Development aid to Africa is a blessing for all those directly involved - both on the giving end and on the receiving end. Functionaries on the donor side, at least those abroad, earn good money. Many of those on the receiving end, for their part, know how to organize things in such a way that their own personal interests don't get short shrift.

There is no reason for these two groups to be interested in changing the status quo. Yet even so, some within their ranks are starting to suggest the situation as it stands cannot continue. The development aid of the past 50 years, they say, is hardly justifiable given the disappointing results. Even individual donors, who know little about how development aid works in practice, increasingly sense that something might be amiss.

They're right. The aid has failed to a large extent. We have taken on too much responsibility for solving African problems. We have essentially educated them to, when problems arise, call for foreign aid first rather than trying to find solutions themselves. This attitude has become deeply rooted in Africa. These perpetual gifts have made partners into beggars, ones who no longer value the things they have been given and consequently have not maintained them well. Apart from a few exceptions, emergency aid being one example, free aid was and remains fundamentally wrong.

The man with the gray beard and the piercing eyes grabs a bottle of mineral water and fills a metal cup to the brim. "There you go," he says, handing the container over to a sweating farmer in muddy clothing. "Drink, my brother, drink," he says. "May Allah protect you!" The young man gulps down the water as the older man hands a cup to the next person standing in line. Hundreds of people have lined up here for nothing more than a single cup of clean drinking water.

That, however, is also the extent of the aid provided by the extremists in Pakistan's flood areas - a table in a tent and a banner on the fabric wall with the words "God is great" written in Arabic. Beneath stand a few cardboard boxes filled with water bottles. "I know it is little," says Rahim Ullah, who is distributing water in Charsadda in northwestern Pakistan. "But it is more than others are doing for the people here."

Rahim Ullah is a Pashtun from the northwestern Swat Valley, where the Taliban ruled until a Pakistani military offensive in early 2009. He admits that he is "very close" to the Islamists. When asked if he is an extremist himself, he answers with a counter-question: "At what point does a person become a Talib?"

"I have visited the scenes of many natural disasters around the world, but nothing like this," says UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who visited Pakistan on Sunday to assess the damage. "The scale is so large: so many people, in so many places, in so much need." Describing the floods as "unprecedented," he said they "demand unprecedented assistance."

The Pakistani government, at least so far, has failed miserably in its response to the disaster. Around 60,000 soldiers are attempting to provide relief across the country. But many more soldiers remain stationed on the border shared with the country's archenemy, India, while 140,000 soldiers are still occupied with the war on terror. The West, on the other hand, is concerned that its ally in the battle against terrorism, which has been made unstable through extremist attacks, could be toppled once and for all.

But several companies making contact lenses in Asia claim to have achieved the same wide eyed look. The product, known as 'circle lenses', covers part of the white area in the eyes to make the pupil look larger. The lenses are illegal to sell in the US because they haven't been approved by federal health officials, but they can bought online from foreign websites.

Opticians are worried that the lack of quality control will lead to problems like eye infections, damage to vision, and even loss of vision. Dr Assumpta Madu, from the Montefiore Medical Centre in New York, said: "There literally is potential for somebody to lose their vision within 24 hours from an infection." The Circle Lenses are available to correct poor eyesight or just as a decorative accessory. But doctors are emphasising that contact lenses should only be purchased after an optician has approved a prescription.

A YouTube video on how to get the Bad Romance look has had more than 11 million hits. Chantal George, 19, from Pennsylvania, has been wearing them for almost two years. "As of now, I have 15 pairs", she said. "It's like wearing a new shade of make-up, or a new outfit. I feel like I'm popping in terms of my look for the day." Chantal told Newsbeat she's not worried about wearing them and will continue recommending them to friends. "I say these are like any other contact lenses. They need to have care taken of them, they need not to be worn too often or for too long. And they're just coloured lenses - just not made in the United States."

Western powers say Iran is trying to build a nuclear weapon. Iran denies this and says its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes. The BBC's John Leyne reports from Cairo that the plan is a gesture of defiance to those outside Iran who fear that the new plants could be used to make nuclear weapons. The Islamic republic is already enriching uranium at a plant in Natanz in central Iran, and has been building a second enrichment site near Qom, further to the north.

Iran says it needs the plants to supply fuel for a new generation of up to 20 nuclear reactors, the BBC's Jon Leyne says. However, the only reactor under construction, at Bushehr, is being supplied with fuel by Russia. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad originally announced plans to build the 10 new plants in late 2009, days after the UN nuclear watchdog rebuked Iran for covering up the uranium enrichment plant it was building near Qom.

The report contains no dramatic new data but confirms US concerns about the rapid growth of China's military might. According to the Pentagon report, China has been upgrading its land-based missiles, expanding its submarine force and modernising nuclear forces. It says China has 1,150 short-range ballistic missiles and an unknown number of medium-range missiles. The billions of dollars in expenditure has been conducted largely out of the public eye, the report alleges.

"The limited transparency in China's military and security affairs enhances uncertainty and increases the potential for misunderstanding and miscalculation," it says. Recent commentaries from the Chinese military establishment have complained about large-scale military exercises held by the US and South Korea. They have spoken of an alleged policy of US "encirclement" that threatens China's core interests.

China has also criticised what it sees as unwarranted interference by the US in one of those core interests, China's claim to much of the South China Sea. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently told a regional summit in Vietnam that it supported non-Chinese claimants to the sea. The US also recently held a week of visits and training exercises with Vietnam. The US is embarking on a new round of exercises with South Korea which it describes as purely defensive.

Military-to-military contacts between the US and China have been suspended and China refused to meet US Defence Secretary Robert Gates.

Mr Obama expressed his support for the mosque, which will replace a building damaged by the attacks, at a White House meal celebrating Ramadan. In his speech on Friday, Mr Obama said: 'Let me be clear: As a citizen and as President I believe that Muslims have the same right to practise their religion as everyone else in this country.

'That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community centre on private property in Lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances. This is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable.' But the next day he insisted he had not been commenting on the 'wisdom' of placing a mosque in such a symbolic place.

Democratic Senate candidate Jeff Greene of Florida said: 'President Obama has this all wrong and I strongly oppose his support for building a mosque near Ground Zero especially since Islamic terrorists have bragged and celebrated destroying the Twin Towers and killing nearly 3,000 Americans. Freedom of religion might provide the right to build the mosque in the shadow of Ground Zero, but COMMON SENSE and respect for those who lost their lives and loved ones gives sensible reason to build the mosque someplace else.'

"The first time I saw it, my mouth hit the floor," Emily's mother, Kristin Cooper, said of the list, which also included perennials like glue sticks, scissors and crayons. Schools across the country are beginning the new school year with shrinking budgets and outsize demands for basic supplies. And while many parents are wincing at picking up the bill, retailers are rushing to cash in by expanding the back-to-school category like never before.

Now some back-to-school aisles are almost becoming janitorial-supply destinations as multipacks of paper towels, cleaning spray and hand sanitizer are crammed alongside pens, notepads and backpacks. On the list for pre-kindergartners at McClendon Elementary in Nevada, Texas: a package of cotton balls, two containers of facial tissue, rolls of paper towels, sheaves of manila and construction paper, and a package of paper sandwich bags.

State and local school financing, which make up almost all of public schools' money, is falling because of budget-balancing efforts and lower property- and sales-tax revenue. "Some of the things that have been historically provided by schools, we're not able to provide at this point," said Barbara A Chester, president of the National Association of Elementary School Principals.

The modern American nuclear (two reactors) aircraft carrier is nearly 1,100 feet long, displaces nearly 100,000 tons but is fast (over 30 knots) and maneuverable. It carries more than 6,000 service personnel and more than 80 aircraft. Until now, the carrier has been virtually invincible. Short of a nuclear hit, the American Supercarrier could not be sunk - until now.

The Chinese have built, tested and are on schedule to deploy next year a missile designed to kill an American carrier. The Dong Feng 21D, according to published reports based on Chinese sources, could penetrate the carrier's existing antimissile defenses from 900 miles away with a nonnuclear precision warhead. A version of this missile was seen publicly for the first time in a Chinese military parade last year.

American defense analysts acknowledge that this missile could be a game-changer, immediately affecting American naval operations within 1,000 miles of the Chinese coast.

We have the capability to knock down land and sea based missiles with airborne, sea-launched or land-based laser technology. After the successful February 2010 test, no further tests were scheduled or conducted by the administration. Obama's proposed 2011 federal budget eliminates all funding for laser-based antimissile weapons systems.

Unless Congress acts to restore funding, the United States mainland, our ships at sea and Europe will have no defense to missile threats from the Chinese, the Iranians and the North Koreans. Obama is engaged in unilateral disarmament. Aboard the USS George Washington, more than 6,000 brave men and women are left defenseless.

Once the fuel rods are loaded, Bolton told Fox News on Friday afternoon, "it makes it essentially immune from attack by Israel. Because once the rods are in the reactor an attack on the reactor risks spreading radiation in the air, and perhaps into the water of the Persian Gulf." Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin declared in March that Russia would start the Bushehr reactor this summer. But the announcement from a spokesman for Russia's state atomic agency to Reuters Friday sent international diplomats scrambling to head off a crisis.

The story immediately became front-page news in Israel, which has laid precise plans to carry out an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities while going along with President Obama's plans to use international sanctions and diplomatic persuasion to convince Iran's clerics not to go nuclear. Bolton made it clear that it is widely assumed that any Israeli attack on the Bushehr reactor must take place before the reactor is loaded with fuel rods.

"If they're going to do it that's the window that they have," Bolton declared. "Otherwise as I said before, once the rods are in the reactor, if you attack the reactor you're going to open it up and radiation will escape at least into the atmosphere and possibly into the waters of the Persian Gulf. So most people think that neither Israel nor the United States, come to that, would attack the reactor after it's been fueled."

Bolton cited the 1981 Israeli attack on Saddam Hussein's Osirak reactor outside Baghdad and the September 2007 Israeli attack on a North Korean reactor being built in Syria. Both of those strikes came before fuel rods were loaded into those reactors. "So if it's going to happen in Bushehr it has to happen before the fuel rods go in," Bolton said.

The development comes after it emerged that three animals descended from cloned cows have found their way into the food chain in Britain, with dozens more living on farms across the country. All were descended from embryos of a cloned 'supercalf ' that was created in the United States, where official regulators have said that cloned meat and milk is as safe as normal produce.

American scientists are far ahead of Britain on animal cloning and are replicating exceptional animals as breeding stock with the aim of improving the quality of beef, dairy and pig herds. They use a range of techniques to make this assessment including productivity, longevity or meat quality, which cannot be done until the animal has been slaughtered.

The 'resurrection' technique is being carried out by leading animal cloning company J R Simplot. Brady Hicks of the Idaho-based firm said: 'the animals are hanging on a rail ready to go to the meat counter. We identify carcasses that have certain characteristics that we want, but it's too late to reproduce the genetics of the animal. But through cloning we can resurrect that animal.'

Figures compiled by the price comparison website mySupermarket.co.uk show that parents with young children are also being hit particularly hard. The cost of baby wipes, creams and bath wash has risen by 38 per cent. Baby food and snacks have gone up by 21 per cent while baby milk and drinks have increased by 29 per cent.

The soaring prices are in contrast to the overall inflation rate, which is currently 3.2 per cent a year. Britain's high food prices are also at odds with many of our European neighbours, who have seen their grocery bills fall steadily over the past year. Experts say UK food prices have surged above the official rate of inflation because of worries about the financial uncertainty in the face of drastic public spending cuts. Nervous shoppers are concentrating on buying essentials rather than luxury items, which is pushing up food price inflation.

The price of bread, pasta and many processed foods is likely to rise further after Russia announced a ban on the export of wheat. Analysts believe Britons could soon be paying 15p more for a loaf of bread. Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin said it was necessary to protect his country against wheat shortages following a severe drought which has ravaged crops.

Dr Philip Thornton, of the International Livestock Research Institute in Nairobi, said: "One [solution] is artificial meat, which is made in a giant vat." He added that another could be the use of nanotechnology, or molecular engineering, to deliver medication to livestock, which could increase their efficiency.

Other answers put forward were: increased yields from plants due to higher levels of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere on which they feed; genetic modification; lowering food waste by encouraging people only to buy what they will use; or by developing food technology so agriculture produces less greenhouse gases.

However, some scientists warned that progress could be hindered by the amounts of information being controlled by some big multinationals in the sector, such as Monsanto. Professor Jenifer Piesse, an international business expert at King's College, London, said: "This represents a threat to the global commons in agricultural technology on which the green revolution has depended."

The suggestions were presented in a range of papers published by the Royal Society, the Guardian reported.

The rebel group, the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), has bases in the mountains in the north of Iraq, near the Turkish border. "The president has said to Erdogan that some of the actions that Turkey has taken have caused questions to be raised on the Hill (Congress)," a senior administration official told the Financial Times newspaper.

These questions centred on "whether we can have confidence in Turkey as an ally," said the official. "That means that some of the requests Turkey has made of us, for example in providing some of the weaponry that it would like to fight the PKK, will be harder for us to move through Congress." The United States voiced disappointment after Turkey voted against fresh UN sanctions on Iran, which the United Nations Security Council adopted in June.

Ankara argued that Tehran should be given a chance to carry out a nuclear fuel swap deal, brokered by Turkey and Brazil. Relations between Turkey and Israel were thrown into crisis after an Israeli raid targeting Gaza-bound aid ships on May 31 that left nine Turks dead. Mr Obama called on Turkey to cool its rhetoric about the raid when he met Erdogan at the G20 summit in Toronto in June.

"The military counteraction of (North Korea) will be the severest punishment no one has ever met in the world," he said. The warning came a day before US and South Korean troops begin the 10-day computerised war games called "Ulchi Freedom Guardian (UFG)". About 30,000 US soldiers will take part in the exercise, a US military spokesman said, adding an unspecified number of American soldiers based in the United States would join in via computer networks.

Some 56,000 South Korean soldiers will be mobilised for the war games, a defence ministry spokesman said. In a message posted on a US military website, General Walter Sharp, who heads some 28,500 US troops based in the South, described the exercise as "one of the largest joint staff directed theatre exercises in the world."

A separate security drill involving South Korean government officials and soldiers will be held during the period, Yonhap news agency said. This week's exercise is one of a series planned by the South - either alone or jointly with the United States - in the aftermath of the sinking of a South Korean warship in March.

China is North Korea's closest ally and trade partner and Beijing has refused to join in international condemnation of Pyongyang for the sinking of a South Korean warship.

Mike Stock (one third of the legendary pop factory Stock, Aitken and Waterman) has publicly attacked pop culture for prematurely 'sexualising' today's children. He believes it's all gone too far: 'These days you can't watch modern stars - such as Britney Spears or Lady Gaga - with a two-year-old. Now, 99 per cent of the charts is R&B and 99 per cent of that is pornography.'

If an ordinary person came out with a statement like that the critics would be quick to sneer about 'moral panic'. If you dare to challenge the 'anything goes' conventions of our society you get dismissed as a prude. But Stock is the man who launched the career of Kylie Minogue and has made his fortune from the business he's condemning.

But any eight-year-old can watch this stuff on the TV or computer - and they do. 'Mothers of young children are worried because you can't control the TV remote control,' says Mike Stock. 'Before children even step into school they have all these images - the pop videos and computer games, such as Grand Theft Auto - confronting them, and the parents can't control it.'

Pop music has always used subtle sexual innuendo, but once it wasn't de rigueur. Now raunchy R&B and hip-hop seem to have a stranglehold on the market, so that what used to be edgy and extreme is now the commercial mainstream. I applaud this one man with influence in the music business for speaking out. For the rest - well, I wish that the producers of music videos would realise that 'restraint' is not a dirty word and that selling everything by means of the nastiest sexual message has a long-term corrupting effect on the next generation.

They won't, of course. But just don't tell me that doesn't matter.