The utility said it also plans to cover the reactor building, which was hit by a huge quake and tsunami on 11 March. Nearly 14,000 people died and another 14,000 are still unaccounted for. Tepco unveiled its roadmap as Hillary Clinton briefly visited Tokyo to pledge America's "steadfast support" for Japan's reconstruction.

Radiation levels in the sea near reactor 2 rose to 6,500 times the legal limit on Friday, up from 1,100 times a day earlier, Tepco has said, raising fears of fresh radiation leaks. Tsunehisa Katsumata, the chairman of Tepco, Asia's largest utility, told a news conference in Tokyo on Sunday they would need up to nine months to bring the power plant to ''cold shutdown''. He said the plan would allow the tens of thousands of families evacuated from the area around the facility to return home as soon as possible. But the BBC's Roland Buerk in Tokyo says it is still not certain that the nine-month deadline can be achieved.

Our correspondent says Japan's recovery bill has been estimated at $300 billion (184 billion pounds) - already the most expensive disaster in history. But the government said last week that figure might be an underestimate.

A BBC correspondent says there is a sense of relief and jubilation that the vote and count have been relatively calm, unlike in past years. However, some results in individual states have been suspiciously high. Mr Jonathan had staked his reputation on the election, repeatedly promising it would be free and fair.

Unless the national electoral commission declares a large chunk of the votes to be invalid, he is now on track to become Nigeria's first elected president from the oil-producing Niger Delta region. The Christian politician was appointed to the presidency last year, upon the death of incumbent Umaru Yar'Adua, whom he had served as vice-president.

In Akwa Ibom state, he was credited with winning 95% percent and in Anambra it was 99%. In his home state, Bayelsa, he took 99.63%. "Figures of 95% and above for one party suggest that these are fabricated figures and, personally, they worry me because they pose serious questions on the credibility of the election," Jibrin Ibrahim of the Centre for Democracy and Development told AFP news agency.

The governor declared a state of emergency after deaths were reported in four counties. Oklahoma, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Virginia have also been hit. Officials say the number of victims will increase further as rescue teams search damaged areas. Hailstones the size of grapefruit were reported as the storms swept through the region, creating flash floods as well as tornadoes. The storms first struck Oklahoma on Thursday before sweeping eastward through other states.

An estimated 200,000 homes in North Carolina were without power on Sunday, Reuters reported. Fatalities have also been reported in Alabama, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Mississippi. Trees and power lines have been felled by the storms, which have torn roofs off houses and overturned cars. The governor of Alabama visited several of the devastated areas on Saturday, and declared the entire state a disaster area.

The storms have now moved out over the Atlantic.

As in previous years, a group of Jews who wish to fulfill the commandment of offering the sacrifice on Passover eve, this coming Monday, have asked for police protection. If the results of previous years' requests are any guide, the police are expected not only to refuse to provide such protection, but to ban the event from taking place at all. Last year, Rabbi Yehuda Glick and Noam Federman were arrested while on their way to the Temple Mount with sheep for the sacrifice. About ten others who awaited their arrival so that they could participate in the event were left without sheep to offer.

In letters to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Jerusalem Police Chief Aharon Franco, Attorney Aviad Visuly of the Land of Israel Task Force explained, "The commandment to offer a Paschal sacrifice on the 14th day of Nisan is a particularly serious one, leading to the punishment of karet (divine punishment by untimely death or eternal excommunication - ed.) for those in Jerusalem who refrain from fulfilling it. As a religious rite, it need not receive a police permit; we therefore request that you simply provide protection."

Netanyahu's office responded that the matter is something for the security bodies to decide.

However, after the Portuguese and Irish bail-outs, the 60 billion euros EFSM facility will be virtually used up. A larger scheme backed only by the eurozone nations expires in 2013, as does the EFSM. Brussels has been pressing the UK to be part of the replacement, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), on the grounds that it is a member of the European Union.

France and Germany are particularly keen for the UK to sign up because, as the largest member states, they will bear the lion's share of the burden. The topic has arisen on the fringes of the International Monetary Fund's spring conference in Washington but reliable sources say the requests have had short shrift. "It is a eurozone problem," said one source.

George Osborne, the Chancellor, has already stressed that Britain is not in the business of bailing out eurozone nations, but must honour its existing agreements. He decided to back Ireland with a 3.25 billion pounds bilateral loan because of the struggling country's strategic importance to the UK.

In the east, fighting has continued on the coastal road to Benghazi. Fierce battles on the road between Ajdabiya and the strategic oil town of Brega - which has changed hands half a dozen times since February - killed a number of rebels and wounded many more, reports said. Meanwhile, anti-aircraft fire was heard in Tripoli, suggesting the Libyan capital was coming under attack from the air, although there were no immediate reports of damage.

Frustration is growing among the city's residents, who have come under intensified attacks by pro-Gaddafi forces in recent days, and are critical of Nato for failing to halt the deadly assault. Rebels said dozens of Soviet-designed Grad rockets had been fired at an industrial district of Misrata by government forces, although this has not been confirmed. The Grad, which launches multiple rockets from mobile launchers, has been blamed for a number of civilian deaths in recent days, including eight people in a bread queue.

On Friday, US-based Human Rights Watch accused the Gaddafi regime of using cluster bombs - which scatter multiple bomblets, causing indiscriminate casualties, and have been banned by most countries - although the Libyan government vehemently denies the charge.

The entire Washington DC metropolitan area has been put under tornado watch. While tornadoes formed in the south, much of the damage there was attributed to high winds. The warning by the US National Weather Service for the Washington area also applies to counties in both Virginia and Maryland. Trees and power lines have been felled by the storms which have torn roofs off houses and scattered tractor-trailers across roads.

Staff from the Child Protective Services, accompanied by police, turned up at Godboldo's home to take her child into state care. A SWAT team then descended on the 56-year-old woman's house with a tank and automatic rifles after she was accused of firing a gun at police officers. After a ten-hour stand-off, which resulted in the mother giving herself up, Ariana was taken into protective custody.

The girl had been home-schooled by her mother but wanted to start going to a regular school, which required her to take a number of immunisations, reports Prisonplanet.com. The girl then suffered adverse reactions to these shots and her mother was told to put her on a prescribed pyschotropic drug. 'She began acting out of character, being irritated, having facial grimaces that have been associated with immunisations,' the child's aunt, Penny Godboldo, told the Detroit News.

The mother at first took the advice of doctors and gave Ariana the medication, Risperdal, but stopped after she said it was making her daughter's condition worse. Risperdal is an anti-psychotic medication which works by changing the effects of chemicals in the brain. It is used to treat, among other things, schizophrenia, as well as the symptoms of bipolar disorder and autism. 'Child Protective Services was trying to force her child to take a dangerous medication, Risperdal, against her will,' said the Godboldo family lawyer.

Her bail has been set at $500,000. 'We're hoping that Ariana is returned home, this whole matter is released, because we don't think that the mother has done anything at all,' attorney Wanda Evans told My FOX Detroit. Ariana remains in protective custody, at the Hawthorne Center in Northville. Officials have said they have not medicated the girl since she has been in their care.

Supporters say that the "window" prevents a great deal of mental and physical anguish caused by the maturing of sex organs, facial hair growth and changes in the voice. But critics argue it only prolongs the agony and can prevent people "growing out" of any feelings of confusion. The treatment can be prescribed for people diagnosed with Gender Identity Disorder (GID) - a rare psychiatric condition where a person is born one sex, but feels they are the other.

One of the main effects of the drugs is to stunt the development of sexual organs so less surgery will be required if someone chooses to permanently change their gender at a later date. However, bodily and hormonal changes will continue as normal if the medication is stopped. Until this month, British doctors were prevented from offering youngsters diagnosed with gender issues any medical intervention before the late stages of puberty usually at 16. But now the National Research Ethics Service has given approval to the UK's only specialist clinic for GID - the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust in London - to prescribe the drugs to youngsters from 12 years old.

Researchers found nearly half of the meat and poultry samples, 47 percent, were contaminated with S-aureus, and more than half of those bacteria, 52 percent, were resistant to at least three classes of antibiotics. For the study, researchers looked at 136 samples involving 80 brands of beef, chicken, pork and turkey from 26 grocery stores in five cities including Los Angeles, Chicago, Fort Lauderdale (Florida), Flagstaff (Arizona), and Washington DC.

"For the first time, we know how much of our meat and poultry is contaminated with antibiotic-resistant Staph, and it is substantial," Dr Lance B Price, senior author of the study, said in a statement. "The fact that drug-resistant S-aureus was so prevalent, and likely came from the food animals themselves, is troubling, and demands attention to how antibiotics are used in food-animal production today." According to the findings published in the journal Clinical Infectious Disease, industrial farms, where food animals are steadily fed low doses of antibiotics, "are ideal breeding grounds for drug-resistant bacteria that move from animals to humans."

"Antibiotics are the most important drugs that we have to treat Staph infections; but when Staph are resistant to three, four, five or even nine different antibiotics - like we saw in this study - that leaves physicians few options," Price said. Experts say although Staph can be killed with proper cooking, it still may pose a risk to people who handle food improperly or who cross-contaminate various ingredients in the kitchen.

There were no injuries but the cause of the smoke at the plant in coastal Niigata prefecture was not clear, Kyodo news said, citing Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO). The incident occurred in the evening during the checking of water purification equipment at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear complex, the company was quoted as saying.

The beleaguered TEPCO has been fighting to prevent more radiation from leaking out of the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan's northeast after it was crippled by the devastating March 11 quake and tsunami.

He says there have been hundreds of earthquakes southwest of Hawthorne over the past few days. The largest - recorded at a 4.4 in size. "These are the biggest in a sequence we've seen at least in the last couple of years." Kent says unlike the 2008 quakes in Somersett that damaged so many homes, these earthquakes are fortunately not underneath a community.

Size is not the only reason Kent says they are watching the swarm of quakes closely. The location of these quakes is on top of a fault that has until now remained unknown or has not been active. Kent then made an eerie comparison, "Whats really interesting about most of these earthquakes we've experienced. Short of the Chilean and Japanese; Haiti, Baha, even Christchurch... were on unknown faults.

But Kent says just because those devastating quakes happened on un-named faults does not mean that the series of quakes near Hawthorne will lead to a big quake there. Reno, Carson City and the Las Vegas valley all lie on top of fault lines. And right now, there is no way to predict where the next big quake will occur. "That's yet another reason why you don't want to look at the map and go phew, I'm safe. We're in earthquake country and so we have to be prepared."

Another 10 per cent rise in food prices would push 10 million into extreme poverty, defined as an effective income of less than $1.25 a day. Already, the world's poor number 1.2 billion. Mr Zoellick said he saw no short term reversal in the damaging effect of food inflation, which is felt much more in the developing world as packaging and distribution accounts for a far larger proportion of the cost in the advanced economies.

Asked if he thought prices would remain high for a year, Mr Zoellick said: "The general trend lines are ones where we are in a danger zone... because prices have already gone up and stocks are relatively low." Rising prices have been driven by the changing diet of the ballooning middle classes in the emerging markets. "There is a demand change going on, with the higher incomes in developing countries. People will eat more meat products, for example, and that will use more grain."

"I am not suggesting that the improved diets in the developing world are the source of the problem but it means it takes longer to rebuild the stocks when you get a supply [shock]." The problem has been exacerbated by "weather problems in Russia, Ukraine, North America, China". Making matters worse has been rising fuel prices, which go into fertilisers and energy.

He also raised concerns about the food investment policies of some of the world's wealthier nations in poorer countries. China has been buying up huge tracts of Africa to grow enough food to feed its growing middle class. Using Saudi Arabia's decision to scrap wheat production and invest overseas for food instead as an example, he said: "This raises sensitivities about the purchasing and investment and the land."

Greece is implementing spending cuts but concerns have mounted in recent days because tax revenues have disappointed as the austerity programme squeezes the economy. Although it can tap the rescue package backed by Europe and the International Monetary Fund as the Mediterranean nation's debts come up for refinancing, traders reckon Greece will be unable to escape its vast borrowings. Market caution means it now costs 1.1 million euros to insure 10 million euros of Greek debt for five years.

Although Greece is not expected to default officially on the principal amount, holders of its debt may agree to reduce the interest rate and lengthen the terms of the loans. The effect would be largely similar to a default, as the value of the debt would fall. Any restructuring before 2013 would have to be on a voluntary basis, as new rules that would force private creditors to shoulder some of the burden do not come into effect until then.

On Friday, Greece will present new fiscal and privatisation plans in an attempt to convince investors it can meet its bail-out's terms. But its slumping economy and slow progress in tackling tax evasion have led to revenue shortfalls when Athens should be reaping the fruit of its reform.

It meant that just under seven million people living in Britain were immigrants - enough to fill a city the size of London. The rise was largely down to Labour's "open door" immigration policy, under which three million foreigners were added to the population during the party's 13 years in power. The figures, which were compiled by the Office for National Statistics, were disclosed amid a renewed debate on immigration.

David Cameron warned yesterday that uncontrolled immigration had undermined some British communities and led to "discomfort and disjointedness" in neighbourhoods. National statisticians estimated that, on current patterns, the population would pass the 70 million mark in less than two decades and two-thirds of that rise would be driven by immigration.