Mmm

Yesterday belonged to a couple of early twenty somthing year olds. First, Rafael Nadal became the first man since Bjorn Borg in 1980 to win the French Open for the third consecutive time when he defeated Roger Federer. Then Lewis Hamilton claims his maiden Formula 1 Grand Prix win in Montreal and by doing so, he's extended his lead atop Formula 1's drivers' championship by 8 points. Given that they are so young, they can only get better which isn't good news for their rivals.

The destination of this year's La Liga title will remain unknown until the last day of the football season in Spain. Real Madrid and Barcelona have the same number of points, but Real are top because of a better head-head record against Barca. Lionel Messi emulated his idol, Maradona, to a tee when he scored the first goal with his hand and went onto score a legit second goal, in Barca's penultimate match against Espanyol - let's hope that's as far as he takes his emulation.

Bliar attended his last G8 summit and in Berlin and there was the obligatory munificence show towards Africa. This time the headline grabbing figure was $60 billion, but when you drill down, it's not as generous as it sounds, especially when you consider that the $50 billion boost to aid for Africa, announced at the G8 summit in 2005, has not been honoured. "Trade not aid" is what Africa needs.

In the wake of the furore surrounded BAE, a former Lord Chief Justice has been appointed to head an independent review of BAE's business practices. How independent the review will be remains to be seen considering BAE's contribution to Britain's national coffers. Consider this, even after Haliburton was found by the US Army's Auditor General to be overcharging the US military for petrol in Iraq aka war profiteering (which is a felony), their contract to supply the US military in Iraq was not terminated.

The US wants to set up a missile defense shield in central Europe which has sent temperatures plummeting in its relationship with Russia.Russia has offered the US joint use of a radar station in Azerbaijan, which borders Iran and it remains to be seen if the US will take up this offer.

Till next week.