As a result of the ongoing economic crisis the Mafia is also cashing in with its traditional money-raising means of loan sharking - charging extortionate interest rates to hard-pressed businesses who are unable to raise funds. According to a report titled Criminality's Grip On Business, the various Mafia groups across Italy make a profit of around 116 billion pounds a year - a figure equivalent to seven per cent of the country's GDP.

It is a massive amount of money leaving the economy and passing from businesses straight into the pockets of gangsters.

The report said that 'every minute' a business or commercial activity was directly affected by organised crime - with no part of the country escaping, and with a surge of activity in the capital Rome. Marco Venturi, president of Confesercenti - an association of small and medium-sized companies, and publisher of the report - described the Mafia as 'the biggest bank in the country' with liquid assets of more than 50 billion pounds.

Mr Venturi added that, as a result of extortion and loan sharking, more than 190,000 businesses had been forced to shut in the past three years alone.

He explained that Rome was the prime city targeted by organised crime gangs, with the Sicilian Mafia, Naples Camorra, Calabrian N'drangheta and the Sacra Corona Unita from the Puglia region all having an active 'financial interest' in the capital city.

The deployment, which will only include five troops so far, comes after a report of a massacre was refuted by the United Nations, and also as South Sudan continues to accuse the Sudanese government of preventing it from shipping oil more efficiently. It also comes just days after President Obama announced his intention to sell weapons to the South Sudanese government's "People's Liberation Army" saying that the sales would be a key to "world peace."

South Sudan's independence from the north was finalized in July, and the indications from this week suggest they are well on their way to being a modern US client state, complete with massive internal unrest and US deployments of "advisors."

Two assailants on a motorcycle attached a magnetic bomb to the car of an Iranian university professor working at a key nuclear facility, killing him and wounding two people on Wednesday, a semiofficial news agency reported. The attack in Tehran bore a strong resemblance to earlier killings of scientists working on the Iranian nuclear program. It is certain to reinforce authorities' claims of widening clandestine operations by Western powers and allies to try to cripple nuclear advancements.

The bomb killed Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, a chemistry expert and a director of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran, the semiofficial Fars news agency reported. Iran's Atomic Energy Organization said the country's nuclear path would not change despite the killing, which it branded a "heinous act". "Our path is irreversible," Arabic language al-Alam TV quoted an agency statement as saying.

Tehran has accused Israel's Mossad, the CIA and Britain's spy agency of engaging in an underground "terrorism" campaign against nuclear-related targets, including at least three slayings since early 2010 and the release of a malicious computer virus known at Stuxnet in 2010 that temporarily disrupted controls of some centrifuges - a key component in nuclear fuel production. All three countries have denied the Iranian accusations. But Israeli officials have hinted about covert campaigns against Iran without directly admitting involvement. On Tuesday, Israeli military chief Lieutenant General Benny Gantz was quoted as telling a parliamentary panel that 2012 would be a "critical year" for Iran - in part because of "things that happen to it unnaturally."

At least the backdrop to the heated exchange was glamorous. The venue for the mid-December conference, which was hosted by the US Chamber of Commerce, was the Hotel InterContinental in Athens. Poul Thomsen, wearing a purple tie, was standing on the floor of the ballroom. Thomsen, the International Monetary Fund's envoy for Greece, summarized the country's reform efforts to date in harsh terms. "Reforms are running behind schedule in most areas," he said. There was no longer even a pretense of hope. When Thomsen predicted that the economy would shrink in 2012, someone in the room shouted angrily: "Your troika is destroying us!"

Two years after the crisis began, the Greek tragedy is reaching a new climax. The economic data are distressing, the reforms are progressing very slowly, and now negotiations with private lenders on a voluntary writedown of Greek government bonds appear to be on the rocks.

The Greek economy was actually expected to shrink by only 3 percent in 2011. But according to current calculations the contraction was closer to 6 percent. Hopes that the economy will regain strength in 2012 will probably remain unfulfilled. Instead, it will most likely continue its downward slide - for the fifth year in a row. It is becoming more and more apparent that without general debt relief that includes all groups of creditors, from private banks to the European Central Bank (ECB), Greece will hardly be able to free itself from its predicament.

But the Greek government and the so-called troika, consisting of the European Union, the IMF and the ECB, are determined to stick to their current strategy. IMF envoy Thomsen plans to return to Athens next week, and he is already starting to ramp up the pressure. In light of the country's gloomy economic outlook, the troika wants to revise the benchmark figures for the restructuring program approved in October.

Nevertheless, even German politicians are slowly realizing that the current strategy is not sustainable. "It is quite possible that we will also have to write off some of the Greeks' debts," says Gerhard Schick, financial policy spokesman for the Green Party in the German parliament. "After all, it doesn't make sense to demand debt repayments that can never be made."

In Greece, where the crisis started over two years ago, the government is in a race against time to agree a bond-swap deal with banks that is crucial to a new 130 billion euro bailout package from European partners and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Without that package, Athens faces the threat of a debt default in March. But talks with the banks and investment funds that are being asked to accept 50 percent losses on their Greek bonds to help pay for the bailout have dragged on for weeks, sowing doubts about whether Athens can really deliver.

"The risk of a disorderly Greek default is once again on the rise, with the threat of contagion to Italy and others," economists at Barclays Capital said last week. Compounding the challenge, both Greece and France face elections within months that could complicate decision-making at the national level in two key states and thwart the broader bloc's ability to act swiftly at a time when pressure is high to bed down agreements sealed at an EU summit last month. A key element of the summit package was a deal to funnel 200 billion euros to the IMF, money that could be used to offer precautionary credit programs to Italy and possibly Spain.

The Greek election, expected by the end of March, seems unlikely to produce an outright winner, meaning coalition talks could drag out and prolong uncertainty. In France, polls suggest there is a good chance President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has steered Europe's crisis response along with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, could be pushed out of office by his Socialist challenger Francois Hollande.

A cut in France's triple-A credit rating in the weeks ahead could also upset the delicate Franco-German balance, although some economists believe it could force the French to accept more far-reaching fiscal reforms, regardless of who wins the two-round election in April and May. "It won't be Merkozy anymore. It will be Angela Merkel and (IMF chief) Christine Lagarde dictating policy in Europe," said French economist Jacques Delpla.

Peter Ludlow, president of the European Strategy Forum think tank, said Germany and France are confident they will secure a deal to save the long term future of the euro by the end of this month. That would mean tougher financial rules for members of the eurozone and the use of existing EU institutions to enforce them, a move Mr Cameron has indicated is a step too far.

However, veteran EU analyst Mr Ludlow said one "very senior member" of the European Council had told him that if Britain were to try to block the deal it would be "tantamount to a declaration of war".

He said: "If Cameron is stupid enough to try and block the use of the institutions it would be a very, very dramatic development which could only have grave consequences in terms of Britain's own interests. It would be his nuclear weapon and that's why all the messages I get from various people give the impression he will not do that."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy want a new "fiscal compact" that commits countries to running a balanced budget. They want the rules enshrined in EU law so that sanctions can be levied on any member breaching them. That would mean a bigger role for the European Court of Justice and un-elected European Commission, which would also have a larger say on the single market, not just matters relating to the euro.

Mr Cameron said on Friday he would be against such a development but Mr Ludlow, who lectures around the world on EU affairs, told the Sunday Express: "The Germans and the French are absolutely serious. They are confident they can get the political agreement on this treaty by the end of this month and they will go ahead. I don't think for a moment that Britain will join this scheme within 50 years, let alone five. However, I don't think there is much that Cameron can do."

"I don't think there is any intention of the Germans or French or anyone else of pushing Britain out of the EU but there is nevertheless a realistic assessment that the British may edge themselves out or at least redefine their position in such a basic way that they are to all intents and purposes in another category of membership."

Speaking to FNA, Tehran's Ambassador to Moscow Seyed Reza Sajjadi said that the proposal for replacing US Dollar with Ruble and Rial was raised by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in a meeting with his Iranian counterpart Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Astana on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) meeting.

"Since then, we have acted on this basis and a part of our interactions is done in Ruble now," Sajjadi stated, adding that many Iranian traders are using Ruble for their trade deals. "There is a similar interest in the Russian side," the envoy stated, adding that Moscow is against unilateral sanctions on Iran outside the UN Security Council, specially the recent sanctions against Iran's Central Bank (CBI).

"The move (imposing sanctions on the CBI) is unacceptable. Russians have clearly announced that they will not accept these sanctions and Iran's nuclear issue is resolvable just through negotiations." Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hit back at the US after Washington introduced new sanctions against Iran's central bank. President Ahmadinejad told an annual meeting of senior central bank officials that Iran's central bank would respond with "force" to the new US sanctions intended to pressure Tehran to abandon its nuclear program.

He said the bank was strong enough to defeat "enemy plans". During the last two years, Iran has been replacing the dollar with other currencies in its trade with the outside world. Iran has replaced the dollar in its oil trade with India, China and Japan. Late in November, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) issued the needed permission to the Central Bank of Iran to open rupee accounts with two Indian banks, namely UCO and IDBI, as a long-lasting solution to the two countries' payment problems.

What Could Go Wrong?

Looking behind the headlines:

- The people pushing for war against Iran are the same neocons who pushed for war against Iraq.

- China and Russia have warned that attacking Iran could lead to World War III.

- War against Iran was planned at least 20 years ago.

- The US has been claiming for more than 30 years that Iran was on the verge of nuclear capability (and the US apparently helped fund the Iranian nuclear program.)

- The sinking of the USS Maine, the Gulf of Tonkin incident, and other justifications for past wars have turned out to be false. Similarly, a number of high-level intelligence officials and politicians have said that the US would fake a provocation and blame it on Iran as a casus belli. For example, Ron Paul has warned of a "Gulf of Tonkin type incident" in Iran, and Pulitzer-prize winning investigative reporter Seymour Hersh says many ideas have been proposed for provoking a war, including building boats that look like Iranian boats, and then putting Navy Seals on them to "start a shoot-up"

- The CIA admits that it hired Iranians in the 1950's to pose as Communists and stage bombings in Iran in order to turn the country against its democratically-elected prime minister. Pulitzer-prize winning investigative reporter Seymour Hersh says that the Bush administration (and especially Dick Cheney) helped to fund terrorist groups within Iran. And the New York Times, Washington Post and others are reporting, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, former national security adviser Fran Townsend and former Attorney General Michael Mukasey - who all said that the terrorists were going to get us if we didn't jettison the liberties granted under the Bill of Rights - are now supporting terrorists in Iran.

- Endless war is bankrupting America and harming our national security.

- The war against Iran has already begun.

What could possibly go wrong?

Last November, a Syrian news agency reported that Russian warships were planned to arrive at Syrian territorial waters, indicating that the move represented a clear message to the West that Moscow would resist any foreign intervention in the country's civil unrest.

Citing the official Syrian news agency SANA on Sunday, AFP reported that a large Russian naval flotilla, led by an aircraft carrier, is making a six-day port call to Tartus. SANA also quoted a Russian naval officer as saying that the visit was "aimed at bringing the two countries closer together and strengthening their ties of friendship."

"The commanders of the Russian naval vessels docked in Tartus took turns to express their solidarity with the Syrian people," SANA added. The Russian visit came as the Arab League ruled out considering a withdrawal of its widely criticized peace observers from Syria, ahead of a meeting in Cairo to assess the performance of the mission.

"We've invested in capabilities to ensure that if that happens, we can defeat that." Blocking the strategic shipping lane linking the Gulf of Oman with the Persian Gulf would constitute a "red line" for the US, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on the same program.

He assessed that Iran is preparing groundwork for making nuclear weapons someday, but is not yet building an atomic bomb. He called for continued diplomatic and economic pressure to dissuade Tehran from taking that step. Panetta warned that a unilateral strike by Israel against Iran's nuclear facilities could trigger Iranian retaliation against US forces in the region. "We have common cause here" with Israel, he said. "And the better approach is for us to work together."

According to AP's analysis, Panetta's remarks "suggest the White House's assessment of Iran's nuclear strategy has not changed in recent months, despite warnings from advocates of military action that time is running out to prevent Tehran from becoming a nuclear-armed state."

The Obama administration has come under attack from Republican presidential hopefuls for what they say is a soft approach to Iran. "If we re-elect Barack Obama, Iran will have a nuclear weapon," said Mitt Romney. "And if you elect Mitt Romney, Iran will not have a nuclear weapon."

According to the report, Beilinson Hospital in Petach Tikva reported seven cases of e coli of whom three patients died within two days. However, it is estimated that there were more deaths as a result of bacteria, but were not diagnosed as such because no one suspects that the e coli could be deadly like the other predatory bacteria.

Belinson Hospital infections unit manager, Professor Jihad Bishara, said that "This is really necrosis or gangrene, a severe infection which eats the skin and tissues. The Ministry of Health should be more aware and maybe instruct all doctors to be aware that there is some new predator bacterium which is widespread."

The Prime Minister vowed to resist Franco-German pressure for the Financial Transaction Tax across the entire EU. "I don't think is sensible and so I will block it," said Mr Cameron.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are expected to discuss the plan at a meeting in Berlin today. French sources claim a deal is agreed and the tax will be in by the end of 2012.

Labour's Shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander said: "When jobs and growth in Britain depend on an effective resolution to the eurozone crisis David Cameron's decision to walk away from the table is looking more and more reckless."

This is the warning at the heart of a book recently published by Paul Marshall and Nina Shea, senior fellow and director, respectively, of the Center for Religious Freedom at the Hudson Institute. In "Silenced: How Apostasy and Blasphemy Codes are Choking Freedom Worldwide," (Oxford University Press), they say that when Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini pronounced his fatwa, or decree, calling for the death of British author Salman Rushdie because of his book "The Satanic Verses," most Westerners considered it to be a one-off event.

The decree, however, marked the beginning of the use of Islamic blasphemy laws to curb freedom of speech. The use of these laws intensified after the attacks of September 11, 2001, as Islam and Muslim governments came under much greater scrutiny. Muslim authorities took action to try and silence activists, analysts and the media in general.

The laws, already used to oppress religious minorities within Islamic countries, were now extended as Islamic rulers demanded that Western governments punish those who had allegedly insulted Islam. According to the book's authors this is a break from a long-standing Islamic legal tradition, that offenses committed by non-Muslims in non-Muslim countries are of no concern to Islamic law.

Contrary to the Western notion of religious freedom as guaranteeing the rights of an individual, the 57 member nations of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) interprets it as meaning respect for religion itself, Islam and everything Islamic, the book explains.

The following are things that are not what they seem to be on television:

#1 The Lie: Mitt Romney won Iowa.

The Truth: Mitt Romney may not have won Iowa. The following report of a documented vote discrepancy comes from KCCI...

Edward True, 28, of Moulton, said he helped count the votes and jotted the results down on a piece of paper to post to his Facebook page. He said when he checked to make sure the Republican Party of Iowa got the count right, he said he was shocked to find they hadn't. "When Mitt Romney won Iowa by eight votes and I've got a 20-vote discrepancy here, that right there says Rick Santorum won Iowa," True said. "Not Mitt Romney."

True said at his 53-person caucus at the Garrett Memorial Library, Romney received two votes. According to the Iowa Republican Party's website, True's precinct cast 22 votes for Romney. So how many other "vote discrepancies" were there in Iowa? Was this just a "coincidence" or did someone do this on purpose?

#2 The Lie: Barack Obama will be much different from George W Bush and will actually protect our civil liberties.

The Truth: Under Barack Obama we have lost even more of our civil liberties than we did under George W Bush. Barack Obama recently signed a new law that gives the US military the power to arrest US citizens on American soil, detain them indefinitely and ship them off to Guantanamo Bay for endless "interrogation" sessions.

#3 The Lie: SOPA is all about cracking down on international sellers of counterfeit goods.

The Truth: SOPA is all about censoring the Internet and cracking down on websites that the federal government does not like.

#4 The Lie: The US unemployment rate is now at 8.5% and will continue to fall as the US economy recovers.

The Truth: If the number of Americans considered to be "looking for work" was the same today as it was back in 2007, the "official" unemployment rate put out by the US government would about 11 percent, and the US middle class continues to be systematically destroyed right in front of our eyes.

#5 The Lie: The debt crisis in Europe has been stabilized and the euro is going to be just fine.

The Truth: The debt crisis in Europe continues to get worse and the euro is dropping like a rock.

#6 The Lie: The US stock market is in great shape and is poised to soar to new heights in 2012.

The Truth: Investors are pulling money out of stocks at an alarming rate. In fact, as CNBC recently noted, investors have pulled more money out of mutual funds than they have put into mutual funds for 9 weeks in a row. A lot of people out there expect that something really bad is going to happen very soon...

Investors yanked money out of US equity mutual funds for a ninth-consecutive week despite a bullish 2012 outlook from Wall Street and a December rally that's carried over into the New Year.

#7 The Lie: There are no plans to replace the US dollar as the global reserve currency.

The Truth: Top financial authorities all over the world have been developing plans for a new global currency for a long time. The following comes from a CNN article:

The International Monetary Fund issued a report Thursday on a possible replacement for the dollar as the world's reserve currency.

The IMF said Special Drawing Rights, or SDRs, could help stabilize the global financial system.

#8 The Lie: There is not a municipal bond crisis in America.

The Truth: There is a growing municipal bond crisis in America. Over the last several months a whole host of municipal bonds have been downgraded. Just today, Moody's downgraded Illinois government debt from A2 to A.

#9 The Lie: Chicago is a safe place to live.

The Truth: 14 people were shot across the Chicago area on Thursday alone.

#10 The Lie: Federal employees are not overpaid.

The Truth: The federal government is advertising for an "invitations coordinator" that will make between $53,500 and $102,900 per year.

#11 The Lie: The old-fashioned incandescent light bulbs are bad for the environment and it is a good thing that the federal government is requiring that they bephased out.

The Truth: The new CFL light bulbs are filled with mercury, they are an environmental nightmare and they are incredibly toxic and dangerous if they are broken.

#12 The Lie: The US education system is producing a huge crop of really sharp students who are prepared to be the leaders of tomorrow.

The Truth: The US education system is a complete and total joke.

Dimiero based his report on Lexis-Nexis searches which includes transcripts of nighttime newscasts. Comcast/NBCUniversal (which owns MSNBC and NBC News), Viacom (CBS), News Corporation (Fox News), Time Warner (CNN) and Disney (ABC) are all listed as supporters of the bill. ABC and CBS are also listed as separate supporters of the bill.

SOPA would block access to sites accused of violating US copyright laws. The measure has been called Draconian by opponents who say it would fundamentally change the free-flow of information across the Internet. Proponents, ranging from the NBA to Universal, say the measure is needed to block sites which flagrantly flaunt copyright laws and make content available for free without paying copyright owners.

Traditional media companies have been key players in lobbying for SOPA's passage, with more than half of that funding coming from cable television providers, commercial TV and radio stations, and the entertainment industry. Opponents of the legislation have been developing apps to help voters track how their legislators stand on SOPA and how much they have received in campaign donations from SOPA-supporting entities.