London's Brent crude rose 43 cents to $71.00 after a new record-high of $71.40 on fears that lost Nigerian production and the threat to Iran's output would hit Europe harder than the United States.

"The drama over Iran's face-off with the West, the rise of insurgency in Nigeria and gasoline supply concerns in the U.S. ahead of the driving season are keeping a high floor under oil," said Victor Shum at consultancy Purvin & Gertz in Singapore.

Oil prices have risen more than 20 percent since mid-February, despite sizeable U.S. crude inventories, as geopolitical fears compound fundamental worries that refiners may struggle to make enough gasoline for the summer driving season.

Iran has expanded its uranium conversion facilities in Isfahan and reinforced its Nantanz enrichment plant, a U.S. think tank said over the weekend.

This comes just days after U.S. magazine The New Yorker reported that the United States was exploring the option of using tactical nuclear weapons to knock out Iran's underground sites. Western powers fear Iran may be planning to build an atomic bomb, which Tehran denies.

Worries over supply from Iran, which pumps about 5 percent of the world's oil, were compounded by Chad, which demanded that a U.S.-led oil consortium pay it at least $100 million by Tuesday, or it would halt its daily output of up to 170,000 barrels.

Oil Minister Mahamat Nasser Hassan told Reuters at the weekend that Chad had asked Exxon Mobil Corp., Malaysia's Petronas and Chevron Corp. to put the funds into a state account, circumventing the World Bank's escrow account that was meant to ensure revenues benefit the poor.

In West African producer Nigeria, there was no indication that output was resuming from Royal Dutch Shell's (RDSa.L) offshore EA field, which has been shut since February, despite hopes for a preparatory assessment last week.

A quarter of the OPEC member's output is shut in due to militant attacks, which many analysts fear could last up to the next presidential elections in a year's time.

And the cartel does not seem to be able to deal with the rocketing prices. "I think oil prices are too high but there is nothing we can do," Qatari Oil Minister Abdullah al-Attiyah said on Monday.

Asked if high prices were harming the global economy, he told Reuters on the sidelines of the Qatar Economic Forum. "When they get above $60 I start to worry.

REFINERY WOES

A series of refinery outages in Asia and the United States added to worries of summer supplies after the U.S. government said last week that inventories fell by 3.9 million barrels, much deeper than earlier expected due to heavy refinery maintenance.

A ConocoPhillips refinery in Borger, Texas, reported an equipment malfunction at the weekend, said regulators, while Japan's Cosmo Oil Co. had to shut a crude unit at its Chiba plant after a fire, on the heels of recent unplanned closures at two other Japanese plants.

"Along with the continued hardline talk from Iran, we've had some refinery issues, which is not good at this time of year," said a New York-based futures broker.

May gasoline rose 0.53 percent to $2.1191 a gallon.

Analysts said the combination of bullish factors had also drawn a fresh infusion of investor funds, helping push open interest on New York Mercantile Exchange crude oil contracts to a record high above 1 million lots last week.

"The funds are back in the market, showing a strong commitment on long positions for crude," said Jim Ritterbusch, president of Ritterbusch and Associates.

Surges of gold and silver futures on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange spilled to bolster dollar-based spot prices as both London and New York markets were closed for Easter holidays on Friday.

"We all know both gold and silver prices are too high, but no long holders are willing to sell, while short holders were getting heavily squeezed," said Takashi Ogura, risk management section manager at Kanetsu Asset Management.

"People don't want to go against the present bullish trend, so prices are surging," Ogura added.

Spot gold rose as high as $605.70 an ounce -- the highest since December 1980.

At 0314 GMT, gold was trading at $604.50/605.30, compared with Friday's late Asia level of around $599.30. It was at $596.10/596.90 in New York on Thursday.

New York metals futures markets will reopen on Monday, while London precious metals markets will be closed until Tuesday.

Key most-distant February contract on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange ended the morning session at 2,331 yen per gram, up 12 yen or 0.5 percent from Friday's close.

Gold was supported by bullish U.S. oil futures, which leapt to $70 a barrel for the first time in seven and a half months on Monday. Gold is considered a hedge against inflation.

Iran has expanded its uranium conversion facilities in Isfahan and reinforced its Nantanz enrichment plant, a U.S. think tank said over the weekend.

This comes just days after U.S. magazine The New Yorker reported that the U.S. was exploring the option of using tactical nuclear weapons to knock out Iran's underground sites. Western powers fear Tehran may be covertly planning to build an atomic bomb.

Still many traders were nervous about chasing gold and silver from current levels as they were unsure whether the current upward trend would be maintained even after participants fully return from the Easter holidays.

"Rises in TOCOM silver and gold boosted spot prices, while many foreigners are watching today's rises very cautiously," said a senior trader at a Japanese trading house said.

"Prices are sharply up but there are few players who are willing to take new positions from these high levels."

Key most-distant February TOCOM silver rose more than 3 percent on active speculative buying, which helped lift the spot silver price.

Silver was trading at $13.23/13.26, up from around $12.93 in late Asia on Friday and surpassing the previous 23-year high of $13.01 an ounce reached on April 11.

It was at $12.77/12.80 in New York on Thursday.

Both platinum and palladium rose in line with gains in silver and gold.

Platinum was trading to $1,090/1,095 an ounce from $1,080 in late Asia on Friday. It was at $1,075/1,080 in late New York on Thursday.

Palladium advanced to $350/357 an ounce from $344 in Asia on Friday. It was at $344/349 in New York on Thursday.

According to the president's tax return released Friday by the White House, the Bushes had adjusted gross income of $735,180 - about $50,000 less than the year before.

The couple paid $187,768 in federal taxes for last year - about $19,500 less than they paid the Internal Revenue Service for 2004.

Their income included Bush's presidential salary - about $400,000 - and investment income from trusts that hold their assets.

The Bushes contributed $75,560 - about 10 percent of their income - to churches and charitable organizations. Those included the American Red Cross and the Salvation Army's funds for hurricane relief in the United States and earthquake aid in Pakistan. They also gave to Martha's Table, which provides food and services to the underprivileged in the Washington area, the Archdiocese of New Orleans Catholic Charities and the Mississippi Food Network.

The Bushes paid $26,172 in state property taxes on their ranch near Crawford, Texas, up about $4,000 from the year before.

The Cheneys reported adjusted gross income of nearly $8.82 million, a number largely padded with income they received by exercising stock options that had been set aside in 2001 for charity.

The Cheneys donated about $6.87 million to charity from the stock options and royalties earned on Mrs. Cheney's books: "America: A Patriotic Primer," "A is for Abigail: An Almanac of Amazing American Women" and "When Washington Crossed the Delaware: A Wintertime Story for Young Patriots."

Recipients of their charitable donations included: George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates for the benefit of the Cardiothoracic Institute, the University of Wyoming Foundation and Capital Partners for Education, to benefit low-income high school students in the Washington area.

After subtracting the charitable contributions, the Cheneys' income was $1.95 million on which they owed $529,636 in taxes, according to a statement released by the vice president's office.

Since the Cheneys paid $2.46 million in withholding and estimated taxes over the year, they were entitled to a refund of about $1.93 million.

The Cheneys' income included the vice president's $205,031 government salary and $211,465 in deferred compensation from Halliburton Co., the Dallas-based energy services firm he headed until Aug. 16, 2000.

Cheney elected in December 1998 to recoup over five years a portion of the money he made in 1999 as chief executive officer of Halliburton. This amount was to be paid in annual installments - with interest - after Cheney's retirement from Halliburton. The 2005 payment is the last.

The White House has said that the amount of deferred compensation received by the vice president is fixed and is not affected by Halliburton's current economic performance or earnings.

The Cheneys' tax return also reports Mrs. Cheney's royalty income from her book, "A Time for Freedom: What Happened When in America," salary income from the American Enterprise Institute and a retirement benefit from Reader's Digest. Mrs. Cheney served on the Reader's Digest board of directors until retiring in 2003.

The survey was conducted in the days before the mid-April deadline for filing income tax returns.

Dissatisfaction with the tax system remains high after numerous changes in tax law since the late 1980s.

The Reagan administration led a tax overhaul two decades ago that significantly lowered tax rates and eliminated or reduced several deductions. The first President Bush abandoned his "read my lips, no new taxes pledge" in a 1990 budget deal that raised taxes.

The Clinton administration won passage in 1993 of a deficit-reduction measure that blended tax increases, budget cuts and rebates for the working poor.

And the second Bush administration pushed successfully for tax cuts that lowered the top income tax rate to 35 percent and slashed tax rates for individuals and manufacturers.

People were most likely to think the middle class is paying too much in taxes, according to the poll.

More than half, 58 percent, said middle-income families pay too much income tax and people were almost as likely, 54 percent, to say that about low-income families.

Six in 10 said high-income families were paying too little in taxes. But 20 years ago, almost eight in 10 said high income families were paying too little.

Tax cuts for the wealthy have been at the heart of a bitter partisan tax debate during much of this Bush administration.

The poll of 1,005 adults was conducted April 11-13 by Ipsos, an international polling firm, and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

The headlines of several newspaper commentaries give a flavor of this contempt, from the Wall Street Journal's, "The Decline of France" (March 21) and "Casseurs" (or "Smashers," March 29); to the Washington Post's "French take to the Streets to Preserve their Economic Fantasy" (March 22) and "The French In Denial" (March 28); to the New York Times' "France's Misguided Protesters" (March 27).

In one way or another all of the commentaries suggest the protests are illegitimate. They declare that France's labor laws and social protections are outmoded and must be "reformed" if corporations are to thrive and create jobs. They suggest that "everyone" agrees with this, everyone, that is, except the millions of workers and young people marching on the streets of France. Echoing the infamous comments of British Prime Minister Tony Blair at the time of the invasion of Iraq, the US media suggests that the strength of a democracy is measured by the ability of political leaders to defy the will of the people and do "what's right."

As always, the Wall Street Journal leads the pack of reactionary voices. Having spared no provocative insult against Jacques Chirac and Dominique de Villepin for refusing to line up behind the US invasion of Iraq, the Journal now declares the French president and prime minister the champions of democracy. The French government is facing down "Jihadist" students, who, the newspaper claims, are resorting to violence to defend their "religion of job security." Writer Nidra Poller declares, "Democracies run on elections and legislation; mobs rule by fire and the sword," suggesting that state repression is needed to crush the protests and uphold "democracy."

Like the Wall Street Journal, the premise of liberal newspapers such as the Washington Post and the New York Times is that France's high unemployment rate is due to the unfair burden placed on employers by the social protections fought for by the working class and put in place after World War II. If corporations are given the unrestricted right to fire workers and exploit them like American workers, the story goes, this will entice companies to create new jobs.

While "those of you brainwashed by Anglo-American market capitalism" see the need for this type of "market flexibility" to increase employment, Post writer Steven Pearlstein declares cynically, "viewed through the dark prism of the French imagination, these aren't real jobs - they're 'garbage jobs' and 'slave contracts' meant to undermine the birthright of all Frenchmen to be shielded from all economic risk. Give in on this, and who knows what could go next? The 35-hour workweek? The six weeks of paid vacation? State-mandated profit sharing? Retirement at age 60?"

Oh, what horrors!

Posing as a defender of the unemployed, Pearlstein claims that the reason immigrant youth and many university students cannot find jobs is because a "shrinking pool of older, middle-class workers" enjoy the "full panoply of worker protections" and are "sucking the innovation and vitality from the economy." Expressing dismay over the fact that young people are demanding the same rights their parents achieved, Pearlstein complains, "rather than supporting the reforms that might generate more jobs and more income, the outsiders have bought into the nostalgic fantasy of a France that once was, but can never be again, making common cause with the very 'insiders' whose selfishness and pigheaded socialism have left them out in the cold."

Indeed it is the continuing influence of socialism and egalitarian ideals in France - in spite of the betrayals of Stalinism and social democracy - that most outrages Pearlstein and his cohorts in the media. The Post reporter disparagingly notes the results of a recent poll by the University of Maryland on international policy attitudes showing that only 36 percent of French respondents felt that "the free enterprise system and free market economy" is the best system. This was the lowest percentage of any of the 22 countries polled and compared with 59 percent in Italy, 65 percent in Germany, 66 percent in Britain and 71 percent in the United States.

Complaining that France sported "only" 14 billionaires, as compared to 24 in similarly sized Britain, Pearlstein concludes his column: "Indeed, when you ask French university students who is the Bill Gates of France, they look at you blankly. It's not simply that they can't name one. The bigger problem is that they can't imagine why it matters, or why that has anything to do with why they can't find a good job."

Nowhere does Pearlstein explain how the hoarding of vast fortunes by the super-rich and the gaping levels of social inequality have improved the lot of American workers. Instead, he, along with the other well-heeled pundits in the corporate-controlled news media take as given that US employers should wield dictatorial powers in the workplace and retain the unquestioned "right" to destroy thousands of jobs and slash wages and benefits. After all, Dr. Pangloss, this is the best of all possible worlds.

Pearlstein's fellow columnist at the Post, Robert J. Samuelson, argues that the protests in France point a "larger predicament" for Europe. "Hardly anyone wants to surrender the benefits and protections of today's generous welfare state, but the fierce attachment to these costly and self-defeating programs prevents Europe from preparing for a future that, though it may be deplored, is inevitable."

Samuelson then lets the cat out of the bag, acknowledging that the media's take on the French protests is bound up with political situation in the US and concerns over how American workers will respond to the unprecedented attacks now on the agenda of corporate America and both of its political parties. "The dilemma of advanced democracies," he says, "including the United States, is that they've made more promises than they can keep. Their political commitments outstrip the economy's capacity to deliver...To disavow past promises incites public furor; not to disavow them worsens the country's future problems."

This anxiety over possible "public furor" in the US was spelled out even more clearly in a USA Today editorial, entitled, "Before you scoff at the French, consider the U.S. connection." It begins by warning that the French protests demonstrate the "lengths that people will go to preserve guarantees and benefits" despite "harming their own long-term prospects and those of their children."

While the US should consider itself "fortunate" that it does not "endow its workers with the right not to be fired," the editorial says, "one can see counterproductive sentiments similar to those of the French protesters in the workers at companies such as General Motors. They demand preservation of generous pensions and lifetime health coverage from employers that might be driven out of business...

"On a larger scale, it's possible to see the French in the intractability of the Medicare and Social Security debates," the editorial continues. Claiming that longer life spans, the coming retirement of baby boomers and exploding health costs, were pushing the government and economy toward a "fiscal abyss," the newspaper complains that "those who receive these benefits, or are about to, have shown scant interest in reforms needed to avert a looming crisis..."

The editorial concludes: "The USA rarely has the strikes and street protests that France is almost as famous for as its cheeses. But it does suffer from some of the same unwillingness to consider the future."

Thus, the media's sudden interest in France reveals itself to be a concern that working class resistance could spread to the US itself, where the reactionary agenda of free market policies was initiated in the first place, before it spread to Britain and the rest of the world. With unrelenting attacks on workers by GM, Delphi, Northwest Airlines and other US corporations, as well as plans by the Bush administration to slash "entitlement" programs to pay for further tax cuts to the rich and the burgeoning costs of America's worldwide military adventures, there is no doubt that at least some establishment figures who are not too blind to see are considering the possibility that if mass opposition could explode in France, it could happen here too.

The arguments that society simply cannot afford to provide for the basic needs of working people are becoming increasingly threadbare, not only for French workers but for their American counterparts as well. Despite their efforts to reassure themselves about popular support for the profit system, the reality is that there are growing numbers of workers and youth in America who realize that the real problem is that society cannot afford to allow a tiny minority of the population to monopolize the wealth created by working people. Despite the insistent claims over the years about the death of the class struggle and the working class, the explosive events in France, as they so often have done throughout history, are a sign of what is coming throughout the world, and within the US itself.

Last November, when he was still chairman of Exxon, Raymond told Congress that gas prices were high because of global supply and demand.

"We're all in this together, everywhere in the world," he testified.

Raymond, however, was confronted with caustic complaints about his compensation.

"In 2004, Mr. Raymond, your bonus was over $3.6 million," Sen. Barbara Boxer said.

That was before new corporate documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission that revealed Raymond's retirement deal and his $51.1 million paycheck in 2005. That's equivalent to $141,000 a day, nearly $6,000 an hour. It's almost more than five times what the CEO of Chevron made.

"I think it will spark a lot of outrage," said Sarah Anderson, a fellow in the global economy program at the Institute for Policy Studies, an independent think tank. "Clearly much of his high-level pay is due to the high price of gas."

Exxon defends Raymond's compensation, pointing out that during the 12 years he ran the company, Exxon became the largest oil company in the world and that the stock price went up 500 percent.

A company spokesman said the compensation package reflected "a very long and distinguished career."

Some Exxon shareholders are now trying to pass resolutions criticizing the company's executive pay policies. The company is urging other shareholders to vote against those resolutions.

The U.S. Treasury Department is poised to sign agreements with other nations to produce currency if U.S. mints cannot operate, according to the report. The Pentagon is considering stockpiling millions of latex gloves and the Department of Veterans Affairs has developed a drive-through medical exam to quickly assess patients who suspect they have been infected.

The 240-page response plan identifies more than 300 specific tasks for federal agencies, including determining which frontline workers should be vaccinated first and expanding the Internet to accommodate a likely flood of people working from their home computers, according to the newspaper.

Bush was briefed on a draft of the plan on March 17. He is expected to approve the plan within the week, but it continues to evolve, said several administration officials who have been working on it.

The White House is eager to show it can manage the medical, security and economic fallout from a major outbreak following its widely criticized response to Hurricane Katrina, the Post said.

Concern about a possible pandemic has grown with the emergence of the H5N1 avian flu, the most dangerous strain in decades.