More than 70 European and African leaders were also at odds on how to deal with Zimbabwe, which was singled out along with Sudan by German Chancellor Angela Merkel for not respecting human rights. The two-day summit ended with an ambitious action plan and a promise to meet again in 2010. But the world's largest trading bloc and its poorest continent were at loggerheads over trade, which would be the basis for future economies ties.

The EU is Africa's largest commercial partner, with trade totalling more than 215 billion euros ($315.2 billion) in 2006. But EU officials and businessmen fear growing Chinese investment in Africa could displace Europe from the top spot. Beijing held a summit for African leaders last year, wooing them with multibillion-dollar trade investment contracts.

ORIGINS:-- Ebola haemorrhagic fever (EHF) is a severe, often fatal disease in humans and non-human primates (monkeys, gorillas, and chimpanzees) that has appeared sporadically since its initial recognition in 1976. The disease is caused by infection with Ebola virus, named after a river in the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire) in Africa, where it was first recognised. Three subtypes, occurring in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and the Ivory Coast, have been identified as causing illness in humans. EHF is a febrile haemorrhagic illness which causes death of between 50 and 90 percent of all clinically ill cases.

TRANSMISSION:-- The Ebola virus is transmitted by direct contact with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected people. Burial ceremonies where mourners have direct contact with the body of the deceased person can play a significant role in the transmission of Ebola. Health care workers have frequently been infected while treating Ebola patients.

SYMPTOMS: -- Ebola is often characterised by the sudden onset of fever, intense weakness, muscle pain, headache and sore throat. This is often followed by vomiting, diarrhoea, rash, impaired kidney and liver function and, in some cases, both internal and external bleeding. The fever has an incubation period of two to 21 days. No specific treatment or vaccine is yet available.

On Friday, the government said suspected cases of Ebola -- most of them in western Bundibugyo district bordering the Democratic Republic of the Congo -- had risen to 101. They included two in Kampala, one of them a doctor who died.

Another 338 people were being monitored because they came into contact with those infected by the virulent haemorrhagic fever. Doctors say the virus can be passed through contact with an infected person. Uganda was last hit by an epidemic of Ebola in 2000, when 425 people were infected and just over half died.

This year, an outbreak in Congo -- where some of the first cases in 1976 gave the virus its name after the country's Ebola river -- infected up to 264 people, killing 187.

Experts say the sharp growth, if it continues, means several of THE WORLD'S MOST IMPORTANT SUPPLIERS MAY NEED TO START IMPORTING OIL WITHIN A DECADE to power all the new cars, houses and businesses they are buying and creating with their oil wealth.

INDONESIA has already made this flip. By some projections, the same thing could happen within five years to MEXICO, the No. 2 source of foreign oil for the United States, and soon after that to IRAN, the world's fourth-largest exporter. In some cases, the governments of these countries subsidize gasoline heavily for their citizens, selling it for as little as 7 cents a gallon, a practice that industry experts say fosters wasteful habits.

"It is a very serious threat that a lot of major exporters that we count on today for international oil supply are no longer going to be net exporters any more in 5 to 10 years," said Amy Myers Jaffe, an oil analyst at Rice University.

More than six out of 10 English voters say they feel "British", according to a new opinion poll. An even greater proportion - 69 per cent - want to keep the historic Union between England and Scotland, while only 24 per cent want the two countries to separate. Asked if they were aware that 2007 is the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, 73 per cent said they were and 27 per cent said they were not.

However, the ICM survey for The Sunday Telegraph also reveals great concern about the future of the Union, and only 48 per cent believe it will survive a maximum of 25 years. Just over half (59 per cent) believe it will be gone in a maximum of 50 years, while only 18 per cent think it will survive indefinitely.

Iranian oil minister Gholam Hussein Nozari told the press THE DOLLAR IS NOT CONSIDERED A TRUSTWORTHY CURRENCY ANY MORE, considering dollar depreciation and the dollar losses experienced by crude-oil exporting countries, according to a report published Saturday by the Iranian Student News Agency, or ISNA, in Tehran.

Nozari also strongly suggested OPEC should move to a trustworthy currency to stop the loss of oil exporting countries, according to the ISNA report. OPEC's next meeting is scheduled for Feb. 2 in Vienna. Iran currently has a proposal before OPEC recommending that OPEC oil-exporting countries move to sell oil in a basket of currencies, rather than dollars. In April, WND reported Iran successfully pressured China to begin paying for Iranian oil in euros, not dollars.

In October 2005, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced that Venezuela was ready to move the country's foreign exchange holdings out of the dollar and into the euro. He also called for the creation of a South American central bank designed to hold in euros all the foreign exchange holdings of the participating countries.

WND also reported Iran is seriously considering establishing an Iranian Oil Bourse (or Iranian Oil Exchange) with the goal of establishing competition with the New York Mercantile Exchange, NYMEX, and London's International Petroleum Exchange, or IPE.

The 3-sided sign was erected in the Town of Vernon's Central Park on Dec. 1 by the Connecticut Valley Atheists. The two sides facing Main Street feature a pre-attack image of the Twin Towers with the sun shining between them and the message, "Imagine no religion," drawn from the John Lennon anthem, "Imagine." USE OF THE IMAGE IS MEANT TO SAY THE TWIN TOWERS WOULD STILL BE STANDING WERE IT NOT FOR RELIGION, CVA COORDINATOR DENNIS HIMES TOLD THE HARTFORD COURANT.

The goal is to "simply emphasize an advantage of atheism, something good about atheism," Himes said. "AL-QAIDA IS NOT A TERRORIST ORGANIZATION THAT HAPPENS TO BE RELIGIOUS, IT IS A TERRORIST ORGANIZATION THAT IS INSPIRED BY ITS RELIGIOUS BELIEFS."

The third side of the sign faces town hall with a message about the winter solstice - the basis for the group being given a permit. It reads:
"In late December the sun is lower and days are shorter than any time of year. Throughout the rest of winter the sun gets higher and the days get longer. Because of this people have celebrated the winter solstice from time immemorial. People used to believe that gods moved the sun across the sky. TODAY WE KNOW THAT THERE ARE NO GODS, and that the sun moves by natural causes, and we celebrate not only the movement of the sun but our ability to understand that movement."

THE CONFLICT - Rebels in Sudan's western Darfur region took up arms against the government in February 2003, saying Khartoum discriminated against non-Arab farmers and neglected the region. The rights groups said failure to act on Darfur would mean turning "our back on the people of Darfur", where an estimated 200,000 people have died of disease, hunger or as a result of violence.

Here are some facts about the conflict in the Darfur region.

-- Rebels in Sudan's western Darfur region took up arms against the government in February 2003, saying Khartoum discriminated against non-Arab farmers and neglected the region.

-- Khartoum mobilized proxy Arab militia to help quell the revolt. Some militiamen, known locally as Janjaweed, pillaged and burned villages and killed civilians. The government has called the Janjaweed outlaws and denied supporting them.

-- Experts have estimated at least 200,000 people have died and 2.5 million driven from their homes in the region since early 2003, some crossing the border into Chad, exacerbating a refugee crisis there. Sudan says 9,000 people have died.

-- The United Nations calls Darfur one of the world's worst humanitarian crises. The United States says the violence in Darfur amounts to genocide.

In a speech at the opening of a summit of European and African leaders in Lisbon, the chairman of the AU Commission, ALPHA OUMAR KONARE, attacked the EU'S FORCEFUL CAMPAIGN to clinch new trade and development deals with former colonies. Most governments on the world's poorest continent have resisted EU pressure to sign NEW ECONOMIC PARTNERSHIP AGREEMENTS (EPA) by Dec. 31, when a World Trade Organisation waiver allowing preferential treatment for developing countries' exports expires.

But EU trade officials have persuaded some African regional sub-groups and individual countries to sign initial interim trade deals, and talks have started with large regional groups, with the EU saying it wants to promote regional integration. Some developing countries and anti-poverty campaigners accuse Brussels of arm-twisting poor states into agreements that could open up weak economies to destructive competition.

But Africa's major economic powerhouses, South Africa and Nigeria, have been holding out against signing EPAs. EU Aid and Development Commissioner Louis Michel denied Europe's aim was to divide Africa. He told reporters EU trade negotiators were trying to help states that would be hardest hit by tariffs after the end of the year if no deal is in place.

But Konare insisted speeding up the trade negotiations would bring no benefit to Africa and called for a new strategic partnership in which both continents would gain. "It is time to bury definitively the colonial pact based on slavery and trading posts. We can no longer be merely exporters of raw materials, we can no longer accept being solely an import market for finished products," he said.

Konare noted that, as the EU continued to press Africa to sign EPAs, THE CONTINENT WAS INCREASINGLY ENGAGING WITH OTHER INTERNATIONAL PARTNERS, SUCH AS CHINA, INDIA AND LATIN AMERICA.

Delegates of the San Joaquin diocese in Fresno voted 173-22 to secede. It follows years of disagreement with Church authorities triggered by the consecration of a gay bishop in 2003. The Episcopal Church is the US wing of the 77m-member Anglican Communion, which is threatened by a deep split between conservatives and liberals.

"This is the first time, I believe, that a diocese has finally said 'enough' in terms of the liberal theology of the Episcopal Church," said Bishop John-David Schofield of the San Joaquin diocese ahead of the vote. Anglican leaders in many parts of the world were angered by the consecration of openly-gay Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.

Conservative churchgoers believe active homosexuality is contrary to the Anglican Communion's teachings, which are rooted in the bible. However, liberal Anglicans have argued that biblical teachings on justice and inclusion should take precedence.

WE LIVE IN STRANGE TIMES FOR PARENTS. Even though we know rationally that there isn't a child snatcher hiding behind every recycling bin, WE BEHAVE AS IF THREATS ARE ALL AROUND US, waiting for us to drop our guard. A report from the Children's Society warns that parents' fears about safety are stopping children from playing outdoors unsupervised. And it shows how today's parents are not giving their children the freedom to roam that they enjoyed in their own childhoods in the 1970s.

MAYBE IT'S BECAUSE WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY THAT IS DRIP-FED INSECURITY. From the first car alarm of the morning, to the last police siren at night, we know much too much about the threats around us. Terrorism, ill-health, bad food, debt, global warming, moody loners with handguns are all out there waiting for us. Terrible stories, played through 24-hours news, seem more like the norm than the exception. Because we care most about our children, we worry most about them.

Children are hitting puberty before they've even crossed a road on their own. Of course there are real worries - like traffic. There are 80 people injured by hit and run drivers every single week in London. And in terms of children going missing, the Madeleine McCann story strikes a chord with every parent.
But what's changed? MAYBE IT'S BECAUSE THE FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN NOW BEGINS ON OUR OWN DOORSTEPS.

We moan about children being unfit and then stop them going out to play. Instead they can stay inside and watch DVDs about other children having adventures. How about Swallows and Amazons, good wholesome children's yarn. Bunch of kids get in a sailing boat on their own, not a lifejacket between them, live rough on an island, hanging out with the unattached uncle of another bunch of feral kids!

Hold on, where's that remote control?

With exotic names such as Colonel Murphy's and the Black Valentine, they were once common sights in the vegetable plots of Britain. Now around 98 per cent of our traditional greens have been wiped out, a study claims. RED TAPE AND MODERN FARMING METHODS HAVE MEANT THAT VIRTUALLY ALL THE VEGETABLES WE NOW EAT COME FROM JUST 20 SPECIES OF PLANT.

And the few remaining varieties from the Edwardian and Victorian eras face extinction because of European rules which only allow companies to sell seeds on an "official" list. Some of the varieties that have vanished were victims of changing tastes. But others were killed off by European regulations, introduced in 1970, which only allowed companies to sell vegetable seeds on an approved list.

Because it costs thousands of pounds to get a species approved by Brussels, many big growers no longer bother producing unusual seeds.

House prices are stalling. Consumer confidence is collapsing. Bad debt hammers at the doors of the banks. Things are "very, very tough" on the high street, according to Sir Philip Green, boss of Top Shop.

Meanwhile, financial advisers Merrill Lynch this week said that interest rates would have to fall sharply on both sides of the Atlantic if central bankers are to help prevent a recession led by rising oil and food prices, the house boom collapse and rising unemployment. They predicted that the economy was on the brink of the first consumer-led recession since 1991.

There's no doubt about it - the panic buttons are glowing red and a nation is moving its jittery fingers towards them. If it sounds grim, it also sounds familiar - at least to anyone over 35 who can remember the recession that kicked off at the fag end of the Thatcher revolution. After the booming 1980s it left a jagged detritus of collapsing house prices, home repossessions and rocketing unemployment.

Hawkins spent four years in treatment centres, care homes and foster care after threatening to kill his stepmother in 2002. Finally, in August 2006, social workers, the courts and his father agreed it was time for Robert Hawkins to be released - nine months before he turned 19 and would have been required to leave anyway.

On Thursday, while some of those who knew Hawkins called the massacre at the busy Omaha mall unexpected, not everyone was surprised. "He should have gotten help, but I think he needed someone to help him and needed someone to be there when in the past he's said he wanted to kill himself," said Karissa Fox, who said she knew Hawkins through a friend. "Someone should have listened to him."

After reviewing surveillance tape, a suicide note and Hawkins' last conversations with those close to him, police said they do not know - and may never know - exactly why Hawkins went to the Von Maur store at Westroads Mall and shot more than a dozen people. But he clearly planned ahead, walking through the store, exiting, then returning a few minutes later with a gun concealed in a rolled-up sweatshirt he was carrying, authorities said.

Acquaintances said that Hawkins was a drug user and that he had a history of depression. In 2005 and 2006, according to court records, he underwent psychiatric evaluations, the reasons for which Mr Landry would not disclose, citing privacy rules. In May 2002, he was sent to a treatment centre in Missouri after threatening his stepmother. Four months later, a Nebraska court decided Hawkins' problems were serious enough that he should be under state supervision and made him a ward of the state.

He went through a series of institutions in Nebraska as he progressed through the system: months at a treatment centre and group home in Omaha in 2003; time in a foster care programme and treatment centre in 2004 and 2005; then a felony drug-possession charge later in 2005. Mr Landry said court records do not identify the drug. The drug charge was eventually dropped, but he was jailed in 2006 for not performing community service as required.

On 21 August, 2006, he was released from state custody.

The heads of state of the world's largest trading bloc and its poorest continent are to approve an ambitious action plan intended to revitalise trade and improve cooperation in sensitive areas like immigration and peacekeeping. Even before the summit started, differences over getting new trade deals in place and over the attendance of Mugabe -- accused by the West of ruling like a dictator and wrecking his country's economy -- clouded the atmosphere in Lisbon.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is boycotting the summit because of Mugabe's presence, depriving the weekend meeting of high-level representation from a major former colonial power in Africa. The Czech president also stayed away.

Previous attempts to hold the summit have failed over the question of Mugabe's attendance but this time the EU, mindful of growing Chinese influence in Africa, lifted its travel ban on the Zimbabwean president. He arrived late on Thursday. Host Portugal, the current EU chairman, played down the controversy over Mugabe, saying there would be "no taboos" and that the meeting would not shy away from points of friction. EU officials were keen to emphasize the need for the summit.

"Africa and Europe are two neighboring continents, rich in a complex history. They are today determined to forge a new partnership and give up their sterile relation between the donor of the North and the beneficiary of the South," EU Aid and Development Commissioner Louis Michel said.