oil reserves estimated at 42 billion barrels – enough to tide China over for a while – as Iran’s Oil Minister Rostam Qasemi adds after 10-15 years of negotiations the decision has finally (and coincidentally very timely) been reached as “the Chinese side has started its activities by investing $20 billion in the oil fields”.

His intervention follows the publication last month of the Church of England’s response to the Government’s consultation on same-sex marriage. The document warned the move would threaten the established status of the Church, labelling the plans “divisive” and “essentially ideological”.

This weekend Dr Williams faced a series of questions on the proposals in a meeting of the General Synod, the Church’s governing body, in York. “There have also been discussions between Home Office and Church House officials.” He added: “The basis of the mandate for changing the state’s understanding of marriage given the lack of any commitment in the election manifestos of the main parties has been one of the many issues raised in those discussions.” The Church’s official response to the proposals to introduce same-sex marriage has fuelled a growing internal row over homosexuality which surfaced on Friday night as the leadership was also trying to avoid a second split, over the appointment of women bishops.

Ian Stubbs, an Anglican priest from Glossop, Derbyshire, delivered a petition to Dr Williams and Dr Sentamu, signed by almost 4,000 people who object to the church’s refusal to endorse homosexual marriage. The Government’s proposals — which ministers intend to make law by 2015 — have also been strongly opposed by the Roman Catholic Church, the Chief Rabbi, and the Muslim Council of Britain. But other religious groups, including the Jewish Reform and Liberal movements, have backed the plans.

Drought conditions are present in 56 percent of the continental US, according to the weekly Drought Monitor. The Drought Monitor noted that the drought is starting to "take a significant toll" on food supplies. "In the primary growing states for corn and soybeans, 22 percent of the crop is in poor or very poor condition, as are 43 percent of the nation’s pastures and rangelands and 24 percent of the sorghum crop."

Rain and cooler temps are forecast for many areas in mid-July but over the summer "drought is likely to develop, persist or intensify" across much of the Ohio and Tennessee valleys, the Corn Belt region, the Mississippi Valley and much of the Great Plains, the weather service said Thursday in its latest Seasonal Drought Outlook.

In Tennessee, the severity of the drought has been reported by county farm agents sending comments to the National Agricultural Statistics Service office in Nashville, the Associated Press reported. "Crops have really begun to suffer and go backwards this week. Rain is needed yesterday," wrote agent Richard Buntin in Crockett County. Crops and pastureland are "burnt to a crispy crunch," wrote Kim Frady of Bradley County. "Need rain," in Loudon County, added John Goddard. "Saw a farmer digging a waterline about 4-5 feet deep. Nothing but powder!"

German President Joachim Gauck urged Chancellor Angela Merkel on Sunday to explain her euro policies in a remark interpreted as criticism from the outspoken former civil rights activist whose nomination she tried to block. Speaking about the euro crisis, Gauck, in an interview with the public television station ZDF broadcast, said: "She now has the duty to explain in great detail what it means, also in fiscal terms."

Politicians in general sometimes didn't communicate their polices enough, he said. "Sometimes it's hard to explain what it's about. And sometimes there's a lack of energy to tell the population very openly what is really happening." Although the chancellor's office had no immediate comment on the advice, it is unlikely to be well received by Merkel, who tried unsuccessfully to prevent Gauck from becoming president in March.

Gauck is not the only politician in the country who feels the chancellor has a lot more explaining to do. Opposition politicians have said they believe her center-right coalition is trying to push too many serious euro-related issues through parliament without explaining them fully or giving lawmakers enough time to discuss them. Her latest policies will come before the Federal Constitutional Court on Tuesday. The court will rule on a fast-track petition for a temporary injunction against the permanent euro rescue fund, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), and the fiscal pact.

Gauck became president in March. His role is largely ceremonial but he can wield influence through public statements and speeches and by refusing to sign legislation.

It's in the nature of things that there is occasionally disagreement between the court and the political world. The court's job is to ensure that the government sticks to the guidelines laid down in the German constitution. Politicians, on the other hand, don't appreciate it when the court portrays them as underhanded rogues who bend the constitution to conform to their backroom deals. It also doesn't help matters that the court's judges generally enjoy a level of popularity that many politicians can only dream of.

Since the eruption of the euro crisis, however, there has been more at stake than the usual vanities. If the court's landmark ruling on the European Union's Lisbon Treaty is also taken into account, the judges in their trademark red robes have already crossed Merkel three times in the last few years. The Karlsruhe decisions read like indictments of a chancellor who, in the judges' opinion, is ignoring the basic rules of democracy with her bailout policies.

Citizens applaud them for their decisions, and it is of course the judges' job to keep the executive in check when necessary. There are those in Berlin, however, who increasingly suspect that the court is in league with those populists and euroskeptics who are fundamentally opposed to the project of European integration.

Merkel's people, at any rate, are already planning for the possibility that the Karlsruhe court will stop a further transfer of power to Brussels. One option would be to convene a constitutional convention, which would then establish A COMPLETELY NEW LEGAL BASIS FOR THE STATE.

The proposal was a tentative first step towards a European banking union that could eventually feature a joint deposit guarantee and a bank resolution fund, to prevent bank runs or collapses sending shock waves around the continent. The leaders agreed that the euro zone's permanent bailout fund, the €500 billion ($620 billion) European Stability Mechanism, would be able to inject capital directly into banks on strict conditions once the joint supervisor is established.

But the rush to put first elements of such a system in place by next year may come too late. Deposit flight from Spanish banks has been gaining pace and it is not clear a euro zone agreement to lend Madrid up to €100 billion in rescue funds will reverse the flows if investors fear Spain may face a full sovereign bailout.

Many banks are reorganizing, or being forced to reorganize, along national lines, accentuating a deepening north-south divide within the currency bloc. An invisible financial wall, potentially as dangerous as the Iron Curtain that once divided eastern and Western Europe, is slowly going up inside the euro area. With ever-higher unemployment and poverty levels in southern countries, a political backlash, already fierce in Greece and seething in Spain and Italy, seems inexorable.

But for now, Europe's financial disintegration seems to be moving faster than the forces of financial integration.

Last November, the prime minister of tiny Luxembourg announced his plans to quit, SAYING THE JOB WAS TOO STRESSFUL. After almost eight years as head of the 17-member eurozone, Juncker had had enough.

"I WORK FOUR HOURS A DAY FOR THE EUROGROUP. I'd rather have that time for myself," said Juncker following the most recent EU summit last week.

Juncker, who took office in 1995, is the longest serving prime minister in the European Union. Twenty years ago, he helped co-found the common euro currency. The oft grumpy-looking Juncker has the ability to mediate between the Eurogroup's large and small, rich and poor countries.

Germany and Indonesia have had diplomatic ties since 1952. Considering the Southeast Asian island nation's strong economic growth (which is over six percent) and its young population, the spotlight is on economic ties - especially against the backdrop of the euro crisis.

German exports to Indonesia rose in the year 2011 to 5.3 percent, while the volume of Indonesian imports to Germany even rose by 16.8 percent. Haryo Aswicahyono of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Jakarta is convinced that Indonesia is becoming an increasingly attractive destination for foreign investors - especially for ones from Germany. "Because of its high growth rates, Indonesia needs a lot of capital goods - for example for the construction of factories and machines. Considering quality, this is where Germany has a strong advantage. In the energy and mining sectors, there are many promising possibilities for investment," Aswicahyono told DW.

"We do have a plan to close the Strait of Hormuz," state media quoted General Hasan Firouzabadi as saying Saturday. "A Shiite nation (Iran) acts reasonably and would not approve interruption of a waterway … unless our interests are seriously threatened," Press TV quoted him as saying.

The comments by Firouzabadi, the chairman of Iran's Joint Chiefs of Staff, come days after the European Union enforced a total oil embargo against Iran for its refusal to halt its uranium enrichment program.

“The head of the oil products exporters’ union,” reports Reuters, “said the agreement between the exporters’ union, Iran’s central bank, and the oil ministry would get around a European Union ban on shipping insurance for tankers carrying Iranian oil.”

“In accordance with the agreement,” said Hassan Khosrojerdi, the exporters’ union head, ”it is planned that 20 percent of Iran’s oil exports will go through this private consortium.”

The impact of a decade of conflict on Britain’s hard-pressed Armed Forces is revealed in new Ministry of Defence figures. A study of the 1,472 new cases of Servicemen and women seeking help in the first three months of the year shows some clear trends. Female personnel are twice as likely to suffer mental ill-health, and lower ranks are more vulnerable than officers.

Today’s problems seem to be obvious and as more soldiers leave the regimental system and find themselves in civilian life they will not have their friends close at hand. ‘Only they really appreciate the difficulties of spending so long on the frontline.’