Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, will launch the so-called exit program at the end of June, agency chief Heinz Fromm announced Monday, speaking at the presentation of the service's annual report for 2009 in Berlin. The agency is to set up a telephone hotline that militant Islamists can call if they want to leave radical Islamist groups. Multilingual specialists will be available to give potential quitters advice in Turkish or Arabic, as well as German, Fromm said, without giving further details of the program.

Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere described the scheme as a "valuable preventative effort." Fromm however warned against overly high expectations for the scheme. "We'll have to wait and see if it gets a big response," he said. The agency's programs for neo-Nazis wanting to quit their milieu, which have been running for several years, have only met with moderate success.

There was a small drop in acts of right-wing violence in 2009, down to 891 acts from 1,042 in 2008. De Maiziere stressed that, despite the fall, the threat of far-right violence should not be "neglected."

As the high-stakes dramas unfolded, the political risks from the disaster were underscored by a new poll that showed President Barack Obama's job performance rating has dropped to the lowest level of his presidency.

The worst spill in US history has been thrust to the top of Obama's crowded domestic agenda but the Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll found half of those surveyed disapproved of his handling of the spill. Overall Obama's rating stood at 45 percent in the poll, down 5 points from early last month. For the first time in the survey, more people, or 48 percent, say they disapprove of his job performance.

The administration sought to keep its key responses to the catastrophe in play as it appealed the ruling to lift the deepwater drilling ban after a judge said it was too far-reaching and not adequately justified despite the spill.

Obama said bluntly that General Stanley McChrystal's scornful remarks about administration officials represent conduct that "undermines the civilian control of the military that is at the core of our democratic system." He fired the commander after summoning him from Afghanistan for a face to face meeting in the Oval Office and named Petraeus, the Central Command chief who was McChrystal's direct boss, to step in. Obama had offered the job to Petraeus during a private White House meeting earlier Wednesday, said a senior military official.

The announcement came during what is on pace to be the deadliest month for the US-dominated international coalition in Afghanistan. NATO announced eight more international troop deaths Wednesday for a total of 75 this month - matching the toll of the deadliest month of the nine-year-long war, in July 2009. Forty-five of those killed this month were Americans. The US has 90,800 troops in Afghanistan.

The midday quake was felt in Canada and in a number of US states, including Michigan, Vermont and parts of upstate New York. The USGS said the quake occurred at a depth of about 12 miles (19.2 kilometers). The agency initially said the quake had a 5.5 magnitude, but later reduced it to a magnitude 5.0. The quake occurred at 1:41pm EDT (1741 GMT), the USGS said.

The quake lasted for about 30 seconds, rattling downtown buildings and homes in Ottawa and Toronto, as well as government offices across the Ottawa River in Gatineau, Quebec. Several buildings in Toronto and the Ottawa region were evacuated.

The setback, yet another in the nine-week effort to stop the gusher, came as thick pools of oil washed up on Pensacola Beach in Florida and the Obama administration tried to figure out how to resurrect a six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling.

When the robot bumped the system just before 10am Wednesday, gas rose through the vent that carries warm water down to prevent ice-like crystals from forming, Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen said. Crews were checking to see if crystals had formed before putting it back on. BP spokesman Bill Salvin could not say how long that might take. "We're doing it as quickly as possible," he said.

Before the problem with the containment cap, it had collected about 700,000 gallons of oil in 24 hours and sucked it up to a ship on the surface. That's oil that's now pouring into the Gulf. Another 438,000 gallons was burned on the surface by a different system that was not affected by the issue with the cap.

But seven of the nine Supreme Court Justices decided that ruling was unconstitutional. The seed is modified to be resistant to Monsanto's brand of weedkiller. The US is the world's largest producer of alfalfa, a grass-like plant used as animal feed. It is the fourth most valuable crop grown in the country.

Environmentalists had argued that there might be a risk of cross-pollination between genetically modified plants and neighbouring crops. They also argued over-use of the company's weedkiller Roundup, the chemical treatment the alfalfa is modified to be resistant to, could cause pollution of ground water and lead to resistant "super-weeds". But Monsanto says claims its products were dangerous amounted to "bad science fiction with no support on the record".

The waterway, a tributary to the River Tees, rises in the Pennine Hills and flows over a bed of porous limestone. During dry spells, the Greta disappears below the ground, reducing the bed to a pile of stones. Last week United Utilities issued drought warnings across the North West after six of the driest consecutive months in 70 years.

Millions of people could have hosepipe warnings within weeks unless the rains return. According to the Centre for Hydrology and Ecology, a leading independent body in the UK for research into and monitoring of freshwater ecosystems, north west England and Wales have had only sparse rainfall since December.

Reservoirs, lakes and rivers across the North West are at their lowest for mid-June since the 1960s. Thirlmere, in the Lake District, is only half full, while Haweswater is 30 per cent below capacity. Levels in Coniston and other lakes are dropping.

The threat of a drought in the North West follows three exceptionally wet summers. Last November, Cockermouth in Cumbria saw some of the worst floods in a century.

This delinquency in understanding Islamic culture and doctrine makes those they consider non-believers - or kafirs - vulnerable both individually and collectively. This is especially true when we examine the Islamic concept of taqiyya. Taqiyya is defined literally as: "Concealing or disguising one's beliefs, convictions, ideas, feelings, opinions, and/or strategies at a time of eminent danger, whether now or later in time, to save oneself from physical and/or mental injury." In essence, taqiyya can be generally defined as the legitimization of deception in times of danger.

Should the situation arise where a practicing Muslim, loyal to the faith, were to be questioned about a suspected terrorist operation or criminal activity being planed or perpetrated by a fellow Muslim - whether here in the United States or anywhere in the world - that Muslim must employ taqiyya. This makes the gathering of credible information from within the Islamic community, regarding the criminal Islamic community, virtually impossible.

This also brings into relevance our government's predisposition toward skepticism when entering into diplomatic negotiations with leaders of predominantly Muslim countries and the assurances they provide. A perfect case in point is the current nuclear proliferation issue with the Islamic Republic of Iran and its leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Ahmadinejad, a most devote Shi'ite, who has indicated without reservation his blind faith to Islam, would be held to the Quranic tenet of taqiyya. This tenet, understood for its true meaning, it would make it impossible for any clear thinking human being to take Ahmadinejad's words of peace at face value, especially in light of his violent declarations toward Israel, the United States, Western civilization and the non-Muslim world.

If the West - and especially the United States - is to survive this very real conflict with Islamofascist aggression, we must educate ourselves on the intricacies of our enemy's beliefs and tactics. To not do so would be the epitome of neglect and a ostentatious display of stupidity.

The US president will host senators from both parties at the White House - including those who have proposed variations on a climate change bill - but analysts are sceptical about whether he can overcome the political impasse on a proposal that is seen as essentially a tax.

"The oil spill has dramatically increased the urgency for the need to act," said Daniel Weiss of the Center for American Progress Action Fund. "But I'm not looking for any breakthrough at the meeting. I think President Obama wants to listen to various concerns and follow up on various ideas." Since he was a presidential candidate, Mr Obama has been promoting legislation that would put a cap on carbon emissions from polluters but allow them to buy permits to emit more.

Mitch McConnell, Republican leader in the Senate, who has called cap-and-trade a "national energy tax", has accused Mr Obama of trying to take political advantage of the oil spill.

Staff admitted they knew there was a family of foxes living under the building but said they had been advised by a wildlife expert that they posed no threat to the children. His father Sam and mother Jacqui, both 35, described him as a 'very brave little boy', with Sam telling today's Sun newspaper: 'He's doing well. It was a bit of a nightmare but he's back on top form as if it never happened.'

'We feel it was not the fault of the fox or Jake but an unfortunate event.' However, the attack will further heighten concerns about the animals after twin girls were mauled by a fox as they lay in their cots a fortnight ago. Playgroup staff have admitted they had been aware of a family of foxes living under the building for a year. The playgroup was closed until further notice yesterday as pest controllers were called in to remove the foxes.

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis planned to announce Wednesday that the government would require employers to extend the option that has been available to heterosexual workers for almost two decades, two officials briefed on the plan said Monday. Neither was authorized to speak publicly ahead of the announcement.

The move, coming less than five months before November's congressional elections, seemed likely to incite conservatives and Republicans who stood in lockstep against the Obama administration's earlier efforts to repeal a ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military. It also appeared likely to be popular with loyal Democrats and organized labor.

The Family and Medical Leave Act allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave each year to take care of loved ones or themselves. The 1993 law, which also allows employees to take time off for adoptions, has previously only been applied to heterosexual couples.

The Labor Department planned to extend those rights based on a new interpretation of the law, the officials said. There was no plan to ask Congress to change the law, which means future presidents could reverse the decision.

The University of New South Wales researcher says a grumpy person can cope with more demanding situations than a happy one because of the way the brain "promotes information processing strategies". He asked volunteers to watch different films and dwell on positive or negative events in their life, designed to put them in either a good or bad mood.

Next he asked them to take part in a series of tasks, including judging the truth of urban myths and providing eyewitness accounts of events. Those in a bad mood outperformed those who were jolly - they made fewer mistakes and were better communicators. Professor Forgas said: "Whereas positive mood seems to promote creativity, flexibility, co-operation and reliance on mental shortcuts, negative moods trigger more attentive, careful thinking, paying greater attention to the external world."

The study also found that sad people were better at stating their case through written arguments, which Forgas said showed that a "mildly negative mood may actually promote a more concrete, accommodative and ultimately more successful communication style". His earlier work shows the weather has a similar impact on us - wet, dreary days sharpened memory, while bright sunny spells make people forgetful.

Most of the connections between brain areas that control movement and those that control hearing are on the left side of the brain. "But there's a sort of corresponding hole on the right side," said Professor Schlaug. "For some reason, it's not as endowed with these connections, so the left side is used much more in speech. If you damage the left side, the right side has trouble [fulfilling that role]." But as patients learn to put their words to melodies, the crucial connections form on the right side of their brains.

Previous brain imaging studies have shown that this "singing centre" is overdeveloped in the brains of professional singers. During the therapy sessions, patients are taught to put their words to simple melodies. Dr Aniruddh Patel from the Neurosciences Institute in San Diego, said the study was an example of the "explosion in research into music and the brain" over the last decade. "People sometimes ask where in the brain music is processed and the answer is everywhere above the neck," said Dr Patel. "Music engages huge swathes of the brain - it's not just lighting up a spot in the auditory cortex."

Dr Nina Kraus, a neuroscientist from Northwestern University in Chicago, also studies the effects of music on the brain. In her research, she records the brain's response to music using electrodes on the scalp. This work has enabled her to "play back" electrical activity from brain cells as they pick up sounds. "Neurons work with electricity - so if you record the electricity from the brain you can play that back through speakers and hear how the brain deals with sounds," she explained.

Dr Kraus has also discovered that musical training seems to enhance the ability to perform other tasks, such as reading. She said that the insights into how the brain responds to music provided evidence that musical training was an important part of children's education.

"The costs of the ineffectual G20 pledges mount quarter by quarter," Simon Evenett, an economics professor at St Gallen University in Switzerland and coordinator of GTA, said. The report finds that nearly 650 protectionist measures implemented since the first crisis-related G20 summit in November 2008, when leaders promised to avoid protectionism, remain in place.

The findings of GTA, which has consistently warned that protectionism is running at a far higher level than governments acknowledge, are not shared by all economists. The World Trade Organization (WTO), for example, says that the rules-based global trading system, and memories of the 1930s Great Depression that was partly triggered by beggar-thy-neighbor policies, have kept protectionism in check.

Russia, Argentina and Nigeria also feature high in its lists. China, followed by the EU and United States, was the main target. The report identifies 22 far-reaching "jumbo" actions hurting more than 15 G20 trading partners and affecting more than $10 billion in trade, that should be a starting point for any G20 exit strategy on trade. "Few of these jumbo measures are policies for which there are strong WTO rules," Evenett said. The policies, covering $1.6 trillion or more than 10 percent of world imports, include measures such as China's export tax rebates and US "Buy American" provisions in its stimulus package.

The changes in Riyadh's reserves were revealed by the World Gold Council, the industry-backed body which regularly tracks official bullion holdings. According to the WGC, the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, the central bank, has gold reserves of 322.9 tones, more than double the 143 tones it had previously reported.

Analysts said the rise in official gold holdings probably represented an accounting shift rather than fresh purchases. One possibility is that a large fraction of the country's gold was not considered until now part of the official reserves. But without an official explanation, analysts were keeping options open. At current prices, the extra gold in Saudi Arabia's official reserves amounts to $7 billion. The revelation could fuel gold's rally as it is a further sign that central banks are keen on gold, after two decades of selling their bullion.

Analysts believe that central banks could be net buyers of gold this year for the first time in nearly two decades. India bought 200 tones of gold from the International Monetary Fund earlier this year, while Russia and others are purchasing bullion from domestic miners on a regular basis, official data show. European central banks, after more than a decade of hefty disposals, have all but stopped selling.