Investment in infrastructure accounts for much of China's GDP, making the consequences of getting it wrong all the more serious. And with such a large pool of labour, it is harder to put the brakes on when growth slows down and the supply of housing and shops outstrips demand.

"You have got seven to eight million people entering the workforce in China every single year, so you have to give them something to do in order to retain the legitimacy of the government," Doran told the BBC World Service.

"Maybe 10 or 15 years ago they were doing things that made sense - roads, rail, power stations etc - but they have now got to the point where it's investment for investment's sake."

Parents who trust in divine intervention, even after doctors say there is no hope of survival, are putting their children through aggressive but futile treatments, they said.

In an article published in the Journal of Medical Ethics they warned that families with deeply held hopes for a “miraculous” recovery were increasingly being allowed to “stonewall” medical opinion. The doctors, from Great Ormond Street Hospital, called for an overhaul of the legal system to reduce the weight given to parents’ religious beliefs in such cases.

Critics have accused the authors of attempting to “impose” secular values on society, irrespective of religious affiliations.

On August 9, the HMNZS Canterbury ship observed the floating pumice "island" — measuring a whopping 300 miles (482 kilometers) in length and more than 30 miles (48 km) wide — along a voyage from Auckland to Raoul Island, New Zealand. A maritime patrol aircraft, RNZAF Orion, had seen the weird mass and reported it to this Royal New Zealand Air Force ship. Soon after, the HMNZS crew saw the thick mass of porous rocks.

"The rock looked to be sitting two feet above the surface of the waves, and lit up a brilliant white colour in the spotlight. It looked exactly like the edge of an ice shelf," said Lieutenant Tim Oscar, a Royal Australian Navy officer, in a statement.

Pumice, which forms when volcanic lava cools quickly, is riveted with pores due to gas getting trapped inside as the lava hardens. The result: lightweight rocks that can therefore float.

The summit of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation is to take place on Tuesday and Wednesday in the Muslim holy city of Mecca. "The world today is in a very sensitive situation," Ahmadinejad told reporters just before leaving Tehran, according to the Fars news agency.

"Different groups are at work and the enemies are actively pursuing their aims and a great deal of energy is being spent by Islamic governments and groups on arguing and confronting each other," he said. "I hope that the summit will focus on increasing unity and lowering antagonism," he said.

Saudi Arabia hosts the headquarters of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, a 57-member pan-Muslim body. The oil-rich Gulf nation, a close US ally that observes an extreme version of Sunni Islam, supports the mostly Sunni rebels in Syria fighting to overthrow the Shiite-dominated regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Iran, a Shiite state, is Assad's biggest ally and has pledged him full support in his fight, though it denies providing him with soldiers or arms. Tehran, however, accuses Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey of arming and financing the Syrian rebels.

The three countries are linked by deep economic ties, while Japan and South Korea are close allies of the United States.

But as Japan marks the 67th anniversary of the end of the war and its colonization and occupation of its neighbors on Wednesday, a decades-old feud with Seoul over disputed rocky isles turned acrimonious after South Korean President Lee Myung-bak visited the territory last week.

A row with China over islands in the East China Sea has also heated up, while attention is focused on whether members of Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's cabinet will violate his stance against paying homage at Yasukuni Shrine for war dead on Wednesday, seen by many as a symbol of Japan's past militarism.

The dynamics of Japan's relations with its two Asian neighbors differ - Tokyo frets over China's growing military and economic clout while seeking closer security ties with South Korea. But the twin feuds reflect the degree to which the hand of history lies heavily on the region, becoming entangled with modern political pressures.

"Japan has never convinced its neighbors that it has really repented," said Columbia University professor Gerry Curtis, noting persistent skepticism in Beijing and Seoul over Tokyo's repeated apologies for excesses during its occupation of large parts of China and colonization of the Korean peninsula. "And neither China nor South Korea want to let the issues go because they are a way to get political advantage."

This means that the United States, the UK, NATO, and the Gulf State despots of Saudi Arabia and Qatar are knowingly and willfully funding, arming, and politically backing designated affiliates of Al Qaeda contrary not only to US and British anti-terror legislation, but contrary to numerous UN resolutions as well. Western and Gulf State support of the FSA constitutes state sponsorship of terrorism.

Should the UN fail to enforce its own resolutions, while playing host to further sanctions and considerations for military intervention against the Syrian government who is in fact resisting an international terrorist organization, it will have entirely resigned its legitimacy and authority as nothing more than a tool of Western corporate-financier interests. It will also highlight the necessity to expediently remove and replace it – ideally with a system that represents a multipolar balance of global power maintained by sovereign nation-states rather than untenable supranational governance.

There are literally hundreds of thousands of US soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen who were separated from their families for years, faced deadly adversity, injury, mental anguish and even death, because they were told they needed to confront the threat that was international terrorism. Now the very same men they sacrificed so much to fight against are being apologized for and propped up as the new leaders of an entire nation. This is not just being done by politicians or corporate interests, but also by organizations affiliated with the US military itself.

What's more is that US pilots, special forces, sailors, and Marines are being called upon now to help depose Qaddafi - a man genuinely dedicated to ending LIFG's and thus Al Qaeda's reign of terror in Northern Africa. And as LIFG is still listed as an foreign terrorist organization by the US State Department, it is clear that US Congressmen supporting NATO's intervention in Libya, including John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Joseph Lieberman, along with Obama's presidential cabinet, especially Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, are all guilty of knowingly providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization in violation of USC § 2339A & USC § 2339B.

This is an egregious betrayal against both the United States as a nation, and America's armed forces who have been thoroughly made fools of by a government reveling in their duplicity.

Any form of political concession and autonomy from Member States of the euro zone had many political reactions and was considered impossible. Large areas of Europe had previously been very strong, such as the Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire, Frankish Empire, Holy Roman Empire, Ottoman Empire, the First French Empire and Nazi Germany.

In the old times, a peaceful means of some consolidation of European territories used to be provided by dynastic unions; less common were country-level unions, such as the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Largely due to the devastating effects of war many people turned to the idea of some form of unified Europe, notably William Penn, Abbot Charles de Saint-Pierre, Victor Hugo, Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi and Giuseppe Mazzini. Such ideas became greater in Europe following World War I, with the massive loss of life it entailed, but it was not until after World War II those real steps were taken.

Since the European Union has undergone so many changes it is left to be seen if another change will be formed in the coming years OR EVEN MONTHS.