Falling U.S. house prices and rising delinquencies may lead to $565 billion in mortgage-market losses, the IMF said in its annual Global Financial Stability report, released in Washington. Total losses, including the securities tied to commercial real estate and loans to consumers and companies, may reach $945 billion, the fund said. The forecast signals the worst of the credit crunch may be yet to come, because banks and securities firms so far have posted $232 billion in asset writedowns and credit losses. Policy makers, concerned that lenders' deteriorating balance sheets will hobble economic growth, are pushing companies to raise capital.

"The current turmoil is more than simply a liquidity event, reflecting deep-seated balance-sheet fragilities and weak capital bases, which means its effects are likely to be broader, deeper and more protracted," the report said. The fund warned of the risk of "a serious funding and confidence crisis that threatens to continue for a significant period." The report comes days before finance ministers and central bank governors from the IMF's 185 members gather in Washington for spring meetings of the fund and World Bank. Group of Seven policy makers meet April 11.

"There was a collective failure to appreciate the extent of leverage taken on by a wide range of institutions - banks, monoline insurers, government-sponsored entities, hedge funds - and the associated risks of a disorderly unwinding," the IMF concluded in the report.

A squad of 30 young men, from the police academy that turns out the cream of the paramilitary security force, their job at home is to ensure riot control, domestic stability and the protection of diplomats. Questions are now being asked as to who authorised their presence as the torch made its journey through London, with the Conservatives last night demanding clarification from the Government.

The guards' task for the torch relay is to ensure the flame is never extinguished - and now increasingly to prevent protesters demonstrating against Chinese rule in Tibet from putting it out. But the aggressiveness with which the men have been pursuing their brief has provoked an outcry, not least in London where they were seen wrestling protesters to the ground and were described as "thugs" by Lord Coe.

David Davis, the shadow home secretary, yesterday wrote to Jacqui Smith seeking clarification of the role of the Chinese officials and what was known about their background. Mr Davis asked: "Who in the British Government authorised their presence, and what checks were made as to their background?" He added: "This group appears to have some role in providing security, and were seen manhandling protesters. They even accompanied the torch into Downing Street and were highly visible in the picture with the Prime Minister".

And ex-2012 chief Jack Lemley accused Labour Mayor Ken Livingstone of "suppressing" the true cost to win public backing for the bid. The former chairman of the Olympic Delivery Authority said that from "very early on" it was working to a budget of "well over £12billion". But Mr Lemley, who expects that to almost double because of problems with the land in Stratford, East London, said in an interview yesterday that he was banned from revealing the truth.

17,364 acres (6,945 hectares) of land were lost between January and March as Spain endured its worst drought in decades, figures from the environment ministry showed. Spain's water reserves are at 47.6 percent capacity due to a lack of rainfall, the ministry added. The drought has hurt crops and hydroelectric power production with the northeastern region of Catalonia especially hard hit.

Authorities in San Francisco, the next destination for the troubled Olympic torch relay, are gearing up for the same kind of pro-Tibet protests that disrupted the relays in London and Paris in recent days. Signs of protest are already visible after three people climbed the Golden Gate Bridge on Monday to unfurl a Tibetan flag and two protest banners. Billboards protesting China's human rights record have already gone up along major streets in the city and groups including Amnesty International will be holding rallies.

The torch run itself is due to take place on Wednesday and police are throwing a tight security blanket over the torch route in San Francisco following Monday's relay in Paris which was interrupted by hundreds of campaigners protesting China's human rights record. Officials in the French capital were forced to douse the torch several times before the planned procession was halted.

German media commentators say the protests prove that sport and politics cannot be kept apart if a country with a human rights record as controversial as China's tries to hijack a sporting event for propaganda purposes.

"Today, the phase for installing 6,000 new centrifuges at the facility in Natanz has started," the state broadcasting website quoted President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as saying at the atomic plant. His announcement came as Iran marked its "national day of nuclear technology" on the second anniversary of its first production of uranium sufficiently enriched to make atomic fuel. Iran has already installed around 3,000 P1 centrifuges at an underground enrichment facility at Natanz, in central Iran, according to the latest report by the UN nuclear watchdog, and tripling this number would mark a major expansion of its nuclear capacities.

The West fears Iran could use enriched uranium to make a nuclear weapon, and Tehran's refusal to suspend the process has been punished with three sets of UN Security Council sanctions and US pressure on its banking system.

The United States has never ruled out military action to bring Tehran to heel, and Iran's arch enemy Israel has expressed alarm about the nuclear drive, especially after Ahmadinejad predicted the Jewish state is doomed to disappear. Underlining the tensions, Israel's National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer warned on Monday that Israel would respond to any Iranian attack by destroying the "Iranian nation."

The truth is far less romantic: The water is coming from a cracked 70-year-old tunnel hundreds of feet below ground, scientists say. The tunnel is leaking up to 36 million gallons a day as it carries drinking water from a reservoir to the big city. It is a powerful warning sign of a larger problem around the country: The infrastructure that delivers water to the nation's cities is badly aging and in need of repairs.

The Environmental Protection Agency says utilities will need to invest more than $277 billion over the next two decades on repairs and improvements to drinking water systems. Water industry engineers put the figure drastically higher, at about $480 billion. Water utilities, largely managed by city governments, have never faced improvements of this magnitude before. And customers will have to bear the majority of the cost through rate increases, according to the American Water Works Association, an industry group.

Engineers say this is a crucial era for the nation's water systems, especially in older cities like New York, where some pipes and tunnels were built in the 1800s and are now nearing the end of their life expectancies.

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said in an interview Tuesday with The Associated Press that Benedict will deliver a message of "trust and hope." The pope turns 81 during the trip. Bertone says Benedict is fit but could not meet all the invitations from U.S. cities and had to limit himself to Washington and New York.

Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden recently accused the pope of helping in a "new Crusade," but Bertone says the Vatican has faith in American security services to keep the pope safe. The cardinal is the Vatican secretary of state.

The Fed auction marked the ninth in a series that began in December that so far have pumped $310 billion in short-term loans into the nation's banking system. Meanwhile, the 185-nation IMF delivered its most detailed review yet of the global credit crisis that hit last August. It said Tuesday that governments must be prepared to do more to support the global financial system if conditions worsen.

"Markets remain under considerable strain" from a variety of forces such as weakened balance sheets from increased bad loans, the IMF said in a report prepared for meetings this week in Washington of the IMF and its sister lending institution, the World Bank. The global credit crisis is expected to be a top agenda item at those discussions. The IMF report urged policymakers in the United States and other nations to consider what else needs to be done.

"The critical challenge now facing policymakers is to take immediate steps to mitigate the risks of an even more wrenching adjustment, including by preparing contingency and other remediation plans, while also addressing the seeds of the present turmoil," the IMF said.

Rice, the staple food for half the world, gained 2.4 percent to $21.50 per 100 pounds in Chicago, double the price a year ago. Philippine President Gloria Arroyo announced two rice tenders today and pledged to crack down on hoarding. Anyone found guilty of "stealing rice from the people" will be jailed, she said.

"We're in for a tough time," Roland Jansen, chief executive officer of Pfaffikon, Switzerland-based Mother Earth Investments AG, said in an interview with Bloomberg Television from Zurich today. Unless prices decline "you will have huge problems of daily nutrition for half the planet." Mother Earth holds about 4 percent of its $100 million funds in the grain.

China, Egypt, Vietnam and India, accounting for more than a third of global rice exports, curbed sales this year to protect domestic stockpiles. The World Bank in Washington says 33 nations from Mexico to Yemen may face "social unrest" after food and energy costs increased for six consecutive years.

The Philippines, which imports about 15 percent of its rice, is tightening controls over domestic sales and buying more overseas. The government's rice tenders are in April and May.

New York's main oil contract, light sweet crude for delivery in May, touched 109.64 dollars per barrel early Tuesday. The contract later stood at 108.65 dollars, down 43 cents from the close on Monday. New York crude had forged a historic peak of 111.80 dollars on March 17 owing to a weak dollar, tightening global supplies and choppy world financial markets.

London's Brent North Sea crude for May dropped 48 cents to 106.66 dollars after earlier touching 107.78 dollars. That was close to a record high 108.02 reached in March. Oil prices were "still supported by renewed supply concerns after a fire at a Finnish refinery last Friday," said Sucden analyst Andrey Kryuchenkov on Tuesday. Prices surged higher after the fire at a 200,000 barrels-per-day refinery in Porvoo, Finland, he added.

Over the weekend, the OPEC secretary general, Abdullah al-Badri, rejected calls for an increase in the cartel's crude output, saying non-fundamental factors were to blame for current high prices. "At the moment there is enough oil in the market and no need to change OPEC's output," he said in Tehran late Saturday. The OPEC cartel defiantly maintained its output at 29.67 million barrels per day at its last meeting in March.

The head of London's 2012 Games described as "horrible" the burly henchmen who barged their way through the capital, shoving the public and even police out of the way. His trenchant remarks followed those of former Blue Peter presenter and torchbearer Konnie Huq, who revealed the Chinese minders barked orders at her and pushed her arm up to hold the flame higher. Sunday's scenes, which were repeated in France yesterday, brought accusations that Britain had imported Chinese police state tactics to control the supposedly showcase relay.

Referring to the Chinese security guards, who were in France yesterday with the torch on the next leg of its world tour, he said: "One thing in Paris is to get rid of those guys. They tried to push me out of the way three times. They are horrible. They did not speak English. They were thugs." Wearing blue tracksuits, the 14 minders surrounded the symbolic flame, pushing anyone who tried to get near, as it was relayed 31 miles across London.

Miss Huq, one of 80 torchbearers said: "The men in blue perplexed everyone. Nobody seemed to know who they were officially or what their title was. They were very robotic, very full on, and I noticed them having skirmishes with our own police and the Olympic authorities before our leg of the relay, which was confusing. They were barking orders at me, like 'Run! Stop!' and I was like, 'Oh my gosh, who are these people?' They kept pushing my hand up higher when I was holding the torch, so they were... interesting." Miss Huq was nearly knocked to the ground by a protester as thousands of campaigners disrupted the procession to demonstrate against China's human rights abuses and brutality in Tibet.

Some residents in Oakland, which is located south of Apopka, are outraged over the proposed limit on water and said the rapid growth in the area must stop until there is no longer a shortage. "I don't understand why they are allowing them to still build if the water supply is not there," Oakland resident "Susan" said. "And, why should we be cut?"

Mayor Rich Crotty said that if the county does not have a 40 percent reduction in water use, the aquifer will not have enough water to sustain the county. Similar to surrounding cities, water bills in Oakland order "no watering on any day between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. or face a $500 fine."

Local 6 reported that an average resident can use up to 90 gallons of water before leaving the house for the day. "If the growth stops today and we don't build another house, you're still going to have a water problem," Commissioner Willie Welch said. "People are going to have to learn to save (water)."

William Gray, the well-known Colorado State University hurricane forecaster, routinely uses the annual National Hurricane Conference as a platform to bash global warming. In a statement to Florida Today, Gray argued that the scientific consensus on global warming is bogus - and "a mild form of McCarthyism has developed toward those scientists who do not agree" that mankind is in danger.

"We are also brainwashing our children on the warming topic," Gray wrote. Some scientists believe global warming will actually decrease - not increase - the number of hurricanes that form over the Atlantic Ocean each year.

Knutson and Chris Landsea, science and operations officer with the National Hurricane Center in Miami, said historic observation data and computer models debunk doomsday scenarios that foresee armadas of deadly hurricanes, slamming into the Southeast. "Any hurricane trend we're seeing due to global warming really has very limited impact, very tiny changes," Landsea said.

The world will experience global cooling this year, according a leading climate scientist. The prediction - which follows a bitterly cold winter in China and the Arctic - is prompting some sceptics to question the theory of climate change.

However, the World Meteorological Organisation insists that this year's cooling has nothing to do with global climate change. In fact, this year's temperatures could still be way above the average - and it is possible that 2008 will exceed the record year of 1998 because of global warming induced by greenhouse gases.

The Met Office predicts that 2008 will be around 0.4C warmer than the average for 1961-1990. It said temperatures are influenced by a range of variables - including changes in the sun's output, pollution and weather cycles such as La Nina. But most scientists argue that the long-term temperature rises since 1880 can only be explained by carbon dioxide from human activity.