Mr Blair told a charity event in New York that Iran was prepared to destabilise peaceful countries. In his first major speech since leaving office, Mr Blair again defended the decision to go to war in Iraq. He urged continued vigilance by the United States, Britain and their allies in combating the threat of extremism.

Mr Blair - now an envoy for the Middle East Quartet - warned against being "forced into retreat" as the world faced a situation similar to "rising fascism in the 1920s". "This ideology now has a state - Iran - that is prepared to back and finance terror in the pursuit of destabilising countries whose people wish to live in peace."

"There is a tendency even now, even in some of our own circles, to believe that they are as they are because we have provoked them and if we left them alone they would leave us alone. I fear this is mistaken. They have no intention of leaving us alone." Mr Blair stressed the shared values that he believes unite Britain and the US.

"America and Europe should not be divided, we should stand up together. The values we share are as vital and true and, above all, needed today as they have been at any time in the last 100 years."

US light crude rose to $90.02 in late Thursday trading in New York, before pulling back to $89.39 in early Friday trade in Europe. The weak dollar has made oil a more attractive investment. The greenback remains near record lows against the euro, and a three-week low against the yen, not helped by weak US jobs and manufacturing data which was released on Thursday.

Oil prices have quadrupled since 2002 because of strong demand from fast-growing economies such as China and India, allied to instability in oil-producing nations in the Middle East and Africa.

Ms Bhutto, who was travelling through crowded streets from the city's airport to a rally marking her homecoming after eight years in exile, was not hurt. The truck carrying her had its windows shattered and a door blown off. The attacks on the motorcade happened despite a heavy security presence following threats from militant groups.

Several Islamist groups, including pro-Taleban militants, had said they would attack Ms Bhutto on her return after she promised to confront those operating in the northern tribal areas bordering Afghanistan. Her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, said members of the government and intelligence agencies who were going to lose power were behind the attack.

Ms Bhutto earlier warned that if targeted she would hold what she described as hidden authorities within the government as partly responsible. At least 200,000 people turned out to greet her in what correspondents described as a carnival atmosphere, but the crowds slowed the progress of her convoy. Ms Bhutto had been planning to make a speech at the tomb of Pakistan's founding father, Mohammed Ali Jinnah.

Ms Bhutto left the country shortly before Gen Musharraf seized power in a coup, but returned under a power-sharing deal that could see her becoming prime minister again. The US has backed the deal, amid concerns about the military's inability to defeat Islamist militants and Gen Musharraf's rising unpopularity.

The treaty is designed to replace the European Constitution that was rejected by French and Dutch voters in 2005 and will be formally signed on 13 December. It includes the creation of a new longer-term president of the European Council and an EU foreign policy chief. If what will become known as the Treaty of Lisbon is ratified by all member states, it will come into force in 2009.

The new Reform Treaty is designed to speed up decision making in the expanded European Union. It will also create a new president of the European Council, a new EU foreign affairs chief, a reformed voting system and scrap vetoes in dozens of areas. However, the 250-page document has been stripped of any trappings of a super-state, such as the mention of the EU anthem and flag.

It amends, rather than replaces, existing EU treaties, a point which some countries - notably the UK - have argued means there is no need for national referendums on the document.

The UK government had little to say in Friday's negotiations. Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the UK's "red lines", which his government had declared around various policy areas, had been secured. "The British national interest has been protected," he added. On Thursday, Mr Brown once again ruled out a referendum on the treaty.

Despite pressure in the UK and several other countries for a popular vote, only Ireland is legally bound to hold a referendum, and most governments will do what they can to avoid another embarrassing failure, our correspondent Oana Lungescu says.

This was the warning issued by Robin Irvine, president of the Northern Ireland Grain Trade Association, when he met Michelle Gildernew, Minister for Agriculture this week. Mr Irvine emphasised: "I am not just issuing a warning from our association, I am repeating the warning issued by Markos Kyprianou, the EU Commissioner for Food, and Marianne Fisher Boel, the EU Commissioner for Agriculture."

To clarify some misconceptions, Mr Irvine explained: "Some people see this as an argument about the pros and cons of GM materials. This argument is not about GM, it is about the survival of our food industry, GM materials are already in the European food chain.

"The point is that for those consumers who choose GM, the main food-producing countries in the world are using biotechnology to increase the efficiency of food production - Europe is out of step with the rest of the world in that it takes two years longer than any other region to approve these and is in danger of making local food producers so uncompetitive that many will be forced out of business - consumers will be denied an affordable local product, produced to a very high standard and will be dependent on imported food produced under a much less regulated regime - using practices which would not be permitted in Europe."

Food supplies are tightening around the world - the developing countries such as China and India are increasing their consumption and the energy industry is competing with food processors for the world's grain supplies. Global grain supplies are lower than they have been for a generation and a number of food exporting countries are limiting exports to ensure sufficient supply for their own population.

Europe has approved many GM crop materials and these are widely used in food and feedstuffs and the European Food Safety Authority is currently assessing 90 new crop varieties. The difficulties lie with the delays in approving these new varieties and this is leading to disruption in international trade. It is a question of European food security.

A total of 5,014 new and resale homes and condos were sold last month in nine San Francisco Bay area counties -- a 40 percent decrease from the same period a year ago, according to DataQuick Information Systems. Last month was the slowest September since the firm began keeping records in 1988.

Sales plunged 31.3 percent from August as lenders, stung by a nationwide credit crunch, put the brakes on many loans above the $417,000 mark, or so-called "jumbo" loans. Some of those jumbo mortgages are being written, but credit requirements have tightened and interest rates have risen, DataQuick reported.

The month before was not much better, NBC11 reported. New home sales in California fell nearly 45 percent in August compared to August 2006. In Santa Clara County sales dropped 39 percent in August. The median price of new homes fell 8 percent statewide.

Another 30 people were injured in Oklahoma late Wednesday when two tents collapsed at an Oktoberfest festival.

The storm packed hurricane-force gusts ranging from 65 mph to near 90 mph, said Steve Piltz, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Tulsa. He said Tulsa County was under a tornado watch and severe thunderstorm warning when the storm hit the tents, but Tulsa Mayor Kathy Taylor said that less than an hour earlier the skies had been clear.

There were more than 7,000 people at the Tulsa, Okla., Oktoberfest when the tents collapsed at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday. Five of those hurt remained hospitalized Thursday, and three were in serious condition with head injuries, concussions and lacerations, said Tina Wells, spokeswoman for the Emergency Medical Services Authority. "It's easily one of the largest medical emergencies we've had in Tulsa in nearly a decade," Wells said.

"The wind came up incredibly quick and I don't think anyone can prepare for those kinds of winds," said Michael Sanders, the promotions chairman for the Oktoberfest event. Officials said the festival would resume Thursday afternoon with a smaller, more open-air tent.

"In a food surplus country like Myanmar, nobody should be going hungry, but millions are," WFP Regional Director Tony Banbury said. "It used to be the bread-basket of this region. It can produce a food surplus very easily, but it is now failing to provide the food that its population needs."

Given that Myanmar, then called Burma, was one of Asia's brightest economic prospects when it won independence from Britain in 1948, its health statistics are a shocking indictment of the military's 45 years in power. The U.N. estimates one-third of children under five are underweight and 10 percent are classified as "wasted", or acutely malnourished. Child mortality rates of 106 per 1,000 are among the worst in Asia.

"The world now is saying how concerned it is about the people of Myanmar," Banbury said. "But so far, with the exception of Australia, we have not seen that turn into donations."

Around 300,000 people lost their homes or crops after Uganda's heaviest rainfall in a generation. The United Nations says some may not get help before December. The UN World Food Programme's country director, Tesema Negash, told the BBC a conscious effort had been made to reach those most severely affected.

Nevertheless, almost 150,000 people had still received no food or medical assistance following the floods.

Of particular concern is the potential for the spread of diseases as the flood waters recede. Many of those who have lost homes or property were until recently living in camps for the internally displaced.

They had fled fighting in northern Uganda between the Lord's Resistance Army rebels and the Ugandan army but had begun to move back to their villages as peace talks had brought greater security to the area. The effect of the floods has been particularly devastating for them.

"Russia is not really capitalizing on the fact that it is so close to the huge European market," Mandelson said at a conference in Brussels, according to the text of his speech. "In part because it lacks the stimulus of greater trade, the Russian economy is underdiversified." Mandelson also said EU-Russia ties were likely to come under strain over the next year as Russia changes presidents and the Kremlin has the chance to flex its diplomatic muscles over moves by Kosovo for independence and Iran's nuclear program.

"But what is really striking about the EU-Russia relationship is that political and strategic questions like these still share the same political stage with disputes over timber export taxes and the food export ban that is holding up a ... new EU-Russia bilateral treaty," he said. "Regardless of who is right or wrong, issues like these should not be allowed to dominate our relationship," Mandelson told a conference on EU-Russia ties.

"We should strive to resolve the remaining issues between us ahead of next week's EU-Russia Summit in Mafra," Mandelson said, referring to talks in Portugal on Oct. 26.

Katz said the petition drive was intended to send a message to Olmert that he has no mandate to negotiate Jerusalem's future. In a further push to keep Jerusalem on the agenda, the Likud faction will tour the walls of the Old City Tuesday and Opposition leader Binyamin Netanyahu will brief the foreign press at a strategic site overlooking the city.

Jerusalem city council opposition leader Nir Barkat has also started a campaign to save Jerusalem. The campaign is asking the public to sign a petition supporting keeping Jerusalem united on the website jer.org.il.
Thousands of stickers will be distributed with the slogan "Jerusalem should be strengthened, not divided." The campaign's goals are to push Olmert to remove Jerusalem from the agenda in Annapolis and to push the government and the Jewish world to invest in the city's future.

"There seems to be a feeling among our leaders that they can cut their losses and give up on keeping a united Jerusalem with a Jewish majority," Barkat said. "This feeling of desperation has to be replaced immediately and we intend to help make that happen."

The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America has also expressed its opposition to any plans to divide Jerusalem and wrote to Olmert to urge him not to do the "unthinkable" in terms of ceding parts of Jerusalem.

When you listen to a version of the briefing he has been giving recently to President Bush and other top officials, you begin to understand why. He is convinced that al-Qaeda is trying to acquire a nuclear bomb that will leave the ultimate terrorist signature -- a mushroom cloud.

We've all had enough fear-mongering to last a lifetime. Indeed, we have become so frightened of terrorism since Sept. 11, 2001, that we have begun doing the terrorists' job for them by undermining the legal framework of our democracy. But it's worth listening to his warnings.

Mowatt-Larssen argues that for nearly a decade before Sept. 11, al-Qaeda was seeking to acquire weapons of mass destruction. As early as 1993, Osama bin Laden offered $1.5 million to buy uranium for a nuclear device, according to testimony presented in federal court in February 2001. When the al-Qaeda leader was asked in 1998 if he had nuclear or chemical weapons, he responded: "Acquiring weapons for the defense of Muslims is a religious duty. If I have indeed acquired these weapons, then I thank God for enabling me to do so."

Al-Qaeda proclaimed a religious rationale to justify the WMD attacks it was planning. In June 2002, a Kuwaiti-born cleric named Suleiman Abu Ghaith posted a statement on the Internet saying that "al-Qaeda has the right to kill 4 million Americans" in retaliation for U.S. attacks against Muslims.

Most chilling of all was Zawahiri's decision in March 2003 to cancel a cyanide attack in the New York subway system. He told the plotters to stand down because "we have something better in mind." What did that mean? More than four years later, we still don't know.

After 2004, the WMD trail went cold, according to Mowatt-Larssen. Many intelligence analysts have concluded that al-Qaeda doesn't have nuclear capability today. Mowatt-Larssen argues that a more honest answer is: We don't know.

The Corps said in a letter to the state's environmental commissioner that it was abiding by federal guidelines but that officials were now "exploring possible drought contingency options." Corps officials say state and federal regulations require them to send water downstream. Gov. Sonny Perdue said he will sue.

"The Corps' nonsensical action to further release vital water from Georgia's already depleted federal reservoirs must not stand," he said. "There is simply no scientific justification to operate these reservoirs in this manner during a historic drought like the one we are experiencing."

Millions of gallons of water are sent downstream to Florida and Alabama. The drought has heightened tensions among the three states, which already disagree on how to manage the region's limited water supply.Florida has complained the state is not sending enough water downstream to protect mussels, and the state's environmental chief sent a letter to the Corps on Wednesday that warned reducing the water flow "would severely impact Florida's natural resources."

Alabama Gov. Bob Riley has urged the Corps to release more water from Georgia's lakes to help his state cope with the dry conditions."People in Georgia have been hurting. They've lost businesses, jobs and income. And we don't want to see any more harm come to anyone, but we have obligations to manage this basin." More than a quarter of the Southeast is covered by an "exceptional" drought -- the National Weather Service's worst drought category -- and Georgia is taking extreme measures to conserve water.

Officials last month banned virtually all outdoor watering across the northern half of the state, restaurants are being asked to serve water only at customer request and the governor has called on Georgians to take shorter showers.

With a dry winter in the forecast and an estimated 81 days of stored water left in Lake Lanier, the north Georgia reservoir that supplies water to about 3 million residents, the state is considering more restrictions regardless of the Corps' decision. "The crisis will not end anytime soon," Couch said. "So now is the time for all Georgians to come together as families and communities to be good stewards and be mindful of how they use water."

"The North's food inventory has almost hit the bottom, so unless there's an extraordinary measure to stabilise supply, there may be a situation next year similar to the late 1990s," a study by the Korea Rural Economic Institute (KREI) said.

Famine in the late 1990s brought about by flooding, drought and years of mismanagement in the farm sector killed as many as 10 percent of the North's 22 million people, according to some estimates. The KREI study said North Korea will run about 1.4 million tonnes short of the food needed to feed its people and estimated damage to its farming sector at more than $275 million.

North Korea has said flooding in August was some of the worst to hit the country. It killed at least 600 people, left more than 300,000 homeless, destroyed thousands of buildings and wiped out more than 11 percent of its farm land, its official media said.

While Hitler's main legacy -- the murder of 6 million Jews and the destruction caused by the war -- is undisputed, the controversial views of blonde-haired, blue-eyed Eva Herman have grabbed the headlines in Germany for more than a week. Last month, public network NDR sacked Herman, a presenter on a flagship news program for 18 years, for saying she regretted that family values nurtured by the Nazis had been swept away.

The Nazis encouraged women to stay at home, look after their husbands, and produce and rear children. Last week the 48-year-old was thrown off a talk show after refusing to apologise and pointing out Germans were still driving on roads built during the Third Reich.

Many commentators have accused Herman, who rejects any links to far-right parties, of being provocative, dangerous and stupid but a Forsa poll showed a quarter of Germans think the Nazis had some good points. "The insecurity about how to deal with Nazism is huge. As is ignorance. Eva Herman has unwittingly kicked off a long-neglected debate," Stern magazine wrote in a cover story.

That debate is highly sensitive as Germany fights rising right-wing motivated crime and after a spate of racist attacks, especially in the former communist East.