As food prices rose for the seventh month in a row in January, contributing to recent popular unrest in the Middle East and a spike in commodities purchases by developing countries last week, some analysts are quick to make comparisons to the dry years of 2007-2008.

Since early last year, former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Mohamed ElBaradei has been touted as a possible successor to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. But many protesters say ElBaradei enjoys little if any credibility on the street.

Is it more important to build links with African civil society groups or concentrate on existing networks in the South Asian region? That is the dilemma before Indian delegates heading for the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal, and some who have opted out.

Neoliberalism and the attendant financial globalisation were a common enemy that unified and mobilised activists of the most diverse tendencies who founded, ten years ago in Porto Alegre in southern Brazil, the World Social Forum (WSF) as a space to meet, reflect and debate, under the slogan 'Another World Is Possible'.

When Major General Mohamed Said Elassar, assistant to Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, the Egyptian minister of defence, came to the U.S. capital last April, he was given the equivalent of a red carpet welcome. The delegation of high-ranking Egyptian military officials that he was leading was ushered from one Congressional office to the next, from the Pentagon to the State Department.

This weekend, thousands of people will temporarily migrate to Arlington, Texas, to attend U.S. football's Holy Grail - Super Bowl XLV. They expect to watch the game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers, and to enjoy a performance by the Black Eyed Peas during half-time.

Demonstrators who turned up in Cairo's Tahrir Square Friday in even larger numbers than on earlier days are from all walks of life: old men wearing traditional galibiyas, young people in jeans and T-shirts, and women of all ages wearing Islamic head scarves. The protesters, whose numbers across the nation are now estimated at more than one million and growing, shout variations of one slogan: 'The people want the fall of the regime!'

At just 13 years old, Felix Finkbeiner may be one of the youngest participants in the two-week U.N. Forum on Forests, but he already has years of environmental activism under his belt.

Civil society is more coordinated and stronger at an international level today thanks to the Internet, and cyberspace can play an important role in efforts to eradicate the death penalty, says Federico Mayor Zaragoza.

The U.N. Security Council, which is empowered to intervene in crisis situations threatening international peace and security, has remained tight-lipped over the weeklong rioting, killings and mass demonstrations in Egypt - even as the political upheaval has spilled over into Jordan and Yemen.