After centuries of mistrust between religion and science, the intention is to give the public a greater understanding of both sides. The website, which will be available in Italian and English, has information on everything from astronomy to theology, from space missions to philosophy and art.

It will have three portals - one for a general audience, one for students and their professors, and one for scholars. Within each portal, there will be a variety of multimedia platforms, including a cosmology section, and one that will have the latest data collected by satellites and unmanned probes. The venture is being run jointly by the Vatican and the Italian Space Agency, ASI.

Monsignor Gianfranco Basti, the dean of the Pontifical Lateran University's philosophy department, will be the Vatican's point man on the scheme. He says: "From the Church's point of view, this is about getting religious people to see that scientists are not the enemy and getting scientists to see that religious people are not the enemy. The aim is for both sides to come together for the good of humanity. I can believe in God and at the same time accept Einstein's theory that time has not always existed."

In a thinly veiled comparison, he said only Greek military dictators had previously denounced the European Convention on Human Rights. His comments were condemned by David Davis, the Conservative backbencher who was one of the MPs behind last week's Commons vote which backed a motion opposing the European ruling by 234 to 22.

Mr Davis said last night: "It is farcical to compare the oldest democracy in Europe with a military dictatorship. No one has any argument with the Convention as originally drafted and signed but that does not give the court the right to add on any authorities it sees fit. And it does not give the court the right to be insulting." Asked why he said it would be a "disaster" for Britain if it was to defy the judgment, Mr Costa told the BBC: "The only country which denounced the Convention [on Human Rights] was Greece in 1967 at the time of the dictatorship of the colonels. I cannot imagine, even if I can understand some irritation, that the UK, which is a great country, could be in the same situation as the colonels in 1967."

David Cameron set a collision course with both European and domestic judges on Wednesday when he said it was time Parliament decided laws. He spoke out after an "appalling" decision by Britain's Supreme Court that paedophiles and rapists should be allowed to appeal against being held on the sex offenders' register for life. The Coalition is still deciding how to abide by the prison vote ruling, which Mr Cameron has said makes him "physically sick". Today the High Court will rule on a Government attempt to throw out the claims of hundreds of prisoners who demanded compensation for not being able to vote in last year's general election

Mr Costa acknowledged that "it seems a little paradoxical" to give rapists and murderers the vote. He also said he understood the anger the court's decision had caused in Britain as some countries felt such matters were for parliaments not the courts. Mr Costa was one of only three European judges, out of 17, who was against the court's decision and felt Britain was not breaching human rights by having a blanket ban on votes for prisoners. He was overruled by the other judges.

She said it was now a "de facto one party system". Opening the debate, Hungarian European Affairs Minister Eniko Gyori - representing the Council of Ministers - said there was "unacceptable" violence against journalists and human rights activists, particularly in the turbulent North Caucuses region.

She criticised the immunity from arrest of Russian security forces in the region - a decision she said was leading to "grievances and terror".

In November 2010, a leading Russian journalist Oleg Kashin was severely beaten outside his Moscow home. The editor of the liberal Kommersant newspaper said the attack was probably retribution for articles Kashin wrote. He has recently covered anti-Kremlin protests and extremist rallies. MEPs passed a resolution urging action on human rights in Russia at the daily voting session on 17 February 2011.

The Class X flash - the largest such category - erupted at 0156 GMT Tuesday, according to the US space agency. "X-class flares are the most powerful of all solar events that can trigger radio blackouts and long-lasting radiation storms," disturbing telecommunications and electric grids, NASA said Wednesday.

Geomagnetic storms usually last 24 to 48 hours - but some could last for many days, read a statement from the US National Weather Service. "Ground to air, ship to shore, short-wave broadcast and amateur radio are vulnerable to disruption during geomagnetic storms. Navigation systems like GPS can also be adversely affected."

The China Meteorological Administration reported that the solar flare caused "sudden ionospheric disturbances" in the atmosphere above China and jammed short-wave radio communications in the southern part of the country. The CMA warned there was a high probability that large solar flares would appear over the next three days, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

Al-Qaradawi last delivered a Friday prayer sermon in Egypt in 1981 after the assassination of former President Anwar el-Sadat. Other prominent Muslim scholars were also banned from delivering the Friday sermon, such as Abd al-Hamid Kishk, Sheikh Mohammed al-Ghazali, and Sheikh Ahmed El-Mahallawi. El-Mahallawi lately returned to leading Friday prayers during the revolution at al-Qaed Ibrahim Mosque in Alexandria.

Sheikh Qaradawi confirmed in a telephone call with the German Press Agency that he would lead tomorrow's prayers in Tahrir, with hundreds of thousands expected to attend. Some of Qaradawi's sons and daughters took part in the Tahrir demonstrations leading up to the overthrow of Mr Mubarak.

The demonstration was organised through websites such as Facebook and Twitter and was closely coordinated with hundreds of other people who are based in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, one of the organisers told AFP. "We are giving the Palestinian factions until March 5 to make a reconciliation deal," said Badur Zamara, one of the protest organisers who works for a youth organisation called Sherek Forum.

Zamara said the group was planning a sustained pressure campaign which would include marches, rallies and protests, all calling for Hamas and Fatah to reconcile their differences. "They have already failed to do this but we feel that we can do what the factions couldn't do," he told AFP, saying the protesters wanted to use "Egyptian tactics" to bring about reconciliation within the bitterly divided Palestinian national movement.

Last month, a group of young, disgruntled Egyptians organised a series of anti-government rallies that mushroomed into an unprecedented civil protest movement that succeeded in bringing down the 30-year regime of Hosni Mubarak within the space of just 18 days. The uprising sparked shock waves across the Middle East, and has prompted widespread calls for democratic reform. Zamara said activists in Gaza were planning to hold a rally on Friday.

"King Abdullah... is the only person who can carry out these reforms," the prince told the broadcaster. "On his departure, may that be in many years to come, latent trouble will surface and I have warned of this on many occasions. We need to resolve the problems in his lifetime," the prince added. Talal added that if Saudi authorities "don't give more concern to the demands of the people, anything could happen in this country".

Talal has long called for reform in Saudi Arabia and formed the liberal political group "Free Princes Movement" in 1958 in reaction to the hostility between former kings Saud and Faisal. Because of his involvement with the Free Princes Movement it is unlikely that Talal, a former ambassador to France, will ever become king. Leaders throughout the Arab world are anxiously studying the spread of protests which have already unseated the presidents of Tunisia and Egypt.

A pro-government demonstration is also expected to be held, just hours after Bahrain banned public gatherings. Tanks have been stationed at strategic points around the streets of Manama. Soldiers would take every measure necessary to preserve security, the interior ministry said. Western countries have urged Bahrain to show restraint in dealing with protesters and called for meaningful reform in the small Gulf state kingdom.

The use of the military is a course that puts the Bahraini royal family into direct confrontation with members of the Shia Muslim majority who make up the bulk of the protesters, the BBC's Middle East correspondent, Jon Leyne, reports from Cairo. Since independence from the UK in 1971, tensions between the Sunni elite and the less affluent Shia have frequently caused civil unrest. Shia groups say they are marginalised, subject to unfair laws and repressed.

Washington is watching with growing concern as unrest and violence spread across the Middle East, threatening its regional interests, BBC state department correspondent Kim Ghattas reports from Washington. While Bahrain is tiny, with a population of less than one million, it is home to the US navy's Fifth Fleet and is near another key US ally in the region, Saudi Arabia.

At a mass rally in Beirut Monday, Hariri said he would not join the new government being formed by Najb Mukati. Instead, as he told thousands of protesters at a rally commemorating the the assassination of his father, Rafik Hariri, he plans to lead a "million-man march" next month, evoking a similar event six years ago, when some one million protesters gathered to protest Syria's interference in Lebanese affairs.

The protest will take place on March 14, the date of the earlier protest and the name of Hariri's former ruling coalition. The coalition was toppled when Druze leader Walid Jumblatt jumped to Hizbullah's side, giving the terror group the votes it needed to take control of the Lebanese parliament. "We are going on March 14 to say no," Hariri told the crowd. "No to the betrayal of coexistence... no to [Hizbullah's] armed internal tutelage, no to moving Lebanon to an axis rejected by the Lebanese," an axis which consists of, he said, Iran, Syria, and Hizbullah.

One of the major issues in Lebanese politics has been the investigation by an international tribunal of the elder Hariri's murder in 2005. Most observers expect the tribunal to finger Hizbullah as being behind the murder, with the terror group threatening violence if it is blamed for Hariri's death. In his speech, Hariri defended the tribunal, which, he said, "will accuse members and will not do so randomly," he said. "It has to be based on evidence and proof."

Hizbullah had used intimidation to bully its way into office on the background of the investigation, Hariri said. "We congratulate them on a majority that was hijacked by the intimidation of weapons and we congratulate them on a power that was stolen from the will of the voters."

"Our mistake may have been that we extended our hand truthfully every time," Hariri said, telling the crowd that he had been trying to work out an arrangement by which Lebanon could put his father's murder behind it, and move on to a new spirit of cooperation. "But we were met every time with deceit, and our genuine intention was taken as a point of weakness and a sign of fear."

The case stems from a 2006 blast from the San Francisco city board that called the Catholic church's teachings "an insult to all San Franciscans" and accused the Vatican of being a "foreign country" that "meddles with and attempts to negatively influence this great city's existing and established customs and traditions."

The case is being fought by officials with the Thomas More Law Center, who are arguing that the Supreme Court should take this opportunity "to secure and maintain uniformity of decisions on an important issue of federal law." "The crux of the problem is that this court's Establishment Clause jurisprudence... tends to be hostile toward religion," the petition to the court said. The formal statement from the San Francisco Board of Supervisors attacked the church's belief because it prohibits the adoption of children by homosexuals.

The resolution, adopted March 21, 2006, calls the Vatican a "foreign country" that is meddling in the city's affairs. Further it states that the church's moral teachings are "insulting to all San Franciscans," "hateful," "insulting and callous," "defamatory," "absolutely unacceptable," "insensitive" and "ignorant." The resolution further references the Inquisition and calls on the archbishop of San Francisco and other Catholic officials to defy church teachings and beliefs.

According to the TMLC, Catholic doctrine teaches that allowing children to be adopted by homosexuals would mean doing violence to these children, "in the sense that their condition of dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development." "Such policies are gravely immoral, and Catholic organizations must not place children for adoption in homosexual households," the center explained.

Catholic League spokesman Bill Donohue told WND at the time the comments denouncing church doctrine were "incredible, invective and bigoted comments." "This is beyond belief. It clearly is a hostile environment," he said.

The uprisings that removed Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali on January 14 and Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak four weeks later have shown the people are capable of doing it themselves, even when up against huge odds. Scholars and opposition figures, who all opposed the Iraq war, said the uprisings, which have so far sparked street action in Algeria, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Jordan and Iran, also exposed the ulterior motives behind US backing for police states.

"The West must change its mistaken belief that we are not fit for democracy and freedom. Now is the time for Western powers to recognise the desires of the Arab people and to remove their support of their despotic allies," said Ali Al-Ahmed, a Saudi dissident based in Washington. "Tunisians and Egyptians have proven Western powers and analysts wrong about the Arabs desire for freedom," he said.

Western countries long saw rulers such as Mubarak and Ben Ali as strongmen able to deliver on Western foreign policy needs while cracking down on convenient Islamist threats such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the Ennahda party in Tunisia.

"I say to the fighters of the Islamic Resistance: Be ready. If a new war is imposed on Lebanon we may ask you to take Galilee, to free Galilee," Hassan Nasrallah said in a televised speech to mark his Shiite party's martyrs' day. He vowed that the death of Imad Mughnieh, killed in a February 2008 car bombing in Damascus that Iranian-backed Hezbollah has blamed on Israel, would not be forgotten or go unpunished.

"I do not want to go into details. Suffice to say that our decision remains the same and will be executed, God willing, at the right time," he said to thunderous applause from hundreds of his supporters gathered in a stadium. "To the Zionist generals, I say: Anywhere you go in the world, at any time, watch out, for the blood of Imad Mughnieh will not go to waste."

A month-long war between the Shiite militant group and Israel in 2006 destroyed much of Lebanon's infrastructure and killed more than 1,200 Lebanese, mainly civilians, and 160 Israelis, mainly soldiers. Nasrallah's comments came a day after Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak warned that his army may have to re-enter Lebanon to ensure Hezbollah "remembers" the 2006 war.

Israel's state-funded Channel One television said Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, a vociferously far-right partner in the conservative coalition, had spoken out of turn as the Defense Ministry "had preferred to ignore" the ships' approach. Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Israel was tracking them and had alerted "friendly nations in the region" accordingly.

Israel's Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper described the two Iranian ships as a MK-5 frigate and a supply vessel, which would not present a significant danger to the Jewish state. Still, with Israeli-Iranian tensions long running high, the theoretical possibility of the geographically distant enemies encountering each others' forces in the Mediterranean Sea was enough to send oil prices surging.

Syria is one of Israel's neighboring adversaries. It has an alliance with Iran which has deepened along with Tehran's isolation from the West over its disputed nuclear program, which the Jewish state sees as an existential threat. The vessels will "dock at a Syrian port for a year," a senior Israeli official told Yedioth Ahronoth, adding there was no justification for Iran to put warships into the Mediterranean.

The US space administration NASA confirmed that Monday's solar flare was the largest in four years, and the event sparked predictions of heightened activity on the northern hemisphere of the sun. "X-class flares are the most powerful of all solar events that can trigger radio blackouts and long-lasting radiation storms," disrupting telecommunications and electric grids, NASA said.

Solar flares are classified as A, B, C, M or X, with each class having a peak 10 times greater than the preceding one. NASA also said the flare caused "sudden ionospheric disturbances" in the atmosphere above China and the CMA warned there was a high probability that large solar flares would appear over the next three days.

In a letter addressed to President Abdulaziz Bouteflika, he said the government was no longer capable of addressing the nation's challenges. Mr Mehri, 84, said that change must come soon. "The voices calling for a peaceful change of this system are many. This change cannot be postponed any longer," he said.

A former leader of the country's ruling FLN party and one of the founders of the Algerian state, Mr Mehri played a pivotal role in Algeria's bloody struggle for independence. He helped negotiate the Evian Treaty, ending 130 years of French colonial rule in Algeria.

Inspired by the popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, opposition parties and human rights groups have been staging pro-democracy rallies in the capital. They say they will march every Saturday until democratic change is introduced. Meanwhile, Algeria's Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia has said the government will lift a 19-year state of emergency by the end of the month.