The Government aimed to focus attention on areas where it thought it was likely to get a result in order to distract attention from everything else it was giving up. For example, the 'red line' securing a safeguard on social security rights for migrant workers was never actually up for negotiation.

Unfortunately for the Government, legal experts have begun to question whether the safeguards that the Government has put in place to attempt to protect its other "red lines" will be worth the paper they are written on.
The Government repeatedly insisted that it did not want the Charter of Fundamental Rights to become "legally binding" in the UK.

But the new treaty states that "the article on fundamental rights will contain a cross reference to the Charter on Fundamental Rights, giving it legally binding value." Open Europe interviewed several European Court of Justice (ECJ) judges who said the Charter would change national laws, despite the safeguards. This is crucial, as it would be the Court's judges who would ultimately decide on how to interpret the Charter if the Constitutional Treaty is ratified.

One EU judge said it would be "a basis for challenging national law". Another has said it is "foolish" to think it will not affect national laws. Even the President of the Court explicitly refused to deny that the Charter may be used to change member states' laws. Several judges said that the Charter, despite the "safeguards", would give the court "more power". Asked whether the proposal for safeguards would work, one judge said "I guess not, because I saw what was the destiny of other safeguard clauses in the treaty."

The Government has inserted a new clause into the revised Constitutional Treaty which it hopes will give the UK an "opt-out" from the Charter, but legal experts have already called it into question.

Jacques Ziller, a professor at the European University Institute in Florence, said that the idea of one country opting out of the Charter was "nonsense" and would quickly be challenged in the courts. (European Voice, 31 May 2007) The Government has potentially created a lawyers' paradise with this messy fudge. It has clearly broken its repeated promise that the Charter would not become legally binding, whilst it is becoming clear that the much-vaunted safeguards simply will not work.

Mugabe, 83, had proved intransigent despite the "massive risk to life", said Ncube, the head of Zimbabwe's 1m Catholics. "I think it is justified for Britain to raid Zimbabwe and remove Mugabe" he said. "We should do it ourselves but there's too much fear. I'm ready to lead the people, guns blazing, but the people are not ready."

Some parts of Zimbabwe have seen 95% of crops fail, leaving families with only two or three weeks' food supply to last a year. Prices in the shops are more than doubling every week and Christopher Dell, the American ambassador, predicts that by the end of the year inflation could hit 1.5m%.

Ncube said that far from helping those struggling on less than £1 a week, Mugabe had just spent £1m on surveillance equipment to monitor phone calls and e-mails. "How can you expect people to rise up when even our church services are attended by state intelligence people?"

"People in our mission hospitals are dying of malnutrition. We had the best education in Africa and now our schools are closing. Most people are earning less than their bus fares. There's no water or power. Is the world just going to let everything collapse in on us?"

Jakob Kellenberger, the ICRC president, denounced the military regime for violating international humanitarian law by murdering civilians, forcing prisoners to serve as army "porters" in combat areas strewn with landmines and destroying village food stocks.

The abuses - recounted in thousands of interviews between 2000 and 2005 - occurred mainly in eastern Burma along the Thai border, where the military has spent decades battling ethnic minority insurgents, including the Karen National Union. The military's actions have "helped to create a climate of constant fear among the population and have forced thousands of people to join the ranks of the internally displaced, or to flee abroad", the agency said.

Meanwhile, the "institutionalised and widespread practice" of forcing prisoners to carry army supplies in the landmine littered conflict zone has subjected detainees to "the dangers of armed conflict". Along with malnutrition and exhaustion, prisoners used as porters had suffered abuse, degrading treatment, while "some had been murdered".

According to a report in Britain's Independent newspaper, some clergy fear that if the Latin Mass were brought back into common use, it would limit the Church's dialogue with Jews and Muslims, as well as create a schism among Catholics worldwide.

The 16th-century Tridentine Mass - recited every Good Friday - REFERS TO JEWS AS "PERFIDIOUS," AND CLAIMS THEY LIVE IN "BLINDNESS" AND "DARKNESS." The Mass prays that God might "take the veil from their hearts" so that Jews can come to acknowledge Jesus Christ.

Rev. Keith Pecklers, an expert on Jesuit liturgy, told the Independent that elements in the Church who embraced the old Mass tended to oppose "collaboration with other Christians and [the Church's] dialogue with Jews and Muslims."

Army helicopters and transport planes are dropping aid to the homeless in Pakistan's Balochistan province.
More that 140 people have been killed in storms and floods over the past week in India.

In flooded parts of Afghanistan, more than 80 people have died in recent days. The BBC's Ilyas Khan in Turbat district says much of the area is completely devastated, with trees uprooted, electricity wires down and roads destroyed.

He says that only buildings made of cement blocks have survived, but most people living in mud-brick houses have seen their homes destroyed.Heavy flooding has hit the Indian city of Mumbai (Bombay) with train services suspended and people urged to stay at home.

A storm off the coast of India's southern Andhra Pradesh state has forced the evacuation of 50,000 people from low-lying areas.

Parker County officials urged residents to seek higher ground for the night, saying that flood waters could re-enter homes that had been flooded earlier last week.

County spokesman Joel Kertok said roads near the river were waterlogged and remained barricaded. "It still could be a deadly situation and that is why we're strongly urging people to stay out of the water," he said.
Storms on the southern Plains have claimed 11 lives in Texas starting last week. On Saturday, there were reports of tornadoes touching down in southwest Missouri.

Heavy rain fell to the north and northeast on Saturday and the weather service issued flash flood warnings for parts of Kansas and Missouri.

One, the Bishop of Carlisle, even said that the introduction of pro-gay laws had provoked God to send the storms that have left thousands homeless.The bishops argued that while those affected are innocent victims, the flooding was a result of western civilisation's decision to ignore biblical teaching. The Rt Rev Graham Dow, said that the floods were not only a result of a lack of respect for the planet, but also a judgment for decadence.

"This is a strong and definite judgment because the world has been arrogant in going its own way," he said. "We are reaping the consequences of our moral degradation, as well as the environmental damage that we have caused."

The Bishop of Liverpool, the Rt Rev James Jones, previously seen as a future Archbishop of Canterbury or York, said: "People no longer see natural disasters as an act of God. However, we are now reaping what we have sown. If we live in a profligate way then there are going to be consequences." God is exposing us to the truth of what we have done."

GLOBAL WARMING THREATS OUGHT TO BE STUDIED AND MITIGATED, AND THEY SHOULD NOT BE DELIBERATELY EXAGGERATED AS A MEANS OF BUILDING SUPPORT FOR A DESIRED POLITICAL POSITION. Many of the assertions Gore makes in his movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," have been refuted by science.

For example, Gore claims that Himalayan glaciers are shrinking and global warming is to blame. Yet the September 2006 issue of the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Climate reported, "GLACIERS ARE GROWING IN THE HIMALAYAN MOUNTAINS."

Gore claims global warming is causing more tornadoes. Yet the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stated in February that THERE HAS BEEN NO SCIENTIFIC LINK ESTABLISHED BETWEEN GLOBAL WARMING AND TORNADOES.

Gore claims global warming is causing more frequent and severe hurricanes. However, hurricane expert Chris Landsea published a study on May 1 documenting that HURRICANE ACTIVITY IS NO HIGHER NOW THAN IN DECADES PAST.

Gore argues Greenland is in rapid meltdown, and that this threatens to raise sea levels by 20 feet. But according to a 2005 study in the Journal of Glaciology, "the Greenland ice sheet is thinning at the margins and growing inland, with a small overall mass gain." IN LATE 2006, RESEARCHERS AT THE DANISH METEOROLOGICAL INSTITUTE REPORTED THAT THE PAST TWO DECADES WERE THE COLDEST FOR GREENLAND SINCE THE 1910S.

Gore claims the Antarctic ice sheet is melting because of global warming. Yet the Jan. 14, 2002, issue of Nature magazine reported Antarctica as a whole has been dramatically cooling for decades. More recently, scientists reported that satellite measurements of the Antarctic ice sheet showed significant growth between 1992 and 2003. And the U.N. Climate Change panel reported in February 2007 THAT ANTARCTICA IS UNLIKELY TO LOSE ANY ICE MASS DURING THE REMAINDER OF THE CENTURY.

"The tomb that we discovered is the one that the popes and the Emperor Theodosius [A.D. 379-395] saved and presented to the whole world as being the tomb of the apostle," said Giorgio Filippi, a specialist with the Vatican Museums. An initial survey of the basilica enabled archaeologists to reconstruct the fourth century building's original shape.

The Vatican team found the sarcophagus during a second excavation under the basilica's main altar. Under the altar, a marble plaque is visible, dating to the 4th century, bearing the inscription "Apostle Paul, martyr."
Surprisingly, said Filippi, "nobody ever thought to look behind that plaque," where the Vatican team found the sarcophagus. "Absolute proof that it holds St. Paul's bones is impossible," Leonard Rutgers, an archaeologist at the University of Utrecht who visited the excavation, told Archaeology magazine in April.

St. Paul's remains were removed from the original burial site in A.D. 258, according to documentary evidence, reburied in another part of Rome, and then moved back to the site of the basilica when it was built over the original church in the late fourth century. "So they were moving these bones around a lot," says Rutgers. "It's hard to say if the remains in the sarcophagus itself belong to the saint. But it is still a significant late-fourth-century burial."

The Bible does not state how Paul died. Many scholars believe he was beheaded in Rome in about A.D. 64 during the reign of Roman Emperor Nero. The "apostle to the gentiles," as he described himself, was the most prolific of all the New Testament writers.

The UK has moved to its highest level of terror alert - critical - after a burning car crashed into the airport. Two men were arrested, one of whom is in hospital with severe burns, after the attack on Saturday afternoon. Two further arrests were made on the M6 in Cheshire overnight, but no further details are available.

An eyewitness to the arrests, Peter Whitehead told BBC News 24 that three cars straddled the motorway and brought traffic to a halt. "It turned out they were unmarked police cars. In front of them were a couple of other unmarked police cars and they forced a car onto the hard shoulder and got the occupants out and as far as I can see arrested them," he said.

Counter-terrorism police made the arrests hours after Strathclyde police had confirmed they were linking the attack in Glasgow with events in London. Chief Constable Willie Rae said: "There are clearly similarities, and we can confirm that [the Glasgow attack] is being treated as a terrorist incident."

Two first two men were arrested at Glasgow Airport, which is in Paisley, after their car crashed into the main doors and burst into flames. One of the suspects suffered severe burns and was taken to the city's Royal Alexandra Hospital, where he is said to be in a critical condition.

In the light of the attacks, the national terrorism threat level was raised to "critical" on Saturday after a meeting of the government emergencies committee, Cobra. The critical threat level indicates terrorist attacks are imminent. It is the highest possible level and was also in place after the 7 July 2005 suicide bomb attacks on London.

BBC home affairs correspondent Danny Shaw said the decision to raise the level to critical reflected concern that those responsible have the capability and intent to carry out further bombings.

A survey showed attitudes in the country souring towards the West. Mr Rehn told the European Voice weekly: "If you look at the current political situation in the Middle East, in Palestine, in Lebanon, not to speak of Iraq, we don't need another nationalist or Islamist problem in the neighbourhood of Europe."

The survey revealed Turkish approval of Europe to be falling rapidly. Just 27% of Turks have a favourable opinion of the European Union, compared to 58% in 2004, according to this year's annual global survey by the Pew Research Center.

"The ongoing frustration in Turkey over its on-again, off-again membership negotiations with the EU are vividly reflected in these data," Pew said in the poll report. French President Nicolas Sarkozy said he wanted to reopen the debate on Turkey's accession when the leaders of the EU member states meet in December. The French president is not in favour of Turkish entry to the EU, stating that Turkey is not a European country.
According to the Pew survey, Turkey is currently the most anti-US country in the world.

Only 9% of the country favours the US, compared to 52% in 2000, putting Turkey below the Palestinian territories with 13% US approval, and Pakistan with 15%. In the United Kingdom, 51% approved of the US.

The central control, based at Worcester, will gather information from emergency services nationwide and improve the availability of help to the worst-affected areas.

Fire chiefs have admitted that they struggled to cope with the scale of the floods and that many staff were near to collapse after working around the clock for three days.

The Met Office issued a severe weather warning of heavy rainfall with the North East, the Midlands and East Anglia expected to take the brunt of flooding this weekend.

The worst-affected places are Sheffield, Chesterfield, Rotherham, Doncaster, Wakefield and Leeds in the North; Louth, Horncastle, Grimsby, Tetney and Hull in the East of England; Shropshire, Staffordshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire and Nottingham in the Midlands; and Cheltenham in the West.

The national flood support centre will be run by Paul Hayden, chief fire officer for the Hereford and Worcester Fire Service. The centre was recommended after severe flooding at Boscastle in Cornwall in 2004.

Toll so far:-

£1bn The cost of flood insurance claims this week

27,000 homes hit by flooding

18in of water is enough to sweep away a car

21 severe flood warnings

A large chunk of them will not stumble out again until the early hours, after making the most of the "stylish cocktails" and "fabulous wine lists", not to mention the "premium draught and bottled beers" and listening to pounding tracks from the DJ.

At capacity the three-storey venue holds 1,770 revellers who, by closing time pour out in buoyant mood on to Haymarket and the surrounding streets. A car bomb outside would bring devastating and chilling results. The 18,000sq ft club has become a familiar part of the capital's melting pot where theatreland meets the bars and clubs of the West End.

Recruitment consultant Alastair Patterson, 25, from Brighton, works in an office next to Tiger Tiger and was out for the night with a group of friends. He said: "It was around 1.30am when the music was turned off and the lights went on. Doormen and security were going through the building escorting people out. It was all very orderly. "I've never seen a place empty so quickly. It was like a ghost town."

Ian Murray pulled out of the hearing when Zoobia Hussain appeared in a niqab, which covers the head and the face apart from the eyes. Mr Murray, 65, a taxi driver who has been a JP for 12 years, refused to give any reason for his walkout. Hussain, 32, believed to be a mother of five, appeared for what was due to be a brief administrative hearing this week before bench chairman Mr Murray and two colleagues at Manchester Magistrates Court. She denies causing £5,000 worth of criminal damage including graffiti to a housing association property from which she had been evicted.

Her solicitor, Judith Hawkins, said Hussain wanted to appear in the dock in the niqab because she "observed the Muslim religion and remains covered in public places when men are present".
The guidance issued in April says judges and magistrates should consider cases where defendants, victims, witnesses and lawyers wish to wear the niqab sensitively and on their individual merits.

A balance should be struck between the rights of Muslim women who wish to be veiled in the presence of men and the interests of justice, with the latter always paramount, it adds. Grounds for requesting the removal of a niqab could include ascertaining someone's identity or assessing whether they were telling the truth. Hussain would not comment after the case, but her solicitor said she had been "shocked and distressed", adding: "She suffered hurt feelings and felt intimidated and deeply embarrassed".

Reader Comment:- "Of course the Magistrate is right! She could do what she wants in her own country, but once she is in the UK, she, and all foreigners must, at all times, respect, what the host country says. How does the Magistrate know who he is dealing with?If the lawman is disciplined, then I can say that the once beautiful United Kingdom does not belong to the British anymore, but to the thousands of 'guests' which are in your county."

To the fundamentalist, the clubs with their sale of alcohol, often scantily dressed young women, loud music and decadent behaviour epitomise everything they abhor about the West. They are obvious "impact targets" for a spectacular attack because they occupy a controlled space and explosions are likely to result in a large death toll and horrific injuries.

An insight into the way the cell viewed women going to what they described as London's "biggest club" was provided by secret recordings of conversations made during the investigations. One gang member who was subsequently jailed branded all women attending the club as "slags". He told fellow plotters: "The biggest nightclub in Central London, no one can put their hands up and say they are innocent ... those slags dancing around."

Only last month it emerged that an Al Qaeda supergrass had claimed that a man on the run after fleeing one of the Government's controversial control orders had wanted to bomb a nightclub.