In their shadow, plumbers, electricians and truck drivers, sometimes numbering in the thousands, go dutifully about their work, all clad from head to toe in white hazmat suits. Their job - cleaning up the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl - will take decades to complete.

Reporters, also in radiation suits, visited the ravaged facility Saturday for the first time since Japan's worst tsunami in centuries swamped the plant March 11, causing reactor explosions and meltdowns and turning hundreds of square miles (kilometers) of countryside into a no man's land.

Eight months later, the plant remains a shambles. Mangled trucks, flipped over by the power of the wave, still clutter its access roads. Rubble remains strewn where it fell. Pools of water cover parts of the once immaculate campus. Tens of thousands of the plant's former neighbors may never be able to go home. And just as Hiroshima and Nagasaki become icons of the horrors of nuclear weapons, Fukushima has become the new rallying cry of the global anti-nuclear energy movement.

Currently, 43 of Japan's 54 nuclear reactors are shut down, either because of mechanical problems or routine inspections, which must be conducted every 13 months. Local approval is required to restart nuclear power plants, even after routine inspections, and local leaders fearing repercussions at the polls have been loath to provide it.

TEPCO announced two weeks ago there will be enough power to see the country through the winter, but after that, the effect of the nuclear crisis on electricity production could become even more acute. If political resistance remains as high as it is now, every nuclear reactor in Japan could be offline by May.

The remarks by Dagong's chairman, Guan Jianzhong, to be broadcast in an interview with al-Jazeera on Saturday morning, come at the end of another week of deep turmoil for the world economy. Dagong, which has maintained a pessimistic outlook on US fiscal policy, has been leading the charge to downgrade US debt over the last 12 months, lowering the US rating from AA to A+ a year ago.

In August it downgraded US debt again, to A. Days later, Standard & Poor's followed in its wake, becoming the first western agency to downgrade US debt after the threat of a default was narrowly avoided following weeks of political squabbling in Washington over whether President Obama should be allowed to raise the US debt ceiling.

Guan's intervention comes as another embarrassing political standoff over budget policy looms in Washington. The cross-party "supercommittee" given the job of finding ways to cut the budget deficit is reportedly deadlocked, with Republicans refusing to countenance the tax rises being suggested by Democrats. The committee is due to report by 23 November, but there are fears they could fail to reach agreement, prompting a new crisis.

Founded in 1994 by the Chinese government and the People's Bank of China, Dagong is the only credit ratings agency in China that grades foreign sovereign debt and bonds. In an interview with Talk to Al-Jazeera, Guan agrees that it is almost inevitable that his agency will cut America's debt rating once again, arguing that the only solution open to the US economy is further quantitative easing.

The dramatic reduction in export activity is not the only sign of a slowdown in the once fearsome dragon economy. Experts warn China is incubating both a banking crisis and a massive property crash. China's Communist leaders, eyeing a bailout of the euro, may instead have to spend much of their US$3.2trillion foreign reserves solving problems at home. Japanese investment bank, Nomura, forecasts a one in three chance that China GDP growth, or national output, will drop to under five per cent in the next three years.

It describes this as a "hard landing" for an economy currently enjoying healthy growth of nine per cent. Like Europe, China is groaning under a huge pile of debt. It has been growing fast because the majority of its GDP comes from investment in fixed assets such as spending on new rail lines and infrastructure. Nomura reckons China's over investment and excess credit has stored up deep financial problems for the future. The nation's debt-to-GDP ratio could be as high as 1.8 times, the bank said. That is the same ratio as Greece's.

The Communist Party dodged the global recession resulting from the credit crunch by unleashing a huge flood of credit into the system. Between 2009-10 the nation's banks doled out a record 17.5 trillion yuan (1.7 trillion pounds) of new loans. By mid 2009, Beijing was in the midst of a construction boom that was replicated across China. Yet central and provincial government departments that borrowed the cash for make-work projects forgot all about the principle of supply and demand.

China is now littered with questionable monuments to the state-engineered credit boom. A high speed railway costing 200 billion pounds is losing 10 million pounds a day. In July, one of the bullet trains crashed into another, killing 39 passengers. The nation's banks are beginning to count the cost of the construction splurge. Investment bank, Credit Suisse, estimates up to 60 per cent of Chinese banks' capital could be wiped out by bad debt. If banks were forced to disclose the true extent of the holes in their balance sheets the result could be a catastrophic loss of confidence in the Asian giant's financial system.

The European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) last week announced it had successfully sold a 3 billion euros 10-year bond in support of Ireland. However, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal that target was only met after the EFSF resorted to buying up several hundred million euros worth of the bonds.

Sources said the EFSF had spent more than 100 million euros buying up its own bonds to help it achieve its funding target after the banks leading the deal were only able to find about 2.7 billion euros of outside demand for the debt. The revelation will be seen as a major failure and a worrying sign of future buyers strike after EFSF officials and their bankers had spent recent weeks travelling the world attempting to persuade key investors, including China's national wealth fund and Japanese government funds, to buy its bonds.

Chinese and Japanese money was crucial to last year's first bond sales by the EFSF, but they have since been dismayed by the eurozone's failure to resolve the worsening debt crisis and alarmed at how fund has morphed from being a rescue facility for European banks into a potentially 1 trillion euros leveraged first-loss insurer for eurozone governments. Other European Union funds are also understood to have supported the EFSF's bond sale. The failure of the EFSF will increase pressure on the European Central Bank to effectively become the lender of last resort for the eurozone, a move it has strongly resisted.

The European elite have no intention on giving up on a united Europe. Rather, they hope to be able to bring to life a new "United States of Europe" out of the ashes of the existing eurozone. Over the coming months we will see widespread panic and fear all across Europe. The euro will likely sink like a rock and there will probably be huge financial problems in Europe and all around the globe. But for the European elite, a great crisis like this represents a golden opportunity to tear down the existing structures and build new ones. The solution that the European elite will be pushing will not be to go back to the way that Europe used to be. Instead, they will be pushing the idea of a much more tightly integrated Europe really hard.

Of course it will not be called "the United States of Europe", but that is definitely what they have in mind. But they know that the people of Europe will never go for this solution unless they feel enough fear and pain first. Right now, the stage is being set for the coming financial crisis in Europe. All over the EU, media outlets are priming Europeans to expect the worst. For example, the following comes from an article in the Telegraph:

"The collapse of the eurozone would cause a crash that would instantly wipe out half of the value of Europe's economy, plunging the continent into a depression as deep as the 1930s slump, the president of the European Commission has warned. PREPARATIONS were under way last night for the break-up of the euro as Europe's debt crisis spiralled out of control. As Treasury officials worked through the night to soften the impact on Britain, David Cameron warned that the single European currency was facing its "moment of truth". Business Secretary Vince Cable went further and spoke about "Armageddon" while Brussels officials warned that the chaos threatened to plunge us all into a new recession."

If you can believe it, many among the European elite may actually be looking forward to the collapse of the current eurozone structure. Why? Well, it will give them the opportunity to implement something new. A financial crisis is only temporary, but many among the European elite believe that they can build a "new Europe" which will last for ages.

Right now, the people of Europe are not ready to go along with the whole "new Europe" thing. So that means that there is going to have to be a lot of chaos, pain and fear first. A financial collapse is most definitely coming to Europe.

It is going to be tremendously unpleasant. But after it is over, the European elite are hoping that they will finally have what they have always wanted - a "new Europe" that is more tightly integrated than it has been at any point since the fall of the Roman Empire.

According to more than a few observers, Gadhafi's plan to quit selling Libyan oil in US dollars - demanding payment instead in gold-backed "dinars" (a single African currency made from gold) - was the real cause. The regime, sitting on massive amounts of gold, estimated at close to 150 tons, was also pushing other African and Middle Eastern governments to follow suit.

And it literally had the potential to bring down the dollar and the world monetary system by extension, according to analysts. French President Nicolas Sarkozy reportedly went so far as to call Libya a "threat" to the financial security of the world. The "Insiders" were apparently panicking over Gadhafi's plan.

"Any move such as that would certainly not be welcomed by the power elite today, who are responsible for controlling the world's central banks," noted financial analyst Anthony Wile, editor of the free market-oriented Daily Bell, in an interview with RT. "So yes, that would certainly be something that would cause his immediate dismissal and the need for other reasons to be brought forward [for] removing him from power."

According to Wile, Gadhafi's plan would have strengthened the whole continent of Africa in the eyes of economists backing sound money - not to mention investors. But it would have been especially devastating for the US economy, the American dollar, and particularly the elite in charge of the system.

- Report warns the UK could slip into negative growth over next six months

- PM says the Treasury is planning for all eventualities

- France and Spain could be next to face contagion as Italy borrows another 2 billion pounds in order to stave off bankruptcy

- UK growth expected to slow to 0.7% by end of this year and 0.6% in 2012

- In the eurozone, growth is expected to be 0.5% next year

David Cameron said the Treasury was planning for 'all eventualities' and warned eurozone leaders they have to act now or face a 'moment of truth' that will leave the world in a worse position than the 2008 credit crunch. With fears that the euro could collapse altogether, Business Secretary Vince Cable said that such an outcome would unleash an 'Armageddon scenario' that would drag British banks down as well.

With Italy forced to borrow 2 billion pounds more yesterday to stave off bankruptcy, fears were growing last night that France and Spain will be the next to face contagion from the debt crisis as the interest they have to pay on their debts crept inexorably upwards. The burgeoning crisis spread yesterday when the EU admitted that the debt disaster is now obliterating the prospects of healthy economic growth in Europe.

Officials in Brussels painted a grim picture of the UK's economic prospects for the next two years, warning 'contraction in GDP in at least one of the next few quarters cannot be ruled out' - code for a double dip recession. Meanwhile, the contagion continued to spread. The price Spain pays to borrow - known as its bond yield - is already worryingly high at 5.85 per cent, while storm clouds are starting to gather around France. The interest rate on French debt reached 3.4 per cent compared to Britain's 2.2 per cent and Germany's 1.75 per cent.

The proposal would see a formal "union within a union" created, but would lead to a significant deterioration in Britain's influence in Europe. David Cameron is drawing up urgent plans to stop Britain being "railroaded" into agreeing to decisions taken by the new eurozone bloc.

France and Germany are understood to want to strengthen the union between eurozone countries with new taxes and legal measures to stop nations borrowing and spending too much in future. Weaker countries such as Greece could even be barred from the new eurozone, under radical suggestions from some of those involved in discussions over the plan. It comes amid growing concerns that France could be the next nation to become embroiled in the single currency crisis.

Gordon Brown, the former prime minister, said France was "in danger of being picked off by the markets in the coming weeks and months". Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, has warned Mr Cameron that unless he accepts unconditional changes to the Lisbon Treaty a split will take place, leaving Britain isolated and in a voting minority within the EU.

China had offered help in return for European support to grant it either more influence at the International Monetary Fund, market economy status in the World Trade Organisation, or the lifting of a European arms embargo, said the sources, both of whom have direct knowledge of the matter, including one who has ties to the leadership in Beijing.

The IMF route would have been the simplest diplomatically, especially after European Union leaders last month laid out a plan to leverage up the resources of its crisis-fighting fund through an IMF-backed investment vehicle. But the sources in Beijing say that this option was abruptly closed to China when it became clear to EU politicians that any investment from China would be contingent on gaining a greater say in IMF decision-making and a more rapid path to inclusion of China's yuan in the IMF's special drawing rights (SDR) currency unit.

Increasing China's say at the IMF would mean reducing EU representation and possibly diluting the influence of the US, which enjoys veto-power status given its voting rights at the Fund. "We are willing to help, but we are not a charity," the source with leadership ties told Reuters, requesting anonymity due to political sensitivities.

It was Wednesday, the day after the political fate of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi appeared to have been sealed, and people were astonished - and deeply concerned. Many had felt that the financial markets would cheer the approaching departure of the Italian premier. But they were sadly mistaken. Instead of declining, the interest rates Italy must pay for new sovereign bonds rose sharply on the day after Berlusconi announced he would soon resign. Yields on 10-year bonds were intermittently as high as 7.45 percent. Portugal and Ireland turned to the bailout fund for assistance when their bonds reached that level in 2010.

Even after the announced departure of Il Cavaliere, Italy - it became clear this week - remains the biggest threat to the euro zone. The question of whether the currency area will survive hinges on the country, the euro zone's third-largest economy. Italy's debts exceed 1.9 trillion euros ($2.58 trillion), which is 120 percent of the country's annual economic output. Only in Greece is the debt-to-GDP ratio higher.

Short-term spikes in bond interest rates, of course, are not a huge problem. But should investors continue to demand record returns, the Italian budget will face tremendous burdens. Next year alone, Italy will have to refinance 300 billion euros in maturing bonds. Furthermore, the Italian economy is also sluggish and expected to grow by only 0.5 percent this year. By comparison, the German economy is expected to end 2011 with 3 percent growth.

Italy's economic and debt problems remain real. Rome's progress toward solving those problems is crucial for the survival of the European common currency.

The county, once a leading industrial hub in the US Deep South, filed for bankruptcy court protection after failing to reach final agreement on terms of a preliminary deal with creditors led by JPMorgan Chase & Co in September to settle $3.14 billion in sewer-system debt. Federal Judge Thomas Bennett in Birmingham set a December 15 deadline on Thursday for a hearing on whether the county is eligible to file for Chapter 9, the section of the US Bankruptcy Code that covers municipal bankruptcies.

In another key hearing, set for November 21, Bennett will rule on an emergency motion from John Young, a receiver appointed by the Jefferson County Circuit Court to manage the sewer system on behalf of creditors, for relief from an automatic stay in order to try to keep his control over the sewer system.

"It's critical to the reorganization efforts of Jefferson County that the bankruptcy court keeps the automatic stay in place and affirms the county's rights to set rates, gain control of the sewer revenues and control of the sewer system," said Kenneth Klee, a bankruptcy expert whose law firm, Klee, Tuchin, Bogdanoff & Stern LLP, is representing the county.

For the roughly 660,000 residents of Jefferson County, which includes Birmingham, the state's largest city, bankruptcy means a threat to essential jobs and services. More immediately, it could also mean steep sewer system rate hikes, an added burden on poor people already saddled with some of the highest rates in the country.

But meaningful restrictive measures are not likely to happen, say many analysts, considering China's close relationship with Iran, in part to satisfy China's great thirst for oil. Today, Chinese and Russian diplomats announced that they believe no new sanctions on Iran are necessary.

"The Chinese-Iranian relationship has, in fact, been deepening over the last few years," notes Michael Singh, a former senior director for Middle East affairs at the National Security Council during the Bush administration. The Chinese government not only dilutes the sanctions in the United Nations Security Council by sort of providing Iran with diplomatic cover, but it doesn't enforce the sanctions it even does agree to in the Security Council."

China is Iran's largest trading partner, and this year alone business between the two is estimated at $40 billion, enough of an incentive, say analysts, to block any meaningful Security Council action. Some in Congress are calling on the Obama administration to try and do more.

"What China's doing, as I understand, it is avoiding the kind of economic squeeze we want to put on Iran that could force it not to go forward on nuclear weapons and that's a disgrace and we ought to be much tougher with China than we've been," New York Democratic Senator Charles Schumer told Fox News.

The International Atomic Energy Agency says the "very low levels of iodine-131 have been measured in the atmosphere over the Czech Republic" and elsewhere on the continent. Its statement on Friday said the current levels do not seem to pose a public health risk.

IAEA says the cause is not known, but it is not the result of Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, which spread radiation across the globe in March. The agency says the radioisotope will lose much of its radiation in about eight days and that the agency is investigating.

This morning the interest rate - the yield - on one year loans to the Italian government rose from 6.4% to 6.63%, and there was a rather smaller rise to 6.79% in the rate on 10-year loans or bonds (before a slight retreat back to 6.76%). These are (again) euro era highs for these implicit interest rates - very worrying for a government with more than 1.8 trillion euros of debt.

What this means is that the cost for Italy of borrowing is becoming dangerously close to the 7% threshold, which the precedent of Ireland, Portugal and Greece suggests would mean that Italy would be unable to avoid an official rescue. To put it in simple terms, if Italy had to pay an average interest rate of 7% on the whole of its debt - which would only happen over years, since it borrows at fixed rates for fixed periods - that would add a crippling 70 billion euros to its annual interest bill.

The subtler, more important point, is that when the implicit interest rate rises to that kind of level, investors know that a country with big debts can't afford to repay what it owes, so they stop lending to said country, they go on strike. No one wants to lend to a country when that country would use the loan to pay the interest on previous loans - that's throwing good money after bad.

To state the obvious, a lenders' strike would be lethal for a country like Italy, which has to borrow 362 billion euros next year (according to Bloomberg data) simply to pay interest and existing debts falling due.

Little wonder that for years now France and Germany have got into the habit of hatching pre-summit meetings, to try to agree it all in advance. But as the sovereign debt crisis has intensified, a problem has emerged. Germany is strong, France relatively weak, and often they agree about almost nothing. So in the past few weeks a kind of politburo has emerged.

Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Nicolas Sarkozy have been joined by one other democratically elected leader - Jean-Claude Juncker, the Prime Minister of Luxembourg, who also happens to chair meetings of eurozone finance ministers. Also at the table are five others chosen by their peers: Jose Manuel Barroso and Ollie Rehn from the European Commission; Herman Van Rompuy from the European Council; Mario Draghi, the new president of the European Central Bank; and all the way from Washington (but really from France) Christine Lagarde, the head of the IMF.

President Sarkozy, for example, spoke this week of a much more clearly defined two-speed Europe, with federalism and total integration at its heart. But Mr Barroso, president of the European Commission, was quick to reply. A split union, he said, will not work. Neither a union with an integrated core but a disengaged periphery; nor a union dominated by an unhealthy balance of power. What is clear is that a very different European Union will emerge from the sovereign debt crisis.