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38046127 | Media playback is not supported on this device
They ended 2016 unbeaten under new coach Mal Meninga, have reclaimed the Four Nations title following Sunday's emphatic victory over New Zealand and they have returned to the top of the world rankings.
Just 12 months before they attempt to retain their World Cup crown down under, they look a formidable outfit.
They are a team which will "take some stopping", in the words of former Great Britain international Jonathan Davies.
After a decidedly one-sided Four Nations, can anyone realistically stop Meninga's team?
New Zealand coach David Kidwell said after Sunday's 34-8 defeat at Anfield that there were "possibly two or three immortals" in the spine of the Australia team.
He was talking about the half-back pairing of Johnathan Thurston and man of the series Cooper Cronk, and of captain and hooker Cameron Smith.
When asked about Kidwell's comment, Meninga added that he thought centre Greg Inglis could be considered in that category as well.
Their craft, composure and game management has been evident over the last few weeks and no other national team can compete with their combined skill and experience in so many crucial positions.
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As former England international Jon Wilkin said: "The most impressive thing about this Australian side is the rugby league brains they've got.
"In rugby league and rugby union, we're obsessed with producing athletes. These guys are good athletes but it's their rugby league brains that are so impressive."
Some wondered whether the Australian pack would be able to compete with England and New Zealand, but they more than held their own and laid a platform for their back division to exploit.
The Australians built pressure superbly, completed their sets, kicked clinically to pin down each of their opponents - and eventually wore them down.
We saw that at London Stadium, where England at one point led 6-2 - the only time the Kangaroos were behind on the tour - but lost 36-18.
"If I was a coach of any professional team, I would be cutting videos of Australia to show how to get key decisions right," said former Australia international Kurt Gidley on the BBC.
Rugby Football League chairman Brian Barwick said in his programme notes for Sunday's final that England had "much to build on" and that their Australian coach Wayne Bennett knows what is "needed to take them to the next step".
But after a Four Nations that saw England defeated by both Australia and New Zealand, fans could be forgiven for wondering if their team are as far away as ever from threatening the dominance of the top two.
Following England's elimination, new coach Wayne Bennett said his players do not "realise how good they are".
England had Sam Burgess back in their ranks following his return from rugby union, as well as top performers in the Australian National Rugby League such as James Graham and Josh Hodgson, and the best from Super League.
But they spilled the ball or conceded penalties at crucial moments on numerous occasions - and some people wondered whether the team had gone backwards after a morale-boosting 2-1 series win over the Kiwis last year.
"I'm not so sure England have gone backwards," said former Great Britain coach Brian Noble. "The fact we used three different half-back pairings leads me to believe Wayne Bennett was looking at the whole squad.
"We've got some fabulous players and there are 10 or 11 of those playing in the NRL, so they shouldn't worry about intensity or belief."
Davies suggested that it is not all "doom and gloom", arguing that England have one of the best forward packs in the world.
In the long term, it may well be that England simply need a bigger talent pool to pick from if they are to compete with the best on a regular basis.
"One thing we can do is come up with a long-term plan," added Wilkin. "It feels like every year we're talking about the same issues, about having more competitive games and high-intensity games to match the NRL.
"This conversation has been going on for 15 years. We need more junior players, and we need to put that in a cohesive plan for five or 10 years."
Read more: 'England need direction and composure'
The Kiwis might want to look back a little for some inspiration.
Back in 2013, New Zealand were hammered 34-2 in the World Cup final at Old Trafford. The following year, they defeated Australia twice as they won the Four Nations title under coach Stephen Kearney.
As Kearney's successor, Kidwell certainly had a difficult start in his first major tournament in charge of the Kiwis. They were scratchy in a 17-16 win over England, were held by Scotland and were hammered in the final.
"They will need to go back to the drawing board," said former Kiwi international and BBC pundit Robbie Hunter-Paul. "New Zealand are in the process of building again. They have a new coach who needs to put his own stamp on the team. It is a development phase."
Kidwell and his skipper Jesse Bromwich looked stunned as they answered questions after Sunday's match.
A former Kiwi international who played for numerous NRL clubs, Kidwell believes he has learned a lot about what he must do to make his team competitive next year.
"I have told the boys that we have got to get back our belief," he said. "That starts with hard work and doing the little things in games that really count.
"We made seven errors in the first 20 minutes against Australia and that is a tough way to try to win a football game."
Noble is adamant that they can be a threat next year.
He said: "They've had a disappointing tournament, that's all. They won't be far away for the World Cup."
They will need half-back Shaun Johnson to sparkle, they will need their powerful ball-playing forwards to find their form and they will need to find a resolve and discipline largely absent during this Four Nations.
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Nobody expects Scotland to win the World Cup next year but when analysing who triumphed in the the Four Nations it would be foolish not to mention the Bravehearts.
OK, so they got off to an awful start against Australia, losing 54-12, but they took the lead against England and battled to a famous and memorable draw against the Kiwis in Workington.
That draw ensured they became the first team outside the big three to take something from a match at the Four Nations.
"Any neutral fan can see how well we've done," said Scotland coach Steve McCormack.
Nobody would argue with that... but the jury is still out on how to stop the formidable Aussies. | It's been a year of unchecked success for Australia's rugby league team. |
38433522 | The Reds took a deserved lead when Daniel Sturridge flicked in a header after Dejan Lovren's mishit shot.
Sunderland equalised six minutes later as Defoe scored from the spot following Ragnar Klavan's trip on Didier Ndong, before Sadio Mane put the visitors back ahead with a close-range finish.
However, Mane then handled in his own 18-yard box and Defoe converted the penalty to snatch an unlikely point.
The result leaves Liverpool five points behind Premier League leaders Chelsea, who play their game in hand on Wednesday at Tottenham (20:00 GMT kick-off).
However, Reds boss Jurgen Klopp will surely see it as two points dropped after his side led twice, had 71% of the possession and had 15 shots on target.
Only an inspired performance from Black Cats keeper Vito Mannone denied Liverpool further goals, before Mane, playing his last game before representing Senegal at the Africa Cup of Nations, needlessly stuck out an arm to block Seb Larsson's free-kick, costing his side dearly.
To make things worse for Liverpool, Sturridge, who scored only his second Premier League goal of the season, limped off late on with what appeared to be a foot injury after he clashed with Papy Djilobodji.
The England international was only making his fifth league start of the campaign, has also suffered calf and hip injuries this season and was limping badly at the final whistle.
Reds club captain Jordan Henderson missed the game at the Stadium of Light with a heel injury and Klopp could be without three influential players for the trip to Manchester United in 13 days' time.
Sunderland boss David Moyes described his side's performance in their 4-1 loss at Burnley on Saturday as "dire" and had demanded better.
He will surely have been delighted with the response. His team battled hard, gave everything, defended deep in numbers and showed their fighting spirit when Liverpool looked like they might run away with the match.
Sunderland remain in the bottom three, but Moyes will be encouraged by the point as the Black Cats look to extend their 10-year Premier League stay.
However, like Klopp, Moyes faces a battle to juggle his squad. Sunderland's lengthy injury list includes first-choice goalkeeper Jordan Pickford, defender Lamine Kone, midfielders Lee Cattermole and Steven Pienaar and strikers Duncan Watmore and Victor Anichebe.
Midfielders Didier Ndong (Gabon) and Wahbi Khazri (Tunisia) are also set to play at the Africa Cup of Nations in January to provide further problems for Moyes.
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Sunderland manager Moyes said: "I expect them to get results, but I'm really pleased after the few days we've had. We didn't play well (against Burnley) and what they have done is show how well they can do.
"I thought we did quite well, matched Liverpool's energy for long periods of the game and deserved a draw. We had big chances as well.
"I never thought we were out of it. The important thing was to not concede a third goal. In the end we got a deserved penalty.
"Towards the end of the season we are going to have to pick up a lot of results. Today was a tough draw and we have to make sure we win at home - that's key."
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Liverpool boss Klopp said: "I am not able to explain it because I don't know exactly what I saw. My team were fighting but I wasn't sure if they could do it.
"We can play better but I'm not sure if you can play better with that (two-day) break."
On Sunderland's second penalty, the German added: "There was no foul before the free-kick for the second penalty. You need a little bit of luck, but Sunderland worked hard too and maybe they deserved it."
Both sides are next in action in the third round of the FA Cup. Sunderland entertain fellow Premier League side Burnley on Saturday (15:00), one week after losing 4-1 to the Clarets in an away league match.
Liverpool take on League Two high-flyers Plymouth Argyle on 8 January (13:30), before playing at Southampton on 11 January in the first leg of their EFL Cup semi-final (19:45).
Sunderland next play in the Premier League on 14 January with a home game against Stoke (15:00), with Liverpool away at Manchester United at 16:00 the following day.
Match ends, Sunderland 2, Liverpool 2.
Second Half ends, Sunderland 2, Liverpool 2.
Offside, Liverpool. Lucas Leiva tries a through ball, but Divock Origi is caught offside.
Attempt saved. Roberto Firmino (Liverpool) header from the centre of the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by Alberto Moreno with a cross.
Corner, Liverpool. Conceded by Donald Love.
Attempt saved. Adam Lallana (Liverpool) right footed shot from outside the box is saved in the bottom left corner.
Sadio Mané (Liverpool) wins a free kick on the right wing.
Foul by Fabio Borini (Sunderland).
Delay over. They are ready to continue.
Delay in match Papy Djilobodji (Sunderland) because of an injury.
Divock Origi (Liverpool) wins a free kick on the right wing.
Foul by Papy Djilobodji (Sunderland).
Attempt saved. Ragnar Klavan (Liverpool) header from the centre of the box is saved in the top right corner. Assisted by Alberto Moreno with a cross.
Divock Origi (Liverpool) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Foul by Didier Ndong (Sunderland).
Attempt saved. Roberto Firmino (Liverpool) left footed shot from the centre of the box is saved in the top centre of the goal. Assisted by Sadio Mané.
Goal! Sunderland 2, Liverpool 2. Jermain Defoe (Sunderland) converts the penalty with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner.
Adam Lallana (Liverpool) is shown the yellow card.
Sadio Mané (Liverpool) is shown the yellow card for hand ball.
Penalty conceded by Sadio Mané (Liverpool) with a hand ball in the penalty area.
Attempt blocked. Sebastian Larsson (Sunderland) right footed shot from outside the box is blocked.
Foul by Lucas Leiva (Liverpool).
Jermain Defoe (Sunderland) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Delay over. They are ready to continue.
Substitution, Liverpool. Lucas Leiva replaces Daniel Sturridge because of an injury.
Delay in match Daniel Sturridge (Liverpool) because of an injury.
Substitution, Sunderland. Wahbi Khazri replaces Adnan Januzaj.
Foul by Sadio Mané (Liverpool).
Fabio Borini (Sunderland) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Substitution, Liverpool. Divock Origi replaces Georginio Wijnaldum.
Goal! Sunderland 1, Liverpool 2. Sadio Mané (Liverpool) right footed shot from very close range to the centre of the goal following a corner.
Corner, Liverpool. Conceded by Vito Mannone.
Attempt saved. Daniel Sturridge (Liverpool) right footed shot from the centre of the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by Adam Lallana.
Hand ball by Emre Can (Liverpool).
Foul by Sadio Mané (Liverpool).
Patrick van Aanholt (Sunderland) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Georginio Wijnaldum (Liverpool) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Jermain Defoe (Sunderland).
Attempt saved. Roberto Firmino (Liverpool) right footed shot from the left side of the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by Georginio Wijnaldum.
Substitution, Sunderland. Javier Manquillo replaces Jack Rodwell. | Jermain Defoe scored two penalties as Sunderland twice came from behind to earn a point against second-placed Liverpool. |
36901897 | Representatives of Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist faiths spoke after meeting President Hollande.
On Wednesday evening Mr Hollande went on to attend a mass for the priest in Paris's Notre Dame Cathedral.
Fr Jacques Hamel died while conducting a service in his church in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, a suburb of Rouen.
The killing came 12 days after the attack in Nice in which 84 people died.
Only one of the two attackers has been named. Adel Kermiche, 19, had twice tried to reach Syria to fight with the self-styled Islamic State group (IS).
Friends recall 'brainwashed' Kermiche
What we know about church attack
France responds with calls for peace and understanding
Tributes to Fr Jacques Hamel
Airline's concerns over France as destination
Muslim leader Dalil Boubakeur, rector of Paris's Grand Mosque, said the leaders "deeply desire that our places of worship are the subject of greater [security] focus, a sustained focus", as even "the most humble place of worship" can be subject to an attack.
Mr Boubakeur expressed "profound sorrow" on behalf of French Muslims at the attack, which he described as a "blasphemous sacrilege".
The Archbishop of Paris, Andre Vingt-Trois, praised the harmonious relations between France's religions.
"We must not let ourselves get pulled in to Daesh's political games," he said, using a pejorative term for IS, saying it wanted "to set children of the same family against each other".
President Francois Hollande has also been chairing meetings of his security and defence council and his cabinet.
On Tuesday Mr Hollande appealed for "unity" as he warned that the war against terrorism "will be long".
"Our democracy is the target, and it will be our shield. Let us stand together. We will win this war," he said.
According to Le Monde (in French), the prosecutor's office had asked for Kermiche to remain in detention but this was overruled by a judge. She ordered that he be released to house arrest with an electronic tag ensuring that he remained at home, except on weekday mornings.
This meant that on Tuesday morning he was free to leave the family home and head to the church.
He and his fellow attacker slit Father Hamel's throat before being killed by police.
One of four people taken hostage suffered severe knife wounds, prosecutor Francois Molins said.
'I am a priest': Solidarity after church attack
Germans 'full of fear' over attacks
What drives individuals to commit mass killings?
In an editorial, Le Monde says it will no longer feature photographs of those behind attacks such as the one in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray.
It was doing so "to avoid giving posthumous credit" to those responsible, while adding that the intention of killing Father Hamel was to provoke "the blind vengeance that would place the entire country under the empire of hatred".
The move was repeated by the broadcaster BFM.
Elsewhere, Le Figaro's editorial accuses IS of continuing "to pursue its sinister plan: to turn the world into a bloody theatre of war" and calls on the French government to resort to "all military, police and judicial means to ensure the safety of our citizens - whether they believe in heaven or not".
The Catholic daily La Croix also declares that "responding to hatred with hatred would mean that evil has triumphed", while the left-of-centre Liberation maintains that "the war that Islamic State is waging against us is not a war against France, it is a war against freedom."
France is still reeling from the Bastille Day attack in Nice earlier this month, when a lorry was driven into celebrating crowds by Tunisian Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, killing more than 80 people.
That was followed by four violent incidents in a week in neighbouring Germany, two of which are linked to IS.
IS used its news agency to claim the attack in Normandy - thought to be its first on a church in the West.
Christians in Iraq and Syria have long been targeted by the group, with reports of forced conversions and killings.
Syria's beleaguered Christians
Iraq's oldest Christian monastery destroyed
The president of Normandy's regional council, Herve Morin, called for France to learn lessons from the countries hardest hit by terrorism. "We need to Israelise our security," the former French defence minister told Le Figaro. | French religious leaders have called for more security at places of worship following the murder of an elderly priest in Normandy on Tuesday. |
40934283 | Ms Harris, who was reportedly the first licensed female African American road racer in the US, was killed on Monday morning in Vancouver, Canada.
Eyewitnesses said she had lost control of the bike, jumped a kerb and crashed into a building.
Deadpool 2 star Ryan Reynolds said he was "heartbroken, shocked and devastated" at her death.
Production on the film has been temporarily halted.
Local media say Ms Harris had successfully practised the stunt several times before the fatal accident.
Ms Harris has previously been described as a pioneer encouraging more women and African Americans to enter professional road racing.
Black Girls Ride Magazine said in 2015 that she was "leading the pack in more ways than one".
"I am everything people never saw in this sport," Ms Harris told the magazine, adding that the high costs of road racing were a barrier, and most of her competitors were young, affluent white men.
During her first race, she said: "I was alone for most of the day, scared and in tears. I had no-one to talk to, and I didn't know what I needed."
"Sisters on the track are few and far in between. I want to show them that there's more for them to be exposed to. I want to get kids interested through experience."
According to her online profile, Ms Harris had been racing professionally since 2012.
Deadpool 2 was said to be her first film as a stunt performer.
On the FAQ section of her website, Ms Harris said that when it came to crashing, she was "not quite scared, but it crosses my mind at times, but a racer can't let it stop us".
She said that "everything takes time", and encouraged readers to "face your fears". | The stuntwoman who died in a motorcycle accident while filming Deadpool 2 has been identified as Joi SJ Harris. |
32426016 | Italy hopes its EU partners will on Thursday support an initiative to get a military mandate to destroy traffickers' vessels before they use them. The exact details are still unclear but a mandate from the EU - possibly also the UN - would be needed.
A British government source told us that all options were on the table.
Other proposals to be debated also include significantly boosting the EU's maritime patrol to help rescue migrants.
Not quite on a par with Italy's former search and rescue programme but still a huge change.
Libya, too, will be high on the discussion agenda. Italy says 90% of the immigrants washing up on its shores come by boat from there.
It also worries about the organisation calling itself Islamic State, operating so close to Libya's maritime border. There are fears IS could pose a huge security risk for Europe. In the past, it has explicitly threatened Italy.
Add into the mix a German-backed plan to spread migrants out more equally amongst EU countries - an extremely divisive issue - and you can see that the emergency summit will be a challenging one for its participants.
But it's all or nothing according to Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. He's demanding a fully comprehensive political - and financial - solution to the migrant crisis, rather than an emotional response by the EU and its member countries.
Italians want their government to put the rest of the EU under pressure. They feel that they are struggling to cope, between their country's steep economic downturn on the one hand and what their media have dubbed "a migrant invasion" on the other.
Anti-immigrant populist politicians here in Italy as elsewhere in Europe are gaining ground on the back of the debate.
That's why so many European governments have, until now, silently looked the other way when it comes to the perils of migrants at sea. They feared that tackling the issue could cost them domestically.
But Europe is now waking up to the realisation that this is a problem for the continent as a whole.
Most migrants arriving in Italy or Greece don't want to stay there, preferring to slip invisibly over national borders until they reach richer destinations like Germany, Sweden or the UK.
Germany had 200,000 asylum applications last year alone. In 2015 the numbers are expected to rise even further.
The face of Europe is changing. Too fast for some.
This is decision time but also a moment for soul searching.
Some kind of common document will certainly emerge at the end of today's summit. The real test will be to see if those plans are then implemented.
Europe made bold declarations on immigration just under two years ago, also following dreadful loss of life in the Mediterranean.
The plans were similar to a number of proposals now being discussed.
Yet here we are again. | "The most macabre travel agents in history" is how Italy's Interior Minister Angelino Alfano describes the people smugglers who charge migrants sums they can ill-afford to cross the Mediterranean in unsafe boats. |
37547510 | Media playback is not supported on this device
Two years earlier, Phil Mickelson had delivered a shocking and devastating critique of his captain and the American Ryder Cup set-up. The contrast in mood and sentiment this time around could not have been greater.
America's journey towards regaining the trophy after eight long years in European hands began with that fractious news conference immediately after Tom Watson's team suffered heavy defeat at Gleneagles.
In the immediate aftermath of the United States' 17-11 victory at Hazeltine, Mickelson joked: "The pressure started when some dumb ass opened his mouth two years ago in the media centre."
Back then, Mickelson was heavily criticised for insulting a golfing legend.
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But the fallout helped create a more cohesive, collected and motivated team than those that had lost eight of the previous 10 Ryder Cups. Captained for the second time by Davis Love, the US were able to take full advantage against a relatively weak European line-up.
Darren Clarke's side were always going to be up against it, because this match coincided with a period of generational change. There were six first-timers in a team missing stalwarts such as Ian Poulter, Graeme McDowell and Luke Donald.
As we saw at Gleneagles in 2014, heavy defeats can spawn rancour and recrimination, but despite being comprehensively outplayed there was, quite rightly, none from the European side.
They were due a defeat, and the Americans were able to exploit home advantage; riding the wave of raucous support and making the most of a soft course set-up.
For Europe to have won, Clarke would have needed to gamble on giving his rookies more responsibility. He was a naturally cautious leader whose instincts pushed him towards making the most of the more experienced players in his team.
Few argued with his wildcard selections at the time they were made, though I always felt Lee Westwood would be playing under immense pressure having failed to qualify automatically.
In his 10th Ryder Cup, the Englishman did not add to his extraordinary tally of 23 points, which leaves him behind only Colin Montgomerie (23.5), Bernhard Langer (24) and Sir Nick Faldo (25) in the all-time European list.
Westwood's putting capitulation late in the Saturday afternoon fourballs proved a pivotal moment. It was sad to see from someone who has been at the heart of so much European success.
This felt as though it was one Ryder Cup too many for Westwood. Fellow wildcard Martin Kaymer was also disappointing, his lone point coming in a singles match against Matt Kuchar that came too late to affect the overall outcome.
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With hindsight, Clarke should have kept together the irrepressible Spaniards Sergio Garcia and Rafa Cabrera Bello on Saturday afternoon.
But at the point he had to submit his pairings, they were four down to Jordan Spieth and Patrick Reed.
That is why Cabrera Bello was benched. However, he and Garcia were playing well despite the large deficit in a match they ultimately halved. Had Clarke kept the Spanish duo together, those pivotal Saturday fourballs might have maintained European momentum.
The Northern Irishman should also have made more use of Chris Wood, Matthew Fitzpatrick and Andy Sullivan.
Wood was outstanding in his one foursomes with Justin Rose, Fitzpatrick was given little chance to shine and Sullivan sat out until the singles after defeat with Rory McIlroy in Friday's opening foursomes.
Such sparing use of the English rookies reinforced the notion they needed to be protected. Yet look at the way Thomas Pieters responded to being asked to play all five matches. The Belgian wildcard collected four points, a record on a European debut.
Of course, it is easy to make these calls after the event and overall Clarke did a decent job as captain.
In the build-up to the match, his dignified and decisive response to the ill-timed and ill-advised article on US fan behaviour by Danny Willett's brother Peter helped limit the damage.
There were a few Americans in the crowd who lived down to PJ Willett's assessment - several "basement-dwelling irritants" among the huge galleries that swarmed over Hazeltine.
But the insults that flew in the direction of European stars such as McIlroy, Garcia and, of course, PJ's Masters-winning sibling were largely isolated incidents.
For the most part, the home support was passionately raucous and generated the most intense atmosphere I have experienced on a golf course. When you have such large numbers of people whipped into such a frenzy, there will always be a few who will take it too far.
It goes with the territory, but to have golf played and showcased in such an extraordinarily passionate environment can only be good for the growth of the game.
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America's triumph will heighten the sense of anticipation for the next Ryder Cup, in Paris in 2018.
Many of Europe's team in Minnesota will retain their places and will be stronger for this experience. The next skipper - probably Thomas Bjorn - is unlikely to have nearly as many debutants.
The US, meanwhile, have set their own blueprint for success.
"We need to build on this," said Mickelson. "Otherwise, it's all for nought. We created a very solid foundation this year.
"With the input that Davis Love had, and each vice-captain - Tom Lehman, Jim Furyk, Steve Stricker, Tiger Woods and Bubba Watson; all brought integral parts to the success of this foundation, and it's important we build on that.
"For us to go to Europe and try to win the cup is a whole different feat.
"That's going to require a whole different level of play, of solidarity, of fortitude and we are going to have to build on this if we want to try to retain the cup."
And with that, his captain popped the champagne bottle and Mickelson shut up, a happy man. | Amid smiles and laughter, it took a popped champagne bottle to shut him up. |
18305445 | Mr Putin, an ally of Syria, called for more time to be given to the peace plan of envoy Kofi Annan.
The US and UK have called on Moscow to strengthen its condemnation of the Syrian regime since last week's massacre in Houla, where 108 died.
Earlier, Moscow opposed a UN Human Rights Council resolution on Syria.
In an emergency session on Friday, the council condemned Syria over the Houla massacre and called for an investigation.
But Russia voted against the US-backed resolution, arguing that it was "unbalanced".
Meanwhile, a US government website
published satellite images
apparently showing a mass grave in the Houla area.
Correspondents say Mr Putin's latest remarks, made after a meeting with French President Francois Hollande, highlight the divisions between Moscow and Paris towards the conflict in Syria.
Speaking at a news conference, Mr Hollande called for further pressure and sanctions, and said the only solution was for President Bashar al-Assad to resign.
Satellite clues to Houla massacre
Houla: How a massacre unfolded
Timeline: Syria's massacres
He said Mr Assad's regime had conducted itself in an "unacceptable, intolerable way" and had committed acts that disqualified it from power.
"There is no possible exit from this situation except with the departure of Bashar Assad," he said.
Mr Putin, however, questioned calls for the Syrian president to quit.
"Why are we thinking that if we push the current leadership from power, then tomorrow general wellbeing will begin there," Mr Putin said.
"What is happening in Libya? What is happening in Iraq? Has it become safer there? We propose to act in an accurate, balanced manner at least in Syria."
He said the most important thing was to prevent the worst-case scenario of civil war.
There have been calls for more action to be taken in Syria to stop the violence, which has continued despite Mr Annan's six-point peace plan.
Speaking in Oslo on Friday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hit out at Russia saying she did not believe it was acting impartially.
"We know there has been a very consistent arms trade, even during the past year, coming from Russia to Syria. We also believe the continuous supply of arms from Russia has strengthened the Assad regime," she told a news conference.
On Thursday, Western officials confirmed a report that a Russian cargo ship had delivered heavy weapons to the Syrian port of Tartus last weekend.
Mr Putin has insisted that Russia was not supplying Syria with arms "that could be used in a civilian conflict".
Earlier, the UN Human Rights Council said it wanted investigators to identify the perpetrators of the killings in Houla.
In the vote, 41 members voted in favour of the US-backed resolution condemning Syria, while Russia, China and Cuba voted against it. Two other countries abstained and one was absent.
Residents of the village of Taldou, in Houla, said militiamen had been sent in early last Saturday after the Syrian army unleashed a barrage of heavy weapons late on Friday in response to a local anti-government protest.
The UN high commissioner for human rights, Navi Pillay, said the killings in Houla may amount to crimes against humanity.
She said those who ordered attacks were "individually criminally liable", and urged the UN Security Council to refer Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC), a move opposed by Russia and China.
As Syria is not a state party to the ICC the court has no jurisdiction to indict its citizens without a Security Council referral.
Meanwhile, opposition activists said there had been another mass killing of civilians by pro-government militiamen.
Thirteen factory workers were forced off a bus and executed on Thursday in al-Buwaida al-Sharqiya, near the western town of Qusair, they said.
Several videos posted online showed bodies with severe wounds to the head and stomach, consistent with being shot at close range. | Russia's President Vladimir Putin has resisted diplomatic pressure from Western nations to support tougher action against Syria's government. |
39484351 | No footballer has represented Wales 100 times and it is a very proud moment to have reached the milestone.
I have just flown in. I've come to Wales via Seattle, where I have been in pre-season preparation, and before that I was in Melbourne, which is where I last flew into Wales from, for the Cyprus Cup.
I am pretty exhausted from the travel and not entirely sure what time zone I am in, but now all the focus is on Wales.
I think when it comes on Wednesday it is going to be a little bit emotional and maybe a bit overwhelming too. I think that is when the emotion is going to kick in. I am pretty excited already.
My family are going to be at the game against Northern Ireland and it is huge for me that they will be there.
They have been with me for my whole career and are the reason I am where I am and that I am who I am, so if they didn't turn up, there would be questions asked! They deserve this moment as much, or more, than I do.
I never even thought about the possibility of getting to 100 caps, since my first game, I've always just wanted to play for Wales.
Even when I got to 50 caps, I thought another 50 was miles away.
I remember my first game was against Switzerland away in 2006. We won 3-2 and scored a free-kick from a training ground routine, which any footballer will tell you is one of the best feelings in the world, when that comes off. That was my first cap.
To have reached the milestone of 100 now is amazing. I am extremely proud. Football is full of opinions, so it feels nice to become a statistic.
The landscape of women's football, in Wales and globally, has changed dramatically in the time I have taken to make it to 100 caps. It is like a different sport now to what it was then.
Women's football has really jumped levels in the last five years, which is great to see. Ten years ago there was nothing, you literally had to pay to play.
I was extremely lucky because I was seven when I went to my first women's football club.
The Cardiff City Ladies team, if it wasn't for them and the coaches dedication, I would never have got anywhere. There was nothing for women in football back then.
They enabled a seven-year old to achieve their dream and I'll live it by playing for Wales for the 100th time.
I have told Jayne Ludlow, the national team manager, that I am 100% committed to this campaign, I can't say I will play past that, but for this campaign, I believe in what we are doing and I would really love to play in a major tournament. That is the dream.
We don't want to be that maybe team anymore. We want to be the team that makes it.
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I was disappointed when I landed in Wales and caught up with the news to hear the story about David Moyes and what he said to a female BBC reporter.
It is extremely patronising and I can't imagine David Moyes speaking like that if it was to a male reporter.
I don't think he would go to that tone or that way of speaking.
And I think this is something that male managers have to get used to. When a male manager is speaking to a female reporter, the way he speaks maybe has to be different, but it certainly does not have to be patronising. | It is a huge week in my life as I prepare to play for my country, Wales, for the 100th time on Wednesday. |
20174221 | Prison officers have been under threat from dissident republicans for a number of years now. There has been a general threat as well as specific threats against some individuals.
A number have had to move home under a government funded scheme after being informed that dissidents were monitoring their movements and they were being targeted for possible attack.
David Black is not believed to be one of those who had been warned.
"It was just a matter of time," was how one well-placed source responded to the news of the shooting.
The government's assessment of the threat level posed by dissident groups was increased to severe in February 2009, meaning an attack was regarded as highly likely.
Since then, dissidents have killed two police officers and two soldiers, and the assumption is that they were responsible for the killing of David Black.
In recent years the police have warned repeatedly that serving officers were the main focus for dissidents. Some prison officers believe the threat to them has been understated.
"There's a sense of anger," said one source. "Prison officers have been worried for some time now that they face an increasing threat, but many feel their concerns have been ignored. Now, they're saying their fears have been realised."
Dissident republicans and their supporters have been at loggerheads with the prison service in recent years in a dispute over the use of strip searching for prisoners entering and leaving Maghaberry high security prison near Lisburn.
There are currently 41 dissidents being held at Roe House in Maghaberry and many are taking part in a "no wash" protest.
Some are smearing excrement on the walls of their cells, others are throwing it out of their cells, and others are refusing to shave.
They say routine strip searching is an unnecessary humiliation and argue that electronic scanners like those used at airports are a secure alternative.
The prison service recently installed two electronic scanners in Magilligan Prison near Limavady and Hyde Bank Wood in south Belfast to test their effectiveness. It has said they may provide an alternative to full body searches.
It is a long running dispute. Back in August 2010, it was announced that a deal had been reached between the authorities and the prisoners in Roe House to end their protest.
Mediators brokered an agreement that included less restricted movement for prisoners and concessions on strip searching. To facilitate this, a new search facility was introduced and modifications were made to the prison exercise yards.
But the dissidents later accused the prison authorities of breaking the terms of the deal and resumed the protest. Since then, there have been growing fears about possible attacks on prison officers.
A prison service drive to recruit more Catholics may have been another motivating factor for those who killed David Black.
Hundreds of long-serving officers are leaving the prison service under an enhanced redundancy scheme, with their places being taken by new recruits.
Just last week the new head of the prison service, Sue McAllister, expressed disappointment at the low number of applications from Catholics for the new posts advertised and said attracting more would be a priority.
Those who carried out this shooting may hope it deters young Catholics from applying.
In terms of who was responsible, there are a number of possibilities.
The Continuity IRA is active in the Lurgan area and was responsible for murdering Constable Stephen Carroll in March 2009. Just a few weeks ago, two men were arrested on the outskirts of the town in a police operation aimed at the group.
A new organisation calling itself the IRA was formed during the summer, bringing together the Real IRA, Republican Action Against Drugs, and a group of non-aligned republicans - a number of whom are believed to be based in the Craigavon area.
As David Black was from Cookstown, the police will also look at the possibility that dissidents based in County Tyrone may have been involved. | There is a sense of shock at the first killing of a prison officer in Northern Ireland for almost 20 years, but not surprise. |
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Mahrez slipped as he took a second-half spot-kick that diverted the ball onto his standing foot before it looped into the net.
Referee Bobby Madley gave a free-kick to Man City because of the two touches.
"The shot was strange but the rule is clear. Two touches, the same as golf," said Man City manager Pep Guardiola.
"It is not normal."
Had the goal stood, it would have made the scoreline 2-2 after Leicester had trailed 2-0.
Shakespeare accepted there were two touches, but felt the penalty could have been retaken because of opposition players encroaching in the area.
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"I didn't see it at the time. It's a freak thing you don't see often," he said.
"To the letter of the law it's a double touch, but he could bring it back for an encroachment from Manchester City so there's a bit of injustice. It's bad luck from our point of view."
Leicester winger Marc Albrighton received a nasty bruise under his eye after being caught by Fernandinho's elbow in a second-half challenge.
Albrighton was unhappy at the incident and was later booked for a wild challenge on the Brazilian.
However, after seeing a replay of the clash, Shakespeare said: "I have sympathy with Marc but there is no intent. It was a competitive challenge. Marc understands that."
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Man City's opener came amid controversy, as Raheem Sterling was stood in an offside position when he stretched to reach David Silva's shot.
Sterling failed to touch the ball, with the goal awarded to Silva, but Foxes keeper Kasper Schmeichel was angered by the decision.
"The Man City player is in an offside position when the ball is struck," he said.
"The ball goes across him, which prevents me seeing. He's stood in front of Christian Fuchs, and he also goes for the ball - so it's three times offside.
"If he's in the six-yard box he's influencing something in there. I think the rule needs to be looked at. He might be onside and get a flick on it and I have to take that into consideration." | Riyad Mahrez's disallowed penalty in Leicester's 2-1 loss against Manchester City was a "freak" occurrence, said Foxes boss Craig Shakespeare. |
37691160 | Official statistics showed passengers made 119 million fewer journeys in 2015-16 than the year before, a fall of 2.6%.
London also recorded its first drop in bus use since 2012 as congestion increased.
Transport for London (TfL) said it expected new "Hopper" fares to reverse the decline.
Campaigners blamed congestion, which they said has slowed the pace of buses to almost walking speed, for the decline.
The Department for Transport (DfT) said a drop in bus mileage was "largely due" to a fall in the number of services subsidised by councils.
Bus fares had increased 1.8% but the DfT said this was "similar" to other price rises in line with the 1.6% Retail Price Index of inflation.
There were 4.5 billion journeys made by bus in England in 2015-16, the lowest figure since 2006.
In the capital, bus usage was down 3% in a year, to 2.29 billion journeys.
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Research by the Campaign for Better Transport (CBT) has found subsidies for bus routes had been reduced by £78 million since 2010, leading to cuts in services, particularly in rural areas.
Get the data here
Lianna Etkind, public transport campaigner at the CBT, said: "The news that bus use is falling in London is worrying, but as buses are now moving only marginally faster through the city than the average adult can walk, it's hardly surprising.
"Congestion is bringing London to a standstill and needs to be urgently tackled."
Gareth Powell, TfL's Director of Strategy for Surface Transport, said there had been a "small reduction" in bus journeys due to congestion caused by a number of factors, including development across London and "increased internet delivery traffic".
But "bus network reliability has now stabilised," he said, and the completion of major road projects and the introduction of a "Hopper" fare was expected to have a positive effect on passenger numbers.
A DfT spokesman said: "We provide some £250 million a year to support bus services in England and about £1 billion is spent annually to give nearly 10 million older and disabled people in England off-peak bus travel." | Bus use across England has fallen to its lowest for a decade, new figures reveal. |
36421272 | Emergency services were called to Rodway Road, Patchway at about 13:00 BST on Monday. Officers are treating the death as unexplained.
The property is currently cordoned off to allow for an examination to be carried out by a forensic team.
Avon and Somerset Police said a 42-year-old woman has been arrested and remains in custody. | A woman has been arrested on suspicion of manslaughter after a woman's body was found in Bristol. |
21936927 | About one in every 20 children aged five to 16 has a conduct disorder - persistent and extreme misbehaviour.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence guidelines outline how to spot and treat these conditions.
They say parents should play a central role in this.
While all children can be naughty from time to time, the behaviour of children with conduct disorders is different.
They persistently misbehave - both at home and in school - and their actions can be extreme and harmful.
As well as stealing, fighting or vandalising property, they might hurt people and animals, for example.
Prof Steven Pilling, who helped develop the guidelines, said: "Children with conduct disorders are different. It's not a bit of tantruming or getting into trouble now and then. It's picking up the 14in TV and throwing it through the window."
He said it was important that parents be taught how to handle this type of behaviour.
"Firmness and saying 'No' is not the solution for these children. We need to get parents to switch the focus from being controlling and punitive to encouraging positive behaviour," he said.
About half of children with antisocial behaviour or conduct disorders not only miss out on parts of their childhood but also go on to have serious mental health problems as adults. Some go on to be repeated offenders.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) and the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE), who jointly developed the guidelines, say early intervention is essential to break this chain.
Prof Peter Fonagy, a professor of psychoanalysis at University College London who co-authored the guidelines, said: "All children can be naughty, defiant and impulsive from time to time, which is perfectly normal. However, some children have extremely difficult and challenging behaviours that are outside the norm for their age.
"Recognising and accurately diagnosing a conduct disorder is vital to ensuring children and their families are able to access the treatment and support they need to manage the condition."
Fiona is a mother of a child with a conduct disorder. She said: "It is not just the child who is affected by a conduct disorder; it can have a significant impact on their brothers or sisters, their parents, family members, teachers and other people they come into contact with.
"Real practical support and advice is needed to help parents manage their child's condition, such as what to say to calm the child when they are very distressed to avoid inflaming the situation." | A health watchdog has issued guidelines to help parents distinguish between naughtiness and more worrying behaviour in their children that might need medical intervention. |
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The Reds are fourth in the Premier League and host Middlesbrough on Sunday (15:00 BST) knowing victory will earn Champions League football next term.
They last played in the competition in 2014-15 after finishing second.
"The world is not full of players who will make us better immediately but clearly there are a few out there," said German Klopp.
"We have spoken to them.
"We have a really good side when our first 11, 12, 13, 14 players are fit."
The Anfield club have reportedly had a £64.6m bid rejected for Monaco striker Kylian Mbappe and been linked with moves for Roma winger Mohamed Salah, Southampton defender Virgil van Dijk and Fulham left-back Ryan Sessegnon.
Liverpool were top of the table in November and in contention for the title at the turn of the year, but injuries to key players - such as Sadio Mane, Philippe Coutinho and Adam Lallana - at various stages derailed their challenge.
They suffered a shock defeat by Wolves in the fourth round of the FA Cup in January and were knocked out of the EFL Cup at the semi-final stage by Southampton.
But Klopp, in his first full season in charge after replacing the sacked Brendan Rodgers in October 2015, said a return to Europe's elite club competition by finishing in the top four will be a "successful" campaign.
A third-place finish would earn direct qualification for the group stage, while finishing fourth will mean they would have to contest a two-legged play-off match.
Klopp added: "The Champions League, for different reasons, is a wonderful competition.
"You can earn a lot of money there - that is money we did not have last year. That is very interesting and is one part of it, but we are already in a good position.
"We are a club without financial problems and we have money to spend, but it makes sense to think before we spend and that is what we are doing."
Media playback is not supported on this device | Liverpool "have spoken" to transfer targets for next season, says manager Jurgen Klopp. |
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Jay Donnelly headed the hosts ahead but Glentoran replied with a Curtis Allen free-kick and Jay Magee header.
Cliftonville keeper Conor Devlin and Glentoran's Chris Lavery were sent-off for fighting and the Glens were down to nine when Barry Holland was red-carded.
Cliftonville equalised with a James Knowles penalty and got an 80th-minute winner through sub David McDaid.
Cliftonville's win is worth at least £160,000 in Uefa qualification payments.
They took the lead in the 11th minute when Donnelly headed in from close-range after his first effort had come off the crossbar.
Glentoran equalised through a superb free-kick from 22 yards by striker Allen and defender Magee headed in from a Chris Lavery corner five minutes later for 2-1.
Cliftonville claimed they should have had a penalty for hand ball against Jay Magee but referee Raymond Crangle felt the contact had been accidental.
The first half ended with players getting involved in a mass brawl and keeper Devlin and midfielder Lavery were shown red cards in the tunnel.
Glentoran were then reduced to nine when skipper Holland brought down Stephen Garrett in the box.
Jay Donnelly took the resulting penalty but Glens keeper Elliott Morris saved it.
Then came another penalty for hands by Curtis Allen and this time Knowles found the net for 2-2 in the 63rd minute.
In the end, Glentoran were running out of steam and the winner came in the 80th minute when McDaid scored with a shot from just outside the penalty area.
Cliftonville manager Gerard Lyttle: "It was all about digging deep and I have to applaud the players for that.
"To be fair to Glentoran they played their part. They had two players sent off but made it hard for us.
"I am over the moon for everyone involved. The ultimate goal was to qualify for Europe and we have won a cup as well."
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Glentoran manager Alan Kernaghan: "The game was there for us to have but decisions and indiscipline cost us.
"I think the half-time incident hurt us more than Cliftonville. We just could not get going after that.
"I am hugely proud of the players in terms of what they did. They gave it everything and should not be too down on themselves." | Cliftonville sealed a place in next season's Europa League with a dramatic 3-2 win over Glentoran at Solitude. |
28430298 | Very quickly, in addition to smuggling weapons, the tunnel operators began importing any kind of sellable civilian wares.
After Israel withdrew from Gaza, the number of smuggling tunnels jumped from a few dozen to hundreds as more and more Gazans got involved in this lucrative business.
Taxes imposed by the Hamas government on the imports were a major source of its revenue. After the Egyptian military overthrew the Muslim Brotherhood government, the new regime shut down these tunnels - this being one of the causes of the present economic crisis in Gaza.
From 2001 the Palestinians began using explosive-filled tunnels to attack Israeli border posts. There were not many attempts to do this because the effort far exceeded the benefit - casualties were light and it was much easier to achieve them by other means.
In 2006, the Palestinians tried something new - a tunnel was dug underneath the Gaza-Israel border and an assault team emerged behind an Israeli border post.
The Israeli soldiers were surprised - two were killed, one wounded and one - Gilad Shalit - abducted.
After taking control of Gaza, Hamas began a project to build a maze of underground concrete bunkers connected with tunnels and multiple entrances and exits underneath the residential areas of Gaza.
These underground complexes are fairly similar in concept to the Viet Cong tunnels dug beneath the jungles of South Vietnam, though the quality of finishing is better, with concrete walls and roofs, electricity and other required amenities for lengthy sojourn.
Maintenance of a concrete tunnel is fairly simple - virtually nil unless there is groundwater that needs pumping. Without the concrete walls and roof the tunnel would gradually deteriorate (in the area of Gaza most of the soil is soft, with very little bedrock) and require re-digging and shoring up.
The smuggling tunnels under the border with Egypt are generally bigger and better equipped to enable continuous operation and transfer of bulky items, whereas infiltration tunnels are meant to be used at most once or twice and only wide enough for an armed man to walk through.
The purpose of the defensive tunnels is to enable the Hamas command structure to reside safely underground while their armed forces conduct a mobile defence against Israeli forces.
Many of the tunnels are interconnected to enable travelling underground from one to the other, with multiple camouflaged openings to emerge above ground in different locations.
This enables surprise attacks on the IDF units from different directions and then disappearing again underground to emerge and attack somewhere else.
The exact extent of these complexes is not known, though the Israeli army estimates there are dozens.
The entrances and probably the tunnels themselves are booby-trapped with explosives. These were first used during the Israeli offensive against Gaza in 2008-09. They were deemed successful so the project was expanded and accelerated.
After the failure of Hamas' rocket forces to inflict significant damage on Israeli towns in November 2012, they decided to build a large offensive-tunnel capability that would enable them to infiltrate assault teams into Israeli villages within a few kilometres of the border or place large bombs underneath these villages.
The IDF knew of this plan but failed to find and destroy more than a few tunnels.
Detecting tunnels requires either detecting the entrance to the tunnel or "seeing" the tunnel itself with various acoustic, seismic or radar detection devices.
Even after detecting an entrance, one does not know the exact route of the tunnel from there to the border.
To hide the tunnel work from Israeli intelligence, the entrances are mostly located on the bottom floor of houses, mosques, schools or other public buildings.
Digging smuggling and offensive tunnels is a long manual process, usually of several months, because the use of motor diggers would create a noise that could be heard by Israeli listening posts.
Removal of the earth from the site is done gradually and camouflaged by various ruses.
As yet no reliable technology has been developed that can cover a wide area and see a man-sized tunnel to a depth of more than a few meters underground.
The tunnels dug by Hamas are usually about 65ft (20m) underground - so, even if you know the approximate location, they are almost impossible to detect.
Therefore to discover the tunnels, the Israelis must either have excellent intelligence from within Gaza or they must go in and search for them house by house.
Destroying a tunnel is a lengthy and somewhat complex operation because just blowing in the entrance or some of the airshafts leave most of the tunnel intact, so Hamas sappers will be able to quickly dig by-pass sections and continue to use the tunnel.
Therefore, the entire length of the tunnel and its branches must be located, mapped and then completely destroyed.
Dr Eado Hecht is a defence analyst and lecturer in military doctrine at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University.
Correction 5 February 2015: This page has been amended following complaints that were upheld by the BBC's Editorial Complaints Unit. | The use of tunnels in Gaza began approximately a decade and a half ago, on the border with Egypt, to smuggle weapons into Gaza under the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) border security. |
39949527 | The 20-year-old made 38 appearances for Gateshead this season, having joining in June 2016 after leaving Barnsley.
Smith had played 25 league games for the Tykes in 2015-16 as they won promotion to the Championship.
He has signed a two-year contract with Justin Edinburgh's League One side, providing competition for fellow left-back David Buchanan.
"That's the reason why I've come here, because I feel I can give him competition," Smith told BBC Radio Northampton.
"I can learn stuff off him and make myself a better player, but first and foremost try to take his shirt off him."
Find all the latest football transfers on our dedicated page. | Northampton Town have signed left-back George Smith from National League side Gateshead for an undisclosed fee. |
31656670 | What has been leaked overnight is that in some way he will pay for the £2bn-or-so upfront costs with cuts to tax reliefs on pensions.
All of this, right now, begs a huge number of questions.
Here are a few for the Labour leader to answer when he gives the detail of the reform at midday.
Can he make sure that the fee cut doesn't disproportionately help future high earners?
The Institute of Fiscal Studies calculates that a cut in fees from £9000 to £6000 will give almost zero help to graduates who will be in the bottom 50% of earners, such as teachers - in that under the current system they would expect to have much of their student debt written off when they enter their 50s.
Or to put it another way, cutting the fees would largely and exclusively help those who under the current system pay them off rapidly because they are on high earnings.
In other words, there is a likelihood that Ed Miliband will be helping graduates who go to work for hedge funds and Goldman Sachs.
Which he might say is a good thing, if those young hedgies and investment bankers come from poor families.
But if the IFS points out - which it plans to do - that he is disproportionately helping the top 10-20% of earners, that might be embarrassing to him.
There is obviously another set of issues around the funding of our universities - reassuring them that they will have the funds and autonomy to deliver the world class skills that the UK's economic future requires. Many of them have already publicly stated their opposition to the fee cut.
And finally there are bound to be big issues about the fairness or otherwise of whatever further tax raid there is on pension savings.
In recent years, our pensions have been the seemingly bottomless purse from which Tory and Labour chancellors have extracted many billions, from abolishing the tax credit for pension funds on dividends, to progressively shrinking the size of our pension pots, to limiting the amount we can put into pensions each year.
For Labour's shadow chancellor there have however been quite a few options for milking our pensions even more. They include:
If he goes with logic, he may shrink the size of the tax-free lump sum available on retirement. Since it has always seemed a bit odd to some that there should be tax breaks both on saving and on cashing in a pension.
But although limiting the tax breaks to the saving might appear rational, it would certainly cause a sharp intake of breath for those currently approaching retirement and already banking on that lovely tax-free nest egg.
As for limiting tax relief on saving, it could potentially raise billions if it was targeted on all 40% rate earners. But it would be quite a brave Labour Party leader who announced a thinly disguised tax rise for the more than four million households in this tax bracket. And neither Ed Balls or Ed Miliband would presumably wish to sign what some would see as a general election suicide pact. | So as I mentioned a few weeks ago, Ed Miliband is about to confirm his plan to cut student tuition fees from £9,000 to £6,000. |
33595370 | An independent panel appointed by Toshiba found institutional accounting irregularities, the firm said in a statement to investors.
Toshiba said it "takes the situation it has caused very seriously" and that it "deeply apologised" to shareholders.
The overstatement was roughly triple an initial Toshiba estimate.
The probe could lead to a restatement of earnings, a board overhaul and potential action by regulators.
"Within Toshiba, there was a corporate culture in which one could not go against the wishes of superiors," the report said.
"Therefore, when top management presented 'challenges', division presidents, line managers and employees below them continually carried out inappropriate accounting practices to meet targets in line with the wishes of their superiors."
The improper accounting practices stretched back to 2008. | Toshiba overstated its operating profit by a total of 151.8bn yen ($1.22bn, £780m) over several years, according to the findings of a probe. |
33288684 | The 19-year-old Switzerland Under-19 international, who was out of contract with the English Premier League club, has agreed a four-year deal.
Celtic hope Janko, for whom they will pay United a compensation fee, will complete his medical on Thursday.
Janko spent the end of last season on loan at Bolton Wanderers with former Celtic boss Neil Lennon.
As well as right-back, he can also play as a central defender or a right-sided midfielder.
After joining United from FC Zurich in 2013, Janko made his senior debut in a League Cup defeat by MK Dons in August.
He subsequently made 10 appearances for Bolton, scoring on his debut in Wanderers' win over Fulham in February.
Janko becomes Celtic's second summer signing, central defender Dedryck Boyata having arrived from Manchester City.
Celtic have also had a bid for striker Nadir Ciftci rejected by Dundee United.
Find all the latest football transfers on our dedicated page. | Celtic have completed the signing of right-back Saidy Janko from Manchester United subject to a medical. |
37470707 | Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Health Board (ABMU) said patients could face significant difficulties seeing their doctor as the population grows.
The proposals would place GP, dental, research, fitness and library facilities under one roof.
ABMU said move was the best way to "promote good health".
Sian Harrop-Griffiths, ABMU's director of strategy said the proposals were still in the early stages and nothing was set in stone.
"The NHS is facing rising costs, increasing demand and an ageing population, by working across all sectors we aim to tackle these issues by putting prevention and improved health and wellbeing in a joined up way," she said.
Discussions are taking place to see if the wellness centre could be part of the Swansea city centre regeneration plans.
A report being considered by Swansea Public Services Board - a partnership of local agencies including Swansea Council and ABMU - says the hub would help ease pressures at GP surgeries, many of which are out-of-date and "unsuitable" for dealing with modern health care provision.
It warns that problems recruiting GPs teamed with increasing demand threaten the sustainability of primary health care in the city.
Earlier this month the British Medical Association (BMA) warned primary care was in "crisis" in Wales, saying more family doctors could quit unless surgeries get more support.
The proposed centre would provide GP services for 35,000 patients as well as housing dental, sexual health, podiatry, speech and language and mental health services for around 150,000 people.
A GP academy, library, fitness facility, art therapy and computer courses could also be based in the building.
Proposals for the 7,000 square-metre centre are being looked at by Swansea Public Services Board as part of the wider regeneration plans. | Health bosses are hoping to open a wellness centre and GP academy in Swansea to ease the "acute" pressures facing primary care. |
37652612 | Nike will provide the London club's kit from the 2017-18 season, after the Premier League team said in May it was ending its Adidas deal six years early.
The deal is reported to be worth £60m a season for the next 15 years, but the club did not confirm any cash figures.
Chelsea said it was an "incredibly exciting and important deal" for it.
Nike will produce strips for the first team, academy and ladies teams, as well as replica kit and clothing for the club's fans.
Like most large Premier League clubs Chelsea is looking to expand its fan, and commercial, base into areas such as East and South East Asia, and also North America.
Chelsea director Marina Granovskaia said: "We believe Nike will be able to support our growth into new markets as well as helping us maintain our place among the world's elite football clubs."
The Stamford Bridge club's deal with Nike is believed to be worth double its previous deal with Germany's Adidas, which was worth £30m a season.
Rivals Manchester United's have the most valuable Premier League kit deal, which it signed with Adidas in July 2014 and is worth £750m over 10 years. | Chelsea has signed a new kit deal with US sportswear giants Nike, in an agreement which marks the largest commercial deal in the club's history. |
35395010 | Fire crews were called to the Swindon site on Saturday morning.
Four fire engines and an aerial unit dealt with a fire in the die cast facility which was evacuated.
A spokesman for the firm said: "A small equipment fire occurred...while routine weekend maintenance work was taking place.
"Two associates were taken to hospital as a precautionary measure."
He added: "There will be no adverse impact to production which will continue as normal on Monday morning."
The Japanese firm employs about 2,500 workers in Swindon, which is described as the "global hub" for Honda's five-door Civic model. | Production at Honda's factory in Wiltshire will go ahead "as normal," following a fire which left two workers needing hospital treatment. |
26624641 | Another 27 were wounded in the attack in Maymana, the capital of Faryab province, provincial governor Mohammadullah Batash said.
The bomber is believed to have detonated his explosives near the entrance to a busy market.
The attack comes as Afghans prepare to hold presidential elections on 5 April.
No group has so far said it carried out the bombing.
However, Taliban insurgents and the al-Qaeda affiliated group the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan are active in the volatile region.
Mr Batash said the attacker had been riding a three-wheel motorcycle when he detonated his explosives.
"It was a local market day. Hundreds of local farmers and villagers bring their produce. All of those killed and injured are civilians," he said.
Witness Sayed Agha, 43, told the BBC: "I was busy buying bread when I heard a huge bang. I saw dead bodies and blood all around me."
Correspondents say security is likely to be severely tested during the election, where candidates include warlords and former guerrilla leaders from the civil war in the 1990s.
The Taliban have threatened to target anyone who takes part in the polls.
In recent days, the country's election commission has closed 396 polling centres in 15 provinces citing security concerns, says the BBC's Bilal Sarwary in Kabul.
The majority were closed in Faryab province, our correspondent adds.
The last remaining contingent of Nato-led forces is due to leave the country by the end of the year, having handed over security to Afghan forces.
The United Nations says 2,959 civilians were killed and 5,656 wounded in Afghanistan last year, a 14% rise from the previous year. | A suicide bomb attack in northern Afghanistan has killed at least 15 people including women and children, officials have told the BBC. |
37526320 | Jackie Walker has faced criticism over comments made at the anti-Semitism event and on social media, and had been under pressure to quit.
Ms Walker told Channel 4: "I certainly wouldn't call myself an anti-Semite."
Labour said it did not comment on individual party memberships.
Earlier, the TSSA union said it would "seriously reconsider" its support for Momentum if Ms Walker remained in place and the group said its steering committee would meet on Monday to seek her removal.
But a spokesman for Momentum, the left-wing grassroots organisation set up in wake of Jeremy Corbyn's 2015 election as Labour leader, said: "Members of Momentum's steering committee are seeking to remove Jackie Walker as vice-chair of the committee."
Ms Walker was previously suspended by the Labour Party over comments made on social media in which she claimed that "many Jews (my ancestors too) were the chief financiers of the sugar and slave trade" but was re-admitted following an investigation.
But a leaked video emerged on Wednesday of her saying at an anti-Semitism training event: "I came here... with an open mind and I was seeking information and I still haven't heard a definition of anti-Semitism that I can work with". She also questioned why Holocaust Memorial Day was not more wide ranging.
Ms Walker later told Channel 4 News she was not challenging the definition of anti-Semitism but rather "wanted to be clear what we were talking about" at the training event.
Asked if she would describe herself as an anti-Zionist and not an anti-Semite, she said: "Yes. I certainly wouldn't call myself an anti-Semite as I am Jewish and my partner is Jewish."
Manuel Cortes, general secretary of the TSSA union, which backed Momentum and Mr Corbyn's leadership, said on Thursday he was "deeply saddened that a fellow member of our Labour and trade union family holds such anti-Semitic views" and said she should not be allowed to "remain active within our party".
"I am asking Jackie that in the interests of unity she resigns at once from our party and also as vice-chair of Momentum.
"If she doesn't, both the Labour Party and Momentum need to act to get rid of her at once.
"We would seriously need to consider our union's support for Momentum if she is still in post by this time next week."
In an interview with Channel 4 News, Ms Walker said she had not intended to offend anyone.
Asked whether she had thought about resigning, given criticism from some Jewish groups, she said: "Some other prominent Jewish groups, of which I'm a member, think a very different thing.
"What we have to look at when we're talking about this subject, particularly at the moment, is the political differences that are underlying this as well."
Whoever leaked the video "had malicious intent in their mind", she said.
Ms Walker said she was anti-Zionist, rather than anti-Semitic: "Zionism is a political ideology and, like any political ideology, some people will be supportive and some people won't be supportive of it."
What's the difference between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism?
Ms Walker previously had support from six Jewish Labour activists who issued a statement saying she had been subject to a witch-hunt.
Mr Corbyn has denied there is a "crisis" in the party amid accusations of anti-Semitism in its ranks.
Labour MP Naz Shah and former Mayor of London Ken Livingstone were among those to be suspended over allegations of anti-Semitism.
A review of the issue of racism in Labour, led by former Liberty director Shami Chakrabarti, found the party was "not overrun by anti-Semitism, Islamophobia or other forms of racism".
But the report was criticised by Jewish leaders and MPs, who said its credibility was undermined because Ms Chakrabarti was nominated for a peerage by Labour just weeks after its release. | The vice-chairwoman of pro-Corbyn group Momentum has been suspended by the Labour Party over controversial comments she made at a party training event, it has been reported. |
37849862 | The report finds that by 2030 the amount of CO2 entering the atmosphere will be some 25% above that mark.
The analysis takes into account the pledges that countries have made under the Paris climate agreement.
Many scientists say that technology to remove carbon from the air will now be needed to meet the Paris targets.
The UN Emissions Gap Report, prepared by an international team of scientists, finds that by 2030, global emissions are expected to reach 54 to 56 gigatonnes of CO2.
The authors say this is far above the 42 gigatonnes needed to have a good chance of staying below 2 degrees by the end of the century, and a long way from the 39 gigatonnes needed to keep to 1.5 degrees as was promised in Paris last December.
A gigatonne is roughly the equivalent of the annual emissions produced by all forms of transport in the European Union.
While the report notes that the growth of emissions from fossil fuel use and industry is now slowing, this scale of carbon would put the world on track for a rise in temperatures by the end of this century of between 2.9 and 3.4 degrees C.
"We are moving in the right direction: the Paris Agreement will slow climate change, as will the recent Kigali Amendment to reduce HFCs," said Erik Solheim, head of UN Environment.
"They both show strong commitment, but it's still not good enough if we are to stand a chance of avoiding serious climate change."
The report suggests that there are some areas where progress can be made. The assessment of the plans of the richer G20 countries indicates that some are in line to deliver greater reductions than planned.
The UN review also suggests that the contributions from cities, businesses and other "non-state actors", as they are termed, could reduce emissions by a few crucial gigatonnes.
The UN also says that ambitious action on energy efficiency in buildings and in transport and other areas could help drive down carbon significantly. Investments in this area were up by 6% in 2015 to $221bn.
But with global temperatures in 2016 at one degree above pre-industrial levels, there is a growing acknowledgement that even the most ambitious attempts will not be enough to keep to the 1.5 degree target in play.
The UN report says that "most scenarios that limit warming to below 2 or 1.5 degrees assume the use of so-called negative emissions technologies in the second half of the century".
This will involve the active and permanent removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by planting trees for example, and by the deployment of technologies like bio-energy with carbon capture and storage, or BECCS for short.
This means growing crops that absorb CO2 and then burning them for energy while capturing and storing the warming gas they produce.
"At the moment most of the discussion is about BECCS, so we need to identify suitable areas to sequester carbon and make sure it doesn't leak out. That takes time and technology," said Dr Ed Hawkins from the University of Reading, UK.
"We need to develop the understanding of what that will do for the climate. If we grow all these biofuels in places does that mean we can't grow so much food everywhere? There are these constant trade-offs that we need to consider."
With the Paris Agreement becoming operational on 4 November, and delegates from almost 200 countries meeting in Marrakech next week to consider the next steps, experts are hoping that governments will not just bask in the glory of a job well done, but will see the COP22 gathering as a chance to push forward with ambition.
"I hope that they will agree to lower their nationally determined contributions," Prof Joanna Haigh from Imperial College London, UK, told BBC News.
"It's fantastic that they got the Paris Agreement but their contributions at the moment are nowhere near the 1.5-degree target.
"I think the momentum is such that countries all understand that something extra now needs to be done. The thought process has moved on a step."
Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathBBC and on Facebook. | A UN review of national plans to cut carbon says they are well short of the levels needed to keep the rise in global temperatures under 2C. |
35603163 | The Metro Mass Transit coach reportedly collided head-on with a cargo truck carrying tomatoes near the town of Kintampo on Wednesday evening.
Regional police chief Maxwell Atingane told Reuters news agency that many passengers died at the scene.
He said police were investigating the cause of the crash, believed to be one of the worst in many years.
Joy News, a Ghanaian website, reported that a passenger told police that the bus had been experiencing brake problems.
Investigators said the bus was overloaded, carrying more than 70 passengers rather than a maximum of 63.
The coach was travelling north from Kumasi, the second largest city after Accra, the capital.
Fifty-eight of the 71 were already dead when they were brought to the hospital in Kintampo, said Bismark Owusu Fosu, the hospital director.
A further 10 died after admission, and another three people died at a nearby hospital, he added.
Anger has spread against some people on social media who shared horrific pictures of the aftermath, the BBC's Sammy Darko reports from Accra.
Emergency services are said to have worked for hours to try to free passengers trapped in the wreckage.
President John Mahama offered his condolences to "those who've lost loved ones" via Twitter. | The number of people killed when a bus crashed into a truck in northern Ghana has risen to 71, medical officials say. |
26558157 | "We're not making a Smurfs 3 film," said its director Kelly Asbury.
"Our story will explore the beginnings of the beloved little blue creatures in a fun full CG-animated comedy-adventure for every generation to enjoy."
The August 2015 release will follow two live action/CGI "hybrids" in which the Smurfs interacted with human actors.
The new film, Asbury added, "will be stylistically closer to the original artwork created by Peyo".
Peyo was the pen name of Pierre Culliford, the Belgian comic book artist who in 1958 created Les Schtroumpfs, as they are known in their home country.
Asbury's previous films include 2011's Gnomeo & Juliet and 2004's Shrek 2, which he co-directed with Andrew Adamson and Conrad Vernon.
Released in 2011, the first Smurfs film made $142.6m (£85.6m) in the US and Canada and more than $563.7m (£338.4m) worldwide, according to the Box Office Mojo website.
Yet its 2013 follow-up did not perform as strongly, making just $71m (£42.6m) in North America and £347.5m (£208.6m) in total.
It is not known whether US singer Katy Perry will return to provide the voice for Smurfette, the only female in the fantasy village where her mischievous species reside.
Sony Pictures Animation has also announced plans for a fully computer-generated return of spinach-eating sailor Popeye, to be directed by Genndy Tartakovsky of Hotel Transylvania fame. | The third Smurfs film will be a wholly computer-animated affair that will take the popular cartoon characters in "a completely new fresh direction". |
39774164 | Media playback is not supported on this device
Briton Joshua, 27, unified the heavyweight division by stopping Wladimir Klitschko in the 11th round of their fight at Wembley on Saturday.
"All sports need flag-bearers," said Hearn, whose son Eddie promotes Joshua for their Matchroom Sport agency.
"Joshua is the finest role model I have seen in sport."
Saturday's thrilling victory - in front of a post-war British record 90,000 fans - means former Olympic champion Joshua is unbeaten in 19 fights as a professional and is now the WBA and IBF world champion.
Woods, 41, won the Masters as a 21-year-old and has since added a further 13 major titles.
The American is credited with changing the face of golf.
"The Joshua effect is very similar to the Tiger Woods effect, where people who are not so interested suddenly become interested, where young people become aspirational to follow in someone's footsteps," said Hearn.
Meanwhile, Tyson Fury has claimed he could beat Joshua with "one arm tied behind my back".
Joshua called out his compatriot, who beat Klitschko on points in November 2015, after his victory on Saturday.
"Styles do make fights but I am sure I can beat AJ with one arm tied behind my back," Fury said in a Sky Sports interview.
'I don't even need a warm-up if he wants this."
Fury, 28, is unbeaten as a professional, with 18 knockouts in 25 fights, but surrendered his world heavyweight titles in an effort to focus on his mental health problems and is currently without a boxing licence and out of condition.
Media playback is not supported on this device | World heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua can do for boxing what Tiger Woods has done for golf in the past 20 years, says promoter Barry Hearn. |
25455202 | However, the chief inspector of prisons also praised it as "well led", with competent and caring staff.
He said that the jail - which was built for 317 inmates, but houses more than 500 - was making progress.
Last year, the Prison Reform Trust said Exeter was the fifth most overcrowded jail in the UK, with 530 inmates.
The report, by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Prisons, also highlighted that while prisoners at risk of self-harm were well cared for, improvement was needed, "particularly as there had been three self-inflicted deaths at the prison since its last inspection in 2009".
It said the typical Victorian prison was "old and difficult to maintain", adding there was "limited space and significant overcrowding", both in terms of the availability of accommodation and access to amenities and services.
But Nick Hardwick, chief inspector of prisons, said that, despite these challenges, it was a "broadly good report".
He added: "Overall, and despite some weaknesses and gaps, Exeter is one of the better older local prisons we have seen recently.
"There are clear structural challenges for the prison, not least the poor environment and the lack of space, but the prison is well led, and is not overwhelmed by these challenges. There is meaningful work to tackle risks and a sense that progress is being made."
Michael Spurr, chief executive officer of the National Offender Management Service, said: "Exeter is a safe local prison where staff are working well with offenders.
"There are challenges in running the Victorian prison, but I am pleased that the chief inspector has acknowledged the good work that is being done there, especially in resettlement, respect and safety." | Exeter Prison is "significantly overcrowded" with the use of illicit drugs "higher than expected", an unannounced inspection has found. |
32115292 | The firms have all notified their users of the incidents, which varied in approach and do not appear to be connected.
In addition, several Uber users have complained of their accounts being hacked.
However, the car pick-up service said it had "found no evidence of a breach".
The firms have dealt with the attacks in different ways, and BA has been criticised for how it responded.
Complaints about points being stolen from the BA's Executive Club scheme date back at least a fortnight.
One user said their account had been used by someone else to book a hotel room in Spain, while others reported that their list of transactions showed "ex-gratia" deductions that had wiped out their entire credit.
"I checked my account yesterday and found that the mobile number had been changed to a Russian one. I changed it back and my miles are still there. Passwords now changed," reported another member, who appeared to have had a narrow escape.
A spokesman for BA said that it believed only "a small number" of its frequent flyers were affected.
"This appears to have been the result of a third party using information obtained elsewhere on the internet, via an automated process, to try to gain access to some accounts," he said.
"We would like to reassure customers that, at this stage, we are not aware of any access to any subsequent information pages within accounts, including travel histories or payment card details."
Security experts have, however, raised concern that BA initially sent out emails asking users to click on a link to reset their passwords.
"That's a classic trick used by criminals phishing for login credentials," noted security consultant Graham Cluley.
BA said it had removed the link from subsequent emails and suggested concerned members contact its service centre.
The attack on San Francisco-based GitHub - which is used by more than 8 million software developers - has involved an attempt to knock its site offline by flooding it with traffic.
"We are currently experiencing the largest DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack in GitHub's history," systems engineer Jesse Newland wrote on its blog.
"These include... some sophisticated new techniques that use the web browsers of unsuspecting, uninvolved people to flood GitHub with high levels of traffic.
"Based on reports we've received, we believe the intent of this attack is to convince us to remove a specific class of content."
The reports suggest the data barrage was specifically directed at web pages providing China-based users with a way to circumvent local censorship controls.
"It does look like someone in China is fighting back, as we predicted they would, against those who are trying to circumvent the 'great firewall of China'," commented security consultant Alan Woodward.
"Ask most developers and they are likely to be using GitHub in some way, so assuming it is China this looks like their censorship attempts are now having global impact."
When asked about the allegation, a spokeswoman for the Chinese government responded: "It is quite odd that every time a website in the US or any other country is under attack, there will be speculation that Chinese hackers are behind it. I'd like to remind you that China is one of the major victims of cyber-attacks."
Slack reported it was attacked in February.
The US firm provides a way for team members to communicate with each other as an alternative to email.
The service is less than two years old, but was recently valued at being worth $2.8bn (£1.9bn). Were businesses to believe the data it held was insecure then its future would be threatened.
Slack said it believed the hackers had accessed a database that would have allowed them to see user names, email addresses and Skype IDs.
However, it added that passwords - which give users access to posted information - were encrypted in a form that made it "computationally infeasible" for the hackers to unscramble them.
"As part of our investigation we detected suspicious activity affecting a very small number of Slack accounts," it added.
"We have notified the individual users and team owners who we believe were impacted and are sharing details with their security teams."
The company said that it had introduced two-factor authentication as an additional security step, which requires users to type in a code sent to their mobile phone or tablet to access the app.
News site Motherboard has also reported that login details for Uber are being offered for sale for as little as $1.
The BBC was contacted by one London-based user on Sunday who reported that someone else was booking rides in New York using his account without his permission, and had clocked up a $556 bill.
Others have posted similar stories on Twitter.
"We take any issue of this nature very seriously and after investigating have found no evidence of a breach at Uber," a spokesman responded.
"Attempting to fraudulently access and use Uber accounts is illegal and we notify the authorities about such activity.
"We would like to remind people to use strong and unique usernames and passwords and to avoid reusing the same credentials across multiple sites and services." | British Airways' air-miles accounts, the coding site GitHub and the work chat service Slack have all been hit in the latest wave of cyber-attacks. |
35420408 | The Devils Hole pupfish survive in 32-degree Celsius water in a rock shaft in Death Valley in the US.
Previous studies suggested they could have become separated as a distinct population more than 10,000 years ago.
But the latest genetic analysis points to the pupfish being resident in their unique habitat for perhaps only a few hundred years at most.
Christopher Martin and colleagues tell a Royal Society journal that the revelation raises interesting questions as to how the animals got into their present location.
There are other pupfish populations in Death Valley but for any of those to have colonised Devils Hole they would somehow have had to cross one of the driest, hottest deserts on Earth.
"My best guess is that they got in there during some extreme flooding event," Dr Martin, a scientist from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told BBC News.
"The ages we've come up with for the Devils Hole fish do overlap with the great flood of 1862, which was the largest rainfall event ever recorded for California/Nevada.
"We also know that pupfish eggs are adhesive and will stick to vegetation, so it's possible they came in stuck on birds' legs."
It is not beyond possibility that the fish were directly moved by Native Americans at some point.
The Devils Hole pupfish (Cyprinodon diabolis) were once dubbed the "rarest fish on the planet" because their numbers were so limited. As few as 35 individuals have been counted in the past.
They certainly live a precarious existence. Their rock pool is more than 100m deep, which means they must spawn on a narrow shelf near the surface.
Food takes the form of algae, but this is in short supply for two months of the year when sunlight does not fall on the water's surface. A mass die-off is a regular occurrence.
The geological evidence suggests the rock pool opened to the surface about 60,000 years ago, and that large regions of Death Valley were under water some 10,000 years. This would have enabled pupfish populations in the region to move more freely.
Some of the first genetic analyses that tried to age the distinctiveness of Cyprinodon diabolis looked at mitochondrial DNA - genetic material held in the "energy factories" in cells. This DNA incorporates mutations at a regular rate through the generations, and can be used as a kind of clock. But the approach is notoriously sensitive to the calibration rules that are applied to the analysis.
Early mtDNA efforts suggested Cyprinodon diabolis might have been a separate species for 2-3 million years. But the geological indicators rule this out.
For their study, Dr Martin and his team deployed the very latest genomic techniques, analysing thousands of genetic markers and using demographic models that took into account the variation that exists within and across pupfish populations. Calibration was applied from what appeared to be more solid data based on pupfish diversity in Mexico.
The research estimates that Devils Hole was colonised between 105 and 830 years ago.
"They are special fish," said Dr Martin. "The ecology of the Devils Hole is reflected by the very phenotypic distinctiveness of these pupfish. They have not only reduced aggression and a darker metallic colouration, but they have completely lost their pelvic fins. We don't know whether the loss of this major appendage is due to the effects of severe inbreeding over time or if it's adaptive in this habit."
The study is published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
[email protected] and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos | One of the most extraordinary fish species in world may not be as old as once thought. |
38263593 | Lab testing has revealed there have been 1,704 cases so far - 9% higher than the average seen at this stage in the previous five winters.
This will be a fraction of the total number because it only captures people seeking NHS help.
In hospitals, there have been 100 outbreaks of the bug.
These outbreaks cause hospitals to close down beds and whole wards at what is the busiest time of the year.
According to latest figures, over 850 beds are closed because of norovirus out of a total of 100,000.
But Public Health England warned people not to be alarmed, saying the levels being seen were still within an expected range and it may just be a sign that norovirus is peaking earlier this year than previous ones.
Nick Phin, of PHE, said continued outbreaks should be expected.
"Norovirus is a common cause of illness during winter.
"Exactly when the peak in activity occurs will be different each winter, but levels seen so far this year are not unexpected compared with the previous five years."
Meanwhile, NHS England has released it first winter statistics of the year.
The figures, which cover the first four days of December, showed eight hospitals declared a major alert - or what used to be known as red and black alerts.
This happens when hospitals have bed shortages, ambulances queuing outside and patients waiting longer inside A&E.
To cope, hospitals have to start calling in extra staff, cancelling routine treatments, such as knee and hip operations, and diverting ambulances away from their hospital.
The ultimate step is a full closure of A&E, although none of them took this step.
It comes after the BBC revealed this week the number of so-called "trolley waits" - the long delays patients experience waiting for a bed after emergency admission - had risen five-fold over the past five years.
Currently more than one in 10 patients face a wait of over four hours.
John Abercrombie, of the Royal College of Surgeons, said it looked like it would be a "bleak winter" for the health service. | The number of people falling ill with the vomiting bug norovirus in England this winter is at higher than average levels, figures suggest. |
26737264 | It said that the implications were new, serious and of such gravity that a commission had to be set up.
"A system was in place in a large number of Garda (police) stations whereby incoming and outgoing telephone calls were taped," it said.
It is understood the revelations could have an impact on past and current court cases.
The government said it was informed of this new information on Tuesday.
However, Irish broadcaster RTÉ has reported that the former garda commissioner Martin Callinan who resigned earlier on Tuesday following a controversy over whistleblowers, had written to the Department of Justice more than two weeks about the recordings.
In a letter to the secretary general of the department, Mr Callinan asked that Minister for Justice Alan Shatter be informed and added that he had consulted with the Attorney General on 11 November 2013.
By Andy MartinBBC Ireland Correspondent
What could not be ignored was the fact that as commissioner, if Martin Callinan did not know about the secret recording of phone calls into and out of police stations, he should have known.
The practice stopped last year, which suggests that some senior people knew about it and brought it to a halt.
The potential repercussions are huge. Calls from prisoners to solicitors may have been monitored, and it is conceivable that the courts may view that as an abuse of process in cases where subsequent convictions resulted from recorded information.
Read more
Martin Callinan said the systems were set up in the 1980s to enable gardaí to record calls to and from control rooms in particular 999 calls, bomb threats and other messages. The practice continued in some stations over the years with recordings retained in the Garda Stations.
In the letter, Mr Callinan confirmed that all recordings except 999 calls ceased nationally on 23 November 2013.
The total number of tapes amount to more than 2,400 and Mr Callinan said he had consulted with the Attorney General and expected to consult with the Data Protection Commissioner
The government has asked for a full, detailed report from its police force, An Garda Síochána, and its Department of Justice. It said the matter was "of significant public concern" and the investigation would be chaired by a senior serving or retired member of the judiciary.
In a report by the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission (GSOC) published in June 2013, there was a reference to the practice of recording all incoming and outgoing calls on a particular phone line at Waterford Garda Station. The report said a court ruled that recordings were not admissible evidence.
"On consideration of the ruling of the court, the Garda Commissioner may wish to re-evaluate his practice regarding the recording of such calls and the consents required if it is to be permissible to use such recordings in evidence," the ombudsman noted.
However on Tuesday, John Redmond from the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors (AGSI) said: "I am absolutely not aware of any recordings - except by ministerial order - I've never come across routine recording."
The Irish Government's statement on Tuesday also said that the government had agreed to the retirement of Mr Callinan. Deputy Commissioner Nóirín O'Sullivan has been appointed as interim Garda Commissioner. | The Irish government has set up an inquiry into allegations of widespread secret recordings by police. |
39652372 | The 25-year-old super-bantamweight from Belfast will fight at the 9,500-capacity UIC Pavilion.
Conlan, a former world amateur champion and London Olympics bronze medallist, impressed on his professional debut in New York on St Patrick's Day.
He stopped American Tim Ibarra inside three rounds at Madison Square Garden.
More than 5,000 Irish fans were at the famous New York venue to cheer on the highly rated Conlan.
Conlan forced referee Benjy Esteves Jr to step in when a powerful right hand had his American opponent on the ropes.
He was joined on his walk to the ring by UFC champion Conor McGregor. | Michael Conlan's second professional contest will be staged in Chicago on 26 May with an opponent yet to be confirmed. |
35808066 | He says they cannot afford to treat the game as a warm-up for their summer matches with England and New Zealand.
"It's a Test match, it's at home and seriously if you write Italy off, you'll pay the price for it," he said.
Wales have won six of their seven home Six Nations clashes with Italy.
Italy's margin of defeat in Cardiff has averaged over 24 points in those contests, though they earned a draw in 2006.
Italy are playing their final match under coach Jacques Brunel, and have lost all their games in 2016.
"I suppose they are (in transition), there's quite a few teams that are changing whether it be new coaching set-ups or bringing new players in," Charteris told BBC Radio Wales.
But it's an international game, there'll be no lack of motivation from their side of things coming off a defeat like that (58-15 in Ireland).
"Both teams will be out to right some wrongs and it should make for a good game."
Wales are playing for runners-up place in the championship after their 25-21 defeat against England.
Racing 92 lock Charteris, who won his 65th cap off the bench against Ireland, does not believe finishing second will represent a successful tournament for Warren Gatland's men.
Asked if second place would see the current Six Nations campaign regarded as a successful one, Charteris said: "No, because we were trying to win it.
"But if we come second, it's one (place) better than last year.
"Every year we go into the championship trying to win and with the confidence that we can.
"We've come up short this year - we will go again next year." | Lock Luke Charteris is warning that Wales will "pay the price" if they take Italy lightly in the final match of the Six Nations campaign. |
38345080 | 16 December 2016 Last updated at 18:46 GMT
America chose a new president, Rio hosted the Olympics and Paralympics, the UK voted to leave the European Union - and that's just for starters!
So why not take a little look back over some of the biggest news stories of the past 12 months?
Check out the video to see some of the moments to remember from this year - and how Newsround covered them. | 2016 has been an eventful year to say the least. |
40917801 | Crolla, who faces Burns at the Manchester Arena on 7 October, told BBC Scotland: "I can't wait for the fight.
"There will be a great travelling support from Scotland and I'll be in front of my beloved Manchester crowd.
"I've got a lot of respect for Ricky as a fighter and a person. I'll have to be at my best to beat him."
Crolla lost his WBA lightweight title to Jorge Linares in September 2016 and the Englishman, from Manchester, was also beaten by the Venezuelan in a March rematch.
Burns' last outing saw the Scot lose his WBA super-lightweight title to Julius Indongo in April.
"Everyone who knows boxing, Ricky's not the type to be trash-talking and neither am I," Crolla told BBC Radio Scotland's Sportsound.
"Everyone who knows boxing knows that this is a fight that doesn't need that to sell. Come 7 October in that arena, there's going to be an amazing atmosphere.
"It's going to be some night. They [the preparations] have been going very well and I'm in a very good place, physically and mentally. I'm just looking forward to the fight and believe I could be ready sooner.
"We can't wait for it and the winner, I'm sure, will go on to fight for a world title again. I know that I've got to be at my best to beat him but I'm very confident that's what I will be." | Anthony Crolla says the build-up to his lightweight fight against Ricky Burns is devoid of "trash-talking" because of their respect for one other. |
40765712 | The hosts finished on 174-4 despite the efforts off Joe Denly (68 off 50 balls) and Sam Northeast (60 off 34).
Glamorgan's 199-2 was given a blistering start by Aneurin Donald's 50 off 31 balls.
Captain Jacques Rudolph then played a range of inventive shots in his unbeaten 77 from 52 deliveries.
It was his third half-century in seven innings, while David Miller chipped in with 43 off 26 despite Kent's seamers trying plenty of variety in their efforts to drag back the scoring rate.
Denly and Northeast continued the batting dominance with a stand of 89 in 8.5 overs to put the home side in the hunt, but the middle order could not keep the run-rate going against the accurate bowling of Marchant de Lange (1-26 in four overs) and Craig Meschede (1-12 in two).
England batsman Sam Billings did not reach the wicket until the 19th over with the game already sliding away from Kent.
Glamorgan batsman Aneurin Donald told BBC Wales Sport:
"Kent have a pretty strong batting line-up so it was nice for our top four to get the job done. That's what you're looking for in T20 for the top four to get the bulk of the runs, and [for me] to pick up the slack when Colin Ingram fails for once in a blue moon is nice.
"At the top of the order it's your job to get the big scores. I'm the aggressor trying to get us off to a quick start.
"Credit to our bowlers holding their nerve, it shows what a quality outfit we are this year and, if you get to 200, you're going to win more often than not with the experience of our bowling line-up.
"The target's another home quarter-final and trying to get to that Finals Day. I think we're one of the stronger teams in the competition this year and if we play the way we are, we're going to be there or thereabouts."
Kent captain Sam Northeast told BBC Radio Kent:
"When Joe and me were going, we felt we were in the game, but a few overs where you lose a wicket or low overs put us right behind, and it's hard work when the guys come in needing 12 or 13 an over.
"It was never going to be easy chasing that score and we're going to have to be better with the ball. The coaches and bowlers will get together and come up with a plan. We're going to have to have better plans and execute a lot better." | Glamorgan remain top of the T20 Blast Southern Group after they held their nerve to beat Kent by 25 runs in a high-scoring affair at Canterbury. |
29675054 | Both were named in Boro's matchday squad for their game against Accrington Stanley on Saturday.
Adams, 20, made three appearances for Brentford at the end of last season, following a loan spell at Barnet, as they won promotion to the Championship.
Clarke, 19, also played three games for the Bees last term, the most recent a 4-1 loss to Colchester in April. | Stevenage have signed midfielders Josh Clarke and Charlie Adams from Brentford on one-month youth loans. |
36013563 | The film, in which McCarthy plays an eccentric tycoon, took an estimated $23.5m (£16.5m) on its debut weekend.
Dawn of Justice was knocked to second place in its third week, pulling in an estimated $23.4m (£16.4m).
But when final box office figures are released on Monday, the DC comics "mash-up" could still come out on top.
The margin between the top two films is one of the closest in recent years, according to industry analysts.
Ben Affleck and Henry Cavill's superhero movie has defied poor reviews, having taken almost $300m (£211m) in the US.
The film, in which Affleck plays Batman and Cavill takes the role of Superman, now ranks as the third highest-grossing DC Comics release to date in the US, according to Box Office Mojo.
Its box office haul has now surpassed 2013's Man of Steel, also starring Cavill, which took $291m (£205m). However, Dawn of Justice's takings has dropped by 54% since its first week of release.
The Boss was co-written by Bridesmaids star McCarthy and her husband Ben Falcone.
Critics had not expected it to perform well, but the film has done better than McCarthy's 2014 comedy Tammy.
In third place came Disney's Zootopia with $14.4m (£10m), slipping one spot from last week.
Now in its sixth weekend of release, the animated film featuring the voices of Jason Bateman and Ginnifer Goodwin has made a US total of $296m (£208m).
Comedy sequel My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 was at number four, making $6.4m (£4.5m).
The weekend's only other newcomer, action thriller Hardcore Henry, opened in fifth place with takings of $5.1m (£3.6m).
The Russian-American sci-fi stars Sharlto Copley, Danila Kozlovsky, Haley Bennett, and Tim Roth.
Shot through the eyes of Henry in a style similar to a first-person shooter video game, it centres on a man who is resurrected from death with no memory but must discover his identity to save his wife from a murderous tyrant.
In the rest of the top 10, Miracles from Heaven held on in sixth place with $4.8m (£3.4m) and God's Not Dead 2 slipped to seven with $4m (£2.8m).
The Divergent Series: Allegiant fell to eighth, thriller 10 Cloverfield Lane was at nine and drone drama Eye In The Sky was at 10. | Melissa McCarthy's new comedy The Boss has unseated Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice from the top of the North American and Canadian box office. |
36674845 | The 24-year-old has 55 goals in 93 La Liga games since joining from Santos for a reported fee of £48.6m in 2013.
Manchester United and Paris St-Germain were linked with the Brazil forward, whose current deal ends in 2018.
Barca president Josep Bartomeu said: "In the next few days we will finalise an extension." Neymar added: "Very happy to continue living this dream!"
Neymar has also scored 46 goals in 70 appearances for his country.
While at the Spanish club, he has secured two La Liga titles, two Copa del Rey trophies and the 2014-15 Champions League.
Barcelona were forced to pay a £4.3m fine in June because of mistakes in Neymar's transfer from Santos in 2013. | Neymar will stay at Barcelona and is set to sign a new five-year contract, according to his agency NN consulting. |
37521168 | The cheapest deals are often reserved for new customers only.
Meanwhile existing customers have been offered deals which can be hundreds of pounds a year more expensive.
The four companies, E.ON, EDF, SSE and British Gas said they were simply responding to changes in the market.
While the British Gas tariff has now been withdrawn, other suppliers are still restricting their offers to new customers only.
Such deals were originally banned by the regulator Ofgem in April 2014. Following a recommendation from the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in April this year, Ofgem let it be known it would no longer enforce these rules.
The discovery of such deals has as come a surprise to some leading industry figures.
Ken Geddes is the chief executive of Scottish-based Energylinx, the fourth biggest energy price comparison business.
When the BBC told Mr Geddes about the new tariffs, he declared himself "stunned" by the difference between the prices some companies offered new and existing customers.
Mr Geddes immediately tested a new-customer-only tariff from E.ON, launched in mid-September.
He first applied as an E.ON customer and then as a customer of another company. The difference in the the two prices he got from E.ON was £260.
"Having spent over a decade doing this job, I don't think I've ever seen that differential", Mr Geddes told the BBC. "I'm just gob-smacked as to the difference in price".
Large differences in price between new and existing customers are not confined to E.ON.
In the summer, British Gas launched a new-customer-only one year tariff offered exclusively through Uswitch - the UK's biggest energy price comparison website.
For new customers with average household energy consumption, the British Gas "Home Energy Exclusive Jun 17" tariff cost £735 a year. But for existing customers - barred from that deal - the best British Gas price for the same amount of energy was £989.
That British Gas tariff has now been withdrawn but others are appearing.
The SSE new-customer-only tariff, launched in September, offered new customers on average consumption a year's energy for £759 . For existing customers, SSE's best deal cost £972 - a difference of over £200.
Customers were unlikely to have learned such low-priced tariffs were available from their companies even if they searched Uswitch and Energy Helpline.
That's because such websites start by asking users for the name of their existing energy supplier. New-customer-only deals from that supplier are then filtered out.
As a long-standing customer of EDF, I wanted to find out what tariff I would be offered.
In a web-chat, I was told the tariffs available to me were: "Blue+ Price Protection Sep 2017" - costing £133 more than EDF's new-customer-only tariff, and "Blue+ Price Freeze Sep 2018" costing almost £300 more.
Were these the "very best tariffs EDF offers?" I asked the agent.
"Yes" was the emphatic reply.
When pressed about the much cheaper new tariff EDF had just launched, the agent replied, "I'm very sorry. This is only for new customers - not existing customers".
On Friday, EDF relaunched their new-customer-only deal, cutting the price by around £50 a year. So it's a better deal than before but it's still not for existing customers.
Not all major energy suppliers plan to offer such tariffs.
Scottish Power's commercial director Colin McNeill told the BBC his company would not offer them.
"These tariffs must stop," Mr McNeill said. "We must recognise that we are still not a trusted industry, and perceived sharp practices do the industry no favours."
With Scottish Power, he added: "Any of our customers can switch freely to any of our tariffs at any time."
The four energy companies which have offered the new-customer only tariffs, E.ON, EDF, SSE and British Gas, all say that they are responding to changes in the energy market and that their new tariffs are part of a strategy to serve a wide range of customers.
All four companies declined the BBC's invitation to be interviewed about their new exclusive offers.
Ofgem's chief executive Dermot Nolan told the BBC that Ofgem had acted on the CMA's recommendation "to make energy competition more similar to telecoms because on the whole that will mean lower prices and better deals for consumers". | Four of the UK's largest energy companies have been barring their own customers from some of the best deals for gas and electricity, the BBC's Moneybox programme has learnt. |
30686751 | The victim, who was in her 30s, was attacked while walking on Raglan Street, Lowestoft, in January 2005.
Fokrul Islam, 38, from Nevendon Road, Wickford in Essex was found guilty of rape last year at Ipswich Crown Court.
Suffolk Police said the woman reported the attack at the time and this helped secure DNA evidence.
Islam was arrested after he was stopped by the UK Border Agency while travelling from Belfast to Liverpool last year.
Det Con Darren Winchester, from Suffolk Police, said: "Islam's DNA was taken when he was stopped by the UKBA in March 2014 and from that he was identified as a suspect after his DNA matched that taken from the victim in 2005.
"The victim showed immense courage by reporting the rape very quickly and that ensured police were able to secure vital evidence." | A man has been jailed for nine years for dragging a woman off the street and raping her in the back of a vehicle ten years ago. |
38229535 | In 2014, a whistleblower sent the email, to the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment.
It warned them that the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) was seriously flawed.
In the email, the whistleblower is remarkably clear about where the scheme was going wrong.
The warning was not acted on and the scheme continued on. It was closed earlier this year with a likely overspend of £400m and potentially even more.
The department has acknowledged a series of blunders in how the scheme was set up.
Firstly, the subsidy paid to businesses for the heat that they generated was too high.
It is very likely to be more than the cost of the wood over the 20 years of the scheme - a crucial point missed by civil servants.
Imagine your home heating oil costing you 2p an hour. And for every hour you keep the heating on you get 3p from the government.
That was similar to the flaw within RHI, so we ended up with a scheme where "the more you burn, the more you earn" - a scheme that was not only economically calamitous, but potentially environmentally damaging.
Patsy McGlone, who chaired the DETI committee when RHI was set up, said: "This is the paradox of it, that burn more wood and you get more money.
"It's not an incentive to improve or enhance the environment. It's an incentive to put more smoke up into it."
As well as the rate being too high, the department missed important cost controls introduced in Great Britain.
Firstly tiering - or paying two different rates. In Britain, the rate paid each year starts off high to incentivise customers to switch to a wood-burning boiler. Then it drops off significantly to less than the cost of production - avoiding "the more you burn, the more you earn" issue.
Tiering was not introduced in Northern Ireland. Here, there was one flat rate which was too high.
But by far the biggest alarm bell missed by the department was the warning of a whistleblower as far back as 2013.
She first expressed concerns to then enterprise minister Arlene Foster, who referred her to the team of civil servants in DETI which dealt with energy to investigate.
The woman met them in autumn 2013. The email obtained by Spotlight shows she says she urged them to address the flaws in the scheme.
Nothing was done.
In May 2014, she emailed the department, apparently exasperated.
"What we are seeing on the ground in Northern Ireland is that buildings are using more energy than before because it pays them to do so," she said.
"The flat rate means there is no incentive at all to be efficient, so the heat in buildings is on all year round with the windows open everywhere.
"When we had spoken (referring to the autumn 2013 meeting) you did not believe that people would do this. But believe me it's happening.
"It's got to a stage where it cannot be ignored any longer."
It wasn't acted upon.
The scheme was closed earlier this year after a huge spike in applications in late 2015 finally broke the budget.
Mrs Foster, now Northern Ireland's first minister, did not answer our question about whether she made any other effort to follow up on the claims of the whistleblower.
She pointed to a comment by the chief civil servant in the Department for the Economy, the new name for DETI, who said she had dealt with the whistleblower "entirely appropriately".
But she acknowledged that investigations into the whistleblower's claims "should have highlighted the failings of the scheme and actions should have been taken".
Actions were not taken and the NI taxpayer has been left with a bill for hundreds of millions of pounds.
Enough to pay for the new Omagh hospital, converting the A26 at Frosses in County Antrim in to dual carriageway, the Belfast Interchange Project and the Belfast Rapid Transit system - with £15m left over.
Ulster Unionist leader Mike Nesbitt has said Mrs Foster should consider her position over the issue.
"What is now in the public domain proves hundreds of millions of pounds were wasted needlessly, the department was dysfunctional, unaware of the rules, and hapless in seeking solutions," he said.
"This is a scandal prone executive and on this occasion, it comes to a fundamental tenet of democratic government called ministerial accountability. If Arlene Foster believes in it, she must consider her position." | An email that was worth hundreds of millions of pounds to the taxpayers of Northern Ireland and ignored by the Department of Enterprise has been obtained by BBC Spotlight. |
38286086 | Media playback is not supported on this device
Cook, skipper since 2012, watched as England lost four wickets for 13 runs on Monday to slump to an innings defeat and series loss against India.
The opener will discuss his role with director of cricket Andrew Strauss.
"You start having questions, of course you do," said Cook. "Naturally, you look at stuff."
The 31-year-old, who expects to meet Strauss following the end of the current series in India, added: "I think Joe Root's ready to captain England. You never know until you actually experience it, because of everything that goes with the England captaincy.
"You're thrown in at the deep end and you either sink or swim. Nothing can really prepare you for it.
"But he's ready because he's a clued-up guy and he's got the respect of everyone in the changing-room. He hasn't got much captaincy experience, but that doesn't mean he can't be a very good captain."
Root's only senior leadership experience has come in county cricket for Yorkshire and as vice-captain to Cook since the summer of 2015.
England have lost four of their last five Test matches - and seven in total during the calendar year - but Cook has been told he will keep his job "as long as he wants it" by coach Trevor Bayliss.
"When you lose, the captain takes a lot of responsibility but he's got broad shoulders," Bayliss told Sky Sports.
"Over the past 12, 18 months we've seen improvements in the way he captains the team."
Cook, who captained England in Bangladesh in 2010 before taking on the role permanently in 2012, has won 24 of his 58 Tests in charge.
He has also overseen 21 Test defeats, including a 5-0 Ashes whitewash in Australia in January 2014 and England's first Test loss to Bangladesh in October this year. | Alastair Cook says he has "questions" about his role as England Test captain, after admitting Joe Root is "ready" to be his successor. |
33101959 | Dozens of families did not receive their babies' ashes from Shrewsbury's Emstrey Crematorium from 1996 to 2012.
Earlier this month an inquiry concluded a national inspector should be created for crematoriums.
Now 20 similar cases have emerged from across the country.
Glen Perkins, from the Action For Ashes campaign group, which has been calling for a national inspector to be introduced, said the scale of the issue was "unbelievable".
"I cannot believe it is so widespread," he said.
Patricia Jones said she had never received the ashes of her son Nicky, who was cremated at Gilrose Crematorium in Leicester in May 1980.
She said she was told there would be no ashes because the bones were too fragile.
"Everybody takes it for granted that you're either buried or cremated and there will be a place to go to afterwards, but we had nothing," she said.
She added: "We opted for cremation but nobody said 'because there'll be no ashes, would you prefer a burial?'
"We weren't thinking straight."
Leicester City Council said that, like other authorities, it was unable to recover ashes of babies and very young children at the time of Nicky's cremation.
"Our records show that no ashes were recovered from the cremation of Patricia Jones's son," it said.
"We started being able to recover ashes more effectively in the mid-1980s, and with modern equipment we are now able to recover even the tiniest quantity of remains, which we pass on to families."
Sandra Hawes's son Jordan died during childbirth in 1999. His funeral was held 10 days later at Worthing Crematorium.
But she has never received his ashes and is now using a Freedom of Information request to try to find out what happened to them.
"I was desperate to get my baby's remains home with me," she said.
"Parting with him in hospital whilst surrounded by new mothers and babies had been the most heart-wrenching experience of my life.
"My arms ached for him and I felt like I was abandoning him and needed to get him home again more than anything."
She said the funeral directors told her there were no ashes to collect.
She said: "I was utterly devastated. The grieving process could not be completed and I felt utterly empty."
Andy Edwards, Adur and Worthing Council's head of environment, said the authority had received a Freedom of Information request from Mrs Hawes and was seeking information.
Lisa Bhanu's daughter died 20 minutes after being born in 2009 and was cremated at Banbury Crematorium.
She said she was initially told by the funeral directors there would not be any ashes because her baby was too small.
But, after hearing about cases in the news of ashes not being returned, the 41-year-old contacted Banbury Crematorium and said she was told they had been holding her child's ashes since 2009.
"They told me they had them there and were waiting for me to contact them," she said.
"I feel incredibly angry and let down. I'm happy we've got them back, but I'm frustrated it happened at all."
A spokeswoman for Midcounties Co-operative Funeralcare, which arranged the funeral, said the family signed paperwork asking for the scattering of the ashes to be witnessed and said she did not know why Mrs Bhanu was not contacted.
The BBC has asked the London Cremation Company, the private firm which runs and manages Banbury Crematorium, for a response.
Tom Winder was 40 hours old when he died in September 2007.
His mother Lucy said the funeral director told her there probably would not be any ashes because Tom was so small.
She signed a form that gave Eastbourne Cemetery the right to scatter his ashes without a witness, but said she was vulnerable at the time and did not think of the implications.
"I thought they would at least tell me when they were going to do it," she said.
"We were resigned to the fact we were not going to get them, and, at the time, it was not a priority," she said.
Eastbourne Borough Council said its usual policy was to return ashes when parents requested them.
In a statement it said it would be contacting Mrs Winder to answer her questions. | Grieving parents have contacted the BBC in the wake of the Shropshire baby ashes scandal to relate similar experiences of ashes not being returned. |
37908024 | Everton is the second South American coach to win the trophy as IfeanyiUbah beat Nasarawa United 5-4 on penalties in Sunday's final.
His compatriot Paulo Roberto Diaz won both the league and FA Cup with Enugu Rangers in 1981.
It was also a first FA Cup win for the club that has a partnership deal with English side West Ham and play in the same colours as the Premier League club.
"I hope this will open the gate for other Brazilian coaches and players to come here," Everton told BBC Sport.
"I'm very happy to be the first South American coach to win this prestigious trophy in Nigeria because my name could stay in the records for 100 years.
"The club president Ifeanyi Ubah [a billionaire oil magnate] gave me the opportunity to work here and I managed to blend the Brazilian and Nigerian philosophy."
As well as the young coach there are two Brazilian players in the squad and their success has earned them a place in next seasons Confederation Cup.
The 27-year-old is a former Fluminense player and moved to Nigeria at the start of the season and led the team to fourth place in the Premier League.
The youngest manager to win the Nigerian FA Cup says a niggling thigh injury cut short his professional career with Sport Club do Recife.
"I stopped playing and went for my course where I was in the same class as (Atletico Madrid coach) Diego Simeone," said Everton.
"Then I was managing the Fluminense second team before I was approached by the club owner to come to Nigeria.
"Now I want to play with big managers and teams in Africa next year.
One of the club's Brazilian players Alberico Barbosa da Silva is full of praises for his manager and friend.
"This is big for both of us, we are happy to play with fantastic players and in a lovely country," Alberico told BBC Sport.
"We love it here and now we can look forward to competing against big teams in Africa." | Brazilian Rafael Everton Lira is hoping his Nigerian FA Cup Success will pave the way for other coaches and players to follow him to the continent. |
40936071 | HMS Queen Elizabeth entered Portsmouth Harbour for the first time at about 07:10 BST following extensive preparations at the naval base.
The 65,000-tonne ship has been undergoing sea trials since setting sail from Rosyth dockyard in Fife, where it was built, in June.
The 900ft (280m) long carrier cannot currently deploy planes but flying trials are due to begin next year.
Addressing crew members and contractors on the flight deck, Prime Minister Theresa May said the carrier was a "true testament to British ship building and design".
"Britain truly has the best sailors, marines and officers in the world. And I believe you deserve the very best equipment and that it what we have with HMS Queen Elizabeth," she said.
"This ship is the symbol of the United Kingdom as a great global maritime nation. Clearly she is a stunning piece of 21st Century engineering."
Live: New aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth arrives in home port
Spectators who gathered on the shoreline to watch the ship's arrival saw flypasts of Royal Navy helicopters, the first featuring a Sea King, two MK2 Merlins and two MK3 Merlins which were then joined by two Hawk jets.
A flotilla of craft followed the behemoth aircraft carrier as she sailed into the Solent before heading into Portsmouth, where, at its narrowest point, there was less than 66ft (20m) clearance on each side.
An 820ft (250m) exclusion zone was enforced by armed police in small boats and a no-fly zone was put in place to prevent the flying of drones around the harbour.
The ship's available company stood at the edge of the vessel, with officers and family members also lining the jetty to welcome the ship.
Louise Bond, 30, from Fareham, whose husband, Petty Officer Greg Bond, 33, is serving on board, said: "It's my first homecoming, it's brilliant, I was up at 2.30am, first in line.
"It's amazing, I wouldn't miss it for the world."
Road closures were put in place in Old Portsmouth, Southsea seafront and parts of the city centre.
Isle of Wight, Gosport and cross-channel ferry services also altered timetables.
Preparations for the arrival of the future flagship of the fleet, and its 700 crew, saw more than 20,000 items ranging from a human skull to sea mines dredged up from Portsmouth Harbour.
The Ministry of Defence said specialist dredging vessels had removed 3.2 million cubic metres of sediment - the equivalent to 1,280 Olympic swimming pools - during the dredging operation carried out to deepen the harbour mouth to enable the Queen Elizabeth to reach Portsmouth naval base.
65,000
Tonnes
£3.1bn
Cost
280m Flight deck length
700 Crew currently on board
155,000 miles Length of electrical cable inside the ship
162db Volume of foghorn
Speaking on board before the journey in to Portsmouth, Capt Jerry Kyd said he felt a "huge amount of pride" ahead of the vessel berthing in its home port.
"It sends the right signals to our allies and indeed potentially to our enemies that we mean business.
"The armed forces are fundamentally an insurance policy for the country and you can't just, at the flick of a switch, decide that you need these capabilities."
The ship has been undergoing sea trials off the Scottish coast and sailed with the USS George HW Bush and her carrier strike group, during Exercise Saxon Warrior earlier this month.
F-35B Lightning fighter jets are due to make their first trial flights from the carrier's deck next year with 120 aircrew currently training in the US.
HMS Queen Elizabeth is still far from being a fully functioning aircraft carrier. But she now looks and feels less of a giant construction project and more like a warship. For the last seven weeks she's been undergoing sea trials.
They've tested everything from the propulsion system to the sewage processing plant. The ship's five galleys have been churning out more than 3,000 meals a day for the 700 crew and additional contractors on board.
According to the captain, Jerry Kyd, the tests have gone "really well" for what he admits is a "prototype". But even he suggests that they'll need more manpower when she's fully operational. The slightly larger US Nimitz class carriers have a crew of more than 4,000.
HMS Queen Elizabeth's first deployment is still a long way off. Though helicopters have been landing on her massive deck - the size of three football pitches - it will be another year before the new F35s will begin flight trials. And HMS Queen Elizabeth won't be fully operational until 2023. | The UK's new £3bn aircraft carrier has docked in its home port. |
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Adams outpointed Norway's Marielle Hansen in Turkey to secure a women's flyweight (48-51kg) spot in Rio.
Compatriots Galal Yafai, Qais Ashfaq, Muhammad Ali, Joe Cordina, Josh Buatsi, Lawrence Okolie and Joe Joyce also secured places with semi-final wins.
Anthony Fowler could make it nine qualifiers on Saturday.
Ireland's Olympic champion Katie Taylor missed out on a chance to guarantee her Rio berth as she lost her lightweight (60kg) semi-final against Yana Alekseevna.
Birmingham's Yafai (men's light-flyweight 46-49kg) beat Spain's Samuel Carmona Heredia, Ashfaq from Leeds (men's bantamweight 56kg) saw off Ukraine's Mykola Butsenko, Keighley's Ali (men's flyweight 52kg) overcame Bulgarian Daniel Asenov, and Cardiff's Cordina (men's lightweight 60kg) beat Ireland's David Joyce.
Londoners Buatsi, Okolie and Joyce made it through in the heavier categories.
Men's light heavyweight (81kg) Buatsi beat Ukraine's Oleksandr Khyzhniak, heavyweight (91kg) Okolie beat Azerbaijan's Abdulkadir Abdullayev, and super heavyweight (91kg+) Joyce beat Hungary's Istvan Bernath.
Liverpool middleweight (75kg) Fowler lost his semi-final but could qualify if he wins the bronze medal bout, with the top three men and top two women in each division winning places in Rio.
After the event in Samsun, male boxers have two more chances to qualify - at the World Series of Boxing event in Bulgaria in May and the final Olympic qualifying event in Azerbaijan in June.
The women have one more chance - at the World Championships in Kazakhstan in May.
Adams became the first women's Olympic boxing champion when she won gold at London 2012, and she is now targeting another landmark.
Victory in Rio would make the 33-year-old from Leeds only the second British boxer to retain their Olympic title after middleweight Harry Mallin in 1924.
"It feels really good to know that I will be defending my title in Rio. It is no longer the Road to Rio - I am going to Rio," said Adams.
"I've qualified and I am ready to defend my title and hopefully become a double Olympic champion." | Olympic champion Nicola Adams led the way as eight British boxers earned places at this summer's Rio Games with wins at the European qualifying event. |
30600579 | The Pope urged the refugees - forced to flee their homes by the militant group Islamic State - to "persevere", and said he was close to them in his heart.
At a Christmas Eve midnight Mass at St Peter's Basilica, the Pope called on believers to show more empathy towards family and friends.
On Christmas Day, the Pope will deliver his "Urbi et Orbi" Christmas address.
The call to refugees at a camp in Ankawa was made by satellite phone and broadcast live on Italian TV.
"Dear brothers, I am close to you, very close to you in my heart," he told them, saying he was thinking particularly of children and the elderly.
"Innocent children, children who have died, exploited children... I am thinking, too, about grandparents, about the older people who have lived their lives, and who must now bear this cross."
He told them they were like Jesus, forced to flee because there was no room for them. "I embrace you all and wish for you a holy Christmas," he said.
Advances in Iraq by Islamic State have forced tens of thousands of Christians and people from other religious minorities to flee to Kurdish controlled areas.
Later in his homily during Christmas Eve Mass, the Pope said the world needed more tenderness and warmth.
"The question put to us simply by the infant's presence is: 'Do I allow God to love me?'" he said.
"Do we have the courage to welcome with tenderness the difficulties and problems of those who are near to us?" | Pope Francis has spoken by telephone to Iraqi refugees in a camp near Irbil before celebrating Christmas Eve Mass. |
35699161 | In 2004-05 there were 10,145 hip replacements for people aged 59 and below, with 17,883 in 2014-15.
The Royal College of Surgeons says this is partly because doctors are now more confident that replacement joints will be more durable than in the past.
Patients are also said to be less willing to wait.
As a proportion of all hip replacements carried out, the rise among under 60s is small, but the Royal College of Surgeons says it is still noteworthy.
Demand for new hips across all ages has risen - there were 89,919 of the operations in 2004-05 and 122,154 in 2014-15.
Stephen Cannon, vice-president of the RCS, says as hip replacement techniques and prosthetics have improved, so have the numbers of younger patients undergoing this type of surgery.
"It's no longer seen as a last resort.
"As surgeons, we now have more confidence about the wear rate of these prosthetics which allows us to be less restrictive on an age basis."
He said surgeons used to advise patients with hip pain to wait until they were 60 or 65 to have a replacement because the old-fashioned replacements had a shelf-life of about 15 years, meaning the operation might need redoing once in a lifetime - when the patient had turned 80.
"If you look at newer prosthetics, you could do the first operation at 55 and it is going to last for 20 years or more, so you would still only need one revision in a lifetime."
He said another factor might be patient demand.
"Certainly, in my experience, patients do not get fobbed off. They don't want to wait for an operation. They say, 'I can't play a round of golf or tennis and I want to.'"
Mr Cannon said concerns over the safety of a particular type of hip replacement (metal-on-metal) in 2010 did not appear to have affected demand.
He said hip operations had become less arduous. Patients can be back on their feet with crutches on the same day or the day after surgery, and out of hospital within three days post-op. "They're off crutches altogether by six weeks."
Most hip replacements are done if the joint becomes damaged from arthritis or an injury.
Many of the conditions treated with a hip replacement are age-related so hip replacements are usually carried out in older adults.
Mr Cannon says it's not clear if conditions such as osteoarthritis are becoming more common and affecting people at younger ages, but it is worth exploring.
And with an ageing population, he says demand for hip operations could soon outstrip supply.
"The ageing population is a perfect storm. We are not there quite yet, but we might be in 10 years from now. It's a continuing trend."
A spokesman for the National Joint Registry for England, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man said: "The increase in numbers of under-60s undergoing primary hip surgery is entirely in line with the overall increase in provision of the operation.
"The orthopaedic sector must continue to work to get the first time surgery as right for the patient as possible - especially where younger patients are concerned as they are most likely to need at least one revision surgery in their lifetime.
"It is, of course, heartening and very encouraging that hip and knee implants are lasting ten years or more, with risk of revision lower than 5%.
"Joint replacement surgery offers significant benefits - getting patients back to their chosen lifestyle sooner, free from pain and with improved mobility." | The number of hip replacement operations on people aged under 60 has risen 76% in the last decade, NHS figures for England reveal. |
35883899 | Mr Bush, former governor of Florida, dropped out of the race last month after poor showings in state contests.
He said Mr Cruz has shown the ability to appeal to voters and win primary contests, like in Utah on Tuesday.
Republicans must "overcome the divisiveness and vulgarity" Donald Trump has introduced, he said.
If not, the party will certainly lose the White House to Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, Mr Bush wrote in a Facebook post.
"Republicans can win back the White House and put our nation on a path to security and prosperity if we support a nominee who can unite our party and articulate how conservative policies will help people rise up and reach their full potential," he wrote, and linked to Mr Cruz's website.
Mr Cruz, speaking to CNN on Wednesday, said Mr Bush's endorsement proved his candidacy had garnered support among Republicans.
Former 2012 Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney also recently endorsed Mr Cruz, strongly urging fellow Republicans not to back Donald Trump, a billionaire businessman from New York with no prior political experience.
Mr Trump, the party's front-runner, currently has the highest delegate count and has said there may be "riots" if he is denied the Republican nomination come the party's convention this summer.
Anti-Trump Republicans are hoping for a brokered convention, in which party officials, not delegates, would chose the nominee, but that is only possible if Mr Trump falls short of the 1,237 delegates needed to secure the nomination.
After contests in Utah and Arizona on Tuesday, Mr Trump has 739 delegates and Mr Cruz has 465.
Mr Trump endorsed Mr Romney for president in 2012, but now Mr Romney calls Mr Trump a "phony" and a "fraud".
When Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon, was still in the race, Mr Trump called him "pathological". Now Mr Carson has endorsed him.
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who attacked Mr Trump on the campaign trail, backs the businessman now that he is out of the race.
Former Republican presidential candidates Carly Fiorina and Lindsey Graham have also endorsed Mr Cruz.
Mr Cruz has urged Ohio Governor John Kasich to drop out of the race, and said he would probably find a place for him in his administration.
He said Mr Kasich was a "spoiler" by taking votes that could go to him and help the Republicans defeat Mr Trump.
The nasty battle between the leading Republicans worsened this week when Mr Trump warned Mr Cruz he would "spills the beans on your wife" after an anti-Trump group ran ads in Utah featuring a racy photo of Mr Trump's wife Melania from an old GQ magazine spread.
Mr Cruz said in response: "Donald, if you try to attack Heidi, you're more of a coward than I thought." | Former Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush has endorsed Texas Senator Ted Cruz for president, calling him a "principled conservative". |
38390524 | Communities Secretary Carl Sargeant said it would help them build on the "very positive start" they had made on new rules which oblige local authorities to prevent homelessness.
The Welsh Government budget sees total funding for day-to-day council spending in 2017/18 rise by £10m to £4.1bn.
Finance Secretary Mark Drakeford said it was a "good settlement" for councils to plan for harder choices ahead.
As promised in October's draft settlement, no council will see its cash funding fall by more than 0.5%, and many authorities will see their first cash increase for three years.
However, the effects of inflation will result in a real terms cut.
The Welsh Local Government Association said it welcomed the fact that some of the "additional pressures" it had identified were "beginning to be addressed", such as an extra £10m for social care.
However, deputy finance spokesman Anthony Hunt said: "The announcement today will still mean that cuts to local public services will continue as we shoulder the heaviest burden under austerity." | Another £6m to tackle homelessness is being given to local councils in Wales. |
35751760 | The group, who travelled to the Senedd in Cardiff, are calling for Withybush Hospital in Haverfordwest to have 24-hour paediatric care reinstated.
The unit was downgraded two years ago to a 12-hour, daytime only service.
Children needing to be admitted are now sent to Glangwili Hospital, Carmarthen.
Hywel Dda health board said it acknowledged the petition and had a "significant challenge" in demonstrating the safety of its children's services at Withybush and Glangwili hospitals. | Campaigners who want overnight children's care returned to a Pembrokeshire hospital have delivered a 20,000-signature petition to ministers. |
32096340 | The man was arrested by police in Birmingham on Wednesday and was brought to Northern Ireland for questioning.
He faces a number of charges involving drug trafficking and money laundering and is to appear before Newtownards Magistrates' Court.
He was among 15 people arrested in the UK and Italy during the investigation.
Four men have already appeared in court charged with similar offences.
The charges follow the seizure of more than £800,000 of 'skunk' cannabis and cash during searches in multiple locations across Northern Ireland in recent days.
The Police Service of Northern Ireland have carried out searches in Belfast, Greenisland, Bangor, Newtownards and Ballywalter.
They have also been co-operating with police in Italy, where officers uncovered a cannabis factory.
It is believed the total value of the 'skunk' seized in Northern Ireland and Italy was £4.25m and was destined for Northern Ireland.
The four other men who have already been charged - Jian Wen Chen, 29, of Belfast, Jiazhu Cia, 30, of Ballywalter, Yong He, 33, from Belfast and Wei Zou, 32, from Bangor - all appeared in Newtownards Magistrates' Court on Thursday.
The men were among six people, including two women, arrested in Northern Ireland on Tuesday.
The women, aged 29 and 26, have since been released on police bail pending further inquiries.
Eight people were also arrested in Italy and remain in custody. | A 37-year-old man is due in court later over an international investigation into the supply of 'skunk' cannabis to Northern Ireland. |
32330902 | Crews fought the blaze through the night at Pirbright after the wildfire started on Wednesday afternoon.
Surrey fire service said the blaze covered four hectares when they were called at midday. Within four hours, it had spread across 30 hectares.
BBC reporter Mike Buxton said the heath was mostly Ministry of Defence land, but surrounding areas were also popular with dog walkers who raised the alarm.
The heath is home to species including the silver-studded blue butterfly, slow worms and lizards.
Surrey Fire and Rescue Service said the fire was brought under control on Thursday morning.
James Adler, from Surrey Wildlife Trust, said: "Following a dry winter... it's this time of year where everything starts to catch fire unfortunately."
He said ground nesting birds and some reptiles are unlikely to survive. | About 40 hectares of heathland have been destroyed by fire in Surrey. |
31136050 | Members of the GMB union are taking the action over grading and pay proposals by Cityclean, Brighton and Hove City Council's refuse service.
In January, the staff began a new work to rule over job changes.
The council said a "well-established and consistent process" had been used to determine pay for the city's binmen.
The union said its members would walk out for 11 hours from midnight on 11 February, following a series of stoppages last year.
The union said differences with the council now made it difficult to do anything but "clash head-on".
Mark Turner, GMB branch secretary, said: "Once again Brighton council officers' lack of commitment and ability to finding a resolution has meant GMB members are left again with no alternative other than to take further direct action.
"GMB members will lose money and the people of this city potentially will see rubbish remaining uncollected, something we deeply regret."
Richard Bradley, head of Cityclean, said the firm was disappointed to have been notified of further industrial action.
"We understand that refuse and recycling driver charge-hands are unhappy with the outcome of their job evaluation," said.
"There is a right of appeal against the outcome and we would urge the GMB to follow this process rather than seek to disrupt collections from our residents." | Brighton's refuse and recycling collectors are to go on strike in a long-running row over pay. |
34001914 | Life expectancy is now 77.1 years for men and 81.1 for women - up 8 and 5.8 years since 1984.
Statistics published by the National Records of Scotland (NRS) showed 82,440 people came to Scotland from the UK and overseas and 64,860 left in the year up to June 2014.
There were 29,069 marriages, 56,725 births and 54,239 deaths.
The top causes of death were cancer (15,840), ischemic (coronary) heart disease (6,872), respiratory system diseases (6,707), and cerebrovascular disease (stroke) (4,123).
Same-sex couples accounted for 367 of the marriages, while there were 436 civil partnerships - 193 male couples and 243 female couples.
The average age at which people marry for the first time increased by about two years since 2004, to 33.2 years for men and 31.4 years for women.
Other statistics revealed included:
The 2014 records also showed the 1.3% increase in birth rate was the first rise following five consecutive annual decreases.
There were 455 adoptions recorded - about a quarter of what the figure was in the early 1970s.
And in mid-2014, there were 2.42 million households in Scotland, which was an increase of about 169,000 over the past 10 years.
THe NRS report has been published annually since 1855.
Tim Ellis, the registrar general of Scotland, said: "This is a time of substantial demographic change: the population is increasing and ageing.
"The ageing population is the most distinctive current demographic development and will bring both opportunities and challenges.
"Life expectancy at birth in Scotland, while increasing, is lower than in the UK as a whole, and lower than a lot of other developed countries.
"There is also considerable local variation in life expectancy. Good quality data contributes to research aimed at improving the quality and cost-effectiveness of health interventions, and securing lasting improvements to the health of the people of Scotland."
Mr Ellis added: "In the last half of the 20th Century, more people tended to leave Scotland than move here.
"However, since 2001, this has changed, with more people moving to Scotland than leaving. Around 60% of people moving to Scotland are from the rest of the UK, while around 40% are from overseas. Migrants tend to be younger than the population as a whole." | Scotland's population has reached its highest ever total of 5,347,600, according to official figures. |
39759421 | Arsenal are sixth in the Premier League and five points behind Manchester City in fourth, with six games to play.
The Gunners boss described February's 5-1 loss to Bayern Munich and the 3-1 defeat by Chelsea as "big knocks".
"We were a bit like a boxer who got put on the floor twice," he said.
"We lost and people interpreted that as them not caring," added the 67-year-old Frenchman.
"No. Maybe it's because they care very much that we were like that - shocked. We were shocked.
"I think the players care. The players have a good mentality. I love the attitude of this team. There's a good atmosphere compared to one or two months ago."
Of Wenger's 49 north London derbies, his Arsenal side have won 22, drawn 20 and lost seven, but Tottenham are unbeaten in each of their past five league games against Arsenal.
Mauricio Pochettino is the first Tottenham manager to remain unbeaten in his first five top-flight north London Premier League derbies. | Arsene Wenger says his Arsenal players have been "shocked" by some of their results this season, but insists his squad are capable to fight in Sunday's north London derby against Tottenham. |
37611391 | The 35-year-old Scot finished fifth at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship on Sunday to ease his fears.
"I actually saw a training aid online and I found one, believe it or not, at the range I practise at - Mearns Castle," Warren said.
"I tried it, bought two of them online and I warmed up every day using it."
Warren was ranked 48th in the world last year and had slumped to 214th before the latest event played over three courses in his homeland.
"Technically, there were a few things I wasn't happy with with my swing and, if they didn't get better, I would never be as consistent as I was inside the top 50 in the world," he said.
"You look back, a year ago I was top 50 in the world and it all snowballs and leads to frustration, but I feel like I've found something now that can really help me technically.
"I felt as if I could just go on the golf course and swing without really thinking about it, which was a big difference."
Finishing fifth behind Tyrrell Hatton, and picking up a cheque for £155,832, at St Andrews has not only lifted Warren to 176th in the world but meant a jump of 55 places to 70 in Europe's Race To Dubai.
It means that, instead of fighting to retain his tour card, Warren can chase a place in the 60-strong field at the season-ending DP World Tour Championship in the Middle East.
"It proves the fact that, when I do get that feeling for it, I can hold my own in some really good competition like this week," he added.
"I can set my sights on some better things than just trying to keep my job I suppose." | Marc Warren has thanked a £30 golf training aid he stumbled upon while surfing the internet for saving his European Tour card for next season. |
34696574 | The programme, filmed in Ceredigion, is shot in English and Welsh and called Y Gwyll for the bilingual version.
It features Richard Harrington playing Det Ch Insp Tom Mathias.
Filming in and around Aberystwyth for the new series starts in January, with the Welsh version being screened on S4C next autumn and English on BBC Wales in early 2017. | Crime drama series Hinterland will return for a third series, it has been confirmed. |
38787371 | The think tank says living standards improved significantly between 2014 and the beginning of 2016, as subdued inflation coincided with rising wages and employment.
But a rise in inflation late in 2016, coupled with slower income growth, has ended that boom, it argues.
The conclusions are part of its annual report, published later this week.
The Resolution Foundation estimates that incomes in working-age households have grown just 0.5% in the current financial year, the slowest pace since 2012-13.
"After a tight squeeze during the [financial] crisis, working-age households have enjoyed a living standards mini-boom in recent years," said Stephen Clarke, economic analyst at the Resolution Foundation.
"But fast-rising inflation this year has brought this all too short mini-boom to a sharp halt as pay rises have not kept up," he said.
The most recent official measure of UK inflation, released earlier this month, showed a sharp rise in inflation to 1.6%.
Higher costs for imported materials and fuels were behind the rise.
Some economists feel the Resolution Foundation is being too gloomy.
Professor Patrick Minford, chair of Economists for Brexit said the Foundation has followed the consensus view that the economy would slow sharply in 2017.
However, "this consensus view has had to be revised up steadily over the past six months" and further upward revisions are likely, Prof Minford said.
"The 'Brexit uncertainty' factor has proved to be a myth," he added.
Prof Minford conceded rising household incomes were likely to slow this year, but added that the long-term economic outlook still looked bright, partly because consumers and businesses would continue to borrow.
Mr Clarke called on the government to help mitigate the effects of rising prices.
"While there's little that the government can do to stop rising inflation eating into people's living standards this year, there is still plenty of scope to boost pay packets and get employment rising again," he said.
"Closing the large jobs gaps that still exist across big cities like Birmingham and Liverpool would boost household incomes and help send Britain to the top of the global employment league.
"And of course tackling Britain's chronic productivity problems holds the key to maintaining decent pay growth in the years ahead," he added.
The foundation's report notes that falling mortgage costs have given householders a boost and pensioner incomes have been growing more strongly.
The UK economy grew 2% in 2016, driven by strong consumer spending. | A "mini-boom" in living standards has ended according to a report by the Resolution Foundation. |
35865262 | Gwent Police was called to the B4293 near Llanishen at 11:45 GMT on Saturday after two cars collided.
Police said a 46-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving whilst under the influence of alcohol.
Anyone with information has been asked to contact police. | A man has been arrested after a 50-year-old woman was killed in a car crash in Monmouthshire at the weekend. |
38037615 | In the two-page typed draft with handwritten notes, Lennon criticises the couple for their treatment of him and his wife, Yoko Ono.
The attack is said to be in response to Linda's criticism of him not publicly announcing his departure from the band.
The letter was sold at a US auction to an anonymous collector in Dallas.
The opening paragraph makes reference to a letter Lennon received which he said made him wonder "what middle-aged cranky Beatle fan wrote it".
He said: "I resisted looking at the last page to find out—I kept thinking who is it—Queenie? Stuart's mother?—Clive Epstein's wife?—Alan Williams?—What the hell—it's Linda!"
Lennon went on to respond to accusations he was "self indulgent" by criticising the couple for their treatment of him and Yoko.
Using strong language, he said he hoped they realised the trouble "you and the rest of my 'kind and unselfish' friends laid on Yoko and me, since we've been together".
Making direct reference to his former bandmate McCartney, Lennon questions the notion that "today's art" came about because of the Beatles.
He wrote: "I don't believe you're that insane - Paul - do you believe that? When you stop believing it, you might wake up!"
He also responds to the criticism that he did not publicly announce he was leaving the band, saying he was asked by Paul and former manager Allen Klein to keep quiet as it would "hurt the Beatles".
In his last attack directed at Linda, he says he suffered because of her "insane family/in laws" before adding in capitals "God Help You Out, Paul".
US auctioneers RR Auction said it believed the letter was written around 1971 - a year after McCartney publicly announced he was leaving the band.
It said the letter, which sold for $29,843.45, "captures the intense rivalry between the two men in the months, and even years, surrounding the break-up of the Beatles". | A furious letter from John Lennon to Paul McCartney and his wife, Linda, written after The Beatles' break-up has sold for nearly $30,000 (£24,200). |
40105813 | Last year AIB was valued at 11.3bn euros, so a share sale may yield 3bn euros or more.
The bailout cost Irish taxpayers 21bn euros ($23.50bn).
Finance minister Michael Noonan said the progress made by AIB and current market conditions meant the time was right to start privatising the bank.
The financial crisis, which triggered a property collapse in Ireland, cost the Irish government 64bn euros in bank bailouts and forced it to seek support from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.
AIB returned to profit three years ago and the non-performing loans that crippled the bank in the crisis have been reduced by about two thirds.
The government owns 99.9% of AIB and received a dividend of 250m euros last month - its first since the rescue.
AIB's flotation on the Dublin and London stock exchanges will be one of the biggest in recent years.
The prospectus and the price range of the shares is expected to be published in mid-June.
It is thought that about 10% to 15% of the shares will be available to retail investors, although the minimum investment will be set at 10,000 euros.
The shares are expected to be marketed as an investment in the resurgent Irish economy, which grew 5.2% last year, outstripping all 18 other eurozone countries.
AIB is biggest mortgage lender in Ireland, with a 36% share.
The government will use the funds from the flotation to reduce the national debt by about 1.5%. It stands at 200bn euros - among the highest in the eurozone.
Dublin still has stakes in two other rescued banks: Permanent TSB (75%) and Bank of Ireland (14%). | Ireland is to sell 25% of Allied Irish Banks back to the public, eight years after it was rescued during the financial crisis. |
40037128 | On Monday, 22 people were killed and 64 injured when a bomber detonated a device as people left Grande's show at the 21,000-seater Manchester Arena.
A statement said the US singer's Dangerous Woman tour would be suspended until 7 June.
It added that Grande, 23, wanted to pay "proper respects to those lost".
As well as two dates in London, concerts in Belgium, Poland and Germany have been cancelled.
Grande's management said: "We ask at this time that we all continue to support the city of Manchester and all those families affected by this cowardice and senseless act of violence.
"Our way of life has once again been threatened but we will overcome this together."
After the attack, the singer posted her condolences on Twitter, saying: "Broken. from the bottom of my heart, i am so so sorry. i don't have words."
The singer returned to her hometown of Boca Raton, Florida, on Tuesday in a private plane. It is hoped that the tour will continue on 7 June in Paris.
Children were among the dead in the Manchester attack, which targeted the foyer of the arena.
Greater Manchester Police said it believed 22-year-old Salman Abedi, a former city student, had blown himself up.
The attack has led to the UK terror threat being raised to critical - its highest level, which means an attack may be imminent.
Police say they are hunting a network of people over the attack, and have made five arrests in the UK.
Refunds will be granted to all ticketholders at the point of purchase for the cancelled shows, tour promoter Live Nation said.
The first victim of Monday's bombing to be named was 18-year-old Georgina Callander, a devoted fan of Grande.
The health and social care student had posted a message to Grande on Twitter before the event, which read: "SO EXCITED TO SEE YOU TOMORROW."
On her Instagram page the Lancashire resident also had a picture with the actor-turned-singer, which had been taken in 2015.
Other public events have been cancelled in London in the wake of the bombing.
Chelsea Football Club cancelled their open-top bus, Premier League victory parade, which was due to take place on Sunday.
The London premiere of the new Wonder Woman film, due for 31 May, has also been cancelled.
Warner Bros said it would not be proceeding with press junkets or a red carpet event "in light of the current situation". | Ariana Grande's concerts at London's O2 Arena on Thursday and Friday have been cancelled following the Manchester suicide bombing. |
40241229 | The work and pensions secretary - a friend and ally of the PM - has been made First Secretary of State, effectively her second in command.
Michael Gove, one of the driving forces of the Brexit campaign, returns to the front bench as environment secretary.
The previous incumbent, Andrea Leadsom, has been appointed as the leader of the House in the Commons.
Most other ministers have kept their roles - but Liz Truss is moved from justice to chief treasury secretary.
Commons leader David Liddington takes over as justice secretary and Lord Chancellor.
Chief Treasury Secretary David Gauke has been appointed work and pensions secretary.
Live: Reaction to Mrs May's cabinet reshuffle
Mrs May had been expected to carry out a widespread reshuffle of her top team after Thursday's general election but her room for manoeuvre has been limited by her failure to win an overall majority.
Most of the cabinet jobs remain unchanged:
Damian Green, who was previously work and pensions secretary and was at university with Mrs May, has also become minister for the Cabinet Office, a position left vacant by Ben Gummer, who lost his seat in Thursday's general election.
The First Secretary of State is a role previously held by George Osborne and, under Labour, Peter Mandelson and could see Mr Green standing in for Theresa May at prime minister's questions when she is not available.
The role is periodically used by UK governments and did not exist in Mrs May's first cabinet, formed after she became prime minister in July last year.
It does not come with a government department but does give its holder seniority over other cabinet ministers and is seen as being similar to the role of deputy prime minister.
Boris Johnson said that while the public would be wondering about the future of the current government, Mrs May had got the biggest Conservative mandate anyone had achieved for decades.
"It's absolutely right that she should go ahead, form a government and deliver on the priorities of the people.
"I'm going to be backing her, and absolutely everybody I'm talking to is going to be backing her as well."
In the latest fallout from the general election result, which confounded pollsters and left the UK with a hung Parliament:
Liam Fox retains his position as international trade secretary - he told reporters he was "delighted" to be continuing in the role he has held since July last year.
Dr Fox told the BBC that Mrs May was in a "very positive" mood during her reshuffle conversations.
"It's now time for the whole of the Conservative party to rally behind the prime minister and get a government in the national interest.
"I have absolute faith in the prime minister. She is the best person to take this country forward in terms of being able to give a government that is genuinely in our national interest, and I very much look forward to working with her."
Dr Fox was one of the Cabinet's "three Brexiteers" with David Davis and Boris Johnson, who have also kept their roles, as the government gears up for the start of talks with Brussels.
Liz Truss's change of position will be seen by some as a demotion - she was widely criticised by the judiciary following the High Court ruling regarding the government seeking Parliament's permission to trigger Article 50 and begin the formal start of the Brexit process.
The judges involved were heavily criticised by some newspapers, and Mrs Truss was in turn criticised for failing to stand up for them.
Justine Greening remains as education secretary - her opposition to Theresa May's policy of expanding grammar schools might be less of an issue now, if, as some expect, the government is forced to drop it from the Queen's Speech to prevent a backbench revolt. | Damian Green is the big winner as Theresa May seeks to shore up her authority in a post-election reshuffle. |
28463841 | Suarez, signed from Liverpool for £75m this summer, is serving a four-month ban for biting Italy defender Giorgio Chiellini during the World Cup.
He was banned on 26 June but the incident took place on 24 June, meaning he should be available at the Bernabeu.
The second El Clasico of the season is set for 22 March 2015.
Media playback is not supported on this device
Suarez was banned from all football-related activities by Fifa and cannot train with his new club and is prohibited from entering the confines of any stadium.
Defending champions Atletico Madrid begin their campaign against Rayo Vallecano on the weekend of 24 August, with Barca at home to Elche and Real hosting Cordoba.
Real could hand debuts to £71m forward James Rodriguez and German World Cup winner Toni Kroos against the newly promoted side.
Fellow new boys Eibar and Deportivo La Coruna begin against Real Sociedad and Granada respectively.
This week, La Liga agreed to use 'vanishing spray' - popular during the World Cup - to mark out the position of the wall at free-kicks. | Luis Suarez could make his Barcelona debut against rivals Real Madrid, with the first El Clasico of the season set for the weekend of Sunday, 26 October. |
35796831 | They indicate the Christian Democrats lost support in Baden-Wuerttemberg and Rhineland Palatinate, but remain the largest party in Saxony-Anhalt.
The anti-migrant AfD achieved gains in all three states, exit polls indicate.
The elections were seen as a test of support for Chancellor Merkel's policy of accommodating refugees.
More than a million migrants and refugees entered Germany in 2015.
German power is the real key to Europe
Migrant crisis: Will Merkel be left out in the cold?
Profile: Angela Merkel
Profile: AfD leader Frauke Petry
In the western state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, a former stronghold of the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU), support for the party reached a historic low of about 27%, the exit polls suggest.
They say the Green-led coalition currently in power won the election.
The unprecedented success of the populist AfD shows just how vehemently some German voters disagree with Chancellor Merkel's pro-refugee stance. Many are conservative voters disenchanted with her centrist policies, and swayed by the robust populist narrative offered by AfD.
So is this a blow to Mrs Merkel's leadership? Not necessarily. It was also a historic victory for the Greens, who support the chancellor's position on refugees.
And during the campaign in Baden-Wurttemberg and Saxony-Anhalt the CDU candidates saw their voters fall away as they sporadically tried to undermine the chancellor's message and regain the populist ground from AfD.
Remarkably in those states it was the CDU's left-wing opponents who backed Mrs Merkel's refugee policies most consistently - and tonight reaped the rewards for it. These results are proof that Germany is becoming increasingly polarised between voters who passionately support Mrs Merkel's pro-refugee stance and those angered by it.
In Saxony-Anhalt, a poor, eastern state where the CDU and the Social Democrats govern together, that coalition looks set to remain in office but the exit polls say Alternative Fuer Deutschland (AdF) won about 22% of the vote.
The Social Democrats are set maintain their hold on Rhineland-Palatinate, a state the CDU had hoped to capture.
Already represented in five of Germany's 16 regional parliaments, the AfD has campaigned on slogans such as "Secure the borders" and "Stop the asylum chaos".
German Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said on Saturday that gains for the AfD would not change his government's stance on immigration.
He said: "There is a clear position that we stand by: humanity and solidarity. We will not change our position now.
But in Berlin on Saturday, about 2,000 right-wing demonstrators carrying German flags chanted "Merkel must go!" and "We are the people!".
The poor results could put additional pressure on Mrs Merkel, just as she is trying to push through an EU deal with Turkey to reduce the numbers of migrants and refugees entering western Europe.
As Europe's largest economy, Germany has a leading role in policy-making for the European Union.
At a summit earlier this week, the chancellor promoted a last-minute draft of the deal and demanded the support of other European leaders.
Ms Merkel still needs to complete that deal at another summit at the end of this week. If her party performs poorly on Sunday, she will go into that meeting weakened.
The meetings and demonstrations came as thousands of migrants have massed in muddy camps in the Greek border town of Idomeni after countries across the Balkans closed their borders. | The party of German Chancellor Angela Merkel has suffered defeats in two of three states holding regional elections, exit polls suggest. |
33939359 | McDowell needed to improve on his 73, but carded a 76 to lie on five over par, three outside the cut mark.
Clarke did not look like staying in the tournament after his opening 78, and his 81 on Friday put him on 15 over.
Former winner Padraig Harrington and fellow Irishman Shane Lowry also failed to qualify for the weekend's action.
Lowry, winner of last week's WGC-Bridgestone event, was nine shots better than his opening round but his 69 left him on three over par overall.
Harrington, winner of the US PGA in 2008, also had a much-improved score on Friday, but he too was on three over after his 71.
Two-times tournament winner McIlroy is on two under par after a second successive 71. | Rory McIlroy was the only Northern Ireland player to make the cut at the US PGA as Graeme McDowell and Darren Clarke failed to make the weekend. |
31946063 | He rose to prominence during a campaign against Belfast City Council's decision in December 2012 to limit the number of days the flag flies from the city hall.
The 24-year-old was also convicted of obstructing traffic during one of the demonstrations staged in Belfast.
Bryson, of Rosepark, Donaghadee, County Down, will be sentenced next month.
He had denied a series of charges linked to the loyalist street protests, claiming he was the victim of a political prosecution.
However, the judge at Belfast Magistrates' Court rejected claims that Bryson had only been present as an individual at the protests, and as such was unaware the events could have been illegal.
"The defendant's evidence lacked any real substance or credibility on any of the issues relevant to the case," she said.
"In my opinion he was at pains to try and misinterpret statements of senior police in order to attempt to pass responsibility for his actions to the police as opposed to accepting responsibility for his own actions."
The charges included four counts of participating in four un-notified public processions during January and February 2013, and obstructing traffic on the Newtownards Road in east Belfast.
In his evidence, Bryson said he did not know the protests could have been unlawful.
He accepted he had been filmed in CCTV footage of the marches, but said that on each occasion, he had walked to and from the centre of Belfast as an individual.
During the trial, prosecution counsel accused him of treating police with contempt when he was interviewed about the offences.
The court heard that the loyalist campaigner told officers he was an Irish republican and the first minister of Northern Ireland.
He also suggested to police that he was in a fictional gay relationship with fellow flag campaigner Willie Frazer, it was claimed.
In a highly unusual move, one of Northern Ireland's most senior police officers was called to give evidence as part of the defence case.
ACC Will Kerr told the court he agreed to meet Bryson and loyalist community representatives as part of efforts to ensure their weekly demonstrations did not break the law.
The officer also said he warned those at the meeting on 29 January, 2013 of the "criminal justice consequences" of taking part in un-notified public processions.
Delivering her verdict, the judge said Bryson was "closely involved in the arrangements regarding the protests".
"I do not accept his explanation that he did not know the status of the processions in question," she added.
Convicting him on all charges, Mrs Bagnall said CCTV footage of the protests showed Bryson standing with others in the middle of the road.
Bryson was released on continuing bail to return for sentencing in four weeks time. | The high-profile union flag protester Jamie Bryson has been found guilty of taking part in unlawful public processions. |
38518626 | Cranes coach Milutin 'Micho' Sredojevic has kept faith with the striker, who has not scored for club or country for almost eight months.
Goalkeeper Benjamin Ochan and Muzamil Mutyaba did not make the cut.
But Timothy Dennis Awany and Muhammed Shaban were included for their hard work and fighting spirit.
Uganda will be making a return to the finals after 39 years and will be based in Port-Gentil alongside Ghana, Mali and Egypt.
"We shall continue working hard and fine tuning the team ahead of the tournament," Sredojevic told BBC.
Squad:
Goalkeepers: Salim Jamal (Al Merrikh, Sudan), Robert Odongkara (Saint George, Ethiopia), Denis Onyango (Mamelodi Sundowns, South Africa)
Defenders: Timothy Dennis Awany (KCCA, Uganda), Joseph Ochaya (KCCA), Shafiq Batambuze (Tusker, Kenya), Denis Iguma (Al Ahed, Lebanon), Isaac Isinde (Unattached), Murushid Juuko (Simba, Tanzania), Nicholas Wadada (Vipers, Uganda)
Midfielders: Khalid Aucho (Baroka, South Africa), Mike Azira (Colorado Rapids, USA), Geoffrey Kizito (Than Quang Ninh, Vietnam), William Luwagga Kizito (Rio Ave, Portugal), Tony Mawejje (Thotur, Iceland), Hassan Wasswa (Nijmeh, Lebabon), Moses Oloya (Hanoi T and T, Vietnam), Godfrey Walusimbi (Gor Mahia, Kenya)
Strikers: Geoffrey Massa (Baroka, South Africa), Faruku Miya (Standard Liege, Belgium), Yunus Sentamu (Ilves, Finland), Geoffrey Sserunkuma (KCCA, Uganda), Muhammed Shaban (Onduparaka, Uganda) | Uganda skipper Geofrey Massa has been included in the final squad for the Africa Cup of Nations despite his misfiring form. |
35429300 | Liverpool City Council is being asked to approve proposals by developers Place First to demolish and refurbish terraces in the Welsh Streets district.
Some homes will be knocked together to appeal to families, while others will be knocked down.
Last year, then Communities Secretary Eric Pickles overturned his planning inspector's backing for a housing plan.
More on this story and others from Merseyside and Cheshire
The streets are known as Welsh Streets as they are named after the Welsh towns of the construction workers who built the terraces in the 19th Century.
Ringo Starr used to live at 9 Madryn Street - which is one of the 200 homes that would be refurbished.
Sources differ on how long Starr lived there, with some suggestions it was three years before his family moved to nearby Admiral Grove, where he was living as a teenager shortly before The Beatles found fame.
Joe Anderson, Liverpool's Mayor, said 80% of residents backed the original plans for this area.
"As a result of the prevarication over this scheme from different outside interest groups, we have lost a £13m government grant," he said.
"However, given that the government has changed the planning rules we need to find a way forward in order to get this area sorted out as soon as possible and I am pleased we have been able to find a partner that is willing to look into taking on the Welsh Streets."
He said the residents "have been in limbo" for years after the Housing Market Renewal Initiative was axed.
"To add insult to injury, Eric Pickles then overturned his own planning inspector's decision on a subsequent scheme despite it being supported by the vast majority of the local community," he added.
Irene Milson, Chairwoman of the Welsh Streets Community Association, said: "This community has been waiting a long time for new homes and it is extremely frustrating that the previous scheme wasn't approved by the government.
"We await with interest the details of this new set of proposals and will make our decision based on progress over the next few months."
The report will be considered by the council's cabinet on 4 February.
In December, the city council dropped its legal challenge over the demolition of nearly 300 homes saying it wanted to avoid "protracted" legal action. | Ringo Starr's Liverpool birthplace is likely to be saved after years of uncertainty and wrangling. |
35002158 | Denmark's centre-right government had wanted to abandon some Danish opt-outs from EU home affairs legislation.
But with all votes now counted, more than 53% said No to the proposals.
The vote comes weeks after the Paris attacks and as Europe struggles to deal with record numbers of migrants.
"It is a clear no," Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said, adding he had "full respect" for the voters' decision.
Profile: Denmark's anti-EU party
The government, backed by the opposition, had campaigned for Yes, saying it would help Danish authorities in the wake of the Paris attacks.
Ultimately, voting No means Denmark remains exempt from large parts of the EU's criminal justice and home affairs system, a position it negotiated in 1993.
It risks losing access to Europol, Europe's crime and intelligence-sharing agency, a service frequently used by Denmark.
The confusing wording of the referendum question seems to have been a factor.
One voter described it as "the most baffling in the history of the EU", and on the foggy, wet streets of Copenhagen, that sentiment seemed to be shared by voters as they left polling stations, saying the question was too complicated and technical, and that explanations from politicians were not comprehensive.
For Denmark's government, urgent talks will now take place between Copenhagen and Brussels, to work out the ramifications of what the No vote means.
The result is likely to have been monitored by British politicians, interested to see with the upcoming UK referendum battle about to play out, how the gut instinct of the voters can be tied to current European events, and how the particular phrasing of the question can discourage or influence how tied-in to the European project Britons want to be.
Read more from Gavin
Several of the Paris attackers were French nationals who had been living in neighbouring Belgium. At least one surviving gunman, Salah Abdeslam, is thought to have fled across the French border in the aftermath of the shootings and suicide blasts in Paris on 13 November.
The result means Denmark will have to negotiate a special agreement to stay inside Europol, the EU's law enforcement agency which tackles organised crime and terrorism.
"We will work very hard for the Danes to get the best possible agreement. But it will be difficult," Soren Gade of the governing Venstre party told the Ritzau news agency.
The anti-immigration Danish People's Party (DPP), which props up Mr Rasmussen's administration in parliament, had urged voters to say No to avoid giving away further sovereignty to Brussels.
Although a Yes vote would not have affected Denmark's opt-out on immigration, the DPP argued that it could eventually have led to immigration policies being dictated by the EU.
Unlike Denmark, the UK and Ireland have opt-ins on justice and home affairs legislation, which enable them to choose whether to accept or reject legislation on a case-by-case basis.
The result of the referendum is likely to be of interest in Britain, whose government is trying to renegotiate its relations with the EU before holding a vote on whether to remain in the bloc. | Danes have rejected adopting EU rules on cross-border policing in a referendum that could have seen the country take closer ties with the bloc, according to final results. |
29010066 | The Telegraph reported that Harris Associates had cut its stake in Tesco from more than 3% to about 1.4%.
And in an email to the FT, Harris criticised the UK supermarket giant for operating an "incoherent strategy".
Overall, the FTSE 100, rose 5.56 points at 6,825.31, led by ITV on speculation it could be a takeover target.
On Friday, Tesco issued its second profit warning in two months and cut its interim dividend by 75%.
The comments from Harris Associates come on the day that Tesco's new chief executive Dave Lewis begins his job, after his start date was brought forward by the supermarket.
"If new Tesco CEO Dave Lewis was under any illusions that the markets would afford him a 'honeymoon period' upon taking over the reins at the UK food retailing giant, then this morning's share price action should have put paid to that," said Alastair McCaig, market analyst at IG.
Shares in Tesco's rivals were also hit, with Morrisons down 2.25% and Sainsbury's 0.28% lower.
HSBC shares were down 1.5%. One of the UK's most high-profile fund managers, Neil Woodford, said he had sold his stake in HSBC over worries of "fine inflation" in the banking sector.
"I am worried that the ongoing investigation into the historic manipulation of Libor and foreign exchange markets could expose HSBC to significant financial penalties," he said.
ITV shares rose 3.5% on speculation it could be a takeover target for Liberty Global, the owner of Virgin Media.
The Telegraph reported that Liberty Global was canvassing support from major ITV shareholders after it bought a 6.4% stake in the broadcaster this summer.
In the FTSE 250, shares in Perform - which supplies online sports news and clips to media groups and bookmakers - jumped 26% after investment group Access Industries said it planned take full ownership of the firm. Access already owns 42.5% of Perform.
On the currency markets, the pound slipped slightly after the release of weaker-than-expected manufacturing PMI figures.
However, the pound was up 0.09% against the dollar on the day at $1.66120 and was 0.10% higher against the euro at 1.26520 euros. | (Close): Shares in Tesco fell a further 1.9% following news that a major shareholder in the UK supermarket giant had cut its stake. |
36246481 | Nick Norman and Moritz Korn members of Cairngorm Gliding Club at Feshiebridge, reached 28,500ft during a flight over the Cairngorms at the weekend.
The British Gliding Association (BGA) said that while it was not a new UK record, it was the highest gain to be achieved for several years.
Mr Norman and Mr Korn sought permission from air traffic control before making his climb to 28,500ft.
The pilots took advantage of a climatic condition known as a mountain wave.
They had earlier flown to Aboyne in Aberdeenshire and was returning to Feshiebridge via Corgarff when he encountered the weather condition.
The long-standing UK record height for a glider is more than 30,000ft.
Cairngorm Gliding Club made headlines in 2011 when it was used for filming a scene in Batman film, The Dark Knight Rises.
Stuntmen and a film crew made parachute jumps over the airstrip at Feshie Bridge for a scene involving an elaborate escape from a jet aircraft. | Two pilots have set a new record height for his Scottish gliding club. |
33546303 | In a speech to the National Assembly, Mr Castro said that, for normal relations to resume, a US embargo on Cuba would have to be lifted.
He also called for the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay to be returned to Cuba.
On Monday both countries are set to re-establish diplomatic ties for the first time since 1959.
"We are talking about forging a new kind of relationship between both states, different from our entire common history," President Castro told the Cuban National Assembly.
He acknowledged President Obama's efforts to try to get a debate going on the embargo despite the fact that it was up to the US Congress to vote on the matter.
US officials have said several times that Guantanamo Bay is not on the agenda for discussion with Cuba.
The US and Cuba began secret negotiations on restoring ties two years ago.
This led to a historic announcement on 17 December last year where President Castro and President Obama said they had swapped prisoners and would seek to normalise relations.
On Monday both countries are set to reopen embassies in each other's capitals as a first formal step towards re-establishing relations. | The Cuban President, Raul Castro, has said his country must establish a new kind of relationship with the United States. |
35112577 | About a quarter of all photographs uploaded to the site and tagged with the name of the city also include the word "Christmas" or "Xmas".
Across the 10 biggest English cities for population about one in five photographs on average is accompanied by those words as people get into the yuletide spirit.
Whether it is relaxing at home in front of the tree, hotdogs at the Christmas market, fairground wheels in the city centre or mulled wine with friends, thousands of people are sharing their festivities on social media.
Data scraped from photo-sharing service Instagram since 10 December shows that photographs of Leeds included "Christmas" or "Xmas" 23% of the time.
Councillor Judith Blake, leader of Leeds City Council, said: "Leeds is a fabulously festive city and we've seen residents and visitors alike really get into the Christmas spirit more than ever this year.
"One of the most popular attractions in Leeds at this time of year is the Christkindelmarkt, which has become a Leeds Christmas tradition for many visitors and residents, and is fantastic photo opportunity for some fun and festive selfies. Combined with the lights switch-on, which regularly attracts thousands of people, the market has proved to be another roaring success this year."
The city also has a Reindeer Trail, a collection of decorated reindeer statues.
The least Christmassy city in the top 10 is Leicester, where 8% of photographs hashtagged with its name mention Christmas.
However, the arrival of the Coca Cola Christmas lorry on Thursday prompted a series of Christmas-tagged pictures from Leicester.
Leicester also has a lot going on for Christmas despite the lower proportion of mentions on Instagram. This year is the first time that people can view the Christmas decorations from its Wheel of Light, which is in Jubilee Square until 3 January.
A Leicester City Council spokeswoman said: "We have a busy programme of festivals and events throughout the year, including a packed Christmas and Diwali programme.
"Our Christmas celebrations include Leicester's Wheel of Light, a 110ft-high (33.5m) Ferris wheel on Jubilee Square, our popular children's tableaux at Town Hall Square, and our pantomime Snow White is at De Montfort Hall until 4 January. Our Christmas lights switch-on included real reindeer, Santa's sleigh and a programme of live music, and attracted thousands to the city centre."
German Christmas markets, selling crafts, decorations, beer, bratwurst and gluhwein, have proved a big draw, not least in the two old rivals for the status of England's second city, Birmingham and Manchester.
But it seems the two are neck and neck in terms of their Christmas cheer on Instagram. Not only do both cities have photographs mentioning Christmas 19% of the time, but 2% of all tagged photographs contain either #christmasmarket or #christmasmarkets.
In Birmingham, hashtags for the market included #christmasmarket, #birminghamchristmasmarket and even #yestheyhavegermanxmasmarketsinbirmingham.
Earlier this year Manchester topped a poll of the 10 most populated cities when people were asked which should be the UK's second capital, but on pictures of their Christmas markets, at least, they are equals.
23%
of pictures of #Leeds say Christmas or Xmas too
19% of #Manchester (pictured), #Birmingham and #Sheffield
17% of #Bristol, 14% #Wakefield and #London, 12% #Bradford and 11% #Liverpool
8% of #Leicester pictures mention Christmas, the least of the big cities
BBC News used an independent data scraping tool to search Instagram for any mentions of Christmas.
We looked for the top 10 cities for population in England with a hashtag (#) in front of them followed by the words "Christmas" or "Xmas" somewhere in the accompanying caption.
Instagram was founded in 2010 by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger. It has overtaken Twitter and now has about 400m regular users. The app lets users enhance images taken on their mobile phones with filters and then share them instantly across various social networks. | Leeds is the most Christmassy big city in England, if the photo-sharing service Instagram is anything to go by. |
35473354 | Naomi Watts said she was "very excited" to take on the role for Glantraeth FC, based in Malltraeth, which has a population of 400 people.
The English-born star of Mulholland Drive and King Kong spent time as a child on her grandparents' farm nearby.
Glantraeth FC play in the third tier Welsh Alliance football league division one and get crowds of 40 people.
After former president Sir George Meyrick stood down last August, secretary Stan Strickland suggested Ms Watts as a replacement.
He sent a letter to her agent who is based on Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, and received a positive response on Monday night.
Mr Strickland said: "She spent three years of her childhood here and attended school in Llangefni before becoming a major film star.
"I just thought 'if you don't ask, you don't get'.
"She has now got her publicist involved, so we could end up in the New York Times."
Mr Strickland is expecting further correspondence with Ms Watts about her involvement over the coming days, but said her name will appear on the website, letterheads and match day programmes, while she will be provided with annual performance updates. | A Hollywood A-lister has agreed to become the honorary president of a small Anglesey football club. |
32927550 | Now in its fifth year, the BBC Radio 2 contest challenges under-13s to write a story about any fictional topic.
A record 120,421 entries were received, with thousands of volunteers helping to whittle down the entries.
Chris Evans unveiled the six young winners in a live broadcast from St James's Palace.
"Every single young writer in this competition deserves a round of applause, a hats off and a whopping well done for creating such sensational stories," he said.
"They've all been so moving," said teacher Jen Morgan, who helped judge the prize. "It's just a privilege to read some of them."
The winners were:
Gold: Amabel Smith (10) - It's A Wide World
Silver: Hannah Sennouni (12) - Londoner Pigeon
Bronze: Lara Akhurst (11) - Blue
Gold: Sofia Zambuto (9) - Fight For Life
Silver: Robyn Fielding (8) - The Word That Wouldn't Come Out
Bronze: Emily Potts (9) - Cake Wars
Sofia Zambuto's gold award-winning story recounted a mother's desperate attempt to save her family from what appears to be a tsunami.
"Children we must move now," she wrote. "We must leave our home now. We must find a new home. The wave, the flood is coming again. Run with me now, as fast as your legs will carry you. Follow me now."
Judge Charlie Higson said the nine-year-old had "managed to achieve a piece of mature action writing, which is a very difficult thing to do well," and praised the "fantastic twist".
Zambuto had missed the deadline for the 2014 competition by 30 seconds. "I'm kind of pleased I missed it now," she laughed.
The top prize in the older category went to 10-year-old Amabel Smith's It's A Wide World, a story set in a not-too-distant future where the "government uses weight to control society".
Richard Hammond, who chaired the judging panel, called it "astonishing" and "frightening".
"The idea of the government using obesity as a controlling mechanism is such a fresh and original idea."
Cake Wars told the story of a baking contest where the contestants sabotaged each other's entries.
It was written by nine-year-old Emily Potts, who said it was inspired by her grandmother's "terrible cakes".
London Pigeon was a first-person/first-pigeon account of a bird's life, while The Word That Wouldn't Come Out described a stammer from the point of view of a stubborn word, stuck in the speaker's mouth.
Lara Akhurst's Blue was described by children's laureate Malorie Blackman as "a mature, personal story which I found immensely moving".
Celebrities including Sir Kenneth Branagh, Jeremy Irons, Sally Hawkins and Charles Dance read out the short stories during the prize-giving ceremony.
The event was hosted by the Duchess of Cornwall, who is a patron of the National Literacy Trust.
"Whenever I have a chance - and I don't often get a chance to talk on Radio 2 - I tell everybody we must never forget how important reading and story-telling is," she said.
"Like climbing though the wardrobe into Narnia, stories open doors into different worlds.
"We meet impossible people, travel to remote places and make hundreds of new friends.
"We look around with new eyes and recognise Horrid Henry next door or Professor Snape the chemistry teacher in the school down the road.
"The best stories show us what we all have in common."
1. Fairy tales: princess, charming, unicorn
2. Royalty: coronation, Queen, majesty
3. Family: BFF, grandmother, aunt
4. Shopping: Prada, make-up, shopaholic
1. Dinosaurs: stegosaurus, Jurassic, raptor
2. Superheroes: Batcave, Gotham, Avengers
3. Football: Aguero, Neuer, Suarez
4. Science fiction: teleport, continuum, tardis
An analysis of the 50 million words used in the stories showed that new technology featured strongly in children's imaginations.
One of the most common plotlines in the short story competition was achieving sudden internet fame after posting a YouTube video; while #hashtags were incorporated into the stories with increased frequency.
"Children are not tweeting and using Twitter, but they are using the word hashtag and the symbol # for dramatic effect, it is heightening tension," said Vineeta Gupta, head of children's dictionaries at the Oxford University Press.
But the top 10 nouns were reassuringly related to home, family and daily life.
You can read all the finalists, including the six winning stories, on the 500 Words website. | Stories about heroic pigeons, poisoned cakes and living with a stammer were among the winners at this year's 500 Words competition. |
31636505 | Mr Sands, who has been under pressure over the bank's slumping share price, says Mr Winters, who takes over in June, is "a great choice".
The bank's chairman, Sir John Peace, is to step down in 2016 and three non-executive directors are also leaving.
Shares in the troubled bank rose 3% in early morning trading.
The Asia-focused bank has been facing tough market conditions and issued three profit warnings last year.
It is due to close up to 100 bank branches this year in Asia, Africa and the Middle East in an attempt to improve its profitability. | UK bank Standard Chartered has announced that its chief executive, Peter Sands, will be replaced by ex-JPMorgan banker Bill Winters. |
22629712 | Lieutenant Colonel Dudley Clarke was undercover as a correspondent for the Times when detained in the Spanish capital in 1941.
He was "dressed, down to a brassiere, as a woman", reports a letter from the British Embassy to the Foreign Office.
In 1940, he had been instrumental in establishing the British Commandos.
He is also credited with defining the Allies' deception strategy during World War II.
Field Marshall Harold Alexander, who led ground forces at D-Day as well as the Allied forces in Italy, said that "he did as much to win the war as any other single officer".
Lt Col Clarke had stopped off in Madrid in October 1941 on his way to Cairo to deliver important intelligence information to General Auchinleck, who was commander-in-chief of the Middle East command at the time.
The letter about his arrest reaveals he told Spanish police "that he was a novelist and wanted to study the reactions of men to women in the street".
As well as another outfit of women's clothes and a war correspondent's uniform, Lt Col Clarke's luggage contained "a roll of super-fine toilet paper which particularly excited the police who are submitting each sheet to chemical tests", the letter says.
The morning after his arrest, Lt Col Clarke's new explanation to British officials was that he had been "taking the feminine garments to a lady in Gibraltar and thought that he would try them on for a prank".
"This hardly squares with the fact that the garments and shoes fitted him."
The police considered the incident a "homosexual affair" punishable by a fine, but the letter warned that the Germans "apparently think they have got on to a first class espionage incident and will certainly make the most of it".
"Jokes have already begun about 'the editor' of the 'Times' masquerading as woman."
Prime Minister Winston Churchill was informed of the incident and orders were given to get Lt Col Clarke to Gibraltar as quickly as possible, indicating both his importance to the War Office and the potential embarrassment that could have been caused.
War Office messages express hope that Lt Col Clarke's military role remains secret and his mission can be continued, because the intelligence information he possesses can only be delivered by him.
But the War Office said: "If he shows signs of mental derangement he should however be sent home by first ship."
Lt Col Clarke was released and ordered to leave Spain within 48 hours. | One of Britain's most influential World War II spies was arrested in Madrid for cross-dressing, files released by the National Archives show. |
37824345 | They say Michael Vance died in the "dramatic" shootout on Sunday night nearly Leedey, west of Oklahoma City.
The 38-year-old suspect earlier in the day shot and wounded a police officer, triggering a police chase.
Last week he posted two Facebook videos after wounding two police officers. He is suspected of killing two relatives.
Vance had indicated he intended to target several people linked to a sexual assault case against him.
"Letting y'all know, look, this is real," the suspect, wearing a blood-soaked shirt, said in one of the Facebook videos, which police believe was filmed inside a police car he had stolen during last week's shooting of the two officers.
"If you want to know what's up next, stay tuned to your local news," said Vance.
He had been recently released from Lincoln County Jail in Oklahoma, where he was being held on an allegation of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl.
Vance, according to the Oklahoman newspaper, had been scheduled to appear in court next month to face the felony charges. | A fugitive double murder suspect who is said to have live-streamed a getaway has been killed in a shootout with police, officials in Oklahoma say. |
28513036 | It said the regulations for the new bidding round for licences - the first in six years - are stricter than before.
And companies applying to frack near beauty spots will have additional obligations.
But some environmental campaigners say the new rules are not tough enough.
Fracking involves blasting water, chemicals and sand at high pressure into shale rock formations to release the gas and oil held inside.
Planning permission may be granted in National Parks, the Broads and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty if "it can be demonstrated they are in the public interest".
Eric Pickles, the communities secretary, will have the right to overturn planning decisions, if they don't satisfy the government's criteria.
But Greenpeace said: "In fact, so far as we can tell, the announcement actually makes it easier for developers to drill in national parks - by giving the communities secretary the automatic right to overrule local authorities who reject an application."
The National Trust gave the move a cautious welcome.
Richard Hebditch, assistant director of External Affairs for the National Trust said in a statement: "We welcome the new planning guidance which makes clear that applications should be refused in these areas other than in exceptional circumstances"
Forty percent of the National Trust's land is in National Parks and it owns large areas of land in other Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
"We hope it will reflect a much more cautious approach that recognises the risks of turning some of the most special places in the country over to industrial scale extraction of shale gas and oil," Mr Hebditch added.
Environmentalists argue that the process can cause contamination of the water supply and earth tremors. The industry rejects these criticisms, claiming that the process can be done safely.
Business and Energy Minister Matthew Hancock said it would be "irresponsible" not to explore the possibilities that shale offers.
"Unlocking shale gas in Britain has the potential to provide us with greater energy security, jobs and growth," he said.
"We must act carefully, minimising risks, to explore how much of our large resource can be recovered to give the UK a new home-grown source of energy."
"Of course there is local opposition in some places," Mr Hancock told the BBC.
"But broadly there is also public support for the argument that we need energy security."
When challenged on the BBC to name a community that is in favour of fracking, he couldn't immediately identify one.
The BBC's chief political correspondent, Norman Smith, said the government has brushed aside suggestions that the announcement on national parks is designed to quell discontent in conservative MPs constituencies, especially in the south east of England.
But campaigners also pointed to political motives.
"Sneaking out the 14th licensing round after MPs have gone off on their summer holidays shows just how politically toxic fracking has become," said Greenpeace UK energy campaigner Simon Clydesdale.
"With MPs in Tory heartlands feeling the heat and all but seven cabinet ministers threatened by drilling in their constituencies, there could be a high political price to pay for this shale steamroller at next year's general election."
Robert Gatliff, science director for energy at the British Geological Survey told the BBC it would still be some time before full scale drilling would start.
"The first stage, you'd review all the data you've got. Then you'd want to drill one or two exploration holes and then take samples of the shale and see exactly what the content is and see which have got the most in and which bits are likely to fracture best to get the most oil out."
An agreement to proceed with drilling would still be subject to planning permission and permits from the Environment Agency.
He said that surveys suggest there is up to 2000 trillion cubic feet of gas embedded under the UK, although "there's no way we'd get all that out."
"If you look at what happens in the US, and that's where you've got to look because that's where they've drilled thousands of holes, they're not getting more than 5%," Mr Gatliff said.
"In Britain we're so crowded and we've got these beautiful areas, that reduces the amount we can get out as well."
Tom Greatrex MP, Labour's Shadow Energy Minister, said: "With 80% of our heating coming from gas and declining North Sea reserves, shale and other unconventional gas may have the potential to form a part of our future energy mix."
But he added: "There are legitimate environmental concerns that must be addressed before extraction is permitted. Robust regulation and comprehensive monitoring are vital to ensure the public acceptability test is met."
In the UK test drilling has taken place in Lancashire and in the West Sussex town of Balcombe where last summer more than 1,000 people protested at a site operated by energy company Cuadrilla.
The north of England is the area containing the largest shale reserves.
The British Geological Survey has also pinpointed south east Scotland as containing significant resources.
The government is keen to promote fracking in the UK, and has already announced a number of incentives to help kick-start the industry, including tax breaks, payments of £100,000 per site plus a 1% share of revenue to local communities.
It argues that shale gas could be an important bridge to help secure energy supplies until renewable energy capacity is increased.
Others argue that while it may be cleaner than coal, it is still a hydrocarbon that emits CO2 linked to global warming.
The BBC's environment analyst Roger Harrabin said: "If environmentalists succeed in stopping fracking in the UK by stirring up local objections they will actually make the greenhouse effect worse in the short term."
"This is because Britain will continue to use gas for heating and as a backup to capricious wind and solar electricity. If the industry can't get British gas it will import liquefied gas - and the energy needed to turn gas liquid makes it worse for the climate than home-produced gas."
In the US, shale gas has caused energy costs to tumble, but questions remain about whether the American shale revolution can be replicated in the UK and elsewhere. | Fracking licences can only be issued for beauty spots in "exceptional circumstances", according to new rules issued by the government. |
38677505 | They talked about what had attracted them to London and "how we can continue to build on that for the future," Mrs May told the BBC's economics editor Kamal Ahmed, in Davos.
Her remarks came as several big banks said they may move staff out of London.
Both HSBC and UBS have said they could relocate about 1,000 jobs.
Mrs May was asked if she was disappointed that it was becoming clear that there was a price to Brexit.
"I want to negotiate a free trade agreement with the European Union which will give us the maximum access, the right deal for Britain, maximum access to the single European market for trading with and operating within that market for both goods and services," she said.
"I think that's not just in the interests of the UK, I think that's in the interests of the European Union as well," she added.
May: UK will lead world on free trade
Bank exodus?
What did Davos make of May's speech?
Mrs May said she had had a "very good positive discussion with banks about the benefits of the City of London, about what it is that has brought them to the City of London and how we can continue to build on that for the future".
There were "huge benefits" for investment in the UK, Mrs May added, which she said had a "fundamentally very strong economy".
She said the service sector was very important to the UK and that she believed that "truly global Britain can bring jobs and prosperity to the UK across the board, including in financial services".
Mrs May was asked if the government might be prepared to give preferential treatment to EU immigrants coming to the UK in exchange for privileged access to the single market.
People who voted for Brexit were voting for "us to take control of our immigration laws for people coming from the EU into the UK", she said.
"We're looking at the various systems that are possible at the moment. The key issue for people in the UK is that we have control, that's it's the government that is deciding our immigration rules," she added.
Earlier, Mrs May told leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos that the UK will be a "world leader" on trade.
But the prime minister also warned that inequality blamed on globalisation was aiding the "politics of division".
Her speech to business leaders and politicians in Switzerland came after EU leaders said a post-Brexit trade deal with the UK would be "difficult".
The prime minister promised that the UK after Brexit would take on a "leadership role as the strongest and most forceful advocate for free markets and free trade anywhere in the world".
She argued for reforms so the global economy created wealth for all, rather than a "privileged few", and "centre-ground mainstream politics" could "work for everyone".
Mrs May said the world was enjoying an "unprecedented level of wealth", but many people felt this was "not working for them".
Global elites needed to tackle the backlash against globalisation, liberalism, and free trade because leaders who "embrace the politics of division and despair" were working to exploit the situation.
Mrs May said: "Talk of greater globalisation can make people fearful. For many it means their jobs outsourced and their wages undercut. It means having to sit back as they watch their communities change around them.
"And in their minds, it means watching as those who prosper seem to play by a different set of rules, while for many life remains a struggle as they get by, but don't necessarily get on." | Prime Minister Theresa May has had "positive discussion" with big banks about how they might be encouraged to keep jobs in the City of London. |
40400072 | Kenny Rogers debuted the song in 2013; and Dolly Parton featured it in her record-breaking set a year later.
Now Barry Gibb, who wrote the song, has made it the centrepiece of his performance at the festival's coveted "legend slot".
It was one of a dozen or more classics from his, and the Bee Gees', catalogue that made it impossible to stand still.
There was a sense of euphoria as he ran through the likes of Tragedy, Jive Talkin' and Night Fever, his falsetto never wavering in the bright afternoon sun.
As has now become tradition in the legend slot, Glastonbury's security team joined the performance, with a choreographed routine to Stayin' Alive that brought a huge smile to Gibb's face.
His triumphant set came a year after Gibb joined Coldplay on the Pyramid Stage for two Bee Gee covers: To Love Somebody and what Chris Martin called "the greatest song of all time", Stayin' Alive.
Gibb had been meant to play the festival that year, but pulled out when a family member fell ill.
The star recently revealed he struggled with appearing on stage by himself, following the death of his brothers Maurice and Robin.
"I don't like being on stage on my own. I miss my brothers. I get nerves being on stage on my own because it is so new to me," he told the Sunday Mirror.
"We would all lean on each other. I'd lean on Maurice and Robin and they would lean on me and somehow we'd get through every show.
"We knew how each other felt. I knew what their opinions were. We were three brothers and it was a democracy.
"We were three brothers who had to agree. If one of them did not like something we did not do it."
Gibb put a picture of his brothers on stage as he performed Nights on Broadway, eliciting a swell of support from the audience.
Several were wearing Barry Gibb masks and one fan passed a gold jacket up to the stage, which Gibb gamely wore for the last 15 minutes of his 75-minute set.
By that point, the crowd was chanting his name - "Barry! Barry! Barry!" - between songs and the star, who is more than 50 years into his career, was visibly touched by their enthusiasm.
"You guys have been the best. Thank you for the experience of a lifetime," he said. "I hope to see you again."
Gibb was followed onto the Pyramid stage by fellow disco legends Chic.
If anything, they drew a larger crowd than Gibb. The hills were full to bursting with flag-waving fans as Nile Rodgers served up a feast of funk.
The set spanned his entire career as a producer and writer, with Chic's Le Freak joined by Sister Sledge's We Are Family and the Diana Ross classic Upside Down.
Rodgers even threw in Daft Punk's Get Lucky (on which he played guitar) and a verse of The Sugar Hill Gang's Rappers' Delight - which sampled Chic's Good Times - for good measure.
As one audience member near us noted, "Chic have just won Glastonbury".
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email [email protected]. | We're calling it: Islands In The Stream has become the unofficial anthem of Glastonbury. |
40615009 | Chelsea leave for China on Monday and manager Antonio Conte has told both players they will not be selected.
Striker Costa, 28, wants to return to Atletico Madrid, even though they are under a transfer ban.
Manchester United have been trying to reach an agreement to sign midfielder Matic, 28.
However, there is also thought to be interest in the Serb from clubs in Italy.
Monaco midfielder Tiemoue Bakayoko is expected to replace Matic in the Chelsea side next season.
It is believed the 22-year-old will complete his move to the Premier League champions in the next few days.
Chelsea open their pre-season programme against Arsenal in Beijing on 22 July before travelling to Singapore for games against Bayern Munich and Inter Milan. | Diego Costa and Nemanja Matic will miss Chelsea's pre-season tour of the Far East amid suggestions that both will leave Stamford Bridge. |
38064527 | The girl was living at a boarding school in the Kharkiv region for orphans and children from broken homes.
Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov reported the case on Facebook, with photos of the 52-year-old teacher and girl. He said police had been monitoring them for four months.
Mr Avakov said the buyer hinted that the girl's organs would be removed.
The buyer inquired about the girl's health and paid the teacher 1,000 hryvnia (£31; $39) for photos of the girl and her medical records, Mr Avakov said.
Ukrainian media have named the suspect as Galina Kovalenko. She teaches the Ukrainian and Russian languages, and literature, and has more than 20 years' teaching experience, they report.
There has been no statement yet from the teacher.
Mr Avakov said "Galina [Kovalenko] worked for nearly a year on her 'business plan' for selling the 13-year-old girl", whom she had singled out as vulnerable.
"They got this seller 'red-handed' - when she took the girl out of the boarding school, brought her to the buyers and received money," Mr Avakov said.
If found guilty, the teacher could be jailed for up to 12 years. Mr Avakov is personally handling the case.
There have been previous reports of criminal gangs preying on destitute people in eastern Europe to harvest their organs. The trade in organs can be highly lucrative.
In 2013, an EU-led court in Kosovo found five people guilty in connection with a human organ-trafficking ring. The five were accused of carrying out dozens of illegal transplants at the Medicus Clinic in the capital, Pristina. | Police in eastern Ukraine have arrested a teacher accused of trying to sell a 13-year-old girl for $10,000 (£8,035). |
26829031 | The board said it had taken the decision to "allow other political views to govern our football".
Last week, President Jose Mujica withdrew police protection from the home stadiums of Penarol and Nacional, Uruguay's most popular teams, following post-match violence.
On Wednesday, Nacional fans fought with police after their team was beaten.
Dozens of officers were injured in clashes with supporters in the capital, Montevideo.
Despite the lack of security following the police withdrawal, the association ordered teams to play their matches as usual. However, the players' union refused.
The association's board wrote in a letter: "The well-publicised acts that have occurred in recent times show the need for [the board to] step aside and allow other political views to govern our football.
"The Executive Board has worked with the sole objective to benefit our football and, today, there is a clear perception that it's an obstacle to continue with this line of work."
Analysts have suggested that Uruguay could be barred from this summer's World Cup in Brazil if world football governing body, Fifa, decides there has been political interference.
But Eugenio Figueredo, the president of South American football's governing body Conmebol, said he did not believe Fifa would take this step.
"I don't think Uruguay's place at the World Cup is at risk," he told Reuters news agency. | The entire board of Uruguay's Football Association has resigned amid a crisis over violence at matches. |
35574801 | City lost 2-1 at home to title rivals Tottenham and lie in fourth, six points off leaders Leicester.
A contentious Harry Kane penalty gave Spurs the lead, before Kelechi Iheanacho equalised, but Christian Eriksen scored the winner late on.
"There is not a chance we will give up on the title. We have to improve," City captain Kompany told BBC Sport.
Report: Spurs clinch dramatic win at Man City
Relive Tottenham's win at Manchester City
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Manuel Pellegrini's side have now lost twice in three Premier League games - against Leicester and Spurs - since announcing the Chilean will be leaving the club in the summer to be replaced by Pep Guardiola.
City have won the title twice in the last four seasons, coming from eight points behind to pip rivals Manchester United on goal difference in 2010-11 and beating Liverpool by two points in 2013-14, having been seven points adrift.
"We probably could have played a little bit better. Until the penalty, the game plan was OK and we were defending well," added centre-back Kompany.
"But we would be stupid to forget our history and how we react in those moments."
City boss Pellegrini was unhappy with referee Mark Clattenburg's decision to award a penalty for the first goal, as the ball hit Raheem Sterling on the back as the winger jumped to block Danny Rose's cross.
"It was the key moment that decided the game," Pellegrini said. "It was the same referee in the first game where they were two clear goals in offside positions and we lost 4-1.
"We are going to continue fighting until the end. We still have 36 points to play for and are only six points behind the leaders. We will not give up and continue working and improving."
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It was a good day for both north London sides as Tottenham followed up Arsenal's last-second victory over Leicester at lunchtime. Both team are now on 51 points, just two behind the Foxes.
"I think that it was a game that was very important. You could feel it was not a normal game and a real test for us. For that we feel very pleased for the players," said Spurs boss Mauricio Pochettino.
Asked if his side can win their first league title since 1961, the Argentine replied: "I don't like to speak abut the future, it is more important for us to keep working hard and to show we can win in this kind of stadium.
"The supporters are right to dream. They show big support from the beginning of the season and I say thank you to them. It is important for our supporters to believe." | Manchester City "would be stupid to forget their history" and not fight for the title, says Vincent Kompany. |
40679934 | Residents on the Shimmer estate in Mexborough, South Yorkshire, were told property valuation details were left on a train.
The rail firm is buying some of the newly-built houses to clear them to make way for the high-speed line.
The blunder was slammed by a local councillor as "unbelievable".
HS2 Ltd apologised to residents for the "distress this has caused".
More on this and other South Yorkshire stories
The BBC understands the documents drawn up by Carter Jonas include the name of occupiers, address and valuations of two properties on the estate.
In addition, there is a list of the estimated values of 15 other properties. Some of the information is already publically available.
The residents affected were informed of the blunder by letter on Thursday.
Local independent councillor Bev Chapman described the loss of the documents as "unbelievable".
"What beggars belief even more is the residents have actually been banned from talking about their own valuations to other residents, to their neighbours," she said.
"So now it's gone public, we've got 17 valuations out there in the public domain."
In a statement, HS2 Ltd said: "As soon as the loss was reported to HS2 Ltd, we worked as quickly as possible to identify the content of the lost documents and to contact those affected.
"We take our responsibility to protect personal data very seriously. We are working with our supplier Carter Jonas to review what happened and explore whether any further protections can be put in place." | Surveyors working on the HS2 rail project lost confidential documents containing personal data of people whose homes are to be demolished. |
38882236 | Seventeen French newsrooms will be involved in the CrossCheck project, with a focus on the French elections.
The news agencies involved include French daily Le Monde, BuzzFeed News and Agence France-Presse.
Germany and the US have already agreed measures with Facebook to help tackle the issue.
The news organisations operating in France will collaborate with the two technology giants to debunk false information amid an increase in pressure in recent weeks to prevent the spread of fraudulent reports.
CrossCheck, a collaborative verification project aimed at helping French voters "make sense of what and who to trust online", will offer users the option to identify and flag news stories as either "real", "satire" or "fake".
The project is supported by both Facebook and Google's News Lab.
Facebook has faced criticism for failing to prevent the republishing of false information on its site during last year's US presidential election campaign.
Concerns have now been raised that false information may be distributed on Facebook or promoted on Google in the build-up to the French presidential election, which takes place in April and May.
Le Monde said on Monday that the CrossCheck project was "an experiment".
Last week, Le Monde introduced a new tool, Decodex, aimed at helping readers check the reliability of information online.
"In a digital world where the traceability of information is often confusing, or deliberately garbled," Le Monde wrote on its website, "[we will] provide everyone with good practices for checking their sources."
In the US, Facebook is providing users with a service that allows them to highlight fake articles on their feeds as a hoax.
Facebook has said that it will also work with organisations such as fact-checking website Snopes, ABC News and the Associated Press to check the authenticity of stories.
Last month, Facebook set up an initiative in Germany, where officials had expressed concerns that online "hate speech" could influence the parliamentary elections in September in which Chancellor Angela Merkel is seeking a fourth term in office. | French journalists are teaming up with Facebook and Google to create a new fact-checking service aimed at tackling the rise of "fake news". |
25507128 | John McCafferty, 71, has surpassed the previous Guinness World Record of 30 years, 11 months and 10 days set by an American man who died in 2009.
Mr McCafferty was told he had five years to live when he underwent the life-saving operation at Harefield Hospital in Middlesex 31 years ago.
He says his record should give hope to others awaiting transplants.
Mr McCafferty, from Newport Pagnell in Buckinghamshire, said: "I want this world record to be an inspiration to anyone awaiting a heart transplant and to those who, like me, have been fortunate enough to have had one.
"My advice is always to be hopeful, to look ahead with a positive mind, and, of course, to follow the expert medical advice."
Mr McCafferty received his new heart on 20 October 1982 in a procedure carried out by world-renowned surgeon Sir Magdi Yacoub.
He had been diagnosed, aged 39, with dilated cardiomyopathy - one of the most common causes of heart failure. It leads to scarring of the heart wall and damage to the muscle, which causes the heart to become weakened and enlarged, preventing it from pumping efficiently.
The first ever successful heart transplant operation was performed in South Africa in 1967 by Prof Christiaan Neethling Barnard and a team of 30 physicians at the Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town. The patient, Louis Washkansky, survived for 18 days with the new heart. | A British man has entered the record books as the world's longest-surviving heart transplant patient. |
33800711 | Wednesday saw the start of the journey for 12 amateur bakers who are vying to be crowned the latest Bake Off winner.
Last year saw the series move from BBC Two to One, and it attracted huge ratings thanks to headline-grabbing incidents such as "Flangate".
A record 12.3 million viewers watched Nancy Birtwhistle win the final.
The opening episode in 2014 was watched by 7.2 million people, while the previous year's premiere was seen by 5.6 million.
Last night 43% of all TV viewers were watching Bake Off, with a peak viewing figure of 10 million at 20:50 BST. The overnight figures are likely to rise once the consolidated figures are released, which add views from time-shifted and catch-up services.
The series premiere saw musician Stuart Henshall become the first contestant to leave, as his Madeira sponge, walnut cake and Black Forest gateau failed to impress judges Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood.
His failure was compounded by the fact that another contestant's signature bake completely collapsed after her chocolate mousse did not set. Dorret Conway's sunken gateau brought on the first tears of the series.
The Great British Bake Off is hosted by Sue Perkins and Mel Giedroyc, who in part are responsible for the popularity of the show, winning praise for their funny and caring presenting style.
Perkins returned to Twitter yesterday following a four-month sabbatical prompted by a barrage of hateful tweets over rumours she would take over Top Gear.
"Bake Off Series 6 spoiler! Format change means all-new Swimwear Round replaces Showstopper Challenge. (And hello BTW, I've missed you xx)," she wrote ahead of the premiere.
Meanwhile, Ladbrokes has suspended betting on the show after a flurry of wagers sparked fears the winner's name may have been leaked.
"A run of bets" was placed for one contestant, many at shops in the Ipswich area, the bookmaker said. | The return of BBC One's The Great British Bake Off attracted 9.3 million viewers - more than two million up on last year's opening episode. |
29279988 | The Scottish FA bid for Glasgow to be one of the 13 cities that will stage games during the competition, which marks the 60th anniversary of the European confederation.
"It's fantastic news for Scotland and for Scottish football," said SFA chief executive Stewart Regan.
Hampden will stage three group stage games and one last 16 match.
Wembley Stadium in London was chosen to host the semi-finals and final.
Ireland's Dublin Arena was also selected to host games, but Wales' Millennium Stadium was not.
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Glasgow was the last of the host cities to be revealed at the announcement in Geneva.
"As we got to that final ball I thought 'this is between us or Cardiff' and when (Uefa president) Michel Platini lifted the first corner out of the envelope and I saw the 'G' I nearly leapt out of my seat," Regan told BBC Sport.
"You know what kind of party Glasgow can put on.
"If you look back at the Commonwealth Games, the people of Glasgow will make it a great party.
"In 2020 we have the opportunity for some of our kids at our performance schools to get right the way through the age groups to the national team at Hampden Park for a tournament that we qualify for.
"That is the vision and there is a lot of work to put in to getting us there."
Munich (Germany), Baku (Azerbaijan), Rome (Italy), St Petersburg (Russia), Bilbao (Spain), Bucharest (Romania), Brussels (Belgium), Budapest (Hungary), Copenhagen (Denmark) and Amsterdam (Netherlands) are the other cities that will host games as part of Euro 2020.
Stockholm, Skopje, Jerusalem, Sofia and Minsk were the other cities to miss out.
Uefa president Michel Platini, who was behind the idea to share the tournament across Europe as part of the 60th anniversary celebrations, revealed the successful bidders in Geneva on Friday. | Hampden has been chosen to host games as part of the European Championships in 2020, Uefa has confirmed. |
39720744 | Michael Johnson killed 70-year-old Trevor Hadlow in Gillingham, Kent, on 20 November, 2016.
The 18-year-old was also found guilty of dangerous driving for a separate incident a few months before, when he ploughed his car into a traffic warden.
Body-cam footage caught the moment Johnson accelerated into David Drury.
Johnson, of Shannon Place, Sheerness, Kent, pleaded guilty to manslaughter whilst committing the theft of a trailer, but was also on trial over the traffic warden incident, in which he pleaded not guilty on two charges.
Earlier, the jury decided unanimously on a guilty conviction for dangerous driving, but not guilty on the charge of attempting to cause Grievous Bodily Harm (GBH).
The conclusion of the trial means Johnson's conviction over the death of Mr Hadlow can now be reported.
On 20 November 2016 Johnson drove a white Peugeot van on to a farm in Capstone Road, Gillingham, and hitched up the trailer.
Mr Hadlow lived and worked on the site as a handyman. He saw Johnson and closed the gate to stop him but Johnson drove straight at him and left.
The pensioner managed to get back to his caravan but collapsed and died from his injuries. His body was discovered two days later.
Four months prior to this Johnson drove his car into the traffic warden in Eastchurch High Street on the Isle of Sheppey.
On 8 July David Drury had asked Johnson to move his car from lines next to a pedestrian crossing.
As Mr Drury began printing a parking ticket Johnson accelerated, mounted the pavement and drove at the warden.
Kent Police connected the two incidents while Johnson was in custody over Mr Hadlow's death.
Johnson has been remanded in custody and will be sentenced for both offences on 16 June 2017. | A motorist who mowed down a pensioner while stealing a trailer from a farm has been convicted of manslaughter at Maidstone Crown Court. |
35473552 | Tata Motors said that "as a socially responsible company", it had decided to rebrand the vehicle.
The car will go on show at a motor show in Delhi on Wednesday under its old name, but Tata will announce a new name "after a few weeks".
The Zika virus has now reached more than 20 countries and territories.
The World Health Organization declared on Monday that it posed an international health emergency requiring a united response.
The infection has been linked to cases of microcephaly, in which babies are born with underdeveloped brains.
Currently, there is no vaccine or medication to stop Zika. The only way to avoid catching it is to avoid getting bitten by the Aedes mosquitoes that transmit the infection.
Tata intended to name its vehicle Zica, short for Zippy Car, but has now decided that the name is too close to that of the virus.
Until now, Tata Motors has been best known for its budget Nano cars, although it also owns the Jaguar and Land Rover brands.
The new Zica car, promoted with an advertising campaign starring Argentine footballer Lionel Messi, was seen as Tata's attempt to take its brand upmarket. | Indian carmaker Tata Motors is to rename its forthcoming Zica hatchback after the similarly-named Zika virus sparked a global health emergency. |
30972854 | Police and Crime Commissioner Alun Michael said the money - an extra 11 to 15p per week for most households - would safeguard policing levels.
He added South Wales Police remained the lowest cost to tax payers of the Welsh forces.
The increase for the next financial year will raise an extra £5m.
Mr Michael said it would help the force as it faced £9m of cuts this year and £27m over the next four years.
It comes as tax payers in Dyfed-Powys will see a 5% drop in their police bill - a saving of £10 a year for the average band D household.
However North Wales Police's bill is set to go up by 3.44% and Gwent's will rise by 3.99%. | People living in the South Wales Police area will see a 5% increase in the amount they pay for policing - the highest rise of all four Welsh forces. |
35514306 | The Foxes' richly-deserved 3-1 victory in the battle of the top two at Etihad Stadium put them five points clear at the top of the Premier League and installed them as title favourites with every bookmaker.
And it stripped away the last shield keeping Leicester under the radar, despite Ranieri's masterpiece of expectation management this season.
The manner in which Leicester came to Manchester and won so convincingly on their biggest test of the season was designed to make even the doubters believe.
It was an emphatic and mature performance that confirmed the tide of opinion is turning. Leicester are no longer viewed as plucky underdogs but as a club in position to make history.
Leicester can no longer portray themselves as being on a fantasy ride with nothing to lose at the end - there should now be disappointment if they do not win the title.
So how will Leicester handle that potent mixture of pressure and expectation?
Former Norwich City striker Chris Sutton outlined the dangers of underdogs being thrust to the front and feeling the weight of expectation.
He recalled how Norwich City let an unlikely title chance slip in the 1992-93 season when they were a point clear with only six games left.
Sutton told BBC Sport: "The longer you stay up there, and the closer you get to seeing it through, the harder it gets. We got through March and were back on the top of the table and it hit us. All of a sudden we started thinking about whether we could actually do it.
"Everywhere we went in Norwich, people would ask 'can we win it?' We were thinking 'how are we still in the race?' We started to wonder 'what if we do win it?'
"It was a kind of pressure that was new to all of us - the manager Mike Walker and the players - and we faltered at the big moments," he added.
"We had two crunch games before Easter against the two other teams challenging and although we beat Aston Villa we lost at home to Manchester United, who had just gone four games without a win."
United went on to win the title and Norwich City finished third.
Leicester forward Riyad Mahrez said: "We're just going to keep dreaming, We're going to fight for the title and see what we can do."
The pinch points may arrive - but there has not been a trace of evidence yet to suggest Leicester will crack.
BBC Radio 5 live In Short: Leicester City: Champions League to Championship?
The change in perception of Leicester City was emphasised when the title odds dropped moments after the win at Etihad Stadium and the Foxes were favourites with all major bookies.
Ranieri, playing the game he has perfected this season, was ready with the bucket of iced water, saying: "I don't believe them. They said I was first to be sacked - but I hope one time they are right."
The tag of bookies' favourites is only an outside pressure and Leicester have dealt immaculately with any examination they have been presented with this season.
The questions were asked after the Boxing Day defeat at Liverpool - and yet they responded with a fine performance in a home goalless draw against Manchester City.
The FA Cup third-round loss at home to Spurs was followed by a thunderous 3-0 win at home to Stoke City - and when the biggest question of all was asked by Manuel Pellegrini's expensively assembled squad on Saturday, the response could not have been more convincing.
Ranieri's message was always about reaching 40 points and safety - but such has been the transformation in Leicester's fortunes that he is now fending off title talk.
The 64-year-old Italian is a hugely popular figure, a symbol for every neutral's hope that Leicester can fight off the big-spending superpowers and write the final chapter to the most remarkable tale in Premier League history.
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He has maintained a relaxed air throughout the season, offering his players pizza in exchange for clean sheets and deflecting pressure on to Leicester's rivals.
Ranieri was at it again on Saturday, saying: "I don't want to think about if we win. But we are alive and we want to fight. We know it's a crazy league and we have to try. We enjoy it and we fight without pressure. The fans must continue to dream."
For the man who was sacked by Greece after a home defeat by Faroe Islands in the Euro 2016 qualifiers, Ranieri will have to deal with a different type of stress as Leicester City are locked on course for one of football's most remarkable achievements.
Yes they can - and no matter where they finish there will not be enough humble pie to go around for naysayers such as myself, who predicted relegation back in August after Ranieri replaced sacked Nigel Pearson.
These were some of my words that will be eaten: "Ranieri's appointment is, at best, left field and at worst uninspiring and unwise. A charming man but perhaps one out of time with the Premier League, having last worked there with Chelsea in 2004 and having had a chequered career since."
Well that went well - although I was not alone. Now Leicester City are being carried along on a wave of national goodwill, with just about every neutral willing them on.
Five points clear with 13 games left is a wonderful position to be in and there is no team playing better than Leicester City in the Premier League.
It is not simply "the pinnacle of the iceberg", as Ranieri calls lethal strike pair Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez, who are excelling. This is a complete team effort.
Wes Morgan and Robert Huth, who scored two at Etihad Stadium, present a formidable defensive barrier in front of keeper Kasper Schmeichel, while the outstanding midfielder N'Golo Kante is arguably the bargain of the season at £6m from Caen.
If there were any weaknesses in Leicester's armoury they might have surfaced on Saturday against a Manchester City team unbeaten in seven games before kick-off.
And yet they played with drive, conviction and confidence from the moment Huth put them in front, mixing defensive defiance with those lightning counter-attacks that have punctuated their season.
Yes they can with the title - and Leicester City are playing as if they believe they can.
The first answer is simple. Leicester are the Premier League's form team and have a healthy lead. While others such as Manchester City and Arsenal falter, they are standing strong.
Leicester, crucially, have no distractions. They can focus solely on the Premier League, while Arsenal and Manchester City have Champions League and domestic cup commitments.
And what about their fixture list? Seven of their remaining games are at home and they will regard all as eminently winnable.
After Arsenal away next weekend - and who is to say they cannot win there - they have the confidence to pick up points anywhere on their travels, although they face tough trips to Manchester United on Saturday 30 April and then to Chelsea on the final day of the season.
There would be delicious irony in Ranieri standing in front of Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich, the man who sacked him in 2004, as a Premier League champion.
Who will bet against it? Not, it seems, the bookies. | Leicester City's win at Manchester City - the most significant result so far in what is becoming a stunning story - means there is no hiding place for manager Claudio Ranieri's side. |
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