Meanwhile, cloudbursts laced with lightning unleashed downpours in the mountains and deserts, leading to flash flood watches and warnings. Firefighters also watched for lightning-sparked wildfires. The steamy conditions were expected to continue into midweek

Meanwhile, the state entered the peak two months of its fire season, when historically the most devastating blazes have occurred, said Daniel Berlant, a spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

"Merkel continued to impress the world with her cool leadership at two back-to-back summits, and stuck to her principles, getting G8 leaders to agree to significant cuts in carbon emissions, among other things," Forbes said.

World's 10 most powerful women in 2007 according to Forbes:

1 Angela Merkel Chancellor Germany

2 Wu Yi Vice premier China

3 Ho Ching CEO, Temasek Holdings Singapore

4 Condoleezza Rice Secretary of State U.S.

5 Indra K. Nooyi Chairman, CEO, PepsiCo U.S.

6 Sonia Gandhi Political party chief India

7 Cynthia Carroll CEO, Anglo American U.K.

8 Patricia A. Woertz Cochairman, ADM U.S.

9 Irene Rosenfeld Chairman, CEO, Kraft Foods U.S.

10 Patricia Russo CEO, Alcatel-Lucent U.S.

President Vladimir Putin has rattled the West with a wave of dramatic military announcements redolent of the Cold War. Long-range Russian bombers capable of carrying nuclear weapons are back on flying patrol around the world, prompting NATO fighters to scramble in response. New long-range missiles have been test-fired, one streaking from one end of Russia to the other in less than half an hour, according to official accounts.

And the former Red Army is re-equipping itself, with defense spending growing 20-40 percent a year since Putin came to power in 2000, albeit from a low base after the ravages of the 1990s.

Should the West be worried ? "Overall, Russia's military capability is well below 50 percent of what the Soviet Union had," Peter Felstead, editor of Jane's defense Weekly, said in a telephone interview. "The bombers resuming flights was more a prestige thing and a diplomatic signal than real military posturing."

The State Department in Washington dismissed the bombers' reappearance as Russia taking "old aircraft out of mothballs" -- an unflattering reference to the backbone of Moscow's fleet, the propeller-driven Tupolev-95 which first flew in 1952. "The West doesn't terribly need to worry," said Christopher Langton, a retired colonel who works as a Senior Fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London.

"Most of the product of the Russian military-industrial complex is for the export market to bring in revenues. Little goes to the domestic market." And despite pledges to re-equip the military, analysts say new high-tech versions of existing weapons are still snapped up abroad before they come into service at home.

"The first buyer for the modernized MiG-29 (fighter) is Yemen and the second is Eritrea," said Ruslan Pukhov, director of Moscow's Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies. The Kremlin says its military build-up should not worry anyone. Russia's 2007/8 defense budget is half that of Britain's and less than one-tenth of the United States', it says.

"The change in Russian military spending is insignificant compared with the military build-up of the United States or Great Britain," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. "We had quite a long period of underfunding of military programs and of course it has to be compensated. Everything is gradually returning to normal."

Felstead of Jane's defense Weekly said the West's biggest headache might not be Russia's armed forces but some of their overseas customers like Iran, Venezuela or Syria. "Russia still has certain key technologies which we don't have in the West," he said. "If the latest air defense systems find their way from the former Soviet Union to places like Iran, this could have a big impact."

President Bush announced a package of measures to help homeowners struggling to pay their mortgages amid the current sub-prime loan crisis. Meanwhile Mr Bernanke hinted that rates may be cut as the Fed seeks to "promote general financial stability".

Related losses had exceeded "the most pessimistic of projections", he said. President Bush said the measures were aimed at stopping more people defaulting on their repayments and to allow owning a home to remain "at the centre of the American dream".

The pair have banned yoga instructor Louise Woodcock from using their church halls in Taunton for her children's classes. They told her the ancient Hindu and Buddhist meditation method is a "sham" and "unChristian".

The Rev Simon Farrar defended the decision, saying: "We are a Christian organisation and when we let rooms to people we want them to understand that they must be fully in line with our Christian ethos. Clearly yoga impinges on the spiritual life of people in a way which we as Christians don't believe is the same as our ethos.

If it was just a group of children singing nursery rhymes, there wouldn't be a problem. But she's called it yoga and therefore there is a dividing line we're not prepared to cross."

Reverend Tim Jones, vicar of St. James, said: "Any alternative philosophies or beliefs are offering a sham - and at St James we want people to have the real thing. The philosophy of yoga cannot be separated from the practice of it, and any teacher of yoga (even to toddlers) must subscribe to the philosophy. As Christians we believe that this philosophy is false and not something we wish to encourage. Yoga may appear harmless or even beneficial, but it is encouraging people to think that there is a way to wholeness of body and mind through human techniques - whereas the only true way to wholeness is by faith in God through Jesus Christ."

Some 1,000 fighters loyal to rebel Tutsi General Laurent Nkunda attacked a Congolese army brigade headquarters in Katale, around 60 km (38 miles) northwest of the provincial capital Goma, at around 4 a.m. (0200 GMT), witnesses said. Exchanges of machinegun and heavy weapons fire continued for more than six hours and sporadic fighting followed. Military sources said 31 soldiers were wounded on the government side.

In 2004, Nkunda led two army brigades, around 4,000 men, into the bush and briefly captured Bukavu, the capital of neighbouring South Kivu. He faces an international arrest warrant for war crimes allegedly committed at the time.

President Joseph Kabila promised to bring peace to the east of Congo after last year winning the first democratic election in more than four decades, a vote meant to draw a line under a 1998-2003 war that killed an estimated 4 million people.

Wind farms attract controversy, wherever they are proposed, with strong opinions on both sides, but it appeared this latest claim was being made not by the usual anti-wind lobby but by an eminent figure within an international renewable energy group.

At stake was the reputation of a burgeoning multimillion-pound industry and the people who champion it. Or so it seemed, at least. For the revelations resulted in the outbreak of bizarre feuding within the World Renewable Energy Network (WREN), which described its own policy committee chairman as an "oil and gas" expert, his views as "stupid" and his theories akin to imposing a Communist-style command economy.

The debate might be bizarre, but there is no doubting the seriousness of the issue: wind energy has become a mainstay of the renewable sector, which supporters say is vital to cutting greenhouse gases and saving the planet.

They also argue it will make the UK more secure by providing electricity without the risk of politically motivated cuts by countries such as Russia or sudden large price rises on the international market.

Some wind farms were producing a pitiful 7.6 per cent of their potential because the wind was so light, the BBC reported, citing an expert study written by Jim Oswald, an independent engineering consultant, for the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF).

Mr Oswald said he had found that, at times, the wind could drop so low in the UK that wind farms across the country would be producing just 3.3 per cent of their potential electricity.

This large fluctuation of supply would force other power generators - probably fossil fuel ones - to power up and produce more electricity, generating more carbon dioxide than they would if they ran smoothly.

"It is unconscionable that the Israeli government is permitting the Waqf to use heavy equipment to chop away at the most important archeological site in the country without supervision," prominent, third-generation Temple Mount archeologist Eilat Mazar told WND.

"The Israeli government is actively blocking us from inspecting the site and what may be a monumental find and is doing nothing while the Waqf destroys artifacts at Judaism's holiest site," charged Mazar, a professor of Hebrew University and member of the Public Committee for Prevention of the Destruction of Antiquities on Temple Mount.

In a series of WND exclusive interviews, Palestinian terror leaders denied the existence of the Jewish Temples. "We are fed up with this crap nonsense of the Temple Mount," said Nasser Abu Aziz, the deputy commander of Fata's Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in the northern West Bank.

"We do not know where this story came from. There is no historical or archeological proof that your legendary Temples existed. We are sick of this story. But Allah warned us that Jews will look for an excuse in order to corrupt life on earth, so we are not surprised from the fact that you keep raising this issue." Muhammad Abdul-El, spokesman for the Popular Resistance Committees terror organization, said the Jewish Temples "existed only in your dreams.

"Go look for your stupid Temple elsewhere. And I am not saying this for political reasons. I say that the enemy invented this story in order to justify its occupation of Jerusalem." Abu Abdullah, considered one of the most important operational members of Hamas' so-called military wing, accused all Jews of being pathological liars.

"Stop lying and believing your own lies. Even if there was such a thing (as a Jewish Temple) do you really believe that Solomon, who was a prophet, would have built a Temple in the place that Allah wanted for the Al Aqsa Mosque?"

It is the second time this month that the bank has tapped into the central bank's emergency credit line, sparking fears it is facing a cash crisis. But the UK bank insisted it was "flush with liquidity". At the end of every day, banks such as Barclays have to settle their trades through the market settlement system.

Typically, if borrowings are greater than their reserves at the end of the trading session, banks can borrow money from other banks to make up the difference. Barclays explained that it was forced to tap into the Bank of England's emergency credit line because a technical glitch meant it discovered the shortfall in its finances too late in the day to borrow from another high street bank.

But traders have questioned the bank's explanation, saying the loan was taken out at about 1100BST on Thursday - five hours before money markets shut and well before the problems hit the electronic trading system. "When you add this to the senior resignations a week or so ago, you can understand why the stock is coming under pressure," said Simon Denham, managing director of Capital Spreads.

Edward Cahill, the man in charge of structuring debt investments at the bank's investment arm Barclays Capital, unexpectedly resigned last week. His sudden departure sparked panic that Barclays could be sitting on hefty losses as a result of the devaluation of these debt funds which are heavily tied to sub-prime US mortgages - well-known to be the key factor causing havoc in financial markets. Others in that division are also believed to have left.

(ft.com) - The Bank of England has warned financial institutions authorised to use its emergency lending facility that they are not supposed to discuss it publicly

Bill Murdoch, of Massachusetts, and Bill Atwood, of Texas, will be answerable to the Kenyan Church, although they will serve in the US. They left the US branch of the Anglican Church - the Episcopal Church - after it consecrated an openly gay bishop.

There are growing tensions within the Anglican denomination around the world, mainly over the issue of homosexuality. Earlier, Archbishop Nzimbi said the consecration was not intended to widen the gulf in the church, but was a Christian response to a plea for help and pastoral care from Anglicans in the United States.

"Gay people," he said, "did not have a place as leaders in the Anglican communion. We need to love them, we need to preach to them, but not to make them lay readers, pastors, bishops." In February, Anglican bishops meeting in Tanzania issued an ultimatum to the American church, demanding an end to the appointment of gay clergy and the blessing of same-sex couples.

US bishops have until 30 September to respond. Meanwhile, the Episcopal diocese of Chicago on Tuesday included a lesbian priest among five nominees for bishop.

Officials of the Moslem Waqf (religious body) on the Temple Mount are digging there illegally, likely destroying precious artifacts from as early as the First Temple period. So say eyewitnesses and representatives of the Committee for the Prevention of the Destruction of Temple Mount Antiquities.

Gideon Charlap, a top Jerusalem architect and Temple Mount expert, told Arutz-7 what he saw when he visited the Temple Mount on Tuesday: "The Arabs there are digging a deep north-to-south trench, up to a meter [1.1 yards] deep. It is being dug in the area that served during Holy Temple times as the Ezrat Nashim [the area known as the Women's Courtyard, though it was not reserved only for women -ed.]. The trench passes through three east-to-west walls, according to my calculations - walls that probably served as separations for the Temple's offices and the like. This means that the destruction is tremendous."

"At one point during the digging," Charlap continued, "a policeman - apparently a Druze - tried to stop the work from going on, and actually entered the cabin of the tractor. A struggle ensued, and when the Arabs finally pushed him out, he actually stood in the trench and physically blocked the rest of the work!" Charlap said that at that point, the chief officer of the Temple Mount police station, Shai Alali, arrived on the scene. "But instead of stopping the lawbreakers," Charlap related with incredulity, "he tried to 'calm down' the policeman!"

Asked if there has been any lull of late in illegal digs on the Temple Mount, Dr. Mazar responded negatively. "They have a clear goal of turning the Temple Mount into a place exclusively for Moslem prayer. In recent years, they have turned two giant structures - at the Huldah Gate and Solomon's Stables - into giant mosques, where none ever stood before. It is totally illegal; how can such violations of the law be allowed - especially in such an important place for Jewish Nation?

"This is a top archaeological site, and the fact that it's not considered one of the Seven Wonders of the world is our fault, because we don't talk about it enough and certainly don't preserve it enough."

On Tuesday, the United Nations appealed for $20 million to provide clean water, food and shelter to more than 3 million people in what Sudanese officials have called the worst floods in living memory. "One hundred and one have died, and 278 were injured in the floods," Awad Widatallah Hussein, an official in the government's emergency response team, told Reuters. The flooding killed more than 36,000 livestock, he said.

The floods have made at least 200,000 people homeless, and destroyed more than 42,000 hectares of crops, the U.N. humanitarian aid agency (OCHA) said in a statement. In south Sudan, which recently emerged from decades of civil war, witnesses said the situation was worsening. A Gedaref Ministry of Health report obtained by Reuters said 70 percent of samples had tested positive for cholera.

On Tuesday, the government's Humanitarian Aid Commission denied there was any cholera. The WHO declined to comment. Analysts say the word cholera has political and social ramifications so governments are reluctant to use the term.

Last year a cholera outbreak throughout Sudan killed 700 people and affected 25,000. It was the first time in many years the water-borne disease had been reported in Sudan.

One-hundred-seventy-four people from a group of thousands in India that believes it is one of the 10 "lost tribes" of Israel landed here this week, fulfilling for many a life-long dream of returning to what they consider their homeland.

Shavei Israel, a Jerusalem-based organization led by American Michael Freund, hopes to bring to the Jewish state the remaining 7,000 Indian citizens who believe they are the Bnei Menashe, the descendants of Manasseh, one of biblical patriarch Joseph's two sons and a grandson of Jacob.

The tribe lives in the two Indian states of Mizoram and Manipur, to which they claim to have been exiled from Israel more than 2,700 years ago by the Assyrian empire. "I truly believe this is a miracle of immense historical and even biblical significance," Freund told WND as the group of 174 arrived here earlier this week. The group, which has preserved ancient Jewish customs and rituals, has been trying the past 50 years to return to Israel.

Freund said he hopes the arrival this week of more Bnei Menashe would "jump-start the process of bringing back the rest of the 7,000 Bnei Menashe who are in India yearning to return home."

Figures from the Health Protection Agency show there has been a 69% increase in typhoid cases in recent years, with most acquired abroad. Typhoid kills 600,000 people worldwide each year.

In 2002, 147 typhoid cases were reported in England and Wales, with 101 of those acquired abroad. In 2006, this had leapt to 248 cases, of which 122 were acquired abroad.

TYPHOID
Typhoid is caused by the bacterium Salmonella Typhi and is picked up through contaminated food or water.
Typhoid fever can be life-threatening unless treated promptly with antibiotics.

The disease lasts several weeks and it takes people a long time to recover

Euro-federalists cling to 'FALSE CONSCIOUSNESS': THE BELIEF THAT THE PEOPLE CANNOT BE TRUSTED TO SEE THEIR TRUE INTERESTS TO JUSTIFY THEIR TERMS. Hannan urges people to register their dissent by signing the Telegraph petition as he concludes that "OUR RULERS, LIKE THOSE ELSEWHERE IN THE EU, ARE COUNTING ON YOUR FATALISM, ON YOUR RESIGNATION."