The biggest wheel in the world?

England have

Thousands have assembled to watch the giant Ferris wheel move into position as the new landmark on the London skyline.

The engineering feat has taken all weekend. The wheel now stands some 400ft (125m) high, surpassing the Big Ben clock tower and St Paul's Cathedral.

But it still has some way to go and now leans at 65 degrees above the River Thames.

One sceptical observer said: "It looks like a large bicycle wheel with spokes, I assume it works all right but it looks highly dangerous to me - I'm not going on it!"

Others came to marvel at the complex engineering operation.

"We've driven up specially today just to see it...it's tremendous."

Others came to capture a fast changing London landscape with their easels and sketchbooks.

Hoisted by cables and cranes, the 20 million, 1700 metric tonne steel construction moved towards its upright position at the speed of 3.5 metres per hour.

Under the media spotlight a month ago, the first attempt to crank the structure off the ground failed when one of a series of sockets holding high-tension cables to the wheel's rim suddenly slipped.

Now the sockets have been redesigned. 6.5 kilometres of high-tension cable have been attached to the wheel's 80 spokes to help haul it into position.

The wheel will be in its vertical position by next week, and developers promise it will be ready to take its first visitors by New Year's Eve.

Officially the Millennium Wheel has been given a five year lifespan, but Paul Baxter, the project manager, thinks it will last much longer.

"The Eiffel tower was initially there just for the Paris exhibition," he said.

Built for the 1889 Paris exhibition, the Eiffel Tower remains to this day one of the most famous landmarks of the French capital.

The Millennium Wheel's designers and developers are hoping the London attraction will achieve similar immortality.  

Mr Laporte was abducted outside his family home

He was seized from his home in Montreal by two men armed with machineguns.

The kidnappers are thought to be part of the Front de Liberation du Quebec (FLQ), whose goal is independence for French Quebec from Canada.

The militant separatists are also holding captive British diplomat James Cross, kidnapped last week.

The latest kidnapping took place after the Quebec Government rejected demands from the separatists to release 23 'political' prisoners.

Quebec's Justice Minister Jerome Choquette, speaking on behalf of both the federal and provincial government, addressed the militants in a special radio and TV broadcast.

But he also made the unprecedented step of offering the kidnappers safe conduct to any country of their choice in exchange for the safe return of Mr Cross.

He added: "Terrorists cannot impose their will by violence or murder. The Government of Quebec is dedicated to reform. We will make an intensive effort to listen to all social groups."

The offer came 20 minutes before the 1800 local time (2300 BST) deadline set by the kidnappers on the life of Mr Cross.

Mr Laporte's abduction appears to be an instant reprisal for the government's refusal to give in to the FLQ's demands.

Within an hour of the broadcast he was seized at gunpoint from the garden of his home as he played football with his nephew.

Pierre Laporte was once a strong Quebec nationalist but is considered now to be more pro-federalist.

He entered politics after a career as a newspaper reporter and a lawyer.

spoke: one of the small bars which are inserted in the hub, or nave, and which serve to support the rim（轮辐）

marvel at: to be struck with surprise, astonishment, or wonder; to wonder（对……惊奇）

abduction: the criminal act of capturing and carrying away by force a family member（诱拐）