"Its military nuclear and ballistic ambitions constitute a growing threat that may lead to a preventive attack against Iranian sites that would provoke a major crisis that France wants to avoid at all costs," he said. Sarkozy did not say which country might launch such a strike, but it has been reported that Israel - perhaps with US support - has considered bombing Iranian nuclear sites if it believes Tehran is close to building a weapon.

The French leader placed the blame for the crisis on Iran, which insists it has no intention of building a nuclear weapon, and is merely enriching nuclear fuel for medical research and a domestic atomic energy programme. "Iran refuses to negotiate seriously," he told an annual meeting of French diplomats. "Iran is carrying out new provocations in response to the challenge from the international community for it to provide a credible response."

Sarkozy said France would work with its allies to build support for tougher international sanctions against Tehran's Islamist regime, in a bid to force it to back down over its enrichment programme.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in a classified cable sent last January 9th, instructed American embassies in Australia, Britain, Canada, and New Zealand to notify those countries of upcoming Chinese launches two days later. The cable included details of the launch sites for the interceptor and the target, the models of the missiles, the purpose of the test, and the test date.

Yesterday, Hong Kong's South China Morning Post carried comments from Xu, now at the China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, to the effect that American satellites would have detected activity at the launch sites but that some of the information in the cables - specifically the types of missiles and the day of the test - must have come from a source on the ground. WikiLeaks's release of this cable, revealing one or more American spies in China's strategic missile corps, is perhaps the website's most significant compromise of US security to date.

The Hong Kong paper noted that Xu said that "if China could no longer keep secret its missile launches, it would not be able to launch a surprise attack on the US." Is China really in the process of planning to destroy the American homeland with a preemptive barrage of nuclear-tipped missiles? Xu's comment, of course, is not proof, but it does reveal that Chinese flag officers are thinking about doing so.

The US President's disaster declaration allows the Federal Emergency Management Agency to provide low-interest loans or grants to hurricane survivors to help them repair homes, pay medical costs and rebuild businesses. "We're grateful for that rapid response," Bev Perdue, the state's governor said. "Our fellow North Carolinians who suffered losses during this storm need to start rebuilding their lives now - not tomorrow."

Governor Perdue said that the hurricane had destroyed or severely damaged at least 1,100 homes. Eqecat, a risk assessment company, has estimated that over 40 million people in the densely populated eastern seaboard of the US were hit by Irene, with the worst damages due to flooding, "Irene caused significant damage to property," the firm reported on Weds. "Eqecat estimates that Irene caused in excess of $10 billion in economic damages in its traverse across the mainland US."

More than 40 deaths have been blamed on Irene, which made landfall in the US state of North Carolina on Saturday and then progressed northward, weakening to a tropical storm by the time it hit New York on Sunday. Thousands remained cut off by severe flooding in towns across Vermont, New Jersey and upstate New York on Wednesday.

The euro has failed, though more politically than economically, according to an article in the September edition of US magazine Vanity Fair. "Conceived as a tool for integrating Germany into Europe, and preventing Germans from dominating others, it has become the opposite," financial journalist and author Michael Lewis writes. "For better or for worse, the Germans now own Europe."

The fact that a reunited Germany has weathered the Western world's financial crisis with ease, at least so far, has made its neighbors and friends uneasy. In the political salons of Washington and Paris, from Brussels to Madrid, and inside political broadsheets and think tanks, people are asking whether the new Germany is altering its foreign policy. Is Berlin turning away from the European Union, or is it the opposite, that it wants to use the currency to gain control of the entire continent - something it couldn't do with weapons?

Geostrategists point to the emergence of a power imbalance, along with possible new conflicts between rival countries. In a guest commentary published by The New York Times last week, Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown criticized Germany's approach. "Germany's recent failure to act from a position of strength endangers not only the country itself, but the entire euro project that Germany has spent decades developing," he wrote. Other commentators complain that Germany is once again veering towards unilateralism, and some, mainly in Britain, are even referring to a "Fourth Reich." But at the heart of this debate remains the question: Where is Germany headed?

15. Portugal. Value of reserves: $24.6 billion. Holdings total: 421.5 tons

14. Taiwan. Value of reserves: $27.2 billion. Holdings total: 466.8 tons

13. The European Central Bank. Value of reserves: $32.23 billion. Holdings total: 553.3 tons

12. India. Value of reserves: $35.79 billion. Holdings total: 614.6 tons

11. The Netherlands. Value of reserves: $39.3 billion. Holdings total: 674.9 tons

10. Japan. Value of reserves: $49.11 billion. Holdings total: 843.3 tons

9. Russia. Value of reserves: $54 billion. Holdings total: 926.9 tons

8. Switzerland. Value of reserves: $66.75 billion. Holdings total: 1,146.2 tons

7. China. Value of reserves: $67.65 billion. Holdings total: 1,161.6 tons

6. SPDR Gold ETF (GLD). Value of holdings: $70.7 billion. Holdings total: 1,213.9 tons

5. France. Value of reserves: $156.31 billion. Holdings total: 2,683.8 tons

4. Italy. Value of reserves: $157.36 billion. Holdings total: 2,701.9 tons

3. The International Monetary Fund. Value of reserves: $180.6 billion. Holdings total: 3,101 tons

2. Germany. Value of reserves: $218.28 billion. Holdings total: 3,747.9 tons

1. United States. Value of reserves: $522.16 billion. Holdings total: 8,965.6 tons

The 300-plus supporters of the so-called Priests' Initiative have had enough of what they call the church's "delaying" tactics, and they are advocating pushing ahead with policies that openly defy current practices. These include letting nonordained people lead religious services and deliver sermons; making communion available to divorced people who have remarried; allowing women to become priests and to take on important positions in the hierarchy; and letting priests carry out pastoral functions even if, in defiance of church rules, they have a wife and family.

Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, Vienna's Archbishop and head of the Austrian Bishops' Conference, has threatened the rebels with excommunication. Incidentally, those involved in the initiative are not only low-profile members of the clergy. Indeed, it is being led by Helmut Schuller - who was for many years vicar general of the archdiocese of Vienna and director of Caritas - and the cathedral pastor in the Carinthian diocese of Gurk. The issues that supporters of the initiative want addressed may be revolutionary, but they are by no means new: they constitute basic questions that have been around for a long time but have never been addressed by church officials.

Particularly affected are some 700 members of an association called Priester ohne Amt (Priests Without a Job) who wish in vain to practice their ministry because they have a wife and children and stand by them. Priests who break ties with loved ones, on the other hand, are allowed to continue working. Twenty years ago, Austria, nominally at least, was 85% Catholic. Today, in the city of Vienna, Catholics account for less than half the population while rural parishes are melting away.

The US Conference Board's index of consumer sentiment in August plunged to the lowest level since the depths of the slump in 2009, falling to 44.5 from 59.2 in July. Future expectations fell even harder. The drop was far steeper than expected and follows grim warnings over the weekend from Christine Lagarde, new chief of the International Monetary Fund, that the global crisis is entering "a dangerous new phase".

The fund has slashed its growth forecast for America and Europe, according to a leaked draft of its World Economic Outlook. It has called on both the US Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank to stand ready for "further easing of monetary policy" - implying a fresh blast of quantitative easing (QE) by the Fed.

The minutes of the Fed's meeting in early August show that a number of committee members called for more "substantial" stimulus, suggesting that they pushed for further bond purchases or 'QE3'. The Fed's so-called "Gang of Three" hardliners has already shrunk to two. Minneapolis Fed Narayana Kocherlakota said on Monday that deflationary pressures are building again. "Increasing policy accommodation might well be appropriate," he said.

In Europe the picture is as bad if not worse. The eurozone is already on the cusp of recession even before austerity bites in Italy and France, and bites harder in Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Ireland. The European Commission's economic sentiment index (ESI) dropped below the contraction line in August. "A loose monetary policy seems to be the only medicine left to prevent a painful fall back into recession," said Peter Vanden Houte from ING.

Jose Vinals, the IMF's head of capital markets, rebuked Europe's leaders for failing to beef up bank defences and allowing the debt crisis to fester. "You cannot afford to have a world economy where these important decisions are postponed because you're really playing with fire," he said. Stephen Jen from SLJ Macro Partners said the next phases of the eurozone crisis is likely to come when the debtor states conclude that it is no longer worth putting up with the pain of EU-imposed austerity. "I think this will happen in weeks rather than months."

It means the country is in the danger zone following a ten-year borrowing binge under the last Labour government, a hard-hitting report from the Bank for International Settlements has revealed. Its chief economist, Steve Cecchetti, said: 'Beyond a certain level, debt is bad for growth. At low levels, debt is good. It is a source of economic growth and stability. But at high levels, private and public debt is bad, increasing volatility and retarding growth.'

The BIS said government, corporate and household debt in Britain jumped from 223 per cent of gross domestic product in 2000, or 2.18 trillion pounds, to 322 per cent, or 4.68 trillion pounds, in 2010. That is the equivalent of 180,000 pounds per household. The 99 percentage point increase was the biggest of any leading economy and left Britain deeper in the red than any country in the Group of Seven industrialised nations except Japan. The watchdog warned that debt levels in Britain 'will explode' unless it gets to grips with future spending on health and pensions as the population gets older.

The watchdog said the danger limit for government debt is 80 to 100 per cent of a country's GDP. The threshold for corporate debt is 90 per cent of GDP and for household debt it is 85 per cent, it said. Once these levels are reached, debt starts to hold back growth, the report found. In 2010, Britain had government debt of nearly 90 per cent of GDP, corporate debt of 126 per cent and household debt of 106 per cent.

Of the G7 economies, only Britain and Canada were in the danger zone for all three types of debt. The British economy has flat-lined for the last nine months, growing by just 0.2 per cent in the second quarter of the year following six months of stagnation. The subdued recovery at home has been weakened further by a slowdown overseas, particularly in the US and the eurozone, Britain's two biggest trade partners.

In an extraordinary admission, the taxpayer-owned banks said that for the first time they were doing secret credit checks to identify high-risk customers. They expect to call 30,000 in total. Although it is standard for a credit check to be done when a loan is taken out, it is unprecedented for so many to be carried out after mortgages have been approved. And while some would argue the action is a sensible precaution, others will condemn it as patronising and unfairly singling people out.

Other banks and lenders are now likely to launch their own copycat moves. UK Asset Resolution is the company set up to run Northern Rock Asset Management and Bradford & Bingley, which were both rescued by the Government. The company has 616,000 mortgage customers and owes 47 billion pounds to the taxpayer.

It confirmed it was identifying customers who may be struggling with other debts. For example, it is using the credit checks to discover those who are falling behind with credit card payments or have stopped paying back a personal loan or their mobile phone bill. Richard Banks, chief executive of UK Asset Resolution, said: 'Some people won't cope when interest rates rise, but for others there are remedies. They need to think about what is their most important debt.'

The latest figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders show there were 18,100 repossessions between January and June. And the number of people failing to fully pay their mortgages is almost a quarter of a million. Overall, the number of home loans which were more than 1.5 per cent in arrears was 243,000 in the second quarter of this year. Many of the customers who will be subject to the secret credit checks would have taken out Northern Rock's 'Together' loan which allowed customers to borrow up to 125 per cent of a property's value.

Yvonne has been at large since May 24. But she made headlines in late July, when she ran across a highway and nearly collided with a police car. That led authorities to deem her a threat - and they issued a call for hunters to shoot the cow on sight. That order was later suspended, partly due to a public outpouring of support for Yvonne. But Monday, the local government made the suspension permanent - and forbade anyone to hunt her with deadly force.

Authorities say the search for Yvonne will be suspended until at least October - when the cornfields that have offered the cow both sustenance and refuge are due to be harvested, according to German media reports. Animal experts say they believe it will be easier to tempt Yvonne to leave the forest when winter comes.

If she's ever captured, Yvonne will be taken to Gut Aiderbichl, where she has been invited to live out her days. The sanctuary has already purchased her sister and calf. And by October, there may be a more reliable stream of news, from Germany and elsewhere, that could relegate the cow's saga to the back pages of newspapers (and the occasional blog) that have been desperate to find lighthearted stories this summer.

Medical Center chief operating officer Kathleen McManus tells the Traverse City Record-Eagle that officials decided to make it mandatory because voluntary compliance has never topped 65 percent. "The people we serve here are very sick," McManus said. "And I will not put a patient at risk."

But some employees are up in arms over baring an arm. About 50 turned out for a recent meeting of Michigan Opposing Mandatory Vaccines, a Detroit-area group that promotes vaccine choice. Employees also circulated petitions and hope to get the community behind them. "I have a really hard time believing I'm going to be forced to do something against my will," said nursing administrator Dianne Lopez-Wild, who works in an office. "It's like something out of a sci-fi movie. It's bizarre to me. It seems so unreal." Lopez-Wild said it's a "civil rights issue."

There are limited exemptions to the vaccine mandate, such as allergies or faith-based objections. But a religious exemption requires a letter from a pastor. Munson has seven hospitals and provides services to people from 24 counties. "I'd be willing to wear a mask rather than get a vaccination," said Roberta Mesko, a Munson nurse. "I just think we need to be able to choose to make educated decisions about what is injected into our bodies." McManus expects some workers will quit.

Russia on Monday delayed its next manned Soyuz spacecraft mission to the ISS by at least a month after an unmanned cargo vessel using a similar rocket crashed into Siberia instead of reaching orbit on August 24. The station crew normally consists of six - currently three Russians, two Americans and one Japanese - working six-month rotations.

Neither NASA nor the Russian space agency will allow the astronauts aboard the space station to remain beyond a mandated six-month limit because of the risk posed by exposure to radiation. And mid-November is considered the last chance to bring the Soyuz space capsule safely back to the steppes of Kazakhstan because of the lengthening night.

Crew safety and the "very big investment" that the Russian and US governments have made in the ISS would guide future decisions, Suffredini said during the call on Monday. "We prefer not to operate in that condition without crew on board for an extended period of time," he said. "But assuming the systems keep operating we can command the station from the ground and operate it on orbit indefinitely," he added.

This month's failed launch was a spectacular blow for Russia after it had become the sole nation capable of taking humans to the ISS following the July retirement of the US space shuttle program.

On Monday, IDF Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Benny Gantz ordered that deployment across the entire southern sector be bolstered, especially in the area near the Israel-Egypt border, following intelligence indicating an imminent threat. The area adjacent to the border has become the scene of military deployment described by one security source as "unprecedented." The IDF has also deployed advanced technology in the area in order to thwart terror attacks. Still, no changes in security alignments were observed on the Egyptian side of the border.

The security situation in southern Israel has been particularly tense following a series of terror attacks that claimed the lives of eight Israelis in mid-August; as well as several days in which Israel's western Negev communities suffered heavy shelling by Gaza Strip-based terror groups. Following the terror attack, in which five Egyptian troops were also killed, Israel and Egypt agreed to increase the presence of Cairo troops in the Sinai Peninsula. As a result, some 1,500 Egyptian soldiers deployed across Sinai on Monday.

Meanwhile, Iran's Press TV reported Tuesday that Tehran has decided to dispatch the 15th fleet to the Red Sea once more. Iran's Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari told the state-run agency that the Islamic Republic is planning to send its 15th fleet to the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, adding that the fleet's main operational objective will be to patrol the high seas and thwart pirate raids.

The Islamic Republic's 15th fleet is comprised of a submarine and several warships. Sayyari noted that Iran's Navy plans to have "an active presence in the high seas in line with the guidelines of Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei with the purpose of serving the country's interests. The presence of Iran's army in the high seas will convey the message of peace and friendship to all countries," he said.

He called on Germany, Austria, Finland and the Netherlands to quit the euro - ditching struggling economies such as Greece, Spain, Portugal and Italy - and set up a new currency of their own. Such a move - perhaps the closest thing possible to the return of the Deutsche Mark - would be highly controversial as Germany is the area's powerhouse economy and has so far insisted it will stand behind the euro.

But Mr Henkel said: 'We need to focus on saving Europe, not the euro.' It came as ratings agency Standard & Poor's - which recently stripped the US of its prized AAA credit score - downgraded its growth forecasts for Europe. The Eurozone has been crippled by towering levels of debt which led to the bailouts of Greece, Ireland and Portugal.

Hundreds of billions of euros have been spent propping up the single currency - with Germany and France footing much of the bill. But it has failed to solve the crisis tearing through the region with Spain, Italy and even France now under threat. 'Instead of addressing the true causes, politicians prescribe painkillers,' said Mr Henkel, the former head of IBM Germany and ex-leader of the Federation of German Industries.

Earlier this week, Israel's military ordered more troops to the border area following intelligence reports of an impending attack, days after militants crossed into Israel through the Egyptian border and killed eight Israelis in a brazen attack that touched off a wave of violence between Israel and militants in the Gaza Strip. Relative calm has returned, but Israel has remained on alert since the deadly August 18 raid, closing roads near the border and warning citizens against traveling to Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, a popular vacation destination for Israelis.

Israel's Home Front Minister Matan Vilnai said Tuesday that militants from the Gaza-based Islamic Jihad were in Sinai, waiting to strike. "The Palestinian Islamic Jihad wants to carry out a terror attack along the Egyptian border," Vilnai told reporters. "The Egyptian border is absolutely porous. We have known this for many years."

Beyond announcing that two more warships were patrolling the border area, the military would give no further details. Israel has a permanent naval presence with a base in Eilat, at the northern tip of the Red Sea on the Egyptian border. The Israeli military would not disclose the number of warships usually positioned on its maritime border with Egypt or from where the two extra ships were sent. Access for ships to the Eilat naval base from the rest of Israel is possible only through Egypt's Suez Canal. Egyptian officials there were not immediately available for comment.