Protesters, however, have shrugged off concessions by the regime in the past 12 days of unprecedented street demonstrations, saying they will settle for nothing less than the immediate ouster of Mubarak, Egypt's ruler for nearly 30 years. State TV said the ruling party's six-member Steering Committee of the General Secretariat resigned and was replaced. The council was the party's highest decision-making body, and Safwat el-Sharif and other outgoing members were some of the most powerful - and to many Egyptians, unpopular - political figures in the regime.

Protesters have refused to end their mass rallies in downtown Tahrir Square until Mubarak quits. Tens of thousands gathered Saturday in Tahrir, waving flags and chanting a day after some 100,000 massed there in an intensified demonstration labeled "the day of departure," in hopes it would be the day Mubarak leaves.

Their unprecedented 12-day movement has entered a delicate new phase. Organizers fear that without the pressure of protesters on the street, Mubarak's regime will enact only cosmetic reforms and try to preserve its grip on power. So they are reluctant to lift their demonstrations without the concrete gain of Mubarak's ouster and a transition mechanism that guarantees a real move to democracy afterward. From its side, the government has sought to draw opposition parties and the youth groups involved in the protests into immediate negotiations on constitutional reforms so presidential elections can be held in September to replace Mubarak. Protest organizers, wary of a trap, have refused until Mubarak goes.

And while rich nations made big strides in cutting rates of high cholesterol and hypertension, or high blood pressure, the overall number of people with high blood pressure rose from 600 million in 1980 to nearly 1 billion in 2008, fueled by an aging and expanding global population. "Overweight and obesity, high blood pressure and high cholesterol are no longer Western problems or problems of wealthy nations," said Majid Ezzati of Imperial College London and Harvard University, who led the studies published in the Lancet journal.

The research, conducted with the World Health Organization, benchmarks changes in key risk factors that affect heart health. Heart disease is the number 1 killer of people in the industrialized world, and billions of dollars are spent every year on medical devices and drugs to treat it. Thursday's study showed progress in some areas, but also areas of major concern.

Obesity-related diseases account for nearly 10 percent of US medical spending or an estimated $147 billion a year. In Europe, more than half of adults are overweight or obese, piling pressure on already stretched healthcare budgets. Commenting on the findings in the Lancet, Sonia Anand and Salim Yusuf from McMaster University in Canada said they showed a global "tsunami of cardiovascular disease" which needed to be met with population-wide efforts to cut intake of bad fats and salt, and increased levels of exercise.

In draft conclusions prepared ahead of the summit, the 27 heads of state and government said they would consider "concrete proposals" for strengthening the EFSF "to ensure the necessary flexibility and financial capacity to provide adequate support," with those discussions being finalized next month. With no major decisions therefore expected at Friday's meeting, diplomats are describing it as a stock-taking exercise to assess progress since the last meeting in December, since when concerns about the debt crisis spreading from Greece and Ireland to Portugal, Spain or beyond appear to have diminished.

"We are at a key moment - markets are turning, doubts about the solidity of the euro and the euro zone are dissipating," a source in the French presidency said on Thursday, briefing reporters ahead of the summit. "This is the moment to take a great step forward."

Any Chinese bids for this or another contract under discussion would be certain to meet intense political resistance and would appear to have very little chance of success given mounting US concern about China's military power and long-term strategic goals, and the often-prohibitive opposition in the past to Chinese attempts to enter other strategic US sectors, such as energy and telecommunications.

However, the fact that state-run China Aviation Industry Corp, known as AVIC, is even considering bids for these contracts, which industry insiders expect to be awarded in the next two to three years, reflects the rapid development and lofty ambitions of China's aerospace industry. AVIC has been in talks for more than a year with California-based US Aerospace Inc about offering the AC-313-China's largest domestically produced helicopter as the next generation of Marine One, the people involved in the partnership say.

They say the two companies have also been discussing putting forward AVIC's new L-15 trainer jet as a candidate to replace the US Air Force's fleet of Northrop T-38s, which entered service 50 years ago and on which American fighter pilots learn skills such as how to fly at supersonic speeds. That contract is expected to be one of the most lucrative military aviation contracts this decade, with the US likely to buy about 400 and other allied countries about 600 more as the jet will become the standard for training pilots to fly the US F-22 and F-35 stealth fighters.

AVIC already supplies civilian aircraft components to US companies, but US officials and lawmakers have expressed concern about US technology being diverted to AVIC's military arm through such cooperation.

Creation of a military-backed caretaker government in Egypt is one of several ideas being discussed as anti-Mubarak protests escalate in the streets of Cairo and other Egyptian cities, the officials said. Those protests are expected to grow in size and intensity on Friday and the administration fears they may erupt into more widespread violence unless the government takes tangible steps to address the protesters' main demand that Mubarak leave office.

A senior administration official suggested to Fox News that the proposal was one of several being discussed. "It's simply wrong to report that there's a single US plan that's being negotiated with the Egyptians," the official said. The developments came after Mubarak said earlier Thursday in an interview with ABC News that he wants to leave office now but cannot for fear the country will sink deeper into chaos. He announced earlier this week his intention to end his three-decade rule, but only after elections in September.

Mubarak told ABC he is troubled by deadly violence in Cairo's Tahrir Square and that the government is not responsible for it. In the interview at the presidential palace, Mubarak blamed the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood for the violence.

"The president has said that now is the time to begin a peaceful, orderly and meaningful transition, with credible, inclusive negotiations," said White House national security spokesman Tommy Vietor on Thursday night. "We have discussed with the Egyptians a variety of different ways to move that process forward, but all of those decisions must be made by the Egyptian people." Among the options being discussed is a proposal for Mubarak to resign immediately - which the embattled president has refused to do - and for him to cede power to a transitional government run by Suleiman.

The government will run out of money in about two months' time, according to the US Treasury Department, unless Congress votes to raise the federal debt ceiling.

But while Democrats, along with most Republicans, agree on the need to avoid having the United States default on its debt, which likely would likely trigger a massive economic meltdown, some conservatives remain firmly against increasing the ceiling.

They insist instead that it is time for massive spending cuts and belt-tightening, and say that raising the debt ceiling further only forestalls needed austerity moves.

Illinois Senator Richard Durbin said the curtailment of government services today could "precipitate an economic crisis, driving up interest rates on mortgages, loans, businesses, families across America." Durbin called it a "political tactic that could kill our economic recovery and drive unemployment even higher."

Democrats noted that the last similar such standoff which led in 1995 to a brief government shutdown that was limited in scope, proved politically costly for Republicans after the public sided en masse with Democratic President Bill Clinton.

But then something happened. Since 1998, temperatures have been relatively flat. We've got more polar bears than ever, and Manhattan is buried under snow. For a planet-roasting crisis that threatened the human race with extinction, there doesn't seem to be much actual warming. So then the mantra became "climate change." The liberals formerly known as "warmists" began predicting that we would experience fundamental changes in our weather. Scientists at the University of East Anglia - the Harvard of climate change - said snow would be "a very rare and exciting event." Children wouldn't know what it was.

As for summers, in the wake of Katrina "change-ist" groups like realclimate.org predicted "global warming will make hurricanes even worse in the future." What happened? Nothing. Europe has had three winters in a row of snow and cold temperatures. In the Atlantic, "there has been a dramatic decrease in the number of hurricanes in the last five years," according to meteorologist Art Horn. "The total energy in all hurricanes around the world has plunged since 1993. The opposite of what was predicted."

So the new fall back is "global weirding." The site thedailygreen.com has a "Weird Weather Watch" page. The uber-liberal Huffington Post ran a story in August headlined "Global Weirding: Extreme Climate Events Dominate The Summer." "The extreme climate events all across the globe must say something about whether climate change is already upon us," the HuffPo insisted. "Extreme is the new normal." They quote a professor of "environmental studies and politics" from Oberlin College who says, "More hottest hots, driest dries, wettest wets, windiest wind conditions. So it's all part of a pattern."

Gore is on board, too. He's now merely claiming rising temperatures will "create all sorts of havoc, ranging from hotter dry spells to colder winters." Not "warming," but "weirding." Not "heating," but "havoc." Which is how global warming can cause more snow, less snow, no snow, avalanches, heat waves, cold snaps, wetter wets, drier dries, gingivitis, delirium tremens and irritable bowel syndrome. . . all at the same time!

Global warming - is there anything it can't do?

Well, the one thing it apparently doesn't do is help predict the weather. The UK's Met Office stopped giving seasonal forecasts last year after mis-predicting warmer winters three years in a row. Meteorologists without a warmist agenda like Piers Corbyn and AccuWeather's Joe Bastardi, on the other hand, continue to pay the bills by making predictions directly contrary to the "weirdos." Oddly, they don't have degrees in politics.

For a theory to be scientific, it must be fallible - capable of being proven false. If every weather condition can be used to "prove" global warming simply by being declared "weird," then it's not science. It's a joke. Which is exactly what the environmental movement has become.

"After President Mubarak steps down and a provisional government is formed, there is a need to dissolve the peace treaty with Israel," al-Bayoumi said. Egypt was the first Arab country to officially recognize Israel and sign a peace agreement with the Israeli government in 1979. It is also a major mediator of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Muslim Brotherhood has recently come to light amid mass anti-government protests in Egypt. Some media voiced concerns that the banned Islamic movement could eventually take power in the riot-hit Arab country.

The deeply conservative Islamic movement, which wants to move Egypt from secularism and return to the rules of the Quran, failed to win a single seat in the 2010 Egyptian parliamentary election. The Muslim Brotherhood joined the anti-government protests in Egypt last week. The unrest, seen by many analysts as a major threat to repressive governments in the region, has already claimed the lives of at least 300 people and injured several thousand.

Processes that have been roiling beneath the surface for about a decade are suddenly bursting out in an intifada of freedom. Modernization, globalization, telecommunications and Islamization have created a critical mass that cannot be stopped. The example of democratic Iraq is awakening others, and Al Jazeera's subversive broadcasts are fanning the flames. And so the Tunisian bastille fell, the Cairo bastille is falling and other Arab bastilles will fall. The old order in the Middle East is crumbling. Just as the officers' revolution in the 1950s brought down the Arab monarchism that had relied on the colonial powers, the 2011 revolution in the square is bringing down the Arab tyrants who were dependent on the United States.

The second process is the acceleration of the decline of the West.

For some 60 years the West gave the world imperfect but stable order. It built a kind of post-imperial empire that promised relative quiet and maximum peace. The rise of China, India, Brazil and Russia, like the economic crisis in the United States, has made it clear that the empire is beginning to fade. And yet, the West has maintained a sort of international hegemony. Just as no replacement has been found for the dollar, none has been found for North Atlantic leadership. But Western countries' poor handling of the Middle East proves they are no longer leaders. Right before our eyes the superpowers are turning into palaver powers.

The Arab liberation revolution will fundamentally change the Middle East. The acceleration of the West's decline will change the world. One outcome will be a surge toward China, Russia and regional powers like Brazil, Turkey and Iran. Another will be a series of international flare-ups stemming from the West's lost deterrence. But the overall outcome will be the collapse of North Atlantic political hegemony not in decades, but in years. When the United States and Europe bury Mubarak now, they are also burying the powers they once were. In Cairo's Tahrir Square, the age of Western hegemony is fading away.

These armies are strong enough to maintain law and order as long as they stay out of politics; thus the revolutions can remain peaceful. That is what the United States should insist on while encouraging corrupt and repressive rulers who are no longer tolerated by their people to step aside and allow new leaders to be elected in free and fair elections.

The main stumbling block is Israel. In reality, Israel has as much to gain from the spread of democracy in the Middle East as the United States has. But Israel is unlikely to recognize its own best interests because the change is too sudden and carries too many risks. And some US supporters of Israel are more rigid and ideological than Israelis themselves. Fortunately, Obama is not beholden to the religious right, which has carried on a veritable vendetta against him. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee is no longer monolithic or the sole representative of the Jewish community. The main danger is that the Obama administration will not adjust its policies quickly enough to the suddenly changed reality.

I am, as a general rule, wary of revolutions. But in the case of Egypt, I see a good chance of success. As a committed advocate of democracy and open society, I cannot help but share in the enthusiasm that is sweeping across the Middle East. I hope President Obama will expeditiously support the people of Egypt. My foundations are prepared to contribute what they can. In practice, that means establishing resource centers for supporting the rule of law, constitutional reform, fighting corruption and strengthening democratic institutions in those countries that request help in establishing them, while staying out of those countries where such efforts are not welcome.

The writer (George Soros) is chairman of the Soros Fund Management and the Open Society Foundations, which support democracy and human rights in more than 70 countries.

In drought years, the Amazon region changes from being a net absorber of carbon dioxide into a net emitter. The scientists, from the UK and Brazil, suggest this is further evidence of the Amazon's vulnerability to rising global temperatures. They also suggest the days of the Amazon forest curbing the impact of rising greenhouse gas emissions may be coming to an end.

The 2010 drought saw the Amazon River at its lowest levels for half a century, with several tributaries completely dry and more than 20 municipalities declaring a state of emergency. Research leader Simon Lewis, from the University of Leeds, said, "It's difficult to detect patterns from just two observed droughts, but to have them close together is concerning," he told BBC News. Both droughts were associated with unusually warm seas in the Atlantic Ocean off the Brazilian coast.

A single collision between two satellites or large pieces of "space junk" could send thousands of pieces of debris spinning into orbit, each capable of destroying further satellites. Global positioning systems, international phone connections, television signals and weather forecasts are among the services which are at risk of crashing to a halt.

This "chain reaction" could leave some orbits so cluttered with debris that they become unusable for commercial or military satellites, the US Defense Department's interim Space Posture Review warned last year. There are also fears that large pieces of debris could threaten the lives of astronauts in space shuttles or at the International Space Station. The report, which was sent to Congress in March and not publicly released, said space is "increasingly congested and contested" and warned the situation is set to worsen.

Bharath Gopalaswamy, an Indian rocket scientist researching space debris at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, estimates that there are now more than 370,000 pieces of junk compared with 1,100 satellites in low-Earth orbit (LEO), between 490 and 620 miles above the planet.

The February 2009 crash between a defunct Russian Cosmos satellite and an Iridium Communications Inc satellite left around 1,500 pieces of junk whizzing around the earth at 4.8 miles a second. A Chinese missile test destroyed a satellite in January 2007, leaving 150,000 pieces of debris in the atmosphere, according to Dr Gopalaswamy. The space junk, dubbed "an orbiting rubbish dump", also comprises nuts, bolts, gloves and other debris from space missions. "This is almost the tipping point," Dr Gopalaswamy said. "No satellite can be reliably shielded against this kind of destructive force."

"These high prices are likely to persist in the months to come," FAO economist Abdolreza Abbassian said. The index is now at its highest level since the FAO started the measure in 1990 and higher than June 2008 when the cost of food sparked violent protests in countries including Cameroon, Haiti and Egypt. The individual group components of the index, apart from meat, all registered rises in January.

The Cereal Price Index averaged 245 points in January reflecting rises in the price of wheat and grain. This was driven higher by flooding in Australia, which is a major wheat exporter. Rises were particularly high for dairy products, up 6.2% from December. Prices were driven higher by a combination of lower supply and increasing demand in emerging economies such as China and India. The Meat Price Index held steady at 166 points despite falling prices in Europe where a large amount of animal feed was found to have been contaminated with dioxin.

The high price of food is thought to have been a factor in recent political unrest in both Algeria and Tunisia in the form of anti-government demonstrations, protests which have spread to neighbouring Egypt and Jordan. Recently, white sugar futures hit a record high because of concerns about the damage Cyclone Yasi could cause to the Australian cane crop. World Bank President Robert Zoellick has asked global leaders to "put food first" and tackle the problem of price volatility.

Commodities prices have been on the rise generally with copper hitting a record high of $10,000 a tonne. Oil was also up on Thursday with Brent crude rising to $103.37 a barrel.

He said that rising food and fuel prices in recent months had already hit poorer countries and had already led to the massive anti-government protests in Egypt and in Tunisia. Rising social and political instability within nations had become a distinct possibility he said with "dangerous" imbalances likely to sow the seeds of the next crisis.

Unbalanced recovery across countries and social strains within countries with high unemployment and widening income gaps were proving a great challenge to governments, he said. He told his audience: "We face the prospect of a lost generation of young people, destined to suffer their whole lives from worse unemployment and social conditions. Creating jobs must be a top priority not only in the advanced economies, but also in many poorer countries."

What will come next: a democratic era that might transform the Middle East or a descent into chaos that could see the rise of an Islamist order that will undo Egypt's relationship with the West, threaten Israel and give new life to radical movements across the region.

Has a grim sunset been mistaken for a glorious dawn? For days now, articulate, English-speaking members of Egypt's middle class have been reassuring the world that their protests are not about to be hijacked by Islamists. But the secular middle class, which has thrown its weight behind Nobel peace laureate Mohamed ElBaradei is disorganised and lacks a wide social base. Egypt's political future will, instead, likely be decided by the Muslim Brotherhood, which has the assets needed to conduct mass politics effectively: a million-strong membership, deep organisational roots across small-town Egypt, and a nationwide network of schools, hospitals and charities.

Founded in 1928, the Brotherhood fired the imagination of the global jihadist movement. Abdullah Azzam, Osama bin Laden's ideological mentor, was a Brotherhood leader from Jordan; the al-Qaeda chief's Egyptian deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, also has a Brotherhood past. In recent years, though, the group claims to have reinvented itself as a democratic party, like the Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi, which rules Turkey. Mohamed Badei, the Brotherhood's supreme leader, has said that the party considers democratic institutions legitimate, respects laws guaranteeing the equality of women, and will protect minority rights.

But experts are divided on whether the Brotherhood has a new face, or is wearing a mask. Some have characterised the reinvented Brotherhood as the Fabians of the Islamist movement; others suggest that it has used deception to disguise its true agenda. The truth is that no one knows for certain: words alone mean little, after all, for even the most rabid theocratic leaders in Iran don't say they want to persecute women or religious minorities.