However, the country has been battling with the national energy crisis, forcing the state power company Eskom to stop exporting power to the neighbouring countries. This development has taken a great toll on the economy and business in general. The companies - AngloGold Ashanti, Gold Fields and Harmony together with the world's biggest platinum miner, Anglo Platinum - took the painful decision after Eskom said it could not guarantee power supplies. Their fear evolves around miners being trapped underground.

It also follows Eskom's communication to their Key Industrial Consumers (KIC), including Gold Fields to "reduce their energy consumption to the minimum load possible." A decision was taken to put no shifts down last night and no shifts were put down this morning. Eskom said "KIC loads will be reduced to 'survival levels' or switched out totally for the next two to four weeks."

Gold Fields said this will have a "serious effect" on its South African operations, which produce approximately 7000 ounces per day.

With tribal violence and score-settling spreading across the nation of 36 million people, President Mwai Kibaki appealed to all Kenyans to maintain peace. But opposition leader Raila Odinga warned Kenya was "drifting into a state of anarchy."

Reuters reporters in Naivasha said two helicopters dive-bombed the crowd several times, firing what police said were rubber bullets at a mob of about 600 people brandishing machetes and clubs at members of another tribe. The incident came as police trucks prepared to evacuate ABOUT 300 LUO refugees to safety from the mainly KIKUYU CROWD. The helicopter attack drove the Kikuyu crowd back.

Those being bugged include people suspected of illegal fly-tipping as councils use little known powers to carry out increasingly sophisticated surveillance to catch offenders. The report, by Sir Paul Kennedy, the Interception of Communications Commissioner, has fuelled fears that Britain is becoming a state where private communications are routinely monitored.

David Winnick, a Labour member of the Commons home affairs committee, said greater legal protection was needed to prevent abuse of surveillance powers. Britain already has more CCTV cameras per person than any other country in the world. Referring to George Orwell's vision of a surveillance state, Mr Winnick added: "TO WALK BLINDFOLDED INTO 1984 IS NOT ANYTHING THAT ANYBODY IN THEIR RIGHT MIND WOULD WANT."

The report shows that in the last nine months of 2006, there were 253,557 applications to intercept private communications under surveillance laws. It is understood that most were approved. This did not include warrants personally issued by the Foreign Secretary and the Northern Ireland Secretary - thought to be several thousand - which are kept secret. In that period 122 local authorities sought to obtain people's private communications in more than 1,600 cases. Councils are among more than 600 public bodies with the power to monitor people's private communications.

Shami Chakrabarti, the director of Liberty, said: "It beggars belief that in a nine-month period, based on these figures, the entire City of Westminster could have had their phones tapped - YET BRITAIN REMAINS ONE OF THE FEW WESTERN COUNTRIES THAT WON'T ALLOW THIS EVIDENCE TO BE USED IN COURT - to prosecute criminals and terrorists."

Everybody seems to be listening in. A total of 653 state bodies - including 474 councils - have the power to intercept private communications. Bugging is usually carried out by MI5, MI6, GCHQ and the police and most people are targeted on suspicion of terrorism or serious crime. But under laws that came into force eight years ago hundreds of public bodies can carry out surveillance. These include the Financial Services Authority, the Ambulance Service and local fire authorities and prison governors.

Scientists from Oxford University say the effect of nutrition on behaviour has been underestimated. They say increases in consumption of "junk" food over the past 50 years have contributed to a rise in violence. The university will lead the £1.4m study in which 1,000 males aged 16 to 21 from three young offenders' institutions in England and Scotland will be randomly allocated either the vitamin-and-mineral supplements or a placebo, and followed over 12 months.

In a pilot study of 231 prisoners by the same researchers, published in 2002, violent incidents while in custody were cut by a more than a third among those given the supplements. Overall, offences recorded by the prison authorities fell by a quarter. John Stein, professor of physiology at Oxford University, said: "If you could extrapolate from those results you would see a reduction of a quarter to a third in violent offences in prison. You could reduce violent offences in the community by a third. That would have a huge economic benefit."

"Our initial findings indicated that improving what people eat could lead them to behave more sociably as well as improving their health. This is not an area currently considered in standards of dietary adequacy. We are not saying nutrition is the only influence on behaviour but we seem to have seriously underestimated its importance." The theory behind the trial is that when the brain is starved of essential nutrients, especially omega-3 fatty acids, which are a central building block of brain neurons, it loses "flexibility". This shortens attention spans and undermines self-control.

The Ministry of Justice is backing the three-year study, which will start in May. David Hanson, the Prisons minister, said he hoped it would shed further light on the links between nutrition and behaviour. The Food Standards Agency says there is not enough evidence to show harm from additives or benefit from fish-oil supplements.

On the one side of the road hundreds of angry men had gathered, armed with machetes, clubs and metal poles. On the other, scores of desperate families huddled together. Only a thin line of a dozen or so policemen stood between the hunters and their prey. "They killed our people," said Francis Mbogo, calmly gesturing with his machete to across the road. "So now we will do likewise. We are just revenging." Warning shots were fired as the would-be lynch mob surged forward, baying for blood.

A tall man pushed his way to the front. "Listen to me," he demanded, wielding a wooden staff studded with nails. "We have been waiting to see if the government can do anything. They have done nothing. So now we have made our plans." Yesterday's scene was on the main road through Kenya's flower town, Naivasha. The armed gang was ethnic Kikuyus and the fleeing families were Luos and Luhyas. But similar scenes have been repeated through the Rift Valley, with different groups playing different parts in four days of appalling tribal violence that has left at least 100 people dead and many more homeless.

In Naivasha, the families gathered on the north side, mainly Luos and Luhyas, had been chased out of their homes - and the armed gang on the south were not going to let them go back. Another, older man tried to be heard. As he started speaking, the crowd hushed. "We don't want bloodshed," said Leonard Sindani. "We want peace." The crowd murmured its approval. "But they must go. If they stay we will deal with them. There is no going back. This is the final plan." The crowd roared its approval. "You tell them they must go," Mr Sindani shouted. He waved his wooden club for good measure and others joined in: "You tell them! You tell them!"

Before December's election, the Karakita slum had been a cosmopolitan mix of different tribes. Only Kikuyus, the crowd said, could now live in the Karakita slum that stood behind them. People from all over Kenya came here to seek work in the flower farms that line the shore. More than one third of all cut flowers sold in Europe are grown in Naivasha.

Rogue trader Jerome Kerviel was DRAMATICALLY FREED FROM CUSTODY LAST NIGHT in a dramatic day of twists and turns which saw the serious charge of attempted fraud against him being dropped. In the space of two hours last night, 31-year-old Kerviel went from facing a hefty seven years in prison for the biggest bank fraud in history to a maximum of three years for relatively minor offences.

It was unclear what brought about the dramatic change in attitude but earlier in the day, it emerged Kerviel - accused of covering up losses of £3.7 billion - had told investigating officers that he was simply doing his job and at worst could only be accused of trying to boost his career. His legal team were last night jubilant as their client was released on bail and allowed to go to a secret location. He now faces charges of breach of trust, forgery and falsifying computer records. All day his lawyers had been arguing that the junior trader was being used as a scapegoat to cover Societe Generale's investment failures. Elisabeth Meyer, Kerviel's lawyer, described his release as "a great victory" adding: "It's only justice being done".

His lawyers immediately began a robust defence of his activities saying he had not personally profited from his dealings and his intention was only to raise his profile in the cut-throat world of banking. And they dropped the bombshell that other traders broke the rules too, HINTING THAT THEIR CLIENT'S RECKLESS PRACTICES WERE MORE WIDESPREAD IN THE INDUSTRY THAN REALISED. "He has not embezzled anyone, he hasn't taken a cent for himself and he was just doing his job as best he could," said his lawyer Christian Charriere-Bournazel.

In a further twist yesterday, the French market watchdog announced that a member of Societe Generale's board had OFF-LOADED £85.75MILLION IN THE BANK'S SHARES JUST TWO WEEKS BEFORE THE SCANDAL BROKE. American Robert A Day sold the shares on January 9th - long before the banks management became aware of a problem. There was no immediate suggestion of any wrongdoing by Mr Day.

However, Jean-Claude Marin, the head of the Paris prosecutors office, announced in a press conference yesterday: "EUREX ALERTED SOCIÉTÉ GÉNÉRALE IN NOVEMBER 2007 ABOUT THE POSITIONS TAKEN BY JÉRÔME KERVIEL.

During hours of police questioning, Kerviel told investigators that in December HE WAS £1BILLION IN THE BLACK. He has blamed his bosses for the huge losses by closing his position when they uncovered the deception on January 18th.

The power crisis, the worst in China for many years, has been caused by an acute shortage of the supply of coal, the country's staple fuel. Brownouts have affected about half of China's 31 provinces and regions. The snow has caused MORE THAN 100,000 HOUSES TO COLLAPSE -- killing ten people -- and DAMAGED 400,000 OTHER HOMES, Xinhua reported. The worst weather in 50 years pummelled swaths of central, southern and eastern China as migrant workers and students, business travellers and officials assigned to provincial postings battled for tickets to join their families for the lunar new year holiday.

Officials struggled to control an estimated 200,000 travellers at the station - A NUMBER EXPECTED TO SWELL TO 600,000 OVER THE NEXT COUPLE OF DAYS. Temporary shelter was being arranged for the migrant workers in schools and conventions centres. Soldiers were deployed to stand guard around the station and police barked orders through bullhorns to try to maintain order.

What is even more extraordinary is that the legions of commuters have now been told it will be over a week before tickets go back on sale on February 7. The date is the start of Chinese New Year - the nation's biggest annual holiday. There was A THREAT PROTESTS OR WORSE COULD BE SPARKED BY THE WORKERS, who already have a long list of grievances, such as rising living costs, poor working conditions and low salaries that often go unpaid. But so far, the scene in Guangzhou, which rarely sees snow, was relatively calm.

The China Meteorological Administration (CMA) early Monday issued A RED ALERT FOR SEVERE SNOWSTORMS FORECAST FOR CENTRAL AND EASTERN CHINA. The snow, the worst in a decade in many places, is putting more pressure on already strained transport, communications and power grids. There has also been an economic cost -- 22 billion yuan (3 billion dollars), said the official Xinhua news agency.

So they resort to metaphors. Optimist Jacob Frenkel, a former IMF official and head of the Israeli central bank who is now vice chairman of insurer AIG, said repeatedly THAT THE WORLD ECONOMY IS A GIANT OIL TANKER THAT IS NOT EASILY TURNED.

Kenneth Rogoff, another former IMF official who now teaches economics at Harvard, retorted that it was MORE LIKE THE TITANIC.

We won't know the answer to that for at least a few months, and the world's stock market investors seem mighty dubious. What struck me at Davos, though, is HOW MANY BUSINESSPEOPLE AND GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS FROM OUTSIDE THE U.S. WANT THE DECOUPLING THESIS TO BE TRUE.

It's not just that they want to avoid a recession; it's that they'd really like TO SEE SOMEBODY ELSE LEAD THE WAY.

Officials said the dead included nomads who live in tents and villagers cut off from food and medical aid because heavy snow had blocked roads. Faryab province in northwest Afghanistan is covered in a 20-inch-deep blanket of snow, said Gov. Mohammad Omar. "This is a grave crisis," he said. "Sixty percent of the roads to the remote villages are cut off by the snow."

Afghanistan is one of the poorest countries in the world. Afghans in remote villages are typically able to heat their mud-brick homes only by burning animal dung or wood, if the family can afford it. The Afghan government and NATO's International Security Assistance Force have been providing emergency supplies to areas hard-hit by the weather, but provincial officials said the aid has not been reaching some areas fast enough.

So it is no coincidence, historians and academics say, that Rift Valley towns like Nakuru and Naivasha have exploded in the wake of Kenya's disputed elections. A Nairobi-based academic, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Rift Valley was dominated, before the advent of large scale commercial farming in Africa, by ethnic Masaai herders and Kalenjin people.

"The Masaai were displaced from the late 19th Century onwards, at least from the more desirable land, by British settlers," the academic said. The cooler and more fertile parts of the Rift were part of what became known as the "White Highlands" of Kenya. "When independence came," the academic said, "the departing white farmers were replaced not by Masaai, but to a large extent by politically well-connected Kikuyus."

This displacement - or more accurately the historic resentment that politicians can extract from it - is part of the root of today's violence. The Kikuyu are the largest and most economically-dominant ethnic group in Kenya. They organised most successfully against the British (in the Mau Mau rebellion and later through elections) so they won the first fruits of independence. They have been at the heart of the violence in Rift Valley towns like Naivasha and Nakuru - as both perpetrators and victims.

The incumbent government in Kenya is perceived by the opposition as being Kikuyu-dominated, so the current political dispute is fuel for the smouldering embers of a land dispute which has existed for decades. But the Nairobi-based academic said it was far from being a simple matter of ethnicity. "Focussing on the Kikuyu is easy," he said "but it's really about deep, long-running income inequalities in Kenya - and a rapidly growing population which sees land ownership as a means of survival. Rich and politically well-connected members of the Masaai community, he stressed, had benefited from land ownership in the Rift Valley as well as Kikuyus."

Ethnic groups in Kenya - Population 37m
Kikuyu - 20%
Luhya14%
Lou - 13%
Kalenjin - 11%
Kamba - 11%
Kisii - 6%
Mijikenda - 5%
Somali - 2%
Turkana - 2%
Masaai - 1%
Others - 14%

Mugabe Were, a member of the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) of the defeated candidate, Raila Odinga, was attacked outside his home, police said. He is the first leading politician to have died amid violence that has gripped Kenya since December's poll. It comes as nearly 100 people died in fresh bloodshed in the Rift Valley.

Mr Were, who represented Nairobi's Embakasai district, won a seat in the 27 December legislative election, which was held at the same time as the presidential vote. ODM spokesman Tony Gachoka said: "The current situation makes one suspicious. ALL FINGERS WILL POINT AT THE GOVERNMENT, AND THE GOVERNMENT WILL HAVE TO SHOW IT IS NOT INVOLVED."

"First they started killing the ordinary people like us, now they are killing our leaders, we won't accept it," demonstrator Justus Othieno told AFP. The protest comes on the heels of earlier bloodshed in KISUMU and also in ELDORET. Riots have also been ongoing in the towns of Naivasha and NAKURU in the Rift Valley, where dozens of people have been killed in five days of ethnic violence.

Members of President Mwai Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe have been fighting with Luos and Kalenjins who backed his rival, Mr Odinga, in the election a month ago. Analysts warn a cycle of violence is emerging amid the political impasse, where the pattern of attacks is followed by reprisals.

On Monday, European Union foreign ministers urged Kenya's politicians to work to find a solution or risk a cut in EU aid. "What is alarming about the last few days is that there are evidently HIDDEN HANDS ORGANISING IT NOW. MILITIAS ARE APPEARING... THE TARGETING IS VERY SPECIFIC," said the UK's visiting minister for Africa, Mark Malloch-Brown. While President Kibaki says he is open to talks, he has refused to countenance Mr Odinga's demand for fresh elections.

The former prime minister will assist Swiss company Zurich on "developments and trends in the international political environment". The appointment comes less than three weeks after the ex-premier took on a similar role with JPMorgan, one of Wall Street's biggest investment banks, worth a reported £2.5million a year.

It is likely Mr Blair will advise both financial institutions on the political and economic changes brought about by globalisation. Since leaving No.10, Mr Blair has been an unpaid envoy to the Middle East and an after-dinner speaker. JPMorgan is heading a consortium set to make billions as Iraq's economy recovers from the war spearheaded by Mr Blair and US President George Bush. It was chosen to run the new Trade Bank of Iraq, which has raised billions in trade guarantees by mortgaging future oil production and will make huge profits from the deals.

Other sources of income include a £5million deal to write his memoirs and a prime ministerial pension of £64,000 a year. French president Nicolas Sarkozy is spearheading a campaign to have him installed as the first president of the EU - a post expected to be worth at least £200,000 a year.

THE CASE FOR MR KERVIEL AS A HERO, as well as a suspected fraudster, is complicated - but not that complicated. Société Générale's chairman, Daniel Bouton, yesterday dismissed as "absurd" suggestions that his decision to dump more than €50bn in unauthorised trades by Mr Kerviel early last week had plunged European stock exchanges into a tailspin. Market experts pointed out, however, that heavy selling by SocGen on Monday - especially of German shares futures - REINFORCED A MOOD OF PANIC and helped push all markets down.

This in turn jolted the US FEDERAL RESERVE INTO CUTTING ITS INTEREST RATES SHARPLY on Tuesday, PREVENTING A COPYCAT CRASH ON WALL STREET AND POSSIBLY ALSO STEERING THE WORLD OUT OF RECESSION. As a result, some respected US economists are now feting Mr Kerviel as an unwitting saviour. "Merci, Jérôme," said the influential economic analyst, Ed Yardeni, former head economist of Deutsche Bank Securities. "THE RECESSION IS ALMOST OVER, thanks to Jérôme Kerviel in Paris and the panic reaction [of the Fed] in Washington - I CANNOT REMEMBER ANY PRECEDENT FOR SUCH STRONG SUPPORT FOR THE ECONOMY BEFORE THE EVIDENCE OF A RECESSION BECAME MANIFEST."

There are, however, many questions!

Quite apart from its failure to police the actions of its junior employee, SocGen faces a raft of awkward questions - French politicians, and even markets experts, have accused the bank of using the Kerviel case TO "HIDE" MUCH LARGER LOSSES ON THE US SUB-PRIME MARKET than the €2bn it admitted last week. SHARE TRADERS ARE FURIOUS that the bank allowed normal trading in its shares to proceed for three days without warning the market.

Questions are also likely to be asked about THE BEHAVIOUR OF THE FRENCH CENTRAL BANK. SocGen has said that it warned the Banque de France last Sunday. The European Central Bank and the Federal Reserve in Washington were apparently not warned of the coming storm until Wednesday.

But THE GREATEST SINGLE OUTSTANDING QUESTION IS how Mr Kerviel - a young man armed only with a computer screen - could bet €50bn, 30 per cent more than the value of his bank, on the future direction of European stock markets. HOW COULD HIS SUPERIORS NOT NOTICE?

Questions are also being asked about whether Ben Bernanke, the US Federal Reserve chairman, was told by SocGen or Europe's central bankers that the bank was going to unwind its trading positions last Monday. THE FRENCH BANK INFORMED THE BANK OF FRANCE governor, Christian Noyer, on Sunday about the losses and it is understood that he informed Jean-Claude Trichet, chairman of the European Central Bank. But THE FED DENIES BEING TOLD OF WHAT WAS HAPPENING IN EUROPE.

Senior banking sources in London are saying that it is "astonishing" if the ECB did not inform the Fed of what was going on. Further, they say that IF MR BERNANKE DID NOT KNOW, THEN HIS ACTION IN CUTTING RATES CAN BE SEEN AS A PANIC REACTION.

The satellite, which no longer can be controlled, could contain hazardous materials, and it is unknown where on the planet it might come down, they said. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the information is classified as secret. It was not clear how long ago the satellite lost power, or under what circumstances.

"Appropriate government agencies are monitoring the situation," said Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council, when asked about the situation after it was disclosed by other officials. "Numerous satellites over the years have come out of orbit and fallen harmlessly. We are looking at potential options to mitigate any possible damage this satellite may cause."

The largest uncontrolled re-entry by a NASA spacecraft was Skylab, the 78-ton (79.25-metric ton) abandoned space station that fell from orbit in 1979. Its debris dropped harmlessly into the Indian Ocean and across a remote section of western Australia. In 2000, NASA engineers successfully directed a safe de-orbit of the 17-ton (17.27-metric ton) Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, using rockets aboard the satellite to bring it down in a remote part of the Pacific Ocean. In 2002, officials believe debris from a 7,000-pound (3175.18-kilogram) science satellite smacked into the Earth's atmosphere and rained down over the Persian Gulf, a few thousand miles from where they first predicted it would plummet.