Wall Street began the week with a strong start today as better-than-expected profits at Citigroup. and a healthy increase in consumer spending renewed investors’ optimism about the US economy. The Dow Jones industrials soared more than 100 points.

The chief of the only Darfur rebel group that signed a peace agreement with the Sudanese government set an ultimatum today for Khartoum to disarm the feared janjaweed paramilitary group by the end of December.

THE UN refugee agency is facing a race against time to help more than 100,000 impoverished Sudanese refugees who have spilled across the border into Chad to escape increasing violence in their homeland.