Alexander Bortnikov, the chief of the FSB, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB, gave no further details about the attempts or which groups had sought the materials. "We have information which indicates that terrorists are continuing to attempt to get access to nuclear materials (and) biological and chemical components," he was quoted as saying by Interfax.

A top commander told the Jerusalem Post yesterday: 'We boarded the ship and were attacked as if it was a war. That will mean that we will have to come prepared in the future as if it was a war.' Turkey - one of Israel's closest Muslim allies until Monday's clash left several citizens dead - was last night reported to be considering sending a naval escort for the boats.

This would arrive in the region at the end of the week, creating a potential flashpoint for a major clash between the nations. Today Israel bowed to world pressure and began deporting the activists it had seized in Monday's botched raid. However Israel remained defiant about the raid, with the Israeli ambassador to the US comparing it to America's fight against Nazi Germany. Speaking on Fox News yesterday, Michael Oren said the raid was 'perfectly legal, perfectly humane - and very responsible'.

'Israel acted in accord with international law,' he continued. 'Any state has the right to protect itself, certainly from a terrorist threat such as Hamas, including on the open seas. The US acted under similar international law when it fought the Germans and the Japanese in World War Two.'

Stocks in energy companies and oil service providers tumbled on the news, and other stocks followed. Holder would not say which companies or individuals might be under investigation. But investors quickly dumped stocks across the energy industry. BP PLC, which operated the rig that caused the spill, fell almost 15 percent. Oil services company Anadarko Petroleum Corp fell almost 20 percent, and competitor Halliburton Inc fell almost 15 percent.

Analysts have said the oil spill has been among the many issues nagging at investors in recent weeks. Among the fears in the market is the potential economic impact of the spill. But Tuesday's announcement raised the possibility that oil companies might have to pay out huge amounts in fines, or see their operations affected by a government investigation.

If last summer's adults were successful during mating season, then the worst grasshopper infestation in 30 years could strike ranches and agricultural land in the Great Plains states between late July and early August, said Roeland Elliston of the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service in Fort Collins, Colorado, who worked on the survey.

The USDA survey included the number of adult grasshoppers from late spring to early fall in 2009. Based on those numbers, and favorable reproductive conditions such as the mild winter this year, researchers identified areas at risk of a grasshopper infestation, including states in the Great Plains and the Pacific Northwest.

Montana, Wyoming and Nebraska - states with typically high numbers of grasshoppers due to the large expanses of open range land there - are already seeing more than eight grasshoppers per square yard. That's like walking through a field and having eight grasshoppers fly in your face with every step, Zach said. The potential economic impact is uncertain, but federal agencies and researchers are advising farmers and ranchers to keep a watchful eye on grasshopper numbers and be ready to spray their land with pesticides if an outbreak hits.

Smaller grasshopper infestations have hit in recent years. Swarms of grasshoppers devastated over 7,000 acres of grassland in southeastern Oregon's high desert last summer. However, they normally strike open rangeland, which is not as valuable as farmland.

"They eat anything that's green. If they're hungry enough they'll even chew into the shoots," Zach told LiveScience.

Essentially, while the Constitution requires a president to be a "natural born citizen," none of the questions about Obama's qualifications - or lack thereof - under that requirement have yet been answered. "Simply put, this question about Obama's legitimacy as president is undermining everything he does in the minds of millions of Americas," wrote Fritz Wenzel of Wenzel Strategies in an analysis of his results.

"Our latest polling shows a majority of Americans - 55 percent - want Obama to release all records relating to his childhood and his education, including college records, Harvard Law School papers, passport records, travel records, and other similar documentation," he said.

"Asked what should be done should it be found that Obama does not meet the qualifications to be president, 59 percent said he should be removed from office, and 35 percent said all bills signed into law by Obama should be repealed," he said.

"We are preparing to evacuate them," said Pombaen Kadir, head of the local social welfare department."They still do not want to leave their homes which are now under waist-deep water, but we may force them to leave once the situation deteriorates." She said the main highway that cuts through the affected areas had been rendered impassable to light vehicles. Army troops in the area have also dispatched trucks to help in the planned evacuation efforts.

Once Britain's biggest company and one of the largest oil firms in the world, BP's debt is AA rated - close to the highest rating given to non-sovereign bonds. However, traders of debt derivatives pushed the perceived risk of default out to a level similar to that of a much smaller oil company, such as Spain's Repsol, or one of Europe's weakened banks.

Analysts also cited rising takeover speculation, although they said reputational damage and the unknown financial cost of the spill would deter suitors for the moment. BP could now be easy prey having lost over a third of its market value or 46 billion pounds ($67 billion) in six weeks.

Shares in BP fell close to 17 percent on Tuesday, hitting their lowest point in over a year as the London market opened for the first time since the failure of its latest attempt to stem the biggest oil spill in US history. The drop meant the British oil group was worth about 77 billion pounds versus 93 billion on Friday and 123 billion pounds prior to a rig explosion in April that killed 11 workers and unleashed oil from a well head one mile down.

More than 100 people are reported to have died in the state of Gujarat where the mercury topped at 48.5C last week. At least 90 died in Maharashtra, 35 in Rajasthan and 34 in Bihar. Hospitals in Gujarat have been receiving around 300 people a day suffering from food poisoning and heat stroke, ministers said. Officials admit the figures are only a fraction of the total as most of the casualties are found in remote rural villages.

Wildlife and livestock has also suffered with voluntary organisations in Gujarat reporting the deaths of bats and crows and dozens of peacocks reported dead at a forest reserve in Uttar Pradesh. "Because of the heat, lakes and other water bodies have been reduced to parched land, making dehydration common in such birds," said Neeraj Srivastava, a wildlife campaigner.

After a drought last year, India's farmers are now impatient for the arrival of the monsoon, which irrigates 60% of India's fields. National meteorologists have forecast "normal" rains for this year, a relief in a country where prices of basic foodstuffs have rocketed in recent months due to growing shortages and structural problems with agriculture.

Ban called on Israel to "urgently" explain itself over the raid, which according to Israel's Channel 10 TV left 19 passengers killed and 36 wounded, many of them Turks. Israel's closest ally in Washington described the loss of life as a "tragedy," on the eve of talks between President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

"The United States deeply regrets the loss of life and injuries sustained and is currently working to understand the circumstances surrounding this tragedy," a White House spokesman said. As the Vatican voiced "deep sadness and concern" and Middle East peace envoy Tony Blair expressed "deep regret and shock" at the loss of life, capitals across Europe summoned Israel's ambassadors to explain the assault.

Ankara responded with fury, recalling its ambassador from Tel Aviv and warning the assault would have "irreparable consequences" to bilateral ties. Police held back angry crowds shouting "Damn Israel" outside Israel's missions to the country, as Turkey accused Israel of a "flagrant breach of international law," and "disregard for human life and peaceful initiatives."

Muslim leaders united in condemning what Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas called a "massacre" and Arab League chief Amr Mussa said was a "crime." The Islamist movement Hamas which rules Gaza urged world Muslims to "rise up" in protest, as Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denounced the raid as "inhuman Zionist regime action."

For the first time, two Chinese supercomputers appear in the list of the top 10 fastest machines. However, the US still dominates the list with more than half the Top 500, including the world's fastest, known as Jaguar. The Cray computer, which is owned by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, has a top speed of 1.75 petaflops.

One petaflop is the equivalent of 1,000 trillion calculations per second. It is used by scientists conducting research in astrophysics, climate science and nuclear energy. By comparison, China has 24 machines in the list. Its fastest has a top speed of 1.20 petaflops, more than double the speed of its previous top supercomputer. However, it has a theoretical top speed of nearly 3 petaflops, which would make it the fastest in the world.

The fastest machine in the UK - which has 38 supercomputers on the list - is housed at the University of Edinburgh. It has a top speed of 0.27 petaflops. "The Top 500 list definitely has an element of flag waving," said Dr Jon Lockley, manager of the Oxford Supercomputing Centre.

In a community of shacks on a hillside near Johannesburg, a man complained to me: "We didn't like apartheid, but some things were better under apartheid than they are now." In a community of shacks on a hillside near Durban, a man complained to me: "Life here under apartheid was bad, but now it is more bad."

A former African National Congress activist, "Bricks" Mokolo, told me it is still very hard to criticise the government here. He says everybody has been, as he put it, "made to love the ANC, made to love Nelson Mandela" and "made to feel small" if they dare to complain. Mr Mokolo tells me angrily: "I didn't wait for Nelson Mandela. I too fought for my freedom. I was tortured in an apartheid jail." He calls the new houses that are being built all over the country an insult because they are significantly smaller than the old matchbox homes that the apartheid government built in the townships.

"The ANC government now," he insists, "is simply an extension of the apartheid government. There's still separate development," he goes on, "there are still townships, 20 years after liberation." His conclusion: "There were places for blacks in those days. Now they are the same places. They've just changed the word. They've changed black, to poor."

The ships are carrying 10,000 tonnes of aid to try to break a long-standing Israeli-led blockade. Israel says its forces were attacked by activists when they got on board. "The people on the boats were very, very violent toward the soldiers," Israeli military spokeswoman Lieutenant Colonel Avital Leibovich was quoted as saying by AFP news agency. Organisers of the flotilla said at least 30 people were wounded in the incident.

The six-ship flotilla left international waters off the coast of Cyprus on Sunday and was expected to arrive in Gaza later on Monday.

Israel has said it would stop the boats, calling the campaign a "provocation intended to delegitimise Israel". An economic blockade was imposed by Israel after the Islamist movement Hamas took power in Gaza.

Israel says it allows about 15,000 tones of humanitarian aid into Gaza every week. But the United Nations says this is less than a quarter of what is needed.

The resolution adopted by the United Nations on Friday calls on Israel to join the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and urges it to open its facilities to inspection. It also calls for a regional conference in 2012 to advance the goal of a nuclear-free Middle East.

Israel is widely believed to be the only nuclear power in the Middle East, with around 200 warheads, but has maintained a policy of deliberate ambiguity about its capabilities since the mid-1960s. The document, which singles out Israel but makes no mention of Iran's controversial nuclear programme, drew a furious reaction from the Jewish state who decried it as "deeply flawed and hypocritical."

But it was US backing for the resolution which has caused the most consternation among Israeli officials and commentators, who interpreted the move as "a resounding slap around the face" which has dealt a very public blow to Israel's long-accepted policy of nuclear ambiguity. According to the top-selling Yediot Aharonot daily, the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was "furious with the Obama administration for having failed to prevent the resolution from passing... and for choosing to support it."

"The American support for the resolution, after decades in which it supported Israel on this issue, came as a complete surprise," the paper said. "In the secret talks that Netanyahu held with Obama's men... Israel was promised that the resolution would not focus on Israel and that if it did, the Americans would vote against."

The submarines of Flotilla 7 - Dolphin, Tekuma and Leviathan - have visited the Gulf before. But the decision has now been taken to ensure a permanent presence of at least one of the vessels. The flotilla's commander, identified only as "Colonel O", told an Israeli newspaper: "We are an underwater assault force. We're operating deep and far, very far, from our borders."

Each of the submarines has a crew of 35 to 50, commanded by a colonel capable of launching a nuclear cruise missile. The vessels can remain at sea for about 50 days and stay submerged up to 1,150ft below the surface for at least a week. Some of the cruise missiles are equipped with the most advanced nuclear warheads in the Israeli arsenal.

The deployment is designed to act as a deterrent, gather intelligence and potentially to land Mossad agents. "We're a solid base for collecting sensitive information, as we can stay for a long time in one place," said a flotilla officer. The submarines could be used if Iran continues its programme to produce a nuclear bomb. "The 1,500km range of the submarines' cruise missiles can reach any target in Iran," said a navy officer.

His main conclusions are twofold.

First, the euro zone has failed: It hasn't delivered growth and the economies of member states have not converged. According to European Central Bank, average annual economic growth in the euro-zone countries was 3.4% in the 1970s, 2.4% in the 1980s and 2.2% in the 1990s. In the decade of the euro, from 2001 to 2009, it was just 1.1%. "As a project that promised to be of considerable economic benefit to its members," he says, "the euro zone has failed."

His second conclusion is that, despite his provocative title, the euro zone will probably survive. "Of greater interest to non-experts and politicians (rather than economists) is the question of the collapse of the euro zone as an institution," he says. "To that question, my answer is no, it will not collapse. So much political capital had been invested in the existence of the euro and its role as a 'cement' that binds the EU on its way to supra-nationality that in the foreseeable future the euro zone will surely not be abandoned."

However, the price will be low growth for those inside the euro zone and costs for some, like the Czech Republic, outside. "To summarize, the European monetary union is not at risk of being abolished. The price of maintaining it will, however, continue to grow."