The President of the European Commission told The Times that the new era at the White House was in danger of becoming a "missed opportunity" for Europe. Jose Manuel Barroso said that the EU-US relationship was not living up to its potential.

The criticism follows a series of fundamental disagreements on how to deal with the economic crisis, climate change and trade reform. The feelings of a deepening rift are mutual. Senior US figures said last night that Mr Obama could never live up to Europe's sky-high expectations.

The view from Washington is that communication with Europe on a range of crucial issues is difficult because the EU still lacks "a clear foreign policy apparatus."

The proposed law does not name BP, but would apply to any company that has experienced 10 or more deaths in the last seven years. The April explosion of BP's Deepwater Horizon rig killed 11 workers.

According to the draft legislation, the deaths must have taken place at drilling, production facilities, or refineries, and must have broken US health and environment laws. The Deepwater Horizon disaster is still being investigated. BP has already accepted its guilt in a separate accident in Texas in 2005 that killed 15 people. The proposal would need to be passed by both houses of Congress before it can be signed into law.

Built deep inside a mountain, the vault is designed to protect the world's main food plants from future disasters. Since opening in 2008, it has stored seeds from more than half a million of the planet's crops. The group delivering the seeds was led by Benjamin Cardin, Democrat Senator for Maryland, who said that all parts of the world were interdependent when it came to crop diversity. "As we manage the impact of climate change around the world, the seed vault in Svalbard will be the safety deposit box that ensures that we can keep that food supply intact," he said.

The seeds from the chilli plants, along with other samples such as soy, melon and sorghum, were provided by the US Department of Agriculture's (USDA) National Plant Germplasm, based in Colorado. "[We] have a strong commitment to sharing our crop diversity to ensure that Svalbard is well positioned to protect the world's genetic diversity," explained Edward Knipling, administrator for the USDA's Agricultural Research Service (ARS). The seeds are preserved at a temperature of -18C (-0.4F) in two secure store rooms located 130m (426ft) inside a mountain.

The vault has been designed to store duplicates of seeds from collections from all around the world. If the nation's seeds are lost as a result of a natural disaster, such as widespread flooding, the seed collections could be re-established using the specimens stored in the Arctic. The 5 million pounds ($7 million) facility took 12 months to build and opened in February 2008.

Svalbard is an archipelago in the Arctic, constituting the northernmost part of Norway. Located north of mainland Europe, it is about midway between mainland Norway and the North Pole.

The government had earlier delayed the whole procedure amid fears that a failure could make the situation worse. But after experts reviewed BP's plans, officials approved the operation. "There is a tremendous sense of urgency," said Admiral Thad Allen, the US incident commander. But he warned that nobody wanted to make "an irreversible mistake". BP hopes the series of valves will be capable of holding back all of the oil from the well.

Once the leak in the choke valve has been fixed, experts will begin to test the integrity of the new capping device by monitoring seismic, acoustic and temperature changes in the well and the surrounding area. The purpose of testing is to check whether oil will leak out of other areas if valves on the blow-out preventer and new cap are closed.

Put simply, the reason is down to the fact that genetic material does not change during an animal's life. Therefore the first bird that evolved into what we would call a chicken, probably in prehistoric times, must have first existed as an embryo inside an egg. Professor John Brookfield, a specialist in evolutionary genetics at the University of Nottingham, told the UK Press Association the pecking order was clear. The living organism inside the eggshell would have had the same DNA as the chicken it would develop into, he said. "Therefore, the first living thing which we could say unequivocally was a member of the species would be this first egg," he added. "So, I would conclude THAT THE EGG CAME FIRST."

The same conclusion was reached by his fellow "eggsperts" Professor David Papineau, of King's College London, and poultry farmer Charles Bourns. Mr Papineau, an expert in the philosophy of science, agreed that the first chicken came from an egg and that proves there were chicken eggs before chickens. He told PA people were mistaken if they argued that the mutant egg belonged to the "non-chicken" bird parents.

The debate, which may come as a relief to those with argumentative relatives, WAS ORGANIZED BY DISNEY TO PROMOTE THE RELEASE OF THE FILM "CHICKEN LITTLE" ON DVD.

Meanwhile, A team from University of Sheffield and University of Warwick has found that a protein called ovocleidin (OC-17) is crucial in the formation of eggshells.

It is produced in the pregnant hen's ovaries so the correct reply to the egg riddle must be that the chicken came first, the scientists say. The team used a hi-tech computer, called HECToR, to look at the molecular structure of a shell. They discovered that OC-17 acts as a catalyst, kick-starting the conversion of calcium carbonate in the chicken's body into calcite crystals. It is these that make up the hard shell that houses the yolk and its protective fluids while the chick develops. Lead scientist Dr Colin Freeman of Sheffield University said: "It had long been suspected that the egg came first but now we have the scientific proof that shows that in fact THE CHICKEN CAME FIRST. However, the research does not come up with how the protein-producing chicken existed in the first place, the 'Daily Express' reported.

Two members of the Royal Gurkha Rifles, one a British-born junior officer and the other a Nepalese Gurkha, were also killed by the Afghan, who fired a machinegun and a rocket-propelled grenade. The killings happened at a British patrol base in Nahr-e Saraj, just eight months after five British soldiers were shot dead and several others seriously wounded by an Afghan police officer, also in Helmand province. The Afghan soldier who carried out the latest attack fled the base and was being hunted last night by British units including the Special Forces. Last night the Taliban claimed the Afghan soldier had joined its insurgency.

Professor Michael Clarke, the director of the Royal United Services Institute, warned that the latest killings could undermine British commitment to the Afghan deployment. He said: "The betrayal of trust has a very high symbolic value and the danger is that is corrosive of public opinion and public support for the mission. That genuinely worries senior commanders."

"The fact that he [the killer] was a senior NCO is a worry - he was not a raw recruit just out of basic training, he was a senior man, someone who was trusted and respected." One British Army source said: "It massively undermines our exit strategy. Without a functioning Afghan police and army there is no way we can begin reducing our forces."

Questions have been raised about the loyalty of rank-and-file ANA soldiers, who receive only two months of basic training and often go absent without leave. A Pentagon audit last month found that Nato commanders had exaggerated the quality of many ANA units.

Such a crash has never before been seen. Fewer than 12 weeks ago, the multinational oil giant BP still held an uncontested fourth place on the list of the world's largest companies. Its impressive balance sheet boasted annual sales of roughly $246 billion (195 billion euros), a market value of more than $190 billion and after-tax profits of almost $17 billion. Indeed, insurance companies, retirement funds and pension funds worldwide viewed BP as a safe haven, an almost risk-free investment in an otherwise turbulent market.

The company, many believed, would have no trouble weathering even the severest of crises. BP's global earnings appeared safe, its cash and petroleum reserves seemed impervious. But April 20, the day that the company's Deepwater Horizon oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico exploded, marked an end to the once unshakable faith the financial markets had in the oil giant. The company has made several attempts to staunch the ensuing leak, all of which have failed.

On Tuesday, the company was voicing optimism that yet another effort - the installation of an enormous cap said to be an improvement over its predecessors - may stop the leak entirely. Few are holding their breaths. Experts estimate that more than 60,000 barrels of crude oil are surging out of the well and into the Gulf of Mexico each day.

Already, the accident is one of the largest environmental catastrophes in US history - one that will have immeasurable effects on wildlife, eco-systems and the economy. Experts have estimated that it will cost more than 60 billion euros to repair the damages. With every extra day that goes by without a solution to the gushing oil, the threat facing the environment, and BP itself, increases. BANKRUPTCY IS NO LONGER SEEN AS AN IMPOSSIBILITY.

"The system takes three to five times as long as walking through a metal detector," says Phil Bush of Atlanta, one of many fliers on 'USA Today's Road Warriors' panel who oppose the machines. "This looks to be yet another disaster waiting to happen."

The machines - dubbed by some fliers as virtual strip searches - were installed at many airports in March after a Christmas Day airline bombing attempt. The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has spent more than $80 million for about 500 machines, including 133 now at airports. It plans to install about 1,000 by the end of next year.

Passengers can refuse screening by the machines and receive a pat-down search by a security officer, screening by a metal detector, or both, the TSA says.

That's down 7.6 percent from the $1.09 trillion deficit run up during the same period a year ago. Worries about the size of the deficit have created political problems for the Obama administration. Congressional Republicans and moderate Democrats have blocked more spending on job creation and other efforts. Republicans also have held up legislation to extend unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless because of its effect on the deficit.

Another failed effort would have provided cash-starved states with money to help avoid layoff of public employees and finance the Medicaid program for the poor and disabled. President Barack Obama also encountered resistance to further stimulus spending at a meeting of the Group of 20 major industrial nations last month in Toronto. Obama expressed concerns about the risks to a fragile global recovery from withdrawing spending too soon. But the G-20 adopted targets to cut deficits in half as a percentage of their economies over three years.

The heads of the panel told the National Governors Association on Sunday that everything needs to be considered including curtailing popular tax breaks, such as the home mortgage deduction.

"The debt is like a cancer," Democrat Erskine Bowles told the governors. "IT IS GOING TO DESTROY THE COUNTRY FROM WITHIN."

The Energy Department document provides details of the reductions that President Barack Obama has called for on a path to eliminating nuclear weapons. The reductions continue a trajectory of cuts that already has reduced US stockpiles by about 75 percent since 1989.

In May the administration said that it had 5,113 nuclear warheads. The new document says the administration would like to reduce that number to a range of 3,000 to 3,500. The document was presented to Congress in May and posted Tuesday on the websites of the Federation of American Scientists and the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Lazio, who has sought an investigation into the funding of the mosque, was among the witnesses who testified in support of giving the building landmark status, which could complicate plans by Muslim groups to develop a community center and mosque there.

After noting the lower Manhattan building's history and architectural significance, Lazio said it also warranted landmark designation because on September 11, 2001, it was struck by airplane debris from the terror attacks against the nearby World Trade Center. That connection to the attacks, he said, made it "a place of deep historical significance and a reminder of just what happened on New York's darkest day."

Lazio has called on state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, his Democratic opponent in the governor's race, to investigate the funding of the project. On Tuesday, he repeated that request and said the pace of the landmark designation process should be slowed to allow time to thoroughly investigate the matter.

Ms May said that the review would "put right the failures of the last government and in so doing restore the ancient civil liberties that should be synonymous with the name of our country".

The review will consider "the most controversial or sensitive powers," she said, including:

* The use of control orders for terror suspects

* Stop and search powers under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 and the use of counter-terror laws against photographers

* The use of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 by local authorities and access to communications data more generally

* Extending the use of deportations with assurances in a manner "consistent with our legal and human rights obligations"

* Measures to deal with organisations that promote hatred or violence

* Detention of terror suspects before charge.

It is a product of the company's secretive Phantom Works research and development arm. Boeing says the aircraft is capable of long endurance flights because of its "lighter" and "more powerful" hydrogen fuel system. "We flew Condor [the company's previous reconnaissance drone] for 60 hours in 1989 on regular jet fuel, and that was the maximum," said Chris Haddox from Boeing Phantom Works. "Now we're talking 96 hours."

The company explained in a statement that Phantom Eye was "powered by two 2.3 litre, four-cylinder engines that provide 150 horsepower each". It is also very large, with a 46m (150ft) wingspan. "It isn't built for stealth - it's built for endurance," Mr Haddox told BBC News.

The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) has an ongoing interest in long-endurance high-altitude planes for surveillance and is considering a several different technologies, including solar power, to meet the requirements of what it refers to as its "Scavenger project". The aerospace and defence company Qinetiq are carrying out trials in conjunction with the MoD to develop a solar powered plane called Zephyr.

Increasingly, unmanned ground vehicles and unmanned sensors are also being used - and not just in the United States. Countries around the world are turning to unmanned armies to help protect their borders. Here's what some governments are doing:

UNITED STATES: The US uses some of the most high-tech arrays of sensors and devices to guard its border, including tethered blimps, unmanned Predator aircraft and cameras - though whether all that technology has been effective at stemming the flow of illegal movement is unclear.

EUROPEAN UNION: Europe's answer to the United States' high-tech border fence is TALOS, which combines unmanned ground vehicles and sensors. TALOS is intended to "help in detecting, tracking and intercepting persons trying to cross the land border illegally between the border crossing points," according to an official description. The system would theoretically include guard robots that would spot people illegally crossing a border and even have special "interceptor" robots to confront intruders. There are no plans, however, for armed robots.

SOUTH KOREA: Armed robotic sentries may soon be deployed along one of the most politically charged borders in the world: the demilitarized zone that separates North and South Korea. According to news reports, the South Korean government is considering use of the SGR-1, produced by Samsung Techwin, which the military newspaper Stars and Stripes described as looking like a "cross between a traffic signal and a tourist-trap telescope." The SGR-1 would be used to help guard the DMZ. "The robots are not being deployed to replace or free up human soldiers," Huh Kwang-hak, a spokesman for the company that makes the robot, told Stars and Stripes. "Rather, they will become part of the defense team with our human soldiers."

ISRAEL: Home to one of the world's most tech-laden - and controversial - borders, Israel is also one of the leading producers of military unmanned systems. It has made robots that can patrol borders and unmanned patrol boats for coastal waters, and has reportedly looked at automated systems that would shoot at potential intruders with no human intervention.

IRAN: The government in Tehran, which is known for hyping its military technology, now says it has plans to employ unmanned aircraft to patrol its borders. "These drones are to carry only reconnaissance missions for the time being," said Deputy Operations Commander Majid Pirhadi, according to Iran's PressTV.

Dr Susan Shaw, founder and director of the Marine Environmental Research Institute, said during a CNN broadcast that after personally diving the oil spill in late May, a "very fiery sore throat" plagued her from inhaling fumes coming off the water. Because she was covered from head to toe in a protective suit, Dr Shaw was spared direct exposure. Shrimpers who had bare-skin contact with the mixture of oil and Corexit, she said, were not so lucky.

During her segment with anchor Rick Sanchez, Dr Shaw specified that stories shrimpers had told her were from when BP was deploying "the more toxic" Corexit 9527. BP has allegedly switched to Corexit 9500, which Dr Shaw has also taken to task in a widely-publicized essay.

The company responsible for producing the various Corexit formulas is Nalco, which was created by former members of the boards of directors at BP and Exxon. Their product is essentially by the oil industry, for the oil industry. That's why, even in the face of an alternative like Dispersit which is half as toxic as Corexit, Nalco's product is still in much greater supply.