The emergence of China as the world's fastest-growing major economy has led to often strained relations with the United States. The passage of a bill intended to make Beijing let its currency rise could lead to a trade war between the world’s top two economies, Chinese officials have warned. Both China’s central bank and ministries of commerce and foreign affairs are accusing the U.S.... 

Is greed good? Research from the U.S. suggests inequality in a culture makes that society stronger Are greedy bankers good for society? Egalitarian civilisations ‘are weaker’ than those with inequality. Shortages of food affected the poor more, but the upper classes were able to maintain hierarchies. In equal societies everyone suffered the same, making those cultures less able to adapt... 

Britain’s Indian Summer is set to be abruptly interrupted as Hurricane Ophelia’s remnants bring four days of gales and torrential rains across the country. The hurricane, currently affecting the United States, is expected to hit with 65mph gusts, potentially rivaling the strength of Hurricane Katia that devastated parts of Britain last month. Jonathan Powell, a senior forecaster at Positive... 

Protests against Wall Street spread beyond America on Monday as demonstrators marched on Federal Reserve banks and camped out in parks from Los Angeles to Portland, Maine and planned protests around the world in a show of anger over the wobbly economy and what they see as corporate greed. In Manhattan, hundreds of protesters dressed as corporate zombies in white face paint lurched past the New York... 

By day, a red tide is unsightly and uninviting, with water the color of coffee. But at night, during this unusual phenomenon caused by a plankton bloom, the waves are a brilliant, almost neon blue. This wonderfully surreal scene has played out almost nightly along San Diego beaches for several weeks, luring spectators with cameras and video recorders. The bioluminescence is caused by a chemical reaction... 

A shocking new Federal Security Services (FSB) report on Prime Minister Putin’s meeting this past week with one of China’s top military leaders is warning that the United States and its Western allies are in “active preparation” for the unleashing of a series of catastrophic events over the coming year designed to throw the world into chaos from which they hope global economic and social order... 

The most amusing news this week is the Israeli rerun of a 2008 propaganda story, in which Al Qaeda denounces 9/11 inquiry as conspiracy theory and singles out Israel’s arch enemy Iran as the worst peddler of the madness, as described in the Wednesday Ynetnews story, Al-Qaeda slams Iran ‘conspiracy theories’. Thus the Zionist/Globalist bogey man, ridiculed as Al-CIA-duh by the free-thinking Internet... 

Protesters on the lower deck of the Brooklyn Bridge. Over 700 protesters were arrested during the March on the Brooklyn Bridge in New York the arrests come after more than two weeks of constant protest by activists who say that Wall Street has become too greedy. The protests are called Occupy Wall Street and is organized by the Canadian anti-consumerist group Adbusters. Protesters have been camping... 

France, Marseille: Pupils wait for entering their classroom at Fraissinet school, on the first day of the school year. Parents and teachers across France are up in arms over new textbooks which carry accounts of French history revised to avoid insulting ethnic minority pupils. They say common sense has been sacrificed to political correctness in French schools. ­Natives of France now fear their identity... 

Yoichi Shimatsu, former editor of the Japan Times Sixteen tons and what you get is a nuclear catastrophe. The explosions that rocked the Fukushima No.1 nuclear plant were more powerful than the combustion of hydrogen gas, as claimed by the Tokyo Electric Power Company. The actual cause of the blasts, according to intelligence sources in Washington, was nuclear fission of. warhead cores illegally taken... 

Bolivian President Evo Morales Tens of thousands of indigenous Bolivians have taken to the streets in La Paz to protest the construction of a road passing through a nature reserve in the Amazon River basin. Indigenous communities say that the construction of the road would not only endanger the environment of the Amazon, but would also encourage illegal settlements, the Associated Press reported on... 

All four ex-ministers were accused of calling for the massacre of Tutsis in meetings and speeches Two former Rwandan ministers have been sentenced to 30 years in jail by the UN war crimes tribunal for involvement in Rwanda’s genocide in 1994. Former civil service minister Prosper Mugiraneza and former trade minister Justin Mugenzi were convicted of complicity to commit genocide and incitement... 

Therapy: Thomas Lobel, who now calls himself Tammy, is undergoing controversial hormone blocking treatment. Parents say it’s better for Thomas to have sex change before he is adult. The lesbian parents of an 11-year-old boy who is undergoing the process of becoming a girl last night defended the decision, claiming it was better for a child to have a sex change when young. Thomas Lobel, who now... 

US activists in Occupy Chicago Protests A group of American activists have gathered in front of the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank in the “Occupy Chicago” rally to protest against poverty and unemployment in the United States. According to organizers, the activists were inspired by the Occupy Wall Street demonstration in New York, the Chicago Tribune reported on Friday. The Chicago sit-in began on... 

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas The Palestinian Authority has claimed its people are victims of “collective punishment” after accusing the United States of blocking $200 million in aid in response to President Mahmoud Abbas’s application for UN statehood. The freeze on funds, which has been unpublicised, was reportedly put in place in August, ahead of Mr Abbas’s planned...