Instead, the Anglican Communion chose the option of urging the Episcopal Church of the US and the Anglican Church of Canada to "withdraw" temporarily.The primates were at pains to stress that while they were debating the moral appropriateness of specific human behaviour, they continued unreservedly to be committed to the pastoral care and support of homosexuals. This became apparent in 2003 when the US Episcopal Church endorsed the election of Gene Robinson, who is openly gay, as Bishop of New Hampshire.Traditionalists were also angered when New Westminster in Vancouver, Canada, became the first province in the communion to introduce a service of blessing for same-sex couples.Primates from the "Global South" churches of Africa and Asia, have led calls for the suspension and expulsion of the Church in North America.However, there were reports last night that canon lawyers at the primates' meeting advised that there was no legal process to permit such an expulsion to take place. A schism in the Anglican Church was looming last night after the American and Canadian branches were asked to withdraw temporarily due to a dispute over homosexuality. The Mexican Mafia, also known as La Eme, dates back to the 1950s, and is now a thriving presence on the streets as well as behind bars, involved in drug trafficking, money-laundering, prostitution and many other rackets.Its main rival is another Mexican gang called Nuestra Familia, based in northern California. This policy assumes if you are of a certain race, you have a penchant for interracial violence."Nobody is underestimating the bewildering problem of California's prison gang culture, which is a reflection of and a breeding ground for street gangs in Los Angeles, Oakland and elsewhere. "Indeed, evidence demonstrates that integrating inmates reduces all forms of prison violence," Senator Gloria Romero, who has been leading the anti-segregation charge, wrote recently.Bert Deixler, the lawyer who took the case to the Supreme Court on behalf of a black inmate appalled by the blanket discrimination he found on entering prison, argued that the California policy was discriminatory and wrong-headed, since it relied on racial stereotyping to make certain assumptions about inmates."You can look at gang membership as a basis for special treatment," he said, "but you can't look at people coming off the bus and say, 'Blacks go through that door and whites go through the other door'.

50 years ago in Brown vs Board of Education," Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said in the majority ruling, "and we refuse to resurrect it today."The Supreme Court stopped short of declaring prison segregation to be unconstitutional, referring the case back to the federal appeals court. Forty years after the great civil rights battles in the American South, one of the last bastions of formal racial segregation in the United States is set to topple, following a Supreme Court ruling decrying the California prison system's practice of separating black, Latino and white inmates. The nation's highest court said the principle at stake was the same that led to a landmark ruling in 1954 ordering school desegregation - the idea that there is no way to separate people and say meaningfully that they still enjoy equal rights under the law "We rejected the notion that separate can ever be equal ... The week-long operation cost the lives of more than 70 marines, hundreds of insurgents and an unknown number of civilians. The city was all but destroyed in the effort.The shooting of the wounded Iraqi, who was lying in a mosque with other injured men, was recorded by an American television crew. Viewers were able to see the marine pointing his rifle at the man and hear him say that he was faking he was dead. "At the very least, navy legal experts believe the situation is ambiguous enough that no prosecutor could get a conviction," the station reported.The US Marine Corps issued a statement from Iraq saying that no decision had been taken and that the investigation was continuing.Issued from US Camp Fallujah, the statement said: "The investigation into the allegation of the unlawful use of force in the death of an enemy combatant inside a mosque in Fallujah during combat operations on November 13, 2004 has not been completed."The incident took place during the operation in November last year to take control of the city that was long considered a stronghold of the resistance.

Let us pray for him".Marco Politi, the Vatican correspondent of La Repubblica newspaper, said he believed the Pope's recent hospital sojourns marked a new chapter in John Paul II's long battle against Parkinson's disease."The papal illness has silently moved into a new phase," Mr Politi said.. An American marine who shot dead an injured unarmed Iraqi in Fallujah, in an incident captured on video which led the Pentagon to open a war crimes inquiry, is reported to have escaped prosecution. Nuns, pilgrims and other Catholics knelt in fervent prayer for the Pope in St Peter's Basilica throughout yesterday afternoon.The Vatican has traditionally played down papal health crises for fear of precipitating a power struggle over the succession to St Peter's throne but the Holy See has been more open about this pontiff's ailments than in any previous pontificate.Italian politicians from across the political spectrum, evidently fearing the worst could be imminent, joined quickly in a chorus of concern."All Romans are close to the Pope at the moment," said Walter Veltroni, the post-Communist Mayor of Rome. It made this choice for itself, in its own interests and for its people and its citizens. It was a definitive choice and there is no turning back." A return to totalitarianism was impossible, he added.However he indulged in none of the informal small talk beloved of Mr Bush and looked relieved to exit the stage with a stiff handshake, his face taut with pressure. In Russian official circles, the meeting is likely to be seen as a humiliation.Mr Bush also used an earlier speech to revel in the success of revolutions in the former Soviet republics of Ukraine and Georgia, revolutions which Moscow opposed.