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40,441,978 | The Turkish Kebab House takeaway on the Beersbridge Road was targeted overnight.
The incident happened between 00:00 and 07:30 BST on Thursday, police said.
They are treating the incident as a racially-motivated hate crime.
East Belfast MLA Andy Allen condemned the "deplorable attack".
"The individuals responsible are not representative of the wider community of east Belfast," said the UUP assembly member.
"Such actions are not wanted and I would appeal to anyone who saw anything suspicious in the area or has any information to contact the PSNI."
PUP councillor John Kyle said the graffiti was particularly disappointing in light of progress made in terms of assimilating newcomers and residents from different ethnic backgrounds.
"Racism undermines communities, shows distrust and fear and should be opposed on every occasion," he said. | Police are investigating after a takeaway restaurant in east Belfast was daubed with anti-Islamic graffiti. |
37,037,942 | Four lorries and four cars were involved, also injuring 12 people, one with life-threatening injuries.
One man was flown to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford by air ambulance, and two were taken by land ambulance.
The crash took place on the A34 northbound between Chieveley and West Ilsley in Berkshire. One man has been arrested on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving.
BBC Berkshire travel latest
The detained man is currently in police custody and police are appealing for witnesses to come forward.
Inspector Andy Storey said: "All motorists should avoid the area, use alternative routes and await further updates before attempting to travel on this route.
"We appreciate motorists' patience while we deal with this incident."
The fatal crash took place at 17.10 BST, and there are currently six-mile tailbacks on the northbound carriage.
The southbound carriageway was closed to allow the air ambulance to land, but has since reopened. | Four people have been killed in an eight-vehicle crash on the A34. |
36,072,023 | Last month, the UK and US governments agreed that material could be exchanged, with the UK receiving a type of uranium used to diagnose cancer.
The NDA is funding improvement work to enhance the runway at Wick John O'Groats Airport.
The airport is about 30 miles (48km) from the Dounreay nuclear site.
Under the UK-US deal, it has been proposed that highly enriched uranium (HEU) stored at Dounreay be sent to the US.
The NDA said flying the material was among options being considered, but also said no decisions have been taken.
A spokeswoman for the NDA said: "The protection of the public and personnel is of paramount importance at all times. For those reason we are unable to disclose information about the transport arrangement that's could jeopardise the security of this material.
"It has been proposed that a quantity of HEU may be exchanged with the US in return for material to be used in the production of medical isotopes for Europe.
"The upgrades to the airport in Wick will be done to ensure that this is one possible option to allow the transport to take place."
A spokesman for Wick John O'Groats Airport, which is operated by Highlands and Islands Airport Limited, said: "Work will get under way later this month on a project to refurbish the runway at Wick John O'Groats Airport in order to enhance its operational capability and, in particular, its ability to accommodate larger aircraft.
"This work will be carried out on behalf of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. The majority of work will be carried out overnight and the project is expected to be completed in August."
Radioactive material from the civil nuclear industry has been transported by plane in the past, the NDA said.
A spokesman for the authority added that funding improvements to the airport near Wick secured "the option of moving material by air on a range of aircraft".
The Dounreay nuclear power complex is being decommissioned and the site cleaned up.
Most of the radioactive materials, such as fuel, held there is being moved to other locations, including Sellafield in Cumbria where it will be reprocessed or stored.
These shipments are being made by rail.
Over a period of four years, 150 tonnes of waste held at Dounreay were transported in 21 shipments to Belgium by sea.
In October 2014, a fire broke out on a ship involved in this work and it began drifting in the Outer Moray Firth.
The MV Parida was transporting a cargo of cemented radioactive waste when a fire broke out in a funnel.
The blaze was extinguished, but 52 workers were taken from the nearby Beatrice oil platform by helicopter as a precaution.
The cargo ship was towed to Invergordon for repairs before completing its journey to Antwerp.
The NDA said at the time that the ship and its cargo had been categorised at the lowest level of safety concern. | The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) has said radioactive material could potentially be flown to and from Scotland and the US. |
29,712,453 | More than one in 10 three-year-olds in England have rotten teeth.
In some parts of the country, as many as half of five-year-olds have decayed, missing or filled teeth.
NICE's new guidelines for England say nurseries and schools should consider introducing supervised tooth-brushing and fluoride varnishing programmes.
Prof Mike Kelly, director of the Centre for Public Health at NICE, said: "Children, as young as three, are being condemned to a life with rotten teeth, gum disease and poor health going into adulthood.
"Many children have poor diets and poor mouth hygiene because there is misunderstanding about the importance of looking after children's early milk teeth and gums," he added.
Nurseries and primary schools should supervise tooth-brushing in areas with a high level of child tooth decay, the advisory body said.
Tooth decay in children and adults is disproportionately higher in disadvantaged areas, as well for vulnerable people, and in some ethnic minorities, NICE said.
After local authorities identify areas that would benefit, free toothbrushes and fluoride toothpaste should be handed out to parents and carers for use at school and at home, it advises.
If a supervised tooth-brushing scheme is not feasible, children's teeth should be painted with fluoride varnish at least twice a year to strengthen teeth, NICE added.
A recent Public Health England survey found that 12% of three-year-olds had suffered from rotten teeth.
In one area - Leicester - 34% of children had tooth decay.
Part of the issue is that many parents don't recognise that they should take steps against tooth decay, according to health consultant Mandy Murdoch, who was part of the team that developed the guidelines.
"Many people believe that the health of a child's first teeth does not matter as 'they will fall out anyway'," she said.
"However, severe tooth decay at a young age can have negative consequences in later life."
Rotten teeth, aside from being painful for the child, can lead to higher incidences of oral health problems later in life.
Thousands of children have to undergo general anaesthetic to have teeth out, said Prof Elizabeth Kay, foundation dean for the Peninsula Dental School, Plymouth.
"Around 25,000 young children every year are admitted to hospital to have teeth taken out," she said.
"Given that we know how to prevent dental disease this really should not be happening," Prof Kay added.
Poor oral hygiene in adults has been linked to increased gum disease, tooth loss, and oral cancers.
The British Dental Association said that there were "still unacceptable inequalities which need to be tackled" in people's dental health.
Dr Christopher Allen, chairman of the BDA's dental public health committee, welcomed the NICE guidelines.
However, he added: "It's important that local authorities have access to specialist dental health advice to ensure that the interventions chosen are the most appropriate for the needs of the population."
Dr Allen added that water fluoridation programmes would be a more efficient means of strengthening people's teeth.
Only around six million people in the UK have access to fluoridated water, the BDA said. | Schools and nurseries need to step in to tackle the worrying trend of tooth decay in children, the advisory body NICE has said. |
37,476,484 | The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health's (RCPCH) analysis showed the Welsh NHS was performing relatively poorly in a number of key areas.
It suggested Wales was lagging behind in providing follow-up assessments.
The Welsh Government said there had been steady improvements.
The audit, based on 2015 figures, said premature babies had a follow-up appointment aged two in only 31% of cases - compared to 60% across Wales, England and Scotland.
The report also showed 14% of eligible babies in Wales were not screened on time for retinopathy - a potentially serious eye condition which is a complication of being born prematurely.
It said 8% did not appear to get screened at all for the condition - the average across the three nations was 2%.
At the time of discharge, 43% of eligible babies in Wales were feeding with mother's milk - a decrease from 46% in 2014. Breast milk contains antibodies that can help premature babies fight off infections.
In 20% of cases, parents in Wales did not have a consultation with a senior member of the neonatal team within 24 hours of a baby being admitted, though the average was 12% across the board.
But the neonatal network in Wales appears to be performing relatively well in making sure antenatal steroids are given to mothers before giving birth prematurely - which reduces the chance of breathing difficulties and other serious complications.
A Welsh Government spokesman said: "Welsh units are performing comparably in most areas and within the expected standards for a number of the audit measures.
"All neonatal units in Wales will need to consider the findings of this report and develop local action plans to address any identified shortfalls in standards."
It said an initiative to improve breastfeeding for neonates had already started.
Neonatal units in Wales are performing close to the average in making sure babies have the correct body temperature.
Despite the concerns, the RCPCH said many units in Wales were providing "good care" but urged them to work in partnership to drive up standards.
Dr Roshan Adappa, clinical representative for Wales on the audit project board, said: "Wales has the lowest rates for feeding with a mother's milk.
"It has the highest percentage of babies for whom no eye screening data at all was entered and has, by some way, the lowest rates for recording of follow-up data at a child's two-year health check."
The Welsh Government launched a policy on Monday to ensure every child up to the age of seven receives consistent and universal health services in Wales.
In July this year the charity Bliss said neonatal services across Wales were overstretched and more than half did not have enough medical staff to meet national standards.
The Welsh Government said £85m was being spent on training staff. | The Welsh NHS needs to tackle a number of "shortfalls" in the care being provided for sick and premature newborn babies, an annual audit has concluded. |
39,640,664 | The statue was due to be erected in the Market Square area of Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, in September.
It has been put back because of temporary scaffolding at the site for the town's North Waterside development.
Campaigner David Stopps said it was "frustrating" but he was hopeful the statue would be in place by March 2018.
The proposed site, under the arches in Market Square, was referenced by Bowie in Five Years, the opening track of The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders from Mars album.
Mr Stopps said there was a possibility it may be erected in a temporary location between September and March.
The statue will be called 'Earthly Messenger,' a reference to a quote from an interview by Bowie with Rolling Stone in 1973 when he said: "Ziggy himself was not an alien, just the earthly messenger for the Starman".
Bowie performed as Ziggy during gigs at the town's Friars music venue in the early 1970s.
He also played a gig at the club in September 1971 when he gave his debut performance of Hunky Dory.
More than 650 people pledged sums totalling more than £100,000 to Crowdfund the statue.
Mr Stopps said: "We could have called it the Bowie statue, but we wanted it to be distinctive. It will be the first Bowie statue in the world.
"The developers have had to put the scaffolding up as a health and safety provision.
"The delay is frustrating as we are on schedule to get it finished by September, but we can't do much about it." | The installation of a David Bowie statue set to go up in the town where he first performed as Ziggy Stardust has been delayed. |
39,366,871 | Three people have been arrested following the death in hospital on Wednesday of a man aged in his 40s - the latest linked to the inquiry.
A man and a woman, both 37, from the Stockton area also died after taking the drug, on 3 March.
In February, three people died in the space of a week after taking the drug, Cleveland Police said.
The force said it was advising drug users to take "extra precautions" and was working with agencies to find the supplier of the drugs.
Two women, aged 30 and 33, and a man aged 26 were detained on suspicion of administering a noxious substance, in connection with the latest death.
Det Insp Jon Tapper said: "I would reiterate that, whilst we don't advocate that anyone should buy any type of drugs, there are still batches of particularly harmful heroin in Stockton which are being peddled by dealers.
"Lives are being put at risk by accepting this particularly dangerous heroin and, sadly, there has been a further death in the area. We are concerned and would urge drug users to take extra precautions." | The deaths of six people have been linked to a batch of low grade heroin that has been circulating on Teesside. |
35,569,905 | The Scottish government acted after an inquiry into a serious Clostridium difficile (C. diff) outbreak.
Regulations have been put before Holyrood which would let Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) inspectors close wards to protect patients.
Health Secretary Shona Robison said the powers would be "a last resort".
A review of care at Vale of Leven Hospital in West Dunbartonshire found that C. diff was a factor in the deaths of 34 out of 143 patients who tested positive for the infection in 2007 and 2008.
Lord MacLean said NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde had "badly let down" patients, with the board apologising unreservedly for its "terrible failure".
The new system, announced by the government in 2015 and now set to go before MSPs, would see inspectors have the power to intervene and shut wards down in response to safety concerns ranging from cleanliness to staffing levels.
Ms Robison said Scotland had a "very robust scrutiny and inspection regime", with HIS carrying out almost 100 inspections each year.
She said: "Protecting patient safety is of critical importance and that is why we want to go further and give HIS the powers to close hospital wards if they consider it necessary.
"Let me be clear that this would only ever be used as a last resort, and in the majority of cases we would expect HIS to work with health boards to put in place improvements on wards first.
"But on the very rare occasions that inspectors have concerns about the safety of patients on a ward, they should have the powers to take firm and direct action."
The OECD has recommended stronger scrutiny of Scotland's health system amid fears HIS could "mark its own homework", calling for better arrangements for dealing with mistakes and poor performance. | Inspectors could be given powers to close hospital wards to new patients from April, if the move is approved by MSPs. |
33,833,958 | Richard Lochhead said the Scottish government was not prepared to "gamble" with the future of the country's £14bn food and drink sector.
He is to request that Scotland be excluded from any European consents for the cultivation of GM crops.
But farming leaders said they were disappointed by the move.
Under EU rules, GM crops must be formally authorised before they can be cultivated.
An amendment came into force earlier this year which allows member states and devolved administrations to restrict or ban the cultivation of genetically modified organisms within their territory.
Mr Lochhead said Scotland's request for opt-outs from GM crop consent would cover an EU approved variety of genetically modified maize and six other GM crops that are awaiting authorisation.
He said that Scotland was known around the world for its "beautiful natural environment" and banning the growing of genetically modified crops would protect and further enhance its "clean, green status".
Mr Lochhead added: "There is no evidence of significant demand for GM products by Scottish consumers and I am concerned that allowing GM crops to be grown in Scotland would damage our clean and green brand, thereby gambling with the future of our £14bn food and drink sector.
"Scottish food and drink is valued at home and abroad for its natural, high quality which often attracts a premium price, and I have heard directly from food and drink producers in other countries that are ditching GM because of a consumer backlash."
The announcement was welcomed by Scottish Green MSP Alison Johnstone, who agreed that the cultivation of GM crops would harm the country's environment and reputation for high quality food and drink.
But she called on ministers to go further by challenging big retailers to improve their labelling to show whether meat, eggs and dairy products come from animals fed on GM feed.
The move has also been broadly welcomed by environment groups.
But Scott Walker, chief executive of farming union NFU Scotland, said he was disappointed that the Scottish government had decided that no GM crops should ever be grown in Scotland.
"Other countries are embracing biotechnology where appropriate and we should be open to doing the same here in Scotland," he said.
"These crops could have a role in shaping sustainable agriculture at some point and at the same time protecting the environment which we all cherish in Scotland."
Huw Jones, professor of molecular genetics at agricultural science group Rothamsted Research, said the announcement was a "sad day for science and a sad day for Scotland.
He said that GM crops approved by the EU were "safe for humans, animals and the environment". | Scotland is to ban the growing of genetically modified crops, the country's rural affairs secretary has announced. |
30,819,561 | Mayor Rahman and his party face claims of corrupt practices and exerting undue spiritual influence on voters.
A file obtained by the BBC now provides a raft of detail on the allegations Mr Rahman faces in court next month.
The mayor and his party Tower Hamlets First deny any wrongdoing.
The evidence will be heard over several weeks at the High Court by Richard Mawrey QC. He has the power to order a recount or ban the mayor from public office for up to five years.
Part of the Statement of Case, collated by the members of the public who brought the legal action, details an array of alleged misdeeds in the run-up to the election last May, when he was re-elected as mayor.
It claims that in April last year, 30 council employees were asked to a meeting at a Bangladeshi restaurant.
The document continues: "During the meeting both council managers and agents of the First Respondent [Mayor Rahman] instructed each of those attending to obtain 100 votes each for the First Respondent; and informed them that, if they did not do so, they may lose their jobs.
"It was made clear that these votes should be obtained by illegal means, including through postal voting fraud."
The petitioners allege that at another restaurant meeting in the period: "The First Respondent attended together with all or almost all the Tower Hamlets First candidates for the Council elections and some activists.
"The First Respondent told all assembled activists that they must fill up to 250 postal vote application forms each.
"Each of the persons at the meeting was then given a bundle of 250 postal vote application forms."
A spokesman for Mr Rahman denied either meeting ever happened.
The documents also claim Mr Rahman and his party tried to exert undue spiritual influence over voters, which is illegal.
They state that a letter was published by a newspaper in Bengali with a circulation in the borough of about 20,000 entitled "Be United Against Injustice; Make Lutfur Rahman Victorious".
This was signed by 101 leaders of the Islamic community in the borough, including chairmen of Mosques and the head teachers of religious schools.
The petitioners allege the effect was to indicate that a vote against Mayor Rahman would be un-Islamic and sinful.
They claim Mr Rahman corruptly attempted to influence these religious leaders by giving them grants of public money ranging from £8,000 to £25,000, alleging that a total of £278,000 was given out in this way.
A spokesman for the mayor responded: "At no point did religious authority figures use spiritual coercion to procure votes. We believe such claims to be entirely spurious.
"Unless we are now in the business of disenfranchising the Muslim community, local leaders have a right to canvass for their preferred candidate."
There are also claims that during the count corrupt council officers deliberately miscounted votes.
The documents state: "In one instance a bundle of ballot papers purportedly containing only votes cast for the First Respondent was assembled by corrupt members of the counting staff and actually consisted mostly of votes for other candidates, with only the top few ballot papers containing votes for the First Respondent."
A spokesman for the mayor said: "All these allegations are characterised by an utter lack of substantial evidence.
"The police and Electoral Commission have already investigated and found nothing of merit, as has been the case when similar allegations have been made in the past by politicians.
"It is a shame that some elements of the local political establishment cannot cope with losing a free and fair election."
Tower Hamlets Council has made no comment.
Mr Rahman was previously Labour leader in the borough, before leaving during a split within the local party. He received 43.38% of first preference votes in May's election.
Numerous functions of the council have since been taken over by government commissioners after a report found numerous financial failings and what Communities Secretary Eric Pickles called a "culture of cronyism" within the authority. | Employees of Tower Hamlets Council were warned they may lose their jobs if they did not each illegally obtain 100 votes for Mayor Lutfur Rahman, according to court documents seen by BBC London. |
32,930,209 | Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) said the force had "fragile" staffing levels and needed to "implement improvement plans rapidly".
Inspectors visited the force after criticising its response to government spending cuts last year.
Police and Crime Commissioner Olly Martins said the report was "out of date".
In the HMIC's Policing in Austerity: Meeting the Challenge report last year, Bedfordshire Police was judged to be "requiring improvement".
Inspectors, who said the force would be "monitored closely", returned in October and found it was not performing well compared to similar forces.
It highlighted problems in the force control room, although said these should be improved by a recent increase in staff.
The report described staffing levels as "fragile but improving" and said although there had been recruitment, it was not clear what investment the force had made in preventive work to reduce demand.
"There is a concern that it may not be tackling longer-term issues," the report said.
Inspectors said it needed to implement its plans for improving policing in "an affordable way more quickly" while ensuring its service "remains effective".
However, they said the force was "moving in the right direction and the pace of change is increasing".
Mr Martins said: "All that publishing out-of-date snapshots of a force, such as today's report does, is potentially undermine police force morale and mislead the public.
"When HMIC have already made their subsequent inspection it frankly seems incompetent, to say the least, to still publish a report that's seven months out of date."
HMIC said it had made a further assessment in March and would be returning in May and July. | Concerns over the service provided by Bedfordshire Police have been raised by the constabulary watchdog. |
37,417,712 | Four have been told by the Consumer Council for Water (CCWater) to report back by the end of October to explain what they are doing to cut complaints.
Southern Water was the worst performer for the fourth year running, with 10.3% increase in complaints in 2015/2016.
The others were Bournemouth, Affinity and Dwr Cymru Welsh Water.
Across the industry, billing and charges, including debt recovery, accounted for just over 60% of written complaints in the last year.
Southern, which serves Kent, Sussex, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, received about 77 complaints per 10,000 connections - more than double the industry average of 33.7.
Written complaints to Dwr Cymru increased by 115.1%, while Bournemouth Water's increased by 90.6%.
Affinity Water, which covers parts of Bedfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Surrey, west London, Kent and Essex, saw an increase of 82.3%.
Overall, 10 out of the 21 water companies in England and Wales saw an increase in written complaints in 2015-16.
Complaints have been going down in recent years but it is feared the trend could start to reverse.
The overall number of written complaints to the industry fell for an eighth year, but by only 0.5% to 106,196.
"We can't allow the good progress that has been made by the industry in recent years to be reversed," said Tony Smith, chief executive of CCWater.
"That's why we have asked four of the poorest performing companies to report to us by the end of October."
Southern said it was disappointed in its performance but this had been improving since November.
It said the number of complaints received about water services was among the lowest in the industry but billing complaints pushed it into the bottom spot.
"So far this year, we have received approximately half the number of complaints we did in the first five months of 2015," said director Simon Oates.
"We are pleased to report back to CCW next month, and are confident the figures we submit will show a marked reduction in the number of complaints." | Customer complaints have increased at almost half the water companies in England and Wales, with some seeing "alarming" surges, a watchdog has said. |
38,362,307 | David Goodall was ordered to work from home next year after his presence at Western Australia's Edith Cowan University was deemed a safety risk.
But the university has now found an alternative workspace.
Australia's oldest working scientist, Dr Goodall has produced more than 100 research papers in an ecology career spanning 70 years.
He is currently an unpaid honorary research associate.
After two decades at Edith Cowan University, Dr Goodall was told in August to pack up his office when staff raised concerns about his safety.
It was another setback for the ecologist, who was recently forced to give up theatre when his declining vision prevented him from driving to rehearsals.
The university confirmed "better" office space has been found at a campus closer to Dr Goodall's residence.
"I am pleased we have found a solution that will ensure David can continue to be based at ECU," vice-chancellor Steve Chapman told the BBC.
Dr Goodall said he was grateful the university was able to accommodate him.
"I hope to continue with some useful work in my field in so far as my eyesight permits," he told the ABC.
"But I still think the emphasis on safety was unnecessary." | A 102-year-old scientist has won a battle to keep working on campus at an Australian university. |
36,519,766 | The software giant will pay $196 a share - a premium of almost 50% to Friday's closing share price.
The deal will help Microsoft boost sales of its business and email software.
Microsoft said that LinkedIn would retain its "distinct brand, culture and independence".
Ben Wood, head of research at CCS Insight, said the deal would give Microsoft access to the world's biggest professional social network with more than 430 million members worldwide.
Watch: LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman's business secrets
"That's a valuable asset that can be deeply integrated with a number of Microsoft assets such as Office 365, Exchange and Outlook. That said, Microsoft has stated that the company will continue to operate as an independent business, so we'll have to see how deeply the integration occurs," Mr Wood said.
Ever had one of those annoying LinkedIn emails inviting you to "endorse" a contact for some skill or another? Perhaps LinkedIn chief executive Jeff Weiner and its founder Reid Hoffman deserve to be endorsed for salesmanship after today's deal.
After a tricky period in which the shares have fallen amid widening losses, they have persuaded Microsoft to make its biggest deal. The software giant is paying a 50% premium on Friday's closing share price to buy LinkedIn, a price which amounts to $250 (£170) for every active user. To put that into context, that's about the market value of Sky, or eight times as much as Daily Mail owner DMGT - and they are both profitable.
But this deal is about more than money: it is meant as a powerful signal of where Satya Nadella is now taking Microsoft. He sees its future as a cloud computing business providing all sorts of professional services to clients - including a social network to connect them to each other.
"We are trying to ride the wave of the new technologies," Mr Nadella told me from Seattle. "It's about AI, it's about mobile, it's about cloud and we're trying to bring those things together."
However, the deal to buy Nokia's mobile phones division had a similar logic - and the entire value of that purchase was written off just a year later. So Microsoft's investors may look at that $26bn price tag nervously, while anyone with a few LinkedIn shares may be using the network to send a message of congratulations to their board.
Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella said he had long admired LinkedIn: "I have been thinking about this for a long time."
The deal was "key to our bold ambition to reinvent productivity and business processes", he added.
The company planned a different approach to integrating LinkedIn to preserve its culture and brand, Mr Nadella said: "That's what's going to be very very different about this."
Microsoft had a long record of successfully integrating acquisitions, he explained, citing Minecraft - the video game whose maker it bought in 2014 for $2.5bn - as well as its very first purchase: the presentation software PowerPoint for $14m in 1987.
LinkedIn shares soared 47%, or $61.50, to $192.60 in New York following the announcement of the deal.
Shares in the company, which floated in May 2011, have fallen by more than 40% this year.
The stock plunged by a quarter in February after the company issued a profit warning for the first quarter and reported an annual loss of $166m.
Ivan Feinseth, analyst at Tigress Financial Partners, said that LinkedIn was a great business "even though the company stubbed their toe back in February. It's a premium company and it deserves a premium valuation."
Shares in Microsoft fell 2.6% to $50.16, bringing the decline this year to almost 10%.
Jeff Weiner will remain chief executive, reporting to Mr Nadella. He and Reid Hoffman - the chairman, co-founder and controlling shareholder of LinkedIn - both backed the deal.
"Today is a re-founding moment for LinkedIn," said Mr Hoffman. "I see incredible opportunity for our members and customers and look forward to supporting this new and combined business."
LinkedIn has been trying to expand by offering users more messaging options, mobile apps and a revamped "newsfeed" to help boost engagement.
Last year, the site pledged to send less frequent and "more relevant" messages after numerous user complaints.
The takeover is by far the biggest acquisition made by Microsoft, which paid $8.5bn for Skype in 2011 and bought Nokia's mobile phone business for $7.2bn in 2013.
The LinkedIn acquisition also eclipses the $19bn that Facebook paid for WhatsApp in 2014.
Despite having a cash pile of about $92bn, Microsoft said it would pay for LinkedIn mostly by issuing new debt.
It expects the deal, which must be approved by regulators in the US, EU, Canada and Brazil, to generate annual savings of $150m by 2018. | Microsoft is buying the professional networking website LinkedIn for just over $26bn (£18bn) in cash. |
38,143,777 | Talks between BT and regulator Ofcom to find a voluntary solution to the problem seem to have broken down.
Ofcom has now begun the formal process of forcing a legal split.
The big question is what will it all mean for consumers.
The argument for separation centres around whether the firm that provides the vast majority of the UK's broadband infrastructure (Openreach) should be part of the same parent group as one of the UK's leading internet service provides (BT).
Rivals have long argued that this is bad for competition and the consumer. TalkTalk's Dido Harding was one of the first to welcome Ofcom's new tough stance: "Openreach has been letting consumers down for far too long, unable to meet promises of even minor improvements and becoming a household name for all the wrong reasons."
Ofcom agrees and, now too, does the government: "We've been clear that we need a more independent Openreach. It needs to offer genuinely fair and equal access to the country's telecoms infrastructure to BT's competitors," said a spokesman for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
This is the best way to ensure consumers get the service they need, and the country gets the digital infrastructure it needs," he added.
Slow and non-existent broadband is still an issue in remote areas and most agree that is unacceptable in an age where telecoms are as important as gas, electricity and water.
Openreach has been criticised for the slow rollout of rural broadband and for failing to offer radical new technologies. But, on the flipside, there are no large queues of other operators lining up to fix the problem, which is expensive and technically challenging.
The Countryside and Landowners' Alliance pointed out that any split must make sure that the work Openreach is doing to close the digital divide can continue unhindered.
"Any formal break between BT and Openreach must not lose sight of the goal to deliver broadband to rural areas. Ofcom must make it clear that the conditions of the separation include guarantees for future investment to further support rural digital connectivity," it said in a statement.
Will a split lead to better, cheaper broadband?
What consumers really need, according to Andrew Ferguson, founder of the broadband news website ThinkBroadband, is "fibre to the home with gigabit speeds for £20 to £35 per month".
Fibre-to-the-home technology offers faster speeds than the majority of current broadband connections, which are known as "fibre to the cabinet", meaning the final connection to homes is delivered over slower copper wire.
Mr Ferguson told the BBC that no-one currently knows whether a legal separation will deliver this faster option.
"The split has the potential to be very transformational and start the UK down a path of 95% fibre-to-the-premises coverage in 10 years, but that was a possibility yesterday too. The key is whether the split means more money will be available and if a fibre-to-the-premises (home) product is adopted by operators like Sky and TalkTalk," he said.
"The hope is that by reducing the influence of BT Group on Openreach, it would be likely to invest more in faster broadband technology that allows more providers, such as Sky and TalkTalk as well as BT, to offer a better service to their customers."
But, he added, there is a counter-argument that an independent Openreach could create "a stock market that gets jittery which means that Openreach is starved of capital and struggles to meet what its critics have said are already unambitious rollout targets".
Most agree that a separation of BT and Openreach would not alone solve the UK's broadband problems.
Richard Neudegg, head of regulation at uSwitch, said: "Ofcom needs to act across the board to ensure competition and service improvements. This includes universal service obligations, quality of service requirements on regulated products and automatic compensation when providers fail to deliver.
Some believe that the real problem with the UK's broadband is that the copper network simply does not offer the bandwidth and reliability to support our increasingly data-rich needs.
Founder of Mimosa Networks, Jaime Fink thinks it is time to consider other technologies: "Openreach and other UK service providers must change their approach and look at new technologies that can profitably deliver a superfast sustainable broadband network."
He pointed to the US where new entrants such as Google and Facebook have shaken up the market with fixed wireless solutions, which are less expensive than fibre.
Will a split improve customer service?
You have a broadband fault but it is taking weeks to fix. Sound familiar?
One of the biggest arguments in favour of a split is that Openreach has just not provided adequate levels of customer service. Critics say this is because it is not a customer-facing firm so all complaints are channelled via a customer's ISP, giving it no incentive to get on with repairs.
"Millions of people have suffered woeful levels of service from Openreach, so these reforms must lead to significant improvements for customers who have been let down for too long," said Which's Alex Neill, managing director of Home and Legal.
But will a separation deliver this?
It may depend on how the separation looks, thinks Ovum analyst Matthew Howett.
"The improvements in quality and availability of service that Ofcom hopes legal separation will bring about will likely to be delivered much sooner if BT can get on and deliver them today as a result of a voluntary agreement, rather than wait for a lengthy and uncertain process to run its course at the EU level," he told the BBC.
In order to start the legal separation, Ofcom must now prepare a formal notification to the European Commission to start the process.
Mr Howett believes that the door is still open for a voluntary agreement from BT.
"In many ways that would be a better outcome than a forced legal separation, not least because the EU route is uncertain, untested and likely to take much longer to achieve. It is also of course made more complex by the decision from Britain to leave the EU." | It is one of the most dragged-out divorces in corporate history but it seems that BT and Openreach will definitely go their separate ways. |
37,457,860 | The deal, which was signed in a ceremony on Monday in the Colombian city of Cartagena, will be put to a popular vote on Sunday.
Colombians will be asked to reject or endorse the agreement reached between the government and the country's largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc).
The 297-page agreement will not come into force unless a simple majority of voters back it.
While it has the support of Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos and many influential international figures, including UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, there has also been significant opposition to it within Colombia.
One of the leading "no" campaigners is former President Alvaro Uribe.
Here, BBC Monitoring examines some of the reasons Colombians in the "no" camp are citing for their opposition to the deal.
This is not the first time the Colombian government has negotiated with the Farc.
In the 52 years since the Farc were founded and started fighting the Colombian government there have been several attempts at negotiating a peace deal.
However, this is the first time the two sides have reached and signed an agreement.
Previous failed attempts have made many Colombians weary of the rebels' intentions.
President Andres Pastrana, who governed from 1998 to 2002, ordered the demilitarisation of an area the size of Switzerland so that peace talks could take place there.
But after almost three years of negotiations, it transpired that the Farc had used the demilitarised zone to re-group and re-arm.
Mr Pastrana broke off the negotiations and trust in the Farc's intentions were seriously undermined for years to come.
Mr Pastrana has been campaigning against the peace agreement, calling it "a coup d'etat against justice".
Opponents of the peace deal have accused those who back it of being in the pay of the Cuban and Venezuelan governments.
They fear that allowing the Farc rebels, who follow a Marxist ideology and who were inspired by the Cuban Revolution, to take part in politics will open the door to radical left-wing policies.
They have dubbed this threat "Castro-Chavismo" after the Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro and the late Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez.
They point to the fact that the Cuban government hosted the peace talks and Venezuela acted as a facilitator as evidence of the influence these two left-wing governments had on the negotiations.
They have accused President Santos of "selling the country out" and warn that with the rebels becoming political players, Colombia could soon resemble Cuba and Venezuela and suffer from the same shortages these countries are experiencing.
However, analysts say that Colombia is a conservative country especially when it comes to its economy and there is very little indication that this kind of shift could happen.
As part of the peace agreement, a special legal framework has been created to try those who committed crimes during the armed conflict, including Farc fighters, government soldiers and members of right-wing paramilitary groups.
Those who confess to crimes will not serve prison sentences but will take part in acts of "reparation", including clearing land mines, repairing damaged infrastructure and helping victims.
Those opposed to the deal say the rebels are "getting away with murder".
They argue that crimes against humanity and drug trafficking, which the Farc engaged in to finance itself, should be punished with jail terms.
President Santos has argued that "perfect justice would not allow peace" and that victims will receive reparation.
He denies there will be impunity, but pressure group Human Rights Watch says the special legal framework goes too far and the deal constitutes a "surrender of justice".
Farc fighters who demobilise will receive financial aid from the state while they re-integrate into civil society.
The payments, which amount to 90% of the minimum wage, have been derided as "salaries" by opponents of the peace process.
They argue that it is unfair to reward rebels who may have murdered and kidnapped fellow Colombians while "hard-working citizens" are not given the same benefits.
Supporters of the peace deal say the rebels need financial help to ease their transition out of illegality.
BBC Monitoring reports and analyses news from TV, radio, web and print media around the world. You can follow BBC Monitoring on Twitter and Facebook. | The future of a peace agreement aimed at ending the longest-running armed conflict in the Americas is now in the hands of the Colombian people. |
40,061,708 | Valencia, 31, played 43 games in all competitions for United this season and captained the side in their Europa League final victory against Ajax.
The Ecuador international joined the Old Trafford club from Wigan in 2009.
"I am absolutely delighted to have signed a new contract," he said.
"Manchester United has been my life since 2009. I would like to thank the manager for the confidence he has given me this season and I am sure that we will be challenging on all fronts next season."
United only triggered a one-year extension to Valencia's contract in January, at the time committing him to the club until 2018. | Manchester United full-back Antonio Valencia has signed a one-year extension to his contract that will keep him at the club until 2019, with an option to extend for a further year. |
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The Magpies are yet to win a Premier League game under McClaren and are 19th with two points from six games - they have won three of 25 games in 2015.
"No-one said this job was going to be easy, we didn't think it would be," said the former England and Derby boss.
"I am trying to change a lot and being here two and a half months, it's very difficult to change things quickly."
McClaren oversaw a slump at promotion-chasing Derby last season in the Championship and has won only two of his last 19 league games at the Rams and Newcastle.
But having been appointed in June, the 54-year-old said he had discovered more about his squad in the last week following defeat by West Ham last Monday.
"Certainly, it involves hard work and sticking together and keeping calm and that is what we have to do," he said. "It is a long season, and we have come in and in the last week learned a lot about our team.
"There are a lot of things - mentality, getting a bit more belief, so there are things to work on. Things we knew before and now have just been confirmed. We will lick our wounds and work hard on the training field as normal."
Despite BBC pundit Garth Crooks claiming McClaren "could be out of a job by Christmas" if their form remained the same, the Magpies boss said: "There is history that needs changing and turning around, give it time.
"I believe in that squad of players and we need to fight. I think we did that in the second half, and nearly got back in the game."
"We thought the last two games would be a test for us and we would know a lot more and we know now this is a tough job."
Newcastle went behind to two Odion Ighalo goals as last season's Championship runners-up established control at St James' Park, where Newcastle have won twice this calendar year.
Daryl Janmaat's second-half goal gave encouragement to the home supporters, but they were left without any reward with Newcastle only scoring three goals in six matches this season.
Former Newcastle striker and manager Alan Shearer was unimpressed with what he saw on Saturday - and was clearly angry as he analysed their performance on Match of the Day.
"This is a Newcastle team that got battered by the media after they lost at West Ham on Monday. I thought they would go out today and have a right go. But no," said Shearer.
"Midfielder Flaurian Thauvin turned up at the ground in a tuxedo. That was funny at the start of the season but it isn't now. This is serious.
"It was far far too easy for Watford, who were brilliant but helped by Newcastle's defending. The lack of quality was alarming
"From start to finish Newcastle were abject and the manager has big problems."
Former Tottenham player Garth Crooks had earlier said on Final Score: "The more Watford go on and play the way they did today, the more they will gain belief. Newcastle lacked belief, ability and confidence, and McClaren is struggling to inject it.
"The way things are going, McClaren could be out of a job come Christmas. The expectation at St James' Park is sky-high. Can he match that expectation? I doubt it. The fans need to see something, effort at least."
Newcastle host champions Chelsea in their next Premier League game before travelling to top-of-the-table Manchester City. | Newcastle's players are lacking belief admitted United manager Steve McClaren after Saturday's 2-1 defeat by Watford. |
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They all played a small, but potentially significant, part in Michael Schumacher becoming one of the greatest drivers of all time.
"I was the guy in the wrong place at the wrong time that gave Schumacher the chance to shine," Gachot told BBC Radio 5 live.
It is 25 years ago this week that the Frenchman was involved in a incident that ultimately changed the course of racing history.
Back then, Gachot was an impressive young driver for the recently formed Jordan Grand Prix team. He had caught the eye with a number of top-10 finishes in the first half of the 1991 season, as well as winning the Le Mans 24 Hours race.
However, just two days after setting the fastest lap at the Hungarian Grand Prix, he was in court.
Earlier that year, Gachot had been involved in a minor accident with a London taxi. An argument with the driver ensued, with Gachot producing a can of CS gas and spraying it in his face.
"I really didn't think it was an issue," said Gachot, now 53.
"We are talking about something that was really petty and basically I defended myself using tear gas.
"I thought this was what you were supposed to do and never knew it was considered a weapon. I really felt I was within my rights and didn't do anything wrong."
At the time, CS gas was illegal in Britain - but Gachot did not realise the gravity of the situation. He expected a fine and a couple of days in prison at the most. Instead he was sentenced to six months.
"I had no idea that my freedom was at stake," he said.
"Once I was in the prison I thought I would spend the weekend there but then my lawyer came in on the Monday and said it would be months."
It ended up being two months, with Gachot's original sentence reduced on appeal.
However, it was long enough to leave Jordan's team owner Eddie Jordan needing a driver to fill his seat on a temporary basis. That driver was Schumacher.
"Someone at the prison told me that the team had taken a German and they didn't need me any more," said Gachot.
"Every time he came in front of my cell he made the noise of a Formula 1 car, telling me that this driver was very good and they didn't need me."
Gachot's tormentor may have been teasing, but Schumacher was certainly making an impression.
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On his F1 debut, the then 22-year-old produced a stunning display to secure seventh on the grid for Jordan.
A problem with his car would result in Schumacher failing to finish the race itself, but his performance in qualifying had done enough to convince those at Jordan that they had a real talent on their hands.
It had also impressed other teams, and Benetton moved quickly to secure his services. From then on, his rise to F1 dominance was rapid, with the first of his seven world titles coming in 1994.
By the time Gachot had been released from prison, he had missed four grands prix and his seat at Jordan had been filled by Alex Zanardi.
He ended up with Larrousse but was unable to replicate the form he had shown in the first half of the season at Jordan.
After a year away from the sport, Gachot had two seasons at Pacific before leaving F1 for good in 1995.
By then, Schumacher was a two-time world champion and about to embark on a career at Ferrari.
Their careers may have taken very different paths, but Gachot insists he feels no animosity towards Schumacher.
"Schumacher deserved the career he had," he added.
"It was not me that made him, he made himself, he took the opportunity and did the best with it.
"I have regrets for sure and things I could have done differently but I am at peace with it." | What do a London taxi, a can of CS gas and a promising young Formula 1 driver called Bertrand Gachot have in common? |
37,452,689 | George "Tornado" Smith, who grew up at The White Hart at Boxford, performed the stunt for 30 years - even riding with his pet lioness, Briton.
A "Wall of Death" has been set up at the pub this weekend in honour of Smith and as part of a charity festival.
One of the sponsors described the event as a "great occasion" and "part of the village's history".
The attraction, which features motorcyclists riding around a vertical wall, was set up by Smith at the Kursaal amusement park in Southend-on-Sea.
The lioness became part of his act, riding with him on the handlebars, before moving to a sidecar as she got larger.
Out of season, Smith, who died in 1971, would return to Boxford and set up his attraction there.
Briton is said to buried under the pub car park.
Lawrence Motts, one of three sponsors of the event, said the "Wall of Death" event was a "great occasion" and "part of the village's history".
He said: "This guy used to ride with a lion on his handlebars, which seems absolutely bonkers, and he would actually walk around with this lion on a lead in the village."
At Boxford the Wall of Death will be performed by Ken Fox, who recently trained motorcyclist Guy Martin to break the speed record for the stunt on television.
Proceeds will go towards local charity The Smile of Arran Trust, set up in memory of 13-year-old Arran Tosh, who died in 2014, five days after being diagnosed with a brain tumour. | A motorcycle "Wall of Death" is returning to the Suffolk village where the attraction was once popular. |
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The Gills, who are 17th in League One, were knocked out of the FA Cup by non-league Brackley Town on Wednesday.
"I woke up shocked, embarrassed, humiliated, disappointed and very angry," Scally told BBC Radio Kent.
"We both recognise there are some serious problems with the team. The manager has to address those issues."
Edinburgh led the Gills to ninth place last season but the club has only recorded five wins from 17 league games this season, and are three points above the relegation zone.
After a meeting with Scally on Monday afternoon, National League North side Brackley put extra pressure on the 46-year-old former Tottenham defender after winning their first-round replay 4-3 after extra time.
Scally said there were "no excuses" for the side's performance.
"Some of the individual performances wouldn't warrant a place in a Sunday pub side," he added.
"We have got a team with no confidence and not able to defend and that was abundantly clear. He [Edinburgh] does have my backing.
"We have got a long season ahead of us and have a team who have talented players, but they are not playing well at the moment."
Scally has confirmed he is in a three-month recovery period after revealing he had a seven-hour heart operation 18 days ago which left him unconscious for 28 hours.
However, he says Gillingham's current form is not aiding his recuperation.
"I'm not supposed to be at work," he said.
"I've been out of hospital 12 days and frankly this whole matter is probably the last thing I needed.
"Watching the [Brackley] game, I would have been better off going to bed before the kick-off and not having the stress and strain that resulted of watching us go out of the FA Cup.
"The last thing my heart consultant said was don't get stressed." | Gillingham chairman Paul Scally has given manager Justin Edinburgh his backing but says he is "not best happy" with the side's current form. |
34,072,129 | The Money Advice Trust (MAT), which carried out the study, said that amounted to a 16% increase over the last two years.
It said that sending in bailiffs was likely to make debt problems worse.
Local authorities blamed cuts in government funding, and said bailiffs were only ever used as a last resort.
Enforcement agents, as they are officially known, were mainly used to collect Council Tax debts.
Such debts are one of the fastest growing issues being handled by National Debtline, which is run by the MAT.
"Something is seriously wrong here," said Joanna Elson, the chief executive of the MAT.
"On the front line of debt advice we know that sending the bailiffs in can deepen debt problems, rather than solve them - and it can also have a severe impact on the wellbeing of people who are often already in a vulnerable situation."
For its research the MAT made freedom of information requests to all 375 councils in England and Wales, and received replies from 95% of them.
National Debtline for England and Wales 0808 808 4000
National Debtline for Scotland 0808 808 4000
But local authorities say they have been given little choice, given the reduction in government support to councils.
Overall authorities have had to cope with a 40% cut in core government funding over the last five years, according to the Local Government Association (LGA).
In particular, they have had to find £1bn to try and stop those on low incomes having to pay full Council Tax.
But many of those on low incomes have still ended up having to pay more, and have fallen into debt as a result.
"Councils have a duty to their residents to collect taxes so important services like caring for the elderly, collecting bins and fixing roads are not affected," said Cllr Claire Kober, the chair of the LGA's Resources Board.
"But we realise that times are tough and will always seek to take a sympathetic and constructive approach."
She also said that bailiffs were only used as a last resort. Before they were sent in, she said that householders would have received several warning letters, and would have been encouraged to apply for financial support. | Local authorities in England and Wales used bailiffs to collect debts more than 2 million times last year, according to new research. |
35,686,949 | Despite disqualification for a false start at the British Championships, UK Athletics wanted to select Kilty, 26, alongside winner James Dasaolu.
But Kilty has opted instead to focus on realising his potential outdoors.
"Whilst this has been a really tough decision, looking at the big picture it's the smart call," he tweeted.
"This year is all about the Olympics, so going into Portland short of races and taking a gamble that I could run myself into form makes no sense when I could start to focus on my outdoor season early."
Kilty has a best over 60m of 6.49 seconds, but has yet to break 10 seconds for the 100m. His best time of 10.05 seconds was set at last year's Birmingham Grand Prix meeting.
"Individually I'm aiming for sub-10 and making the Olympic final in 2016," the Gateshead Harrier continued.
"As part of the GB 4x100m relay squad, we have a real shot at getting on the podium and are 100% focused on achieving success as a team."
Bath-based Andy Robertson took second place in Saturday's 60m final in a personal best of 6.54secs.
The IAAF World Indoor Championships take place in the United States from 17-20 March. | World indoor champion Richard Kilty will not defend his 60m title in Portland, Oregon next month after choosing to focus on the Rio Olympics. |
39,249,394 | The footballer went into the studio to lay down a new version of the England squad's 1982 recording of "This Time We'll Get It Right".
Keegan, who featured on the original which reached number two in the charts, declared the remake with athletes from north-east England "much better".
The Special Olympics GB National Summer Games begins in August in Sheffield.
Keegan, who lives at Wynyard on Teesside and captained both Newcastle and England's 1982 squad in Spain, said: "I think it's a better song now. These guys are definitely better singers than the England football team were.
"Sport's all inclusive, that's what everyone says. Sometimes you wonder, but the Special Olympics follows through on that."
Held every four years, the Special Olympics is the largest multi-sports competition for athletes with learning disabilities.
Keith Hogan, chair of Special Olympics Gateshead Tyne and Wear, added: "Our athletes are already incredibly excited about Sheffield. Recording this song with Kevin's help is the icing on the cake.
"We're extremely grateful to him helping with the song. Kevin was wonderful, really enthusiastic and interested in what we're doing here."
About 130 athletes have been selected to represent the Northern Region at the 10th National Summer Games, where a total of 2,600 athletes will compete in 20 sports across a dozen venues in Sheffield between 7th and 12th August. | Former England and Newcastle star Kevin Keegan has re-recorded a World Cup anthem to support the Special Olympics. |
33,035,183 | Officers were called to a block of flats in Gristock Place by the ambulance service just after midnight.
A man, thought to be in his late 40s, died a short time later in one of the flats, said Norfolk Police.
His death is currently being treated as unexplained. A woman, aged 50, has been arrested in connection with the incident and is currently in custody at Wymondham Police Investigation Centre.
A cordon on the property remains in place while investigations continue.
A Home Office post mortem examination on the body to establish cause of death will be held later, Norfolk Police said. | A woman has been arrested following the sudden death of a man in Norwich. |
36,203,834 | In his first interview in five years, the Guns N' Roses star told BBC 6 Music he was huge fan of Johnson's singing and "wants to do it justice".
Rose was drafted in after Johnson was advised to stop playing live or "risk total hearing loss".
He makes his debut with the band in Lisbon, Portugal, on Saturday 7 May.
"I'm happy and excited in one sense, but I think it would be inappropriate to be celebrating, in a certain way, at someone else's expense," he said.
"That's not what I'm here to do. It's an unfortunate situation."
Some fans have been unhappy with Rose's hiring, with several thousand requesting ticket refunds for some of the European shows - although these have now all been re-sold.
Johnson, 68, from Gateshead, has been lead singer with AC/DC since 1980.
In a statement last month, he said he was "crushed" by his inability to fulfil the remaining tour dates.
There have been rumours the split was acrimonious, but guitarist Angus Young explained he had spoken to Johnson extensively before he decided to leave the group.
"In his heart he wanted to finish [the tour] but because of that hearing factor he had to make the decision," he told the BBC.
"It's a hard thing to do, and he'd had the problem since we kicked off touring. It was his call. It was a shock to us too."
"The last thing you want to do is walk away from something, but you don't want someone in a tragic situation; being deaf, or any other affliction."
Young said the band had "seen our fair share of tragedies", including the departure of his brother, guitarist Malcolm Young, after he developed dementia, and the death of original singer Bon Scott in 1980.
"After that you're doubly careful," he said. "You want [band members] to be leaving in full body shape, not in a tragic way."
Rose also confirmed it was his idea to approach AC/DC about helping them complete the last 12 dates of their world tour.
"I called the day I read about it in the news, that there was a situation going on with Brian's hearing," he said.
"I called a guy who's their production manager right now... because I knew there was going to be a problem with having dates on sale and dates sold and stuff like that. So if I could help, and if I was able to do it, and they were interested, I'd love to help. And that's how it started.
"I wasn't looking at it like, 'I'm singing for AC/DC.' I was looking at it like, 'y'know, if I can, and if they think I'm able to do it."
Rose also said he didn't know whether he would be able to sing some of the songs in the set.
"A lot of the Back In Black stuff is really challenging. I'm not here in any way out of any disrespect to Brian. I can't take anything away from his singing at all," he said.
"He's a great singer and it's really challenging to sing it. I'm just trying to do it justice for the fans."
AC/DC are due to play London's Olympic Stadium on 4 June and Manchester's Etihad Stadium five days later.
Rose will be alternating between shows with the Australian band and Guns N' Roses, who are on tour with original guitarist Slash for the first time since the 1990s.
You can hear Matt Everitt's full interview with AC/DC and Axl Rose on the BBC 6 Music Breakfast show from 07:00 BST on Friday, 6 May. | Axl Rose says he means "no disrespect" to AC/DC frontman Brian Johnson, whom he is replacing on the band's Rock or Bust World Tour. |
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Their game against Slovakia on Monday is now in doubt.
"We have been getting changed in public toilets on the way to matches," said Republic forward Aine O'Gorman.
Players representative Stuart Gilhooly said that they were being treated as "fifth-class citizens, the dirt on the FAI's shoe".
The Professional Footballers' Association Of Ireland solicitor accompanied women's team members at Tuesday's news conference.
"There is a possibility that the game against Slovakia will not go ahead. The last thing the women's international team want is to not play a game," added the PFAI official.
The players have indicated that they will refuse to train on Wednesday unless the FAI holds talks with their representatives at the PFAI and as of 17:00 BST on Tuesday evening, this had not happened.
The players are fighting for compensation from the FAI for lost earnings while on international duty and improved resources.
"What we want is for the FAI to empower and enable our players to commit to training camps and international games without having to worry about taking unpaid leave from work or being forced to use up all of their holidays," said captain Emma Byrne.
The women have grievances over a series of issues, including a demand for match fees of 300 Euros, bonuses of 150 Euros for a win and 75 Euros for a draw, gym membership for the squad and the provision of team clothing.
O'Gorman was joined by 12 other members of the Irish squad - including Stephanie Roche and captain Emma Byrne - at a news conference publicising their grievances on Tuesday.
The players also alleged that it was commonplace for the team to have to share tracksuits with the country's youth women's squads.
Former Arsenal goalkeeper Byrne, who has played 127 times for her country, said that the team had "given up" trying to deal directly with the FAI.
"We are willing to do whatever it takes at this stage," she added.
"We are fighting for the future of women's international football. This isn't just about us.
"I know players who have had to stop playing. They made the decision they couldn't play any more."
O'Gorman said that the FAI had warned the players that going public with their grievances could "endanger their careers at club and international level".
In response, an FAI statement said the governing body was "deeply disappointed that members of the team have threatened to withdraw from playing for their country".
"The ultimatum by the players concerned comes in spite of repeated invitations from the FAI to the players to discuss clear and tangible financial offers for the payment and compensation of members of the squad," said the statement.
"On five occasions in recent months the FAI has attempted to bring the players to the table, only to have the offer rebuked at every turn."
The FAI added the players had opted to stage Tuesday's news conference despite the governing body's decision to agree to a mediation process.
"The senior women's national team are provided the standards of care expected of a demanding high-performance environment, with top-level training facilities, hotel accommodation, dietary, fitness, performance analysis and medical and physio care.
"The team has also received significant increases in budget in recent years to attain this high standard, as well as the appointment of a Champions League winning coach." | The Republic of Ireland women's football team have threatened to go on strike in a row over treatment by the Football Association of Ireland. |
35,954,147 | The veteran actress won a record eighth Olivier for her best supporting actress role as Paulina in Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company's production of The Winter's Tale.
No-one has won as many Oliviers for acting since the awards began 40 years ago.
As she collected her award she joked that she was "livid" because she had lost a bet with her grandson.
Speaking backstage about her record win, she said: "I'm rather overcome. I didn't expect it... it feels terrific."
Dame Judi praised the "really fantastic company and crew and stage management" of the Shakespeare production at the Garrick Theatre.
"Everybody says what a wonderful time they have doing something. I can truly say that in the Winter's Tale it was an absolutely memorable family."
She added the award was "lovely to have, but in actual fact it belongs to all those people just as much as it belongs to me."
The musical Gypsy won the most awards on the night for a single production. Its four prizes included best actress in a musical for runaway favourite Imelda Staunton, and best musical revival.
Staunton, who opened the ceremony with a performance of Gypsy's Everything's Coming Up Roses, said: "We felt we were doing something special every night and every night we went out and wanted to do a better show than the night before."
The show, which transferred to the West End from the Chichester Festival Theatre, also won for best lighting design while Lara Pulver was named best supporting actress in a musical.
Hosted by Michael Ball, the ceremony took place at London's Royal Opera House and included a performance by singer Cyndi Lauper, whose Kinky Boots was named best new musical.
Denise Gough won best actress for her acclaimed performance as a recovering addict in People, Places and Things, recently opened in the West End after a sell-out run at the National Theatre last year.
Gough had been hotly tipped to win in a shortlist that included Gemma Arterton and Nicole Kidman.
The Irish actress used her speech to raise the issue of diversity, saying: "In a year where we have seen progress made in racial diversity on our stages it's just a bit sad that in this category it hasn't been represented."
People, Places and Things was one of four wins for the National. Duncan Macmillan's drama also won for best sound, while Ma Rainey's Black Bottom was named best revival and Mark Gatiss won best supporting actor for Three Days in the Country.
The best actor prize went to Kenneth Cranham in Florian Zeller's The Father.
Cranham, who plays a man with dementia, beat competition from Kenneth Branagh, Benedict Cumberbatch, Adrian Lester and Mark Rylance.
Speaking backstage, he admitted he didn't think he stood a chance of winning. "They are like brand names," he said. "I felt like a little old cornershop."
Meanwhile in the best director category, Robert Icke triumphed for his work on the Greek tragedy Oresteia, which ran at The Almeida theatre. The play is a blood-soaked family saga spanning several decades and is often said to not only be the 5th Century BC playwright Aeschylus's final play, but also his greatest.
Musical Kinky Boots won two other prizes, with Matt Henry collecting best actor in a musical for his portrayal of Lola and Gregg Barnes awarded for his costume design.
Musical In the Heights also had three wins - for outstanding achievement in music, choreography and a best supporting actor in a musical trophy for David Bedella.
The Royal Court's production of Martin McDonagh's Hangmen was named best new play and also won for Anna Fleischle's set design.
Nell Gwynn, starring Gemma Arterton and written by Jessica Swale, was named best new comedy.
The prize for outstanding achievement in opera went to the English National Opera chorus and orchestra for The Force of Destiny, Lady Macbeth Of Mtsensk and The Queen Of Spades, which were all performed at London Coliseum.
The ENO has faced months of turmoil which includes the resignation of its musical director Mark Wigglesworth and the threat of strike action by its chorus over new contracts.
The ENO's head of music, Martin Fitzpatrick, who collected the prize, said the chorus and orchestra were "a vital part of the lifeblood" of an opera company.
Long-running musical The Phantom of the Opera won the Oliviers audience award - the only category voted for by members of the public.
Highlights from the ceremony were screened on ITV for a third consecutive year and secured an average audience of 700,000 viewers - the same as last year.
However, in 2015 that figure marked a 12.5% drop from the year before - and an almost 50% fall since it was first aired in 2013.
The ceremony will be shown in full on ITV3 on 4 April at 23:00 BST.
Next year the Olivier Awards will be on 9 April 2017 in a new venue, London's Royal Albert Hall. | Dame Judi Dench was the toast of the Olivier Awards on Sunday night. |
32,167,285 | The production, Lazarus, will feature new songs specially composed by Bowie as well as new arrangements of his old songs.
The star is working on the project with Irish playwright Enda Walsh, who won a Tony Award for the musical Once.
Lazarus is due to premiere in New York in the winter this year.
The show is inspired by the 1963 novel, The Man Who Fell to Earth, by Walter Tevis, and centres on the character of Thomas Newton, played by Bowie in the 1976 screen adaptation directed by Nicolas Roeg.
It will be directed by the Belgian Ivo van Hove, whose recent London productions include Antigone, with Juliet Binoche, and the sell-out A View From the Bridge, starring Mark Strong.
Bowie is not expected to feature in the cast.
James C Nicola, the artistic director of the New York Theatre Workshop, said the show had been in secret development for some years.
He told the New York Times: "It's going to be a play with characters and songs - I'm calling it music theatre, but I don't really know what it's going to be like. I just have incredible trust in their creative vision."
Nicola said the show would not retell the story of the book and film, but would feature some of the same characters.
Bowie surprised his fans in 2013 when he suddenly released a new single on his 66th birthday - followed by a new album - after a 10-year hiatus.
He was named best British male at the Brit Awards in 2014. | Rock legend David Bowie is co-writing a stage show inspired by The Man Who Fell to Earth, the New York Theatre Workshop has announced. |
32,717,110 | Henry Engelhardt, who has been in his role since the company was founded in 1991, will leave his post in a year's time.
Admiral employs more than 7,000 people and has four million customers. It is Wales' only FTSE 100 company.
Mr Engelhardt will be replaced by co-founder and current chief operating officer David Stevens. | The boss of Admiral insurance is to stand down as chief executive, the Cardiff-based company has announced. |
30,125,553 | The officials gave safety permits to the Ozone Disco Club without carrying out checks, the court found.
They were sentenced to between six and 10 years, but will not go to jail until after appeals are heard. Two managers of the club also received jail terms.
The fire is one of the most deadly blazes ever to hit a night club.
Some campaigners for survivors of the fire expressed anger that the verdicts had taken so long.
Dante Jimenez told the AFP news agency some of the survivors had died in the time it had taken to hear the case.
"This reflects how rotten the justice system is," he said.
A court official told AFP that those convicted had 15 days to appeal, and added that she did not know where any of the nine were.
Those who died in the fire were mostly students celebrating the end of the academic year.
They could not escape the fire because emergency exits were blocked by other buildings.
Officials at the time described it as the deadliest fire in Philippine history.
The Philippines has poor safety standards and large fires are relatively common - particularly in slum areas.
1942: Cocoanut Grove, Boston, US - 492 killed
2000: Luoyang dance hall fire, China - fire blamed on welders kills 309
2013: Kiss club in Santa Maria, Brazil, kills 233
2004: Cromagnon Republic Club, Buenos Aires, Argentina, kills 194
1977: Beverly Hills Supper Club, Southgate, Kentucky, 165 killed | Seven Philippine safety officers have been sentenced to jail for corruption over a fire at a night club that killed 162 people in Quezon City in 1996. |
37,477,987 | A number of the alleged offences against the seven victims happened in Bristol in 2011 and 2012.
Seven men have gone on trial at Bristol Crown Court, accused of a total of 45 offences, including rape, sexual assault, rape of child under 13 and false imprisonment.
All the accused deny the charges.
The jury was told some of the victims were allegedly given drugs and alcohol, and that the girls travelled by train to meet the men.
On one occasion in March 2013, a 15-year-old girl was allegedly simultaneously raped by two men at a flat in Bristol.
The jury also heard a 12-year-old girl was raped, leaving her feeling "dirty" and "regretful".
The court heard that one girl kept a diary of her trips to the city, in which she wrote coded messages about sex and sex acts she had carried out.
One teenager, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court she felt "pressurised" into having sex with six of the men and that she believed it was "expected" of her.
The trial, which began earlier this month but can only now be reported after reporting restrictions were lifted by the judge, was adjourned until Thursday.
The defendants are: | Girls as young as 12 were repeatedly raped, sexually abused and trafficked for sex, a court has heard. |
39,682,217 | Laugher, who won Great Britain's first Olympic diving gold medal with Chris Mears in the synchronised 3m springboard in Rio last summer, scored 567.15 points from his six dives.
In Windsor, he finished nearly 40 points ahead of China's Xie Siyi, whose second place earned him overall victory in the four-leg World Series.
Laugher finished in second place.
He won the first leg of the event in Beijing, but a second-placed finish in Guangzhou, China followed by fourth in Kazan, Russia, cost him overall success.
On Friday, Laugher and Mears finished seventh in the synchronised 3m springboard final.
Find out how to get into diving with our special guide. | Great Britain's Jack Laugher won gold in the 3m springboard at the FINA/NVC Diving World Series in Canada. |
35,111,008 | Leader Michael Jones resigned last week after facing criticism over his links with the owner of a fitness company.
He denied any wrongdoing and said he stood down to avoid infighting within the Conservative group.
Cheshire Police's Economic Crime Unit will "review the available material" to see if an investigation is needed.
The council waived its financial rules when it granted three contracts to Core Fit Ltd, collectively worth £156,000.
The company, which is owned by physiotherapist Amanda Morris, runs fitness classes in schools. | Cheshire Police are to review the awarding of Cheshire East Council contracts to the council leader's physiotherapist. |
39,911,010 | The 34-year-old pinned her opponent in the corner and the referee stepped in to confirm her second professional victory in the flyweight contest.
"There is nothing like the support of my home crowd," said Adams.
It was her first win by stoppage having beaten Argentina's Virginia Carcamo on points on her professional debut.
The contest against Salazar was fought over three-minute rounds rather than the usual two minutes for women.
Find out how to get into boxing with our special guide.
Adams had said before the fight the extra minute in each round would give her a chance to "take out" her 18-year-old opponent.
She said afterwards: "I was not even thinking about the stoppage, but with the three-minute rounds I knew I could.
"I was able to settle more, I could see where I was throwing the punches and landing the power shots."
Adams was firmly in control, busting her opponent's lip in the opening round, following it up with a flurry of punches with Salazar on the ropes in the next and finishing it off in the third.
Her trainer, Jason Spencer, said she will soon be ready for a world title fight.
Adams added: "I loved every minute of it. The crowd were pumping me up. The more they were cheering, the more I was throwing."
Headlining the Leeds card, home favourite Josh Warrington defended his WBC international featherweight title with a majority decision over the experienced Kiko Martinez.
Warrington, 26, beat the Spaniard with scores of 116-112 from two judges, with the third scoring it a 114-114 draw.
He is now unbeaten in 25 fights and moves closer to a fight against Wales' IBF featherweight champion Lee Selby.
On the undercard, Durham's Thomas Patrick Ward caused somewhat of an upset by beating Liverpool's James 'Jazza' Dickens via a technical decision to win the British bantamweight belt.
Get all the latest boxing news sent straight to your device with notifications in the BBC Sport app. Find out more here. | Britain's double Olympic gold medallist Nicola Adams stopped Mexican teenager Maryan Salazar in the third round in her home city of Leeds. |
22,160,529 | A short service was held at the Palace of Westminster, with around 100 MPs and peers, and parliamentary and Downing Street staff taking part.
The union jack-draped coffin had arrived earlier in an escorted hearse.
Meanwhile, MPs have voted to cancel PM's Questions on Wednesday, after some MPs had tried to force it to go ahead.
Lady Thatcher, who died at the age of 87 on 8 April, has been accorded a ceremonial funeral with military honours, one step down from a state funeral.
Her body will now rest overnight in the Palace of Westminster's Chapel of St Mary Undercroft, where a service was led by the Dean of Westminster for members of the family, senior figures from both Houses of Parliament, and staff from Parliament and Downing Street.
Senior figures attending included Commons Speaker John Bercow, Leader of the House Andrew Lansley, Chief Whip Sir George Young and Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith.
Senior Liberal Democrat Baroness Williams said the service had been "very impressive" and "not at all political" but "more about the Thatcher family".
Conservative MP Sir Gerald Howarth added that it had been "dignified".
The chapel will be open for several hours in order that members of both Houses and parliamentary staff may pay their respects.
The House of Commons Speaker's chaplain will then keep vigil through the night.
Meanwhile, two MPs, Respect's George Galloway and Labour's Dennis Skinner, tried to block plans to delay the start of Commons business on Wednesday until 14:30 BST, which would cause the cancellation of Prime Minister's Questions.
Mr Galloway told MPs there was no reason to "suspend democracy" and said the "British establishment is making a profound mistake" in giving Lady Thatcher a ceremonial funeral.
"It is not a national funeral," he said. "You can only have a national funeral where there is a national consensus about the person being buried. That consensus does not exist in relation to Mrs Thatcher."
Mr Skinner said the argument was about class and that it was "one rule for those at the top and another for those at the bottom".
But MPs voted by 245 to 15 in favour of rescheduling parliamentary business to allow MPs to attend the funeral.
A debate in the Scottish Parliament on Lady Thatcher's legacy is to be postponed until after the funeral.
Green Party and independent members had wanted to hold the discussion shortly after the service, but the main parties at Holyrood have agreed that it should be moved to Thursday.
On Wednesday morning, Lady Thatcher's coffin will initially travel by hearse from the Palace of Westminster to the Church of St Clement Danes - the Central Church of the RAF - on the Strand.
It will then be transferred to a gun carriage and taken in procession to St Paul's.
The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh are among more than 2,000 people expected to attend the service.
Former US Vice-President Dick Cheney and ex-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger will also be among the guests, while 4,000 police will be on duty.
Barack Obama's official presidential delegation will be led by George Shultz and James Baker, who both served as secretaries of state during the Thatcher era.
But Argentina's ambassador to London, Alicia Castro, has declined an invitation to attend.
St Paul's has published a full funeral order of service. | Family, friends and politicians from all sides have paid their respects to Baroness Thatcher, ahead of the former prime minister's funeral on Wednesday. |
29,805,374 | The research, conducted in Sweden, showed women who drank more than three glasses a day were actually more likely to break bones than those who had less.
The researchers cautioned that their work only suggested a trend and should not be interpreted as proof that high milk consumption caused fractures.
Factors such as alcohol and weight were likely to play a role, they said.
Milk has been recommended as a good source of calcium for many years but studies considering whether it leads to stronger bones and fewer fractures have had conflicting results.
A team of scientists in Sweden examined the dietary habits of 61,400 women in 1987-1990 and 45,300 men in 1997 and then monitored their health for years afterwards.
Participants were asked to complete questionnaires on how frequently they consumed common foods such as milk, yoghurt and cheese over a one-year period.
Researchers then tracked how many developed fractures and how many participants died in the years afterwards.
In the 20-year follow-up period in which the women were monitored, those who drank more than three glasses, or 680ml, of milk a day were more likely to develop fractures than those who had consumed less.
The high-intake group had a higher risk of death too.
Prof Karl Michaelsson, lead researcher at Uppsala University, said: "Women who drank three or more glasses a day had twice the chance of dying at the end of the study than those who drank less than one glass a day.
"And those who had a high milk intake also had a 50% higher risk of hip fracture."
Men were monitored for an average of 11 years after the initial survey and the results showed a similar but less pronounced trend.
When fermented milk products such as yoghurt were considered, the opposite pattern was observed - people who consumed more had a lower risk of fractures.
Prof Michaelsson says the findings could be due to sugars in milk, which have been shown to accelerate ageing in some early animal studies.
"Our results may question the validity of recommendations to consume high amounts of milk to prevent fragility fractures.
"The results should, however, be interpreted cautiously given the observational design of our study."
Dietary advice should not be changed until more research had been conducted, he said.
Prof Sue Lanham-New, from the University of Surrey, said the study was of limited use. "We do not have a feel for the influence of physical activity or other lifestyle habits important to bone or overall mortality.
"And the effect of increasing body mass index has not been fully investigated in this study.
"Milk and dairy products in the UK provide 50-60% of the calcium in our diet.
"We know that low calcium intake (less than 400mg a day) is a risk factor for osteoporosis.
"Individuals should still be encouraged to consume a balanced diet from the five key food groups of which milk and dairy are key." | Drinking lots of milk may not lower the risk of fracturing bones, a study in the British Medical Journal suggests. |
33,559,853 | A local district lawyer said the shootings were being investigated as an "act of domestic terrorism".
The gunman, who was shot dead, was named as 24-year-old Mohammad Youssuf Abdulazeez by the FBI and local reports said he was born in the Middle East.
President Barack Obama said the attack was "heartbreaking" and said the suspect appeared to be a "lone gunman".
Abdulazeez is believed to have been born in Kuwait, but has lived in the US for several years.
He was arrested earlier this year in Chattanooga for driving under the influence of alcohol.
A spokesman for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga said a student with the same name graduated in 2012 with a degree in engineering, according to local media reports.
The Chattanooga Times newspaper reported that he went to a local high school and competed on the wrestling team.
He left this message in his school yearbook: "My name causes national security alerts. What does yours do?"
The investigation is still at an early stage, but it appears that Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez was acting alone. What made him do what he did will be the subject of intensive inquiries that will delve deep into his past and that of his friends and family, and into his state-of-mind.
But lone wolves, as such men are often described, are the hardest to stop.
Both the president and the head of the FBI have recently underlined this problem and called on local communities to be vigilant for the signs of any radicalisation.
It is also hard for the authorities to protect all potential targets. The first location at which Abdulazeez began firing was an army recruitment office, in the middle of a strip mall - flanked by a mobile phone shop and an Italian restaurant - in other words, firmly within the local community. Many will not want the military to completely retreat behind barbed wire and concrete barriers.
Armed police raided the house where he lived, a few miles outside Chattanooga in Hixson, after the shootings and an AP reporter said two women were led away in handcuffs.
In a statement, the FBI confirmed his identity but said it "would be premature to speculate on the motives of the shooter at this time".
Officials told the AP news agency that Abdulazeez was not known to federal law enforcement before the attacks.
Earlier, US officials said authorities were investigating whether the gunman was inspired by or had links to the Islamic State (IS) group or other jihadist organisations.
IS leaders have called on their followers to launch attacks during the month of Ramadan, which comes to an end this weekend.
FBI agent Ed Reinhold, who is leading the investigation, said the first shooting occurred at about 10:45 local time (14:45 GMT) at a US Navy recruitment centre in the east of the city.
After opening fire on the building, the gunman then fled the scene in a Ford Mustang and was pursued by Chattanooga police, Mr Reinhold told reporters.
He was shot dead after a gunfight at a US Navy reserve centre about seven miles (10 km) away on Amnicola Highway.
The US Marines confirmed in a statement that there were "four Marine fatalities" at the Navy and Marine Corps Reserve Centre in Chattanooga.
They said one Marine Corps recruiter was wounded but was later released from hospital. Two other people are believed to have been treated for injuries.
"This is a sad day for the United States. These service members served their country with pride," Bill Kilden, the federal prosecutor for eastern Tennessee, said.
"We are investigating this as an act of domestic terrorism," he told reporters.
But other officials expressed caution at jumping to conclusions.
"We are looking at every possible avenue - whether it was terrorism, whether it was domestic, international or whether it was a simple criminal act," Mr Reinhold said.
City Mayor Andy Berke tweeted: "Horrific incident in our community."
"Our hearts are broken for the families of the four Marines killed in today's terrible act of violence. They are in our prayers," he added.
Eyewitnesses reported seeing the gunman firing from inside a car outside the recruitment centre.
Gina Mule, who works at a local restaurant, told CNN she heard "really loud noises" and saw a man with a "high-powered rifle".
"A lot of shots were fired," she added.
A statement from the US Department of Homeland Security said it was "enhancing the security posture at certain federal facilities, out of an abundance of caution". | A gunman has killed four US Marines and injured several others at two US Navy buildings in Chattanooga, Tennessee. |
40,827,139 | The 21-year-old academy graduate has made 45 league appearances for the Elland Road side.
He told the club website: "I joined the club when I was 14 and grew up in Leeds, so to sign a contract extension is an honour."
Leeds start the Championship season with a trip to Bolton on Sunday. | Leeds United midfielder Kalvin Phillips has signed a contract extension to keep him at the club until the end of the 2020-21 season. |
37,327,939 | "Why did you pick him?" "Don't take it short, get it in the box!" "Put a striker on!"
Complaining about the manager's selections and questioning players' decisions on the pitch are time-honoured traditions of being a football fan.
Whether watching from the stands, on TV or listening to the match on the radio, offering full-throated advice to the coach and exhorting the players to try harder or do something different is one of the "joys" of supporting a team.
We football fans flatter ourselves that our alternative ideas would immediately improve the team's performance. Mostly they're based on intuition and a "feel for game", often nurtured over years of watching nil-nil draws in the freezing rain at uncovered away ends.
Nowadays when player acquisitions or formations strike us as baffling or obtuse, there is likely to be method in the madness. As data on player attributes, movements and positioning become more comprehensive and analytical models more sophisticated, football is relying much less on gut instincts.
It is still "the beautiful game", but it is one that increasingly resembles a game of chess.
Data is being created at historically incomparable rates, in all conceivable areas of life. We are living at the start of the age of so-called "big data". Analytics, algorithms and statistical models are increasingly part of our lives, whether we like it or not.
Professional sports are no different. This is an extraordinarily lucrative sector, where data has been identified as potentially giving athletes and teams a competitive edge.
The data revolution in sports is often traced to Billy Beane, general manager of the Oakland Athletics or A's, an unheralded team in Major League Baseball in the US. Beane employed a method that came to be known as Moneyball after Michael Lewis published a book about the A's in 2003.
Beane used an analytical, evidence-based approach to identifying players who could meaningfully contribute to the team and offer good value for money. It drew on sabermetrics, a scientific method for analysing baseball performance pioneered by Bill James. The A's sustained success on a limited budget, later chronicled in a movie based on Moneyball starring Brad Pitt, turned the spotlight on data analysis in sports.
From baseball, these analytical methods for appraising players quickly spread to the NFL and NBA, and a number of sports in the UK. In cricket, former England coach Duncan Fletcher favoured statistical analysis of batting and bowling to identify the best way for players to score runs and to get batsmen out.
Clive Woodward's innovations in using player data helped the England rugby team to win the World Cup. Dave Brailsford's innovations in performance training data helped make Team Sky multiple Tour de France winners.
In football there were pioneers too. In fact, recording granular data on players and match events goes back further than you might think.
Charles Reep coded his first football match, counting passes and noting positions, in 1950. Valeriy Lobanovsky was doing the same in the Ukraine in the 1970s. Former England manager Graham Taylor also used a crude form of analytics to inform his long ball tactics with Watford in the 1980s.
With the launch of the Premier League in 1992, and the money and exposure brought by the Sky TV deal, a number of football data companies were launched, including Prozone in 1995 and Opta in 1996.
These early efforts were impressive for the time. For instance, the computer game Championship Manager (later renamed Football Manager), launched in 1992 with a database of 4,000 players and statistics on 30 attributes per player.
Speaking to the British Science Festival in Swansea last week, Dr Tom Markham, head of strategic business development at Sports Interactive - makers of Football Manager - said those numbers have exploded in the subsequent decades.
"The game now has a database with 319,726 current players. With former players, who may take other roles in football, it comes in at over 600,000."
Compiling that database, Dr Markham said, is a big job.
"We have people on the ground in 51 different countries covering 140 leagues. There are 2,250 fully researched clubs, with 250 statistics on each player - aggregated to 47 in the user interface.
"With 1,300 scouts, all the main clubs have one researcher, and top clubs like Chelsea have multiple experts."
Some Football Manager alumni have gone on to work as scouts with professional teams, he added.
As professional football revenues continue to grow, and leagues become increasingly competitive, the data industry has also expanded. Huge amounts of data from companies like Opta and Prozone underpin not only team tactics but also sophisticated media coverage.
Coaches employ wearable tech to monitor player fatigue on the pitch and in training, to prevent injuries resulting from physically overloading players. Recorded movements on the pitch inform models of formations and playing style, with simulations and in-game stats for coaches to make halftime adjustments.
Data analysis is about spotting patterns and making predictions. Recording the direction of a players' penalty shots can show which area he favours. Knowing this a goalkeeper can increase the probability of "guessing" right.
One important metric is "expected goals", a key input in betting and analytical models. It is a predicted probability of a goal coming from a shot in a particular area of the pitch. How many shots a team has from those areas can be used to predict the likelihood of scoring.
When Leicester became Premier League champions, it was a huge shock. But it is no coincidence that their use of analytics was among the most comprehensive and forward-looking in the league.
Leicester's unusual style of play, with little possession and relying on fast attacks, took many opponents by surprise. The team suffered virtually no injuries, and relied on the emergence of unheralded players like N' Golo Kante and Jamie Vardy.
Those who believe in the data-driven approach would say this is exactly the kind of comparative advantage statistics can bring.
Another of the great rituals for football fans is speculating about transfers. Who are we going to buy? Who should we buy?
Buying and selling players is a huge business. In the recently concluded summer transfer window, Premier League teams combined to spend over £1bn, with Manchester United spending in excess of £80m on a single player.
Datasets like those compiled by Football Manager have become a resource for the scouting and recruitment operations of many teams.
Finding a low-cost, high impact player like Riyahd Mahrez or Dmitri Payet can have remarkable results on the pitch. For clubs with smaller budgets, finding a rough gem or talented youngster that they can later sell for a profit is a crucial form of revenue.
"£8 million a year is the average running cost for a tier 1 academy and teams have to find talented youngsters who they can nurture and sell on," Dr Markham said.
But assessing young talent is difficult, and not every talented youngster will become a Gareth Bale, who was discovered as a boy in Wales, nurtured by Southampton's youth academy and later signed for Real Madrid for a world record fee.
Markham told another story of young talent, Martin Odegaard, the Norwegian prodigy who signed for Real Madrid at the age of 16 after making his debut for the national team at just 15.
When Football Manager came out in Norway Odegaard wasn't in the game because he was a minor, causing a metaphorical riot among Norwegian fans. He was added to the game's database when his dad tweeted a picture giving parental consent.
But how to rate the prodigy?
When the Football Manager club scout sent his rankings to the head of Norway operations, it raised a red flag. How could a 15-year old score so highly? The Norwegian chief went to see Odegaard play a dozen times before corroborating the data sent through to the London HQ, where it was again rejected as improbable.
Dr Markham says Odegaard's stats went through a dozen different checks before his astonishing grades were accepted.
Recruitment is so important to professional clubs that the average Premier League team has 7 international scouts. But clubs don't have the resources to cover players in every country - and many teams use Football Manager to inform their own scouting strategies, Dr Markham said.
Other teams are creating their own datasets, and working with other companies to come up with bespoke solutions. Teams using analytics to thrive include Brentford and the Danish club Midtjylland, both with connections to Matthew Benham, a noted convert to the data-driven analytical approach.
Aside from clubs and gamers using simulations, data underpins many other aspects of the football industry, from TV coverage to betting models and fantasy football. Using analytics to spot patterns in match results is used to monitor match fixing. Books with titles like Soccernomics and Soccermatics allow fans to get close to the "action" of data analytics.
The relationship of gaming with professional football goes both ways. Players enjoy simulations like FIFA in their frequent downtime and many players are used to receiving data on their own performance.
A picture of Paul Pogba playing Football Manager and signing himself for Chelsea set off speculation that he might move from Juventus to Chelsea.
And according to Dr Markham, those involved in the beautiful game itself can be - perhaps unsurprisingly - fixated on their representation in virtual versions like Football Manager.
He often receives messages from players and agents, he said. "Sometimes they complain about their ratings in the game, or their agents try to get them put up." | "Big data" - the world of analytics, algorithms and statistical models - are increasingly part of our lives, and professional sports such as football are no different. |
40,571,444 | Natalia Veselnitskaya said Donald Trump Jr and two senior campaign aides may have met her last summer because they were "longing" for such information.
Ms Veselnitskaya has been linked to the Russian government.
US officials are investigating alleged Russian meddling in the US election.
Mr Trump Jr was told that material on Democratic presidential candidate Mrs Clinton offered by Ms Veselnitskaya was part of Moscow's effort to help his father's election campaign, the New York Times reports.
Publicist Rob Goldstone, who arranged the meeting with Ms Veselnitskaya, stated this in an email, the newspaper says.
The president's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and then-campaign head Paul Manafort also attended the meeting at Trump Tower in New York in June 2016.
Ms Veselnitskaya told US broadcaster NBC on Tuesday: "I never had any damaging or sensitive information about Hillary Clinton. It was never my intention to have that."
Ms Veselnitskaya said the meeting was set up by a man she did not know who told her by telephone to go to Trump Tower.
Mr Trump Jr asked her just one question during the meeting, she said.
"The question that I was asked was as follows: whether I had any financial records which might prove that the funds used to sponsor the DNC [Democratic National Committee] were coming from inappropriate sources.
"It is quite possible that maybe they were longing for such information. They wanted it so badly that they could only hear the thought that they wanted."
Ms Veselnitskaya denied ever having worked for the Russian government.
In a tweet sent after Ms Veselnitskaya's interview with NBC, Mr Trump Jr accused the media and Democratic Party of focusing on a "nonsense meeting" and of "desperation".
Separately on Tuesday, Russian officials said Moscow was ready to expel 30 US diplomats and seize US state property in retaliation for sanctions imposed by President Barack Obama over Russian hacking of Democratic Party computers.
The newspaper reports that three people with knowledge of the Goldstone email said it indicated the Russian government was the source of the potentially damaging information on Mrs Clinton.
But it says there was no mention in the email of any wider effort by the Russian government to interfere in the election, nor was there any indication of a link to the hacking attack on the Democratic Party that was first reported a week after the meeting.
Mr Goldstone has previously denied any knowledge of involvement by the Russian government.
Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, told MSNBC that the New York Times report was "a very serious development" that required further investigation.
Mr Trump Jr's statement on the matter on Sunday did not indicate he had been told of any Russian government involvement.
Lawyer Alan Futerfas, hired by Mr Trump Jr to represent him in the Russia-related investigations, described reports of the meeting as "much ado about nothing" and said his client had done nothing wrong.
The president's son said he was "happy to work with the committee to pass on what I know".
It took place on 9 June 2016, just two weeks after Donald Trump secured the Republican nomination.
After the New York Times first reported the meeting on Saturday, Mr Trump Jr released a statement which confirmed that it had taken place but did not mention whether it was related to the presidential campaign.
However, another Times report, on Sunday, said Mr Trump Jr had agreed to the meeting after being offered information that would prove detrimental to Mrs Clinton.
In his statement on Sunday, Mr Trump Jr said he had been asked to meet "an individual who I was told might have information helpful to the campaign".
Mr Trump Jr's statement continues: "The woman stated that she had information that individuals connected to Russia were funding the Democratic National Committee and supporting Mrs Clinton.
"Her statements were vague, ambiguous and made no sense. No details or supporting information was provided or even offered. It quickly became clear that she had no meaningful information."
Mr Trump Jr said the lawyer then changed the subject to the Magnitsky Act and "it became clear to me that this was the true agenda all along".
Adopted by Congress in 2012, the Magnitsky Act allows the US to withhold visas and freeze financial assets of Russian officials thought to have been involved in human rights violations.
Ms Veselnitskaya is married to a Moscow government official and her clients include companies and individuals said to be close to the Kremlin. She has been at the forefront of a campaign - backed by the Russian state - to overturn the act.
In an interview on Monday, Mr Goldstone backed Mr Trump Jr's version of the meeting, saying Ms Veselnitskaya offered "just a vague, generic statement about the campaign's funding" which was "the most inane nonsense I've ever heard".
On Monday, Mr Trump Jr tweeted sarcastically: "Obviously I'm the first person on a campaign to ever take a meeting to hear info about an opponent..." He also denied issuing conflicting statements.
A spokesman for President Trump's legal team said the president was "not aware of and did not attend" the meeting.
Anthony Zurcher, BBC North America reporter
Whether by plan or happenstance, Donald Trump Jr is stumbling into an increasingly dire situation.
The pattern has been set. The New York Times runs a story, Trump Jr issues his response, then the noose tightens.
First he said the meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya was about adoption issues. Then the Times reports that Trump Jr thought he would learn damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
The presidential son says he was conducting routine opposition research. Then the Times reports that he was told it was the Russian government itself that was coming to his father's aid.
In a traditional campaign, a foreign government's attempt to offer incriminating information about an opponent - or even the hint of such an overture - would set off all kinds of alarms. The FBI would have been notified. Senior staff would have insulated themselves from incrimination.
The Trump team was not a conventional campaign. And time and time again, it made novice mistakes or, more ominously, took unprecedented risks.
Its candidate prevailed, but it has led to countless political headaches. Now it appears the president's own family, and his presidency itself, could be in peril. They have only themselves to blame.
Read more from Anthony
It is alleged that Russian hackers stole information linked to the Clinton campaign and passed it to Wikileaks so it could be released and help tip the election towards Mr Trump.
Congressional committees and a special prosecutor are investigating whether there was any collusion between the Trump team and the Russians.
The investigations have yet to reveal any evidence of collusion, something the president has always denied.
Last week Mr Trump said interference in the election "could well have been" carried out by countries other than Russia and interference "has been happening for a long time". | The Russian lawyer at the centre of allegations surrounding US President Donald Trump's son has insisted she was never in possession of information that could have damaged Hillary Clinton. |
35,019,302 | Jaafar Mohammed Saad and several aides died when their convoy was hit. IS says it detonated a car laden with explosives as he drove by.
The group has established a presence in Yemen since its civil war broke out.
It is opposed to the government and Iranian-backed Houthi rebels who have seized much of the country, including the capital Sanaa.
Earlier this year, Aden was recaptured by government troops backed by a Saudi-led coalition.
Mr Saad was appointed Aden governor in October.
The BBC's Arab affairs editor Sebastian Usher says the killing of Mr Saad is a blow to Saudi-led efforts to re-establish Aden as a secure base for the government which spent months in exile in Saudi Arabia.
Mr Saad was a significant figure not just as the administrative head of Aden, but for the role he played in driving Houthi rebels out of the port city earlier this year, our correspondent says.
But Aden has remained vulnerable to violence with jihadists carrying out regular attacks.
The claim by IS introduces another dangerous factor into the equation, our correspondent says, because like the long established al-Qaeda franchise in Yemen, IS has gained strength from the violence and chaos of the past nine months of all-out conflict.
Mr Saad's murder is also likely to complicate further the latest UN-led efforts to get a peace process under way.
IS has endeavoured to make the situation even worse, our correspondent says, by bombing mosques and killing captives in its trademark style of grotesque and horrifying showmanship.
In a statement, IS promised more operations against "the heads of apostasy in Yemen" along with photos of a booby-trapped vehicle which detonated as a white vehicle carrying Mr Saad drove past.
A witness of the blast told the BBC that the explosion was "very powerful" the ensuing fire was "very intense".
"We pulled some wounded people out but we couldn't get the governor out because [his] car was on fire," Abu Mohammed said.
Sunday's violence came after the UN envoy to Yemen met President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi in Aden on Saturday in an effort to bring eight months of civil war to an end.
Air strikes and fighting on the ground in Yemen have killed more than 5,700 people since the Saudi-led coalition began a campaign to restore the government in March, according to the UN.
The UN hopes to organise talks later this month between the government and the Houthi rebels, who support former President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Islamic State declared its presence in November and have carried out a number of attacks since then.
The war the world forgot?
Yemen's humanitarian catastrophe
Who is fighting whom?
Meeting the Houthis and their enemies | Islamic State militants say they carried out a bombing that killed the governor of Yemen's port city of Aden. |
22,963,499 | Wall, who was awarded the CBE, was a regular partner to Dame Margot Fonteyn.
He studied at the Royal Ballet School and joined the ballet's touring company in 1963, becoming principal in 1966.
Wall, who was 67, died at his family home in Croydon, south London, on Tuesday. Friend Christopher Price paid tribute to "a great dancer and artist".
"It has been an honour to know him and he has brought the world and his family so much joy and happiness during his lifetime," said Mr Price.
"His passing will be an enormous loss to us all."
Daria Klimentova, senior principal ballerina with the English National Ballet (ENB), said she would dedicate her Wednesday performance in Swan Lake at the Royal Albert Hall to her former teacher and friend.
She said she would not be at the ENB without him and that she did not know how she was going to be able to perform after hearing the news.
Gary Avis, ballet master and principal character artist at the Royal Ballet, said he would be raising a glass to his friend.
"With admiration, gratitude and respect I thank you David Wall for being a friend, mentor and gentleman!" he said on Twitter.
He said his passing was "unbelievably sad" but called him "a brave and courageous man" adding he was "inspirational but above all a real gent with an amazing sense of humour".
David Wall was accepted into the Royal Ballet school at the age of 10. A school teacher persuaded his mother to let him audition after seeing his potential in the compulsory ballroom dancing lessons at his primary school in Windsor.
But he said he did not always know he wanted to dance professionally. He told Ballet Magazine it was not until he completed his training, at the age of 16 that he decided.
"David Wall came at a particular time in British Ballet. If you think that British ballet started in 1931. So when David was dancing in the 1960s that was really when it grew up.
We had this generation of home-grown male talent that hadn't had to take time out to do national service.
So it really was the first time there was this coterie of male principals and David was at the forefront of that.
I think he combined incredible technical facility and strength but with real acting ability, real interpretive skills.
If you went to see David perform it was akin to really seeing someone at the National Theatre.
You felt you were going into the character, you were not just seeing the steps you were living the life of the character and that was his particular skill.
David had an incredibly masculine presence, he had a real physicality.
When he danced a pas de deux with Lynn Seymour or Alfreda Thorogood, his wife who he danced with, you had no doubt there was that chemistry between them. Because he managed to have this sensuality and real masculinity in his work."
Deborah Bull is a former Royal Ballet dancer and Creative Director at The Royal Opera House.
"At that point, we were witness to two really great ballets: La Fille mal gardee had just been created, and Cranko's Antigone, in which the males took on the leading roles. Also, Nureyev had just defected, so seeing the male get more prominence in the art form spurred me on," he said.
In 1963, Wall joined the Royal Ballet Touring Company and in 1970, he joined the main Royal Ballet company as principal.
It was a golden age of classical ballet and Wall danced all the leading roles with some of the greatest ballerinas, including Doreen Wells and Lynn Seymour.
He admitted at first he felt most comfortable dancing onstage with his wife Alfreda Thorogood, who was a principal dancer at the Royal Ballet.
He was 17 the first time he danced with Dame Margot Fonteyn.
Appearing on Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, in 1978, Wall remembered feeling nervous when Dame Margot picked him to be her partner.
"I was doubting and questioning my ability very much for three weeks," he said.
"But as soon as I got into the rehearsal room, she put me totally at my ease and we really started to enjoy working."
Wall was renowned for his acting ability, which he said was due to his first artistic director, John Field, who encouraged his dancers to see plays and watch actors perform.
Wall retired from dancing in 1984, deciding not to continue as a character dancer.
"I had created Rudolf in Mayerling, I think that was the pinnacle of my career, and I probably would have just become complacent doing character roles. I needed other challenges," he told Ballet Magazine.
He became associate director of the Royal Academy and went on to become director.
In 1995, he joined the ENB as ballet master because he felt strongly about the importance of teaching ballet.
Gregory Nash, director of arts for the British Council, said on Wednesday that in 1981 Wall heard about the first National Festival of Youth Dance on the radio and immediately drove straight to Leicester to join them.
Many of his former students have paid tribute to his legacy.
He is survived by his wife, two children and a number of grandchildren. | Ballet dancer David Wall, who became the youngest male principal in the history of the Royal Ballet at the age of 21, has died of cancer. |
37,940,494 | First Minister Nicola Sturgeon had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with two state-backed Chinese firms.
But the companies later told the Scottish government by email that they were withdrawing from the deal.
Ms Sturgeon told MSPs that her government remained committed to pursuing all investment opportunities.
Opposition politicians claimed the collapse of the agreement - which only became public knowledge when it was reported by the media in April - had been an "embarrassing saga" for her.
And Conservative leader Ruth Davidson accused the first minister of blaming everyone else for the collapse of the agreement, which had been signed by SinoFortone and China Railway No3 Engineering Group (CR3).
Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie also attacked the first minister, saying that "surely she is responsible for the collapse of this and nobody else".
The MoU had committed the Scottish government and the two Chinese companies to exploring opportunities for investment.
But when details of the agreement became public, it also emerged that Amnesty International had raised concerns over the human rights record of CR3, with the company being blacklisted by Norway's oil fund.
Ms Sturgeon told MSPs that the government was made aware in August "that due to the political climate, our partners in that memorandum of understanding felt that they could not proceed at this time".
She added: "We did not take that as a cancellation of the memorandum of understanding, we remained committed then as we remain committed now to pursuing all opportunities for investment."
The first minister said the government will "continue to try to attract investment from China, from other countries, from anywhere that wants to invest in Scotland in reasonable investment proposals".
She also criticised rival party leaders, saying: "We have an opposition that demanded the cancellation of this memorandum of understanding, we have an opposition that had a hysterical over-the-top reaction to this memorandum of understanding.
"So, while I take responsibility for learning lessons, I really do think the opposition also have to reflect on their behaviour, which led to a political climate in which these partners felt they couldn't proceed."
And Ms Sturgeon said it was "double standards on stilts" for Ms Davidson to raise the China deal with her when the Conservative government at Westminster has failed to answer questions on a reported deal with car manufacturers Nissan over Brexit.
Ms Davidson responded by saying: "I cannot believe the first minister is persisting to come to the chamber today to say that the Chinese Communist Party pulled the plug on this deal because they heard the Scottish Liberal Democrats roar.
"This entire saga is embarrassing. It is embarrassing for the government and I think it is embarrassing for our country.
"Because if we spell out what was at stake here - or what we're now told was at stake here because it was hidden at the time - it was £10bn that could have been invested in housing and transport, and that's exactly the kind of investment you would expect the Scottish government to pull out all the stops to secure." | The Scottish government will continue to seek investment from China despite the collapse of a possible £10bn deal. |
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The United States midfielder, 34, has scored 96 goals in 232 international appearances, including a 13-minute hat-trick in the 2015 World Cup final.
She joins the Women's Super League One club for the 2017 Spring Series, which begins in April and ends on 3 June.
Her deal also includes City's Women's Champions League and FA Cup campaigns.
Nick Cushing's side face Danish champions Fortuna Hjorring in March's Champions League quarter-final, after entering the FA Cup at the fifth-round stage on 19 March.
US captain Lloyd becomes the third American player to move to an English club this winter, after winger Crystal Dunn's move to Chelsea Ladies and midfielder Heather O'Reilly's switch to Arsenal.
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"This facility [at Manchester City] is unbelievable. I don't think anything compares to it," Lloyd told BBC Sport. "I am always looking to improve my game.
"It is another challenge for me, to be able to come over here, train with some of the world's best players, be at the world's best facility, playing in the Champions League and hopefully win an FA Cup and the Spring Series.
"I've had a lot of different offers from various clubs and none of them really panned out, but this one was going in the right direction."
On joining the WSL, Lloyd - who most recently played for American side Houston Dash after a spell with Western New York Flash - added: "It is definitely the next up-and-coming league.
"It is going to be fun to be able to play a few months with some of these players and get a better understanding of how this league operates. I can help promote the [American] NWSL and help see how they run things here and make our league back home a bit better as well."
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Lloyd also stated her ambition to help City win the Women's Champions League this season, a competition that no English side has won since it was rebranded from the Uefa Cup in 2009.
"Not too many people get to say they have taken part in the Champions League," she continued. "It is huge.
"I have experienced a lot; World Cups, Olympics and being at the Fifa World Player of the Year Awards. A Champions League win would totally top that off.
"That's what I'm going after. That's the next challenge set in front of me. I'm just looking to get after it and do anything I can to help."
The final of this season's Women's Champions League takes in place in Cardiff on Thursday, 1 June.
City would face either defending champions Lyon or last year's runners-up Wolfsburg in April's semi-finals if they overcome Fortuna Hjorring in the last eight. | English league champions Manchester City Women have signed World Cup-winner and Fifa World Player of the Year Carli Lloyd on a short-term deal. |
23,930,834 | Two chicks have been raised in the north-east of the country in the past two years, RSPB Scotland has said.
The birds typically spend their summers in northern Europe and migrate to France and Spain for winter.
They were once common in the UK but died out in the 16th Century.
Cranes are known for their graceful tall stature and loud mating calls.
The bird was a popular royal meal in the Middle Ages but the species disappeared mainly because of hunting and loss of habitat.
Since the 1970s a group of cranes have re-established a small population in Norfolk with 17 pairs breeding, but the two chicks born in Scotland are the first confirmed north of the border for hundreds of years.
A crane can grow to 1.3m (4.2ft) tall, with a wingspan of 2.4m (7.8ft). Their elegant breeding displays, which include dancing and ruffling feathers, are popular with bird spotters.
Cranes have been seen in the last few years at RSPB's Loch of Strathbeg nature reserve, near Fraserburgh, while travelling back to their breeding spots in northern Europe.
The bird charity is not disclosing the exact location of the nest site to minimise the risk of disruption.
The species favours large wetland areas such as lowland peat bogs and feeds on small insects, plants and grains.
Stuart Housden, director of RSPB Scotland, said: "We are stunned and delighted to see that common cranes have bred successfully in Scotland.
"These charming, elegant birds have a strong place in our myths and history and are a delight to see, particularly during the breeding season with their dancing displays.
"They undertake regular migrations and small numbers have turned up on the east coast of Scotland in recent years, raising hopes of a re-colonisation. Last year a pair reared one chick, followed by a second chick in 2013."
He added: "We have been working with local farmers, landowners and the community to monitor these fantastic birds.
"Despite their size and flamboyant breeding displays, cranes are secretive birds and are very sensitive to disturbance, and we ask that they be given space and peace so they may establish a breeding population in Scotland." | Conservationists have said they are "stunned" that common cranes have successfully bred in Scotland for the first time since the Middle Ages. |
26,330,911 | The situation has improved a little in the 10 years since the auditor last investigated, but he said there were still challenges to be faced.
Out of 300,000 school children in NI, 20,000 are missing at least six weeks of lessons each year.
The level of unauthorised absences is now proportionately twice as high as in England.
"Our attendance policy is living and vibrant. We talk about great initiatives for getting children into school.
At Holy Cross Boys' School, we have a breakfast club. When the children come in, they can join the i-pad club, the book club or the chess club.
These children come in their droves because they want to be part of what we have to offer.
We have had many challenges over the years. We are in a highly socially deprived area, at the minute we have 78% free school meals.
Despite all that, we do send 42% children to grammar school.
We have a rigorous, robust but very fair attendance policy.
We talk about an early intervention programme. If I have a problem with attendances, I will speak to the parents.
Sometimes, I've been at homes and I've been taking children out of bed and into school. I am known as the headmaster who gets the children out of bed and into school.
We would offer great rewards for getting children into school. We make it competitive and fun.
With children who have 100% attendance in a month, they are put into a draw for £5. That is some incentive to come in.
Kevin McArevey Principal, Holy Cross Boys' PS Commended for good practice in the Audit Office Report
Alarm bells should ring where a pupil misses around six weeks of schooling, but the auditor is concerned that schools are not being encouraged to report all cases.
Of the 20,000 pupils who are persistently absent, less than a fifth were referred to the authorities.
Non-attendance is said to not only waste money, it also affects a child's long-term prospects.
Persistent offenders are seven times more likely to be out of a job and not in education or training when they leave school.
Children in socially deprived areas and in traveller families are most likely to be affected.
Auditor General Kieran Donnelly said the cost to society, in terms of lost career opportunities, amounted to £22m a year.
The audit office published its last report on school absenteeism in 2004.
Ten years later it said there had been a marginal improvement.
The Department of Education has been praised for improving the way information is collected and commissioning research, but the report said there was not enough joined-up thinking among the education and library boards. | The Northern Ireland Audit office has said it is disturbed at the high level of pupils who miss weeks of schooling. |
37,389,256 | Kompany, 30, suffered the injury against Real Madrid on 4 May.
City manager Pep Guardiola says the defender is close to full fitness but not in time for Saturday's Premier League game against Bournemouth.
"The players must compete with each other," said Guardiola. "We'll see on the pitch what is best for each game."
Kompany has been an automatic choice since his arrival from Hamburg for around £10m in 2008.
He replaced Carlos Tevez as City captain following the 2011 FA Cup final victory over Stoke and in his 298 appearances for the club has led them to two Premier League titles and two League Cup final victories.
In recent seasons though, he has suffered a number of muscular injuries.
Last year he was missing for over a month on four occasions prior to the injury that ended his season and meant he was not able to play for Belgium at Euro 2016.
His highest number of Premier League appearances in the past four full seasons was 28 in 2013-14 and he only played half that number of games last term.
So, with City chasing an eighth successive win - which would be a club record from the start of the season - against Bournemouth this weekend, and £47.5m new signing John Stones excelling alongside Aleksander Kolarov and Nicolas Otamendi in defence, Kompany cannot take his return for granted.
"I know Vincent's quality," said Guardiola. "I need him to put pressure on John Stones, Nico Otamendi and Kolarov.
"They have to know if they don't play good that there's another one beside me and the next time he is going to play."
Subscribe to the BBC Sport newsletter to get our pick of news, features and video sent to your inbox. | Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany has not been given any guarantee over his first-team place when he finally recovers from his groin injury. |
20,182,106 | Correction 10 November 2012: The BBC has apologised unreservedly for broadcasting a report on Newsnight on 2 November over allegations of child abuse which transpired to have involved a case of mistaken identity. As a result the video of the original report has been removed from the website. More details can be found here.
Steve Messham was one of hundreds of children abused in the 1970s and 80s - exploitation brought to light by the Waterhouse Inquiry Report in 2000.
But he told BBC Newsnight the inquiry uncovered just a fraction of the abuse.
He and another victim also told the BBC a leading Thatcher-era Conservative politician took part in the abuse.
Since the Jimmy Savile sex abuse allegations surfaced, politicians have been raising questions about other historic cases.
During the 1970s and 1980s almost 40 children's homes in north Wales were the scene of horrific child abuse in which youngsters were raped and abused by the very people who were paid to look after them.
In the early 1990s, allegations of the abuse started to surface and in March 1994 Clwyd County Council commissioned an independent inquiry into claims of widespread abuse across north Wales, centred around the Bryn Estyn care home.
Professor Jane Tunstill, who was on that inquiry panel, told the BBC in 2000 that along with a "litany of abusive practices going on in the home on the part of the care staff" there were rumours that people outside the care system were also involved in the abuse.
However, the inquiry's report was never published and the copies were pulped to ensure that the local authority was able to maintain its insurance cover.
In the wake of this, and amid growing public pressure, in 1996 the-then Secretary of State for Wales, William Hague, ordered an inquiry into allegations of hundreds of cases of child abuse in care homes in former county council areas of Clwyd and Gwynedd between 1974 and 1990.
The tribunal, led by Sir Ronald Waterhouse, heard evidence from more than 650 people who had been in care from 1974 and took almost three years to publish its report.
Counsel for the inquiry mentioned the existence of a shadowy figure of high public standing, but said that there was no substantial evidence to support the allegations.
An investigation by BBC reporter Angus Stickler at the time of the report's publication revealed allegations of a much wider circle of abuse than that uncovered by the inquiry.
He uncovered allegations of widespread physical and sexual abuse of children not just by care system staff, but that children were being lent to paedophiles from all walks of life including businessmen, police, and a senior public figure in a paedophile ring stretching beyond the borders of north Wales, to Chester, London, Brighton and beyond.
One of the victims that Angus Stickler spoke to in 2000 was Mr Messham, who described some of the abuse he suffered. Now, reporting for BBC Newsnight and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, he has re-interviewed Mr Messham.
"In the home it was the standard abuse which was violent and sexual. Outside it was like you were sold, we were taken to the Crest Hotel in Wrexham, mainly on Sunday nights, where they would rent rooms," Mr Messham recalled in this latest interview.
"One particular night that I always recall is when I was basically raped, tied down, and abused by nine different men."
He also stood by his claims then that his abusers included a leading Tory politician of the Thatcher era.
"You were taken by car, where basically you were sexually abused. Various things would happen, drink would be involved, it was basically rape. But it wasn't just him, there be other people involved as well," he said.
When asked how many times he was abused by the politician Mr Messham said:
"Off my head I couldn't give an exact number as it goes back many years but certainly more than a dozen."
In his new interview, Mr Messham also said that he had gone to the police in the late 1970s to report the abuse, but that he was not believed:
"I was called a liar. I was pinned up against a wall. I could still name to this day the police officer who had done it," he said.
"The police denied it and when they looked back, they finally admitted in the inquiry [that] statements were made. That's all they would say. They wouldn't say who was named in them. But they did admit I did make a statement of sexual abuse."
Mr Messham also insisted that his statements to the police included allegations of sexual abuse against the politician.
In his original investigation Angus Stickler also spoke to another victim who claimed to have been abused by the politician, as well as others.
Newsnight/the Bureau of Investigative Journalism has been unable to track him down for this latest report. However, in 2000 he described how as a teenager he was abused by the politician:
"We went out for something to eat and he pulled over in a layby and then, hey presto, oral sex took place," the man - who wanted to remain anonymous - said.
He told Angus Stickler that at the time, in the early 1990s, he went to North Wales Police to report the abuse, showing them faxed photographs of the senior Tory politician.
However, he said that the two police officers he showed the photograph to dismissed his claims, saying that since the pictures were faxed they were not sufficiently reliable evidence and no further action was taken.
The Waterhouse inquiry, which cost £12m to stage, promised to leave no stone unturned in its endeavour to uncover abuse.
However, there have been complaints that the terms of reference were too narrow, restricting investigations to abuse taking place within the care system, not beyond it.
"I don't understand why on Earth we had an inquiry when we had to leave out 30% of the abusers," Mr Messham said in his latest interview.
"And basically I was told to do that. I was told I couldn't go into detail about these people, I couldn't name them and they wouldn't question me on them."
Mr Messham says he wants a new investigation into what happened:
"I would like a meeting now with David Cameron. He's made a statement, a sweeping statement that abused people need to be believed, we haven't been believed, we've been swept under the carpet.
"It's time he knew the truth. It's time a full investigation took place and until I can meet with him and get some reassurance I don't believe we will get anywhere."
Richard Scorer, a solicitor with Pannone and Partners, who represented 30 victims at the Waterhouse inquiry, believes the original remit of the inquiry and attitudes at the time were at the heart of the problem:
"The terms of reference were an important restriction. It's also fair to say at that time, and we're going back to the mid to late 1990s here, at that time the idea that senior public figures; politicians; celebrities could be involved in child abuse was seen as a bit far-fetched," he told Newsnight/the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.
"We now know of course from recent revelations that it isn't far-fetched at all - and that's part of the reason why it's important that these allegations are looked at again," he added.
Anyone with information into these allegations - or who needs support on the issues raised in this article - can call the NSPCC on 0808 800 5000 or email [email protected], or call their local police station by dialling 101. | A man who was sexually abused as a child in care in Wales has called for a new investigation into the true scale of the abuse and who was involved. |
32,241,285 | The 54-year-old said he was "deeply honoured... to join the distinguished list of past recipients of this award."
First presented to Richard Pryor in 1998, the award is named after the 19th Century novelist and essayist who was born Samuel Clemens in 1835.
It is given annually to someone who has had an impact on US society through their humour and social commentary.
Other previous recipients include Bill Cosby, Ellen DeGeneres and talk show host Jay Leno, last year's honouree.
Born in Brooklyn in 1961, Murphy got his break in comedy in 1980 when he joined the cast of Saturday Night Live.
He went on to become one of the movie industry's top box-office performers thanks to such hits as Beverly Hills Cop, Coming to America and the animated Shrek films.
Murphy will be presented with the prize at a ceremony on 18 October at the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC. | Actor and comedian Eddie Murphy is to receive this year's Mark Twain Prize for American humour. |
35,211,486 | Newport had been confident the match would go ahead but referee Charles Breakspear called it off after heavy rain on Saturday.
League Two side County and Newport RFC had games postponed last weekend due to a waterlogged pitch at the same ground.
The fixture could be rearranged for the week starting Monday, 18 January. | Newport County's FA Cup third-round tie against Blackburn Rovers was postponed because of a waterlogged pitch at Rodney Parade. |
18,188,241 | Pedro Hernandez of Maple Shade, New Jersey, told police he choked Etan Patz to death and left his body in a bag in an alley, New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly told reporters.
Etan vanished while walking to a school bus stop on his own for the first time.
He became one of the first to appear on milk cartons asking for information about missing children.
Mr Hernandez, 51, is the first suspect to be arrested in connection with the case. He worked in a convenience shop near the Patz family home in Manhattan, New York.
"He was remorseful, and I think the detectives thought that it was a feeling of relief on his part," Mr Kelly said. "We believe that this is the individual responsible for the crime."
Mr Kelly added that Mr Hernandez had lured the boy "with the promise of a soda". After leading the boy into the basement he "choked him there and disposed of the body by placing him in a plastic bag and placing it in the trash".
No body or bag was ever recovered.
Mr Kelly told reporters that police took Mr Hernandez back to the scene of the crime, which is now a shop selling spectacles. When the incident took place, Mr Hernandez had been stacking shelves at the small grocery shop for about a month.
He added that police had already informed Etan's family of the development in the case.
"We can only hope that these developments bring some measure of peace to the family," he said.
US media said that police had been tipped off by someone Mr Hernandez had confided in, possibly a family member.
By Laura TrevelyanBBC News, New York
The image of Etan Patz's smiling face, framed by his fair hair, haunted Americans in the 1980s as they saw it on their milk cartons nationwide.
Etan's disappearance helped launch a national missing children's movement. The harrowing story of how a six-year-old vanished while walking to the school bus stop for the very first time prompted American parents to curb their children's independence.
Today it's almost impossible to think of a six-year-old being given such freedom, but back in 1979, it was common.
Investigators last month searched a handyman's former workshop near the Patz family home.
In an apparent breakthrough for the decades-old investigation, the Manhattan basement flat was excavated over four days. But no obvious human remains and little forensic evidence were found.
Several containers of rubble and sand from the property were hauled away and preserved in case officials need to revisit the excavation.
The handyman, Othniel Miller, has been questioned by detectives over the past year. But he denies having anything to do with his disappearance.
Etan vanished on 25 May 1979, near his home in New York's SoHo district. Friday is the anniversary his disappearance.
In 1983, President Ronald Reagan declared 25 May National Missing Children's Day.
Etan's parents, Stanley and Julie Patz, became outspoken advocates for missing children in the years after their son's disappearance.
The Patzes have not moved since his disappearance and for years refused to change their phone number, hoping that Etan was alive.
In 2001, however, the family obtained a court order declaring Etan dead as part of a lawsuit in which a convicted child molester was held responsible for their son's death.
A judge ordered Jose Antonio Ramos, who knew Etan's babysitter, to pay $2m (£1.3m) to the Patzes.
Ramos is serving a 20-year prison sentence for a different case, and is scheduled to be released this year. | A man has confessed to suffocating a six-year-old boy who went missing in New York in 1979, police say. |
20,617,312 | Most are "silent" mutations and do not affect health, although they can cause problems when passed to future generations.
Others are linked to conditions such as cancer or heart disease, which appear in later life, say geneticists.
The evidence comes from the 1,000 Genomes project, which is mapping normal human genetic differences, from tiny changes in DNA to major mutations.
In the study, 1,000 seemingly healthy people from Europe, the Americas and East Asia had their entire genetic sequences decoded, to look at what makes people different from each other, and to help in the search for genetic links to diseases.
The new research, published in The American Journal of Human Genetics, compared the genomes of 179 participants, who were healthy at the time their DNA was sampled, with a database of human mutations developed at Cardiff University.
It revealed that a normal healthy person has on average about 400 potentially damaging DNA variations, and two DNA changes known to be associated with disease.
"Ordinary people carry disease-causing mutations without them having any obvious effect," said Dr Chris Tyler-Smith, a lead researcher on the study from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Cambridge.
He added: "In a population there will be variants that have consequences for their own health."
The research gives an insight into the "flaws that make us all different, sometimes with different expertise and different abilities, but also different predispositions in diseases," said Prof David Cooper of Cardiff University, the other lead researcher of the study.
"Not all human genomes have perfect sequences," he added. "The human genome is packed with pervasive, architectural flaws."
It has been known for decades that all people carry some genetic mutations that appear to cause little or no harm.
Many are only damaging if they are passed on to children who inherit another copy of the faulty gene from the other parent.
In others - around one in ten of those studied - the mutation causes only a mild condition, appears to be inactive, or does not manifest itself until later life.
Databases of human mutations, like the one at Cardiff University, will have increasing importance in the future, as we move into the era of personalised medicine.
More people have access to genetic information about themselves, with various companies offering screening of selected gene changes via the internet.
Meanwhile, the cost of sequencing a whole genome is dropping rapidly.
In the case of the 1,000 genomes study, samples were anonymous, and participants will not be given information about any gene changes linked with disease.
But as DNA sequencing becomes more widespread, ethical dilemmas will arise about what to tell people about their genes, especially when many risks are uncertain.
Dr Chris Tyler-Smith said: "All of our genomes contain flaws; some of us will carry deleterious variants but will not be at risk of acquiring the associated disease for one reason or another.
"For others, there will be health consequences, and early warning could be useful, but might still come as an unwelcome surprise to the participant." | Everyone has on average 400 flaws in their DNA, a UK study suggests. |
38,598,767 | The versatile 23-year-old midfielder made 101 starts for Oldham.
The League Two club have also signed West Ham's versatile defender Alex Pike on loan for the rest of this season.
The 19-year-old, who can play at centre-back, full-back or wing-back, has been with the Premier League club since joining their academy, aged 10.
Pike's West Ham debut came in the Europa League in 2015 and he made three starts for the Hammers' Under-23 side in the EFL Trophy earlier this term.
Both players could play for Cheltenham when they host Accrington on Saturday.
Find all the latest football transfers on our dedicated page or visit our Premier League tracker here. | Cheltenham Town have signed Northern Ireland international Carl Winchester on a free transfer from Oldham Athletic on a one-and-a-half-year contract. |
34,659,771 | Shana Pezaro, 36, from Hove, East Sussex, was given antiretroviral drugs after fearing she may have contracted HIV.
Within days, Miss Pezaro noticed an easing of her MS symptoms.
When a doctor saw her walking up stairs after years of using a wheelchair he set up a clinical trial.
Multiple sclerosis is an incurable condition that can lead to sight loss, pain, fatigue and disability. It affects around 100,000 people in the UK.
Miss Pezaro was a dancer and piano teacher before being diagnosed with MS at the age of 28. The condition affected her hands and feet and she used a wheelchair.
In MS the coating around the nerve fibres is damaged causing a range of symptoms
Once diagnosed there is no cure, but treatments can help manage the condition
MS affects almost three times as many women as men
Physical symptoms of MS might commonly include vision problems, balance problems and dizziness, fatigue, bladder problems and stiffness and/or spasms
MS can affect memory and thinking and also can have an impact on emotions
(Source: Multiple Sclerosis Society)
About a year ago, Miss Pezaro thought she may have been exposed to HIV and her doctor prescribed emergency antiretroviral drugs.
"Three days after I took the drugs I walked up a flight of stairs," she said.
"That was an unbelievable, massive change."
Prof Julian Gold from the Prince of Wales Hospital in Sydney, saw a video of Miss Pezaro climbing the stairs and a clinical trial was set up to look at the impact of single or combination antiretroviral drugs on MS patients.
An earlier study led by Dr Gold conducted with Queen Mary University, London and the University of Oxford showed an association between HIV and MS.
They reported antiretroviral treatment may suppress other viruses such as those which may cause MS.
Dr Gold said: "The next stage of the investigation is to use a very similar combination [of HIV drugs] that Shana took. I think that might be quite optimistic."
A spokeswoman for the MS Society said: "Our growing understanding tells us that viruses have a role to play in multiple sclerosis and it will be interesting to see the trial results - positive findings mean another step on the road to beating MS."
Shana and Dr Gold would be very keen not to raise any false hope.
The study builds on a lot of work already done with HIV patients who simply don't get multiple sclerosis.
This is really about finding a cause and increasingly people think the cause may be a virus.
When scientists use words like "amazing" and "intriguing" you have to stand up and listen. | A woman with multiple sclerosis (MS) says her symptoms improved so dramatically she was able to walk again after being prescribed HIV drugs. |
34,667,804 | The team will present its findings at the National Cancer Research Institute conference next week.
They plan to use liposomes - tiny bubbles of fat which carry materials round the body - to release toxic drugs when their temperature is raised.
The "grenades" are intended to avoid side-effects by ensuring the drugs target only the tumour.
Experts said such technology, which has been effective in animal experiments, was the "holy grail of nanomedicine".
Cancer scientists are trying to harness the transporting abilities of these fatty spheres by getting them to carry toxic drugs to tumours.
"The difficulty is, how do you release them when they reach their target?" Prof Kostas Kostarelos, from the University of Manchester, told the BBC News website.
The Nanomedicine Lab in Manchester has designed liposomes that are water-tight at normal body temperature. But when the temperature increases to 42C they become leaky.
"The challenge for us is to try to develop liposomes in such a way that they will be very stable at 37C and not leak any cancer drug molecules and then abruptly release them at 42C," Prof Kostarelos added.
He suggests heat pads could be used to warm tumours on the body surface such as skin, head or neck cancers.
Probes can heat tumours inside the body, and there is also discussion about using ultra sound to warm tumours.
In early tests on mice with melanoma there was "greater uptake" of drugs in tumours using the thermal grenades. And that resulted in a "moderate improvement" in survival rates.
Prof Kostarelos said similar techniques were being trialled in patients and this "is not a fantasy."
Prof Charles Swanton, the chairman of the conference, said targeted liposomes were a "holy grail of nanomedicine".
He added: "These studies demonstrate for the first time how they can be built to include a temperature control, which could open up a range of new treatment avenues.
"This is still early work but these liposomes could be an effective way of targeting treatment towards cancer cells while leaving healthy cells unharmed."
Follow James on Twitter. | Scientists have designed microscopic "grenades" that can explode their cancer-killing payload in tumours. |
32,552,293 | I don't know if it's entirely true, but it's catchy nevertheless and paints the right picture of this urban constituency.
The seat has been held by the Liberal Democrats since 2005, after voters turned to them from Labour following the invasion of Iraq.
Cardiff Central is multicultural with a high proportion of students. As a result, large chunks of the population are transient by nature.
The Labour candidate Jo Stevens told me that recent changes to the voter registration system - which mean that students are no longer registered en bloc in their halls of residence - has led to a drop of around 10,000 potential voters.
She said: "A lot of people here last time voted for the Liberal Democrats thinking they were going to get what the Liberal Democrats said they would do, and they didn't - they got the Tories.
"There has been a lot of people who switched from Labour to the Lib Dems and back to Labour. That is the nature of the seat - it is very very marginal."
The Liberal Democrat candidate Jenny Willott, who has been the MP here for the past decade, has a majority of around 5,000 over Labour.
She believes the difference this time round will be under a thousand.
When I asked her how difficult it had been after five years of being in power with the Conservatives, she said: "I quite like the fact I have a record to defend.
"Previously when I have been standing and I have been the MP I have had my own personal record.
"But this time I can say, 'this is what we said in the last election and I have delivered a lot of it in government'."
The Conservative candidate Richard Hopkin admitted that one challenge he faces is coming across traditional Tory voters who are planning to vote tactically for the Lib Dems in order to keep Labour out.
But he said there are still opportunities.
"All the polling is showing that the Lib Dem vote is going to collapse, so what is going to happen to it?
"I am working really hard to make sure as much as possible comes back to the Conservatives because they are really conservative voters."
Plaid Cymru polled 3% of the vote five years ago.
The candidate Martin Pollard is looking to take advantage of the increase in profile being given to the leader Leanne Wood to get that share of the vote into double digits.
He has been stressing the anti-austerity message.
"There are a lot of reasons why people vote for Plaid Cymru and social justice and wanting to redistribute wealth within society are some of the reasons I got involved in the party," Mr Pollard said.
"They are now as important to many people as the Welsh language and, ultimately, independence."
UKIP's candidate Tony Raybould is a retired bus driver who has never been involved in politics in his life, until he joined the party last year.
He claims there are many people who share his concerns about immigration, even though there are many immigrants in the constituency.
"We try to say to them (immigrants) they are here already, they are not going to be kicked out of the EU," Mr Raybould said.
"They are already here and contributing to this country so we have no reason to want to get rid of them. All we are trying to do is to stop the volume of people coming in."
Also standing in Cardiff Central are the Green Party, The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, and an independent candidate - see the full list here. | The saying goes that Cardiff Central is the only constituency in Wales without a farm. |
33,499,465 | Police said four flag poles were damaged during the incident in the Diamond area.
It was reported shortly after 03:00 BST on Sunday.
The Orange Order has described the theft as "a deplorable act". | Four union flags have been stolen near the war memorial in Kilrea, County Londonderry. |
31,621,074 | Thirty-one-year-old Pierce Boykin was arrested on Monday and charged with a number of offences including aggravated assault and attempted murder.
An unidentified 27-year-old man is seriously ill in hospital with wounds to his arms and side.
The attack happened outside a bar in Philadelphia after an argument.
Another man, Devon Pickett, was killed in the same incident.
"The gentleman who is in custody is only charged with the stabbing of the male who is in critical condition," a Philadelphia police spokeswoman said.
"It is still an active investigation, our homicide unit is still working the case."
Minaj tweeted that she'd been in the city rehearsing for her tour which starts in Europe in March.
Follow @BBCNewsbeat on Twitter, BBCNewsbeat on Instagram and Radio1Newsbeat on YouTube | A man's been charged in connection with the stabbing of a member of Nicki Minaj's tour crew. |
39,077,293 | The findings came from a study of 52,600 people in the US, exploring the "orgasm gap" between the genders and different sexual orientations.
The report in Archives of Sexual Behaviour revealed a "variety of behaviours couples can try to increase orgasm frequency".
These include oral sex and manual stimulation.
The study, by Indiana University, Chapman University and Claremont Graduate University, showed the proportion of people who usually orgasmed was:
The research team said: "The findings, however, indicate that this orgasm gap can be reduced.
"The fact that lesbian women orgasmed more often than heterosexual women indicates that many heterosexual women could experience higher rates of orgasm."
Few heterosexual women climaxed through penetrative sex alone, the report said.
The study showed that "of particular importance was incorporating oral sex along with other activities during a sexual encounter".
There was a clear pattern between more oral sex and more orgasms in heterosexual women, lesbian women, bisexual women, gay men and bisexual men.
Only in straight men was no link detected.
Other behaviours linked to greater orgasms in women were:
The report authors said there were both social and evolutionary ideas around why men and women have different rates of orgasm.
For example a stigma against women expressing sexual desire hampering sexual discovery and a belief in some men that most women orgasm from penetrative sex.
And from an evolutionary perspective they suggested the male and female orgasms served different purposes which could also have an effect.
This male orgasm is all about ejaculation to ensure reproduction while in women it "facilitates bonding with a long-term romantic partner", the report said. | Heterosexual women have fewer orgasms than men or lesbian or bisexual women, a study suggests. |
17,025,119 | The 47-year-old will play the part of Creon in the drama. Jodie Whittaker, from Venus, St Trinian's and Attack the Block, will take the title role.
Antigone begins previews on 23 May and will be directed by Polly Findlay.
Eccleston - soon to be seen in BBC One thriller The Fuse - last performed at the National in 1990.
That was a production of Abingdon Square. The same year he also starred opposite Sir Ian McKellen in Bent.
Antigone, presented here in a version by Don Taylor, is an ancient Greek tragedy telling of a young woman who defies an edict saying her brother's body cannot be buried.
That brings her into conflict with Creon, a ruler desperate to gain control over a city ravaged by civil war. | Former Doctor Who star Christopher Eccleston is to return to the National Theatre for the first time in 20 years in a production of Sophocles' Antigone. |
29,279,405 | Bernadette Smyth, who leads the anti-abortion group Precious Life, was replying to a prosecution lawyer.
Mrs Smyth, of Suffolk Street, Ballymena, County Antrim, denies harassing Marie Stopes clinic director Dawn Purvis.
The lawyer suggested she had laughed at Ms Purvis in a "cackling, jeering, mocking way, in a witch's manner."
Ms Smyth replied: "I can't agree with this court that I'm a witch. I'm a Christian."
The case concerns two incidents involving the accused that happened outside the Marie Stopes Clinic, Great Victoria Street, Belfast, in January and February.
Ms Purvis runs the clinic and Ms Smyth was among anti-abortion protesters outside. Ms Purvis claimed that Ms Smyth harassed her.
The Marie Stopes clinic opened in Belfast in October 2012, amid protests from anti-abortion groups.
It provides medical termination of pregnancy up to nine weeks' gestation, subject to legal criteria being met.
A woman can only have an abortion in Northern Ireland if it can be proven her life is at risk or if there is a risk of permanent and serious damage to her mental or physical health.
The case continues | An anti-abortion protester accused of behaving like a witch told a Belfast court: "I'm no witch, I'm a Christian". |
38,389,556 | Shares in defence technology firm QinetiQ jumped more than 4% after it announced a deal to buy a targeting systems business from Meggitt for £57.5m. Meggitt fell 1%.
Crude oil prices pushed higher in early trading. North Sea Brent crude was 0.7% higher at $55.69 per barrel.
Oil shares were mixed, with BP trading 0.3% higher, but Shell down 0.4%.
"On Wednesday, UK stocks lost some ground with light profit taking headed into year-end," said Jasper Lawler, senior market analyst at London Capital Group.
"A finish for the year above 7,000 might just be the psychological boost required to presage a fresh record high in 2017," he added.
Connor Campbell, financial analyst at SpreadEx, described the session as "another drab day of pre-Christmas trading".
"Hopefully tomorrow can bring with it something a bit more interesting. Investors may have to wait until the afternoon, however, when the final US third-quarter GDP figure is released," he said.
The pound was down 0.13% against the dollar at $1.2351. It was 0.45% lower against the euro at €1.1849. | (Close): London's FTSE 100 drifted lower after Tuesday's two-month high, closing down 2.54 points at 7,041.42. |
34,129,885 | At the same time, 2.3 million male workers will benefit, the Resolution Foundation report says.
The majority of employees would see their earnings rise in line with the minimum but some would gain from a "ripple effect" of wage rises, it said.
The National Living Wage of £7.20 an hour comes into force in April 2016.
It will only apply to workers over the age of 25. The national minimum wage is currently £6.50 an hour, which will rise to £6.70 next month.
"Because of their concentration among the low paid, women will account for the majority of the winners," said the think tank's policy analyst, Conor D'Arcy.
"This will have a positive - though modest - effect on the gender pay gap, and will particularly help those working part-time."
Analysis by the Resolution Foundation found that six million people - almost a quarter of all employees - will get a wage rise by the end of the decade, worth an average of £1,210.
A further 2.8 million employees already being paid the new minimum would gain as firms maintained pay gaps between different workers, the report said.
Workers in areas including Yorkshire and the Humber, Midlands and Wales were expected to be among those benefiting most from the higher wage, it suggested.
Earlier in the week, the government outlined plans for tougher penalties to be imposed on employers which fail to meet the National Living Wage requirements.
The plan for the wage, outlined in Chancellor George Osborne's Budget, has received support, but the CBI said it was a "gamble" to place politics into the setting of a minimum wage level.
TUC general secretary Frances O'Grady said: "The TUC has long argued that Britain needs a pay rise, and the new supplement to the minimum wage is a welcome step forward.
"Despite the pay gains, many of the lowest paid workers will still be left poorer overall because of steep cuts to their tax credits." | Some 3.7 million women - nearly three in 10 employees - will receive a pay rise by 2020 owing to the new National Living Wage, research suggests. |
39,487,574 | The Fitzroy River rose to 8.75m (29ft) in the central Queensland city on Thursday.
It comes nine days after Cyclone Debbie made landfall in northern Queensland, causing floods along a 1,200km (745 miles) stretch of coast.
Authorities said Rockhampton would face a "major flood" for at least a day.
"This body of water is incredible," Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said.
At least 217 homes had been flooded and the river was expected to remain at its current level for at least a day, said local councillor Tony Williams.
Despite temporary levees being installed, floodwaters hit many buildings and forced roads and an airport to close.
Mr Williams, chair of the local disaster management committee, said it could take businesses up to two years to recover.
"I think it will be the nail in the coffin for a lot of businesses," he told Seven News.
Cyclone Debbie pounded Australia's east coast as a category four system before causing torrential rain as a tropical storm.
The Insurance Council of Australia has estimated the damage bill could reach A$1bn ($770m).
Rockhampton sits near the mouth of the Fitzroy River, which draws water from a catchment twice the size of Tasmania.
The peak came so long after Cyclone Debbie because the catchment is upstream, said civil engineer Dr David Callaghan from the University of Queensland.
"The reason for this delay is that it is a large catchment," he told the BBC.
"It takes time for water in a large area of that total catchment to all arrive at once to any particular location along the river." | More than 200 houses in the Australian city of Rockhampton have been flooded after a river reached its flood peak, authorities say. |
34,944,768 | King Arthur Pendragon claims the cremated bones, unearthed in 2008, are from members of the royal line and wants them reburied.
A licence allowing them to go on display expired last month, but has since been extended.
Mr Pendragon said the government had "reinterpreted" the law.
Since their excavation, the remains have led to new discoveries about Stonehenge.
Prof Mike Parker Pearson from University College London said the bones were buried over a period of 600 years, and include the remains of men, women and children.
His findings will be formally published in the Antiquity Journal next year.
If new scientific advances were made, he added, the licence allowed for future examination of the bone fragments.
The items will be held in storage until the bones are transferred to Salisbury Museum in April.
Mr Pendragon said he would will apply for the repatriation of the bones when they are moved to the museum, and will then apply for a judicial review.
He added: "We are not going to roll over on this and we are going to mobilise our supporters around the world."
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: "Every licence application is carefully considered on its merits.
"Having weighed up all the arguments put forward, Ministers found the case made by Professor Parker Pearson to be more persuasive than that put forward by those who opposed the application and have amended the licence as he requested."
Meanwhile, Mr Pendragon also told the BBC he planned to seek a change in the law to better protect pre-Christian human remains.
He will also address the issue at the Stonehenge winter solstice on 22 December. | A senior druid has vowed to seek a judicial review over a government decision allowing ancient human remains from Stonehenge to be kept in a museum. |
39,413,414 | The billionaire, dubbed Wall Street's "Bond King", sued Pimco after his abrupt departure from the firm in 2014.
Pimco, the world's largest bond fund, has agreed to pay Mr Gross in what both sides called an "amicable" settlement.
"Pimco has always been family to me, and, like any family, sometimes there are disagreements," Mr Gross said.
"I'm glad that we have had the opportunity to work through those, and see the Pimco founders receiving the recognition they deserve," he said.
Mr Gross, a Pimco co-founder, had been suing the firm for at least $200m, which he claims he lost after being forced to leave.
He had claimed he was forced out so that his colleagues could get his share of the bonus.
In the statement, Pimco said it recognised the "enormous contribution to its success" from Mr Gross and other co-founders.
Mr Gross, who moved to rival Janus Capital in 2014, also repeated that his lawsuit had never been about money.
The terms of the settlement are confidential. However, both sides have said that any proceeds from the suit will be donated to charity.
Mr Gross earned the moniker "the Bond King" from making good bets on US Treasury bonds, particularly during the dot com bubble and the housing crisis. | Star trader Bill Gross has ended a "family disagreement" with his former firm Pimco, in a settlement worth an estimated $81m (£65m). |
37,060,535 | 12 August 2016 Last updated at 13:24 BST
Scientists have created a special fabric that meshes together when water and a bit of pressure are applied.
It's inspired by chemicals found in a squid's tentacles which allow the creature to heal themselves quickly.
By using those chemicals in the fabric it's possible to make a material that stitches itself back together when needed.
The scientists at Pennsylvania State University and the US Naval Research Laboratory in Washington say this tech could be used to make protective suits to help keep people like soldiers or farmers safe from dangerous materials.
Take a look at some other animals that have inspired technology. | One day in the future the clothes we wear might be able to mend themselves. |
33,080,109 | The governing body said the teachers would not be allowed to teach again.
They were found guilty after a disciplinary process, the Teachers Services Commission (TSC) said.
A Child Welfare Society of Kenya has urged the director of public prosecutions to ensure those convicted are imprisoned, to protect other children in future.
This ban is a departure from previous reactions to sexual abuse by teachers, says the Kenyan newspaper the Daily Nation, as it says previously the TSC just transferred suspended teachers.
The list is compiled from complaints between 2011 and 2014.
Before this, in 2010, more than 1,000 Kenyan teachers were sacked for sexually abusing girls. Most of those cases occurred in rural primary schools.
Africa news updates | Kenya's authorities have banned 126 teachers for "gross misconduct", most for sexual abuse of their students. |
28,282,154 | Italian midfielder Bianchi, 25, joins on a four-year deal from Serie A side Sassuolo and spent last season on loan with Modena in Serie B.
"He can play on the left, right or in the number 10 position and he can score goals," said Leeds boss Dave Hockaday.
Senegal striker Doukara, 22, has arrived from Italian club Catania.
He was on loan with Serie B's Juve Stabia last season, scoring six goals in 20 appearances.
"He is a big, powerful and fast player with a hunger to succeed," added Hockaday. "He is exactly what we need at the club."
The Championship club's tally of signings this summer is now four following the arrivals of goalkeepers Marco Silvestri and Stuart Taylor.
The latest transfers come after Scotland international striker Ross McCormack left Leeds to join Fulham for an undisclosed fee, believed to be £11m. | Leeds United have signed Tommaso Bianchi on a permanent basis and Souleymane Doukara on a season-long loan. |
29,333,033 | Culling is taking place in two areas - west Somerset and west Gloucestershire - for a second year.
The 30-year-old was detained following an incident at a farm in Bromsberrow Heath, near Ledbury on the Herefordshire-Gloucestershire border.
He has been bailed to appear before Cheltenham magistrates on 23 October. | A man from the Bristol area has been charged with common assault and aggravated trespass by officers policing the badger cull. |
35,576,184 | Anthony Wordsworth gave the hosts an early lead from close range but Stuart Beavon equalised for Burton just before the break with a deflected strike.
Tyrone Barnett's fine drive restored Southend's advantage and David Mooney sealed the win in the last minute on the counter-attack.
Burton have now lost three of their past six matches.
Burton boss Nigel Clough told BBC Radio Derby:
Media playback is not supported on this device
"I thought we played well enough to get something out of the game.
"After the first 10 minutes we got to grips with the game and played well; deserved the equaliser and I thought we started the second half very well.
"They hardly had a shot and then all of a sudden one flies in the top corner and we're chasing the game again.
"We probably played better for an hour of the game tonight than we did in the two previous victories." | League One leaders Burton missed the chance to go seven points clear as they were beaten at Southend. |
38,008,151 | The people attempting to flee include children.
Witnesses and Bangladeshi officials say that some people trying to flee have been shot and killed.
At least 130 people have died during a military operation in Rakhine state, where many of the minority live, in just over a month.
Activists say hundreds of homes have been burnt to the ground but the government rejects that claim. Foreign reporters have not been allowed into the area.
Rakhine is home to more than a million Rohingya Muslims, who are not recognised as Myanmar citizens.
People in the country tend to consider them illegal immigrants from neighbouring Bangladesh.
The state has seen simmering tension between its Buddhist and Muslim populations following co-ordinated attacks last month that killed nine police officers, which police blamed on the Rohingya.
Since then, soldiers have closed down parts of Rakhine state and stopped aid workers and independent observers from entering.
The government says "violent attackers" and some members of the security forces have been killed.
Around 100,000 Rohingya people still live in camps after violence that flared up in 2012 forcing them to leave their homes.
Last year, images of hundreds of Rohingya people floating in fishing boats shocked the world. They were trying to escape by sea to Malaysia. Asian countries agreed to work together to try to stem the crisis.
And Aung San Suu Kyi's government has opened a governmental commission to examine the problems in Rakhine state. | Hundreds of people from the Rohingya minority in Myanmar are trying to escape a military crackdown by crossing the border into Bangladesh. |
36,985,799 | There is no standard recall option in the deal for the 18-year-old, who is eligible for the Championship club's opening game against Wigan on Saturday.
He has scored 74 goals in 98 youth games for Chelsea at different levels, and played twice in the Premier League.
"Tammy is a top-class player who has a very bright future in the game," City boss Lee Johnson told the club website.
Find all the latest football transfers on our dedicated page. | Bristol City have signed England Under-19 forward Tammy Abraham on a season-long loan from Chelsea. |
35,882,053 | 23 March 2016 Last updated at 18:40 GMT
Norman Sharp, 91, from Trowbridge, Wiltshire, was the first person to get an NHS hip operation in December 1948, aged 23, after suffering from septic arthritis as a child.
He now holds the Guinness World Record for the longest-lasting replacement hip replacement - and is still dancing.
BBC Points West's Fiona Lamdin put it to the test. | The world's oldest replacement hips are still serving their owner well - 67 years after he received them. |
40,001,838 | The Scot, 25, beat Nicolas Peifer of France 7-6 (3) 6-1 in Sunday's final.
Reigning Wimbledon champion Reid secured his second Super Series title and will top the rankings for the third time when they are published this week.
"I'm very happy to be coming home with the title and regaining my place at the top of the singles rankings," he said.
"My performances in Japan have given me a good confidence boost looking ahead to the summer Grand Slams."
Reid first gained number one spot after winning gold at the Rio 2016 Paralympics against fellow Briton Alfie Hewett.
He remained top for three weeks before regaining the position in December after reaching the final of the wheelchair Masters in London. | Paralympic gold medallist Gordon Reid returned to the top of the world rankings with victory in the men's singles at the Japan Open. |
30,288,987 | Barry Wilkins, 71, was attacked at his flat in Norrington Road, Northfield, Birmingham, in November 2013.
Susan Hughes, 48, was convicted of murder in August. Police said she was overheard attacking Mr Wilkins even as she made a 999 call.
On Monday, a judge at Birmingham Crown Court sentenced her to life.
Det Sgt Harry May said: "In a drunken argument she armed herself with a large kitchen knife and violently attacked Barry in the bedroom.
"Whilst she was attacking him she called the 999 system and whilst on the phone she was heard attacking Barry, physically and verbally abusing him."
During the trial, the jury was told Hughes was overheard by an emergency operator saying "I wish I had stabbed your throat, love".
Hughes, previously of Linley Grove, Kings Heath, used a kitchen knife with a 20cm blade to stab Mr Wilkins, who died on New Year's Eve.
Mr May said Hughes had shown no remorse since the attack. | A former mental health nurse has been jailed for at least 12 years for stabbing her partner to death with a kitchen knife. |
36,075,594 | The Antrim man, 30, begins his Crucible quest full of confidence after winning the Players Championship last month, his third success in a ranking event.
"I think he will try to slow the match down and try to drag me down a little bit," said the world number seven.
"But I don't think he can outscore me or outplay me in any way," added Allen.
The Northern Irishman told BBC Sport he knows he cannot afford to be complacent, despite being such a strong favourite against the world number 74 - the only rookie in this year's tournament.
Birmingham player Mann, 24, booked his place at the Crucible by beating Thai talent Dechawat Poomjaeng 10-9 in the final qualifying round on Wednesday.
"On paper it was probably the best draw I could have got," Allen observed. "But you don't play snooker on paper.
"Mitchell beat me in qualifying for China Open earlier in the season so I know what to expect. He will try to frustrate me.
"But this is the World Championship, not the China Open. I like being in Sheffield and plan on staying here past Wednesday so I will not be letting his tactics get to me. I will worry about my own game and, if I play well, I will win."
Allen said playing at snooker's showpiece event in Sheffield continues to provide a huge buzz and understandable anxiety, but he expects Mann to be affected by nerves.
Allen added: "It's his first time at the Crucible and I remember my first time and thinking, 'just don't fall down the steps'.
"It is so nerve-wracking. And it is still nerve-wracking now. You would think you would get used to it but it's a different sort of pressure here. It is an unreal experience.
"Mitchell is a good lad, a cracking guy. Hopefully he can come here and embrace it, but not too much."
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The former world semi-finalist knows he carries the burden of expectation from home as he looks to become the first Northern Ireland player to win the world title since Dennis Taylor in 1985.
But that will be a long way from his thoughts when he starts his match on Tuesday afternoon.
"I do understand and appreciate the support I get from back home," Allen said. "There is a massive following. People you don't expect to be watching snooker watch when I am playing.
"It's great but I don't think about that when I am playing. Don't get me wrong, if I was to win this and go back home I would be so proud to do it for Northern Ireland, but I don't look at it that way when I am playing.
"It's been a few years since I have gone deep here but I have always felt like I have played okay here. I have just come up against players who have played better in the last few years.
"Everyone will be playing reasonably well, it is who can play exceptionally well." | Mark Allen says he must not allow himself to get frustrated when he faces debutant Mitchell Mann in the first round of the World Championship. |
40,297,299 | O'Flanagan put Ireland ahead but Germany equalised in the third quarter.
Mullan scored the winner by diverting in a long ball from Hannah Matthews in the final quarter and Ireland now face China on Friday and Korea on Sunday.
Ireland will next meet Germany in the pool stages of this year's World League semi-finals in Johannesburg in July.
The World League 3 tournament in South Africa will be followed by the Eurohockey Championships in August. | Anna O'Flanagan and Katie Mullan scored as Ireland beat 2016 Olympic bronze medallists Germany 2-1 in their opening game of the Berlin Four Nations Cup. |
13,875,507 | Milly vanished in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, as she walked home from school on 21 March 2002. Her remains were found in Hampshire six months later.
An Old Bailey jury found Bellfield, 43, guilty of abducting and murdering her after she walked past his home.
In 2008 he was convicted of murdering two young women in west London and attempting to murder a third.
Bellfield was also accused of attempting to abduct 11-year-old Rachel Cowles the day before Milly's disappearance.
The jury was sent home and will continue considering its verdict on that charge on Friday.
Milly Dowler was last seen near Bellfield's flat in Collingwood Place, off Station Avenue.
Police knocked on his door on 11 occasions, the last of which was on 28 May 2004, but officers never tried to contact the letting agent in an effort to trace him.
Rachel Cowles' mother Diana rang police when a man in a red car offered her daughter a lift but it was three years before officers interviewed her.
Milly's mother and her sister Gemma, 25, collapsed after hearing the verdict.
They had each broken down in the witness box after it was suggested that Milly had run away or committed suicide because she was unhappy.
At one stage Milly's father, Robert, became a suspect.
During his trial, Bellfield refused to give evidence in his defence.
During his closing speech for the prosecution, Brian Altman QC, accused Bellfield of putting Milly's grieving parents on trial and described the 13-year-old as an intelligent girl who was in the top set at school.
He said it was a "ludicrous theory" to suggest Milly had run away and was "dark or depressive".
Bellfield went undetected until his arrest in November 2004 for the murder of French woman Amelie Delagrange.
His red Daewoo Nexia car, which was seen turning into Station Road 22 minutes after Milly was last seen, has never been found.
During the trial Bellfield's former partner Emma Mills said he had gone "missing" on the day of Milly's disappearance. The couple had been housesitting for a friend in west London.
When Bellfield returned after 2200 BST he was wearing different clothes from their flat in Walton. He later got up during the night, at about 0300 or 0400 BST, saying he was going back to the flat.
The following day Bellfield told Miss Mills he wanted to move out of the flat back to their former home in West Drayton, west London.
Miss Mills said she thought he had been with another woman because he had destroyed the bed sheets.
Later when she quizzed him about where he had been that day, he said: "What? Do you think I've done Milly?"
Kate Sheedy, who Bellfield tried to kill in 2004, was in court to hear the verdict, along with the parents of Ms Delagrange.
Bellfield, who was wearing a lilac polo shirt, yawned as he was led back to the cells while the jury considered the final charge of attempted abduction.
Mrs Dowler had to be helped from the courtroom by police officers.
Outside the courtroom, Gemma began wailing and shouting "guilty".
Mr Dowler helped to comfort his daughter as the court's matron was called to help both women. | Former nightclub doorman Levi Bellfield has been found guilty of murdering 13-year-old Milly Dowler. |
30,527,500 | The Federal Reserve statement caused US stocks to climb the most since 2013.
Japan's Nikkei rallied 2.3% to close at 17,210.05 points while the broader Topix rose 1.8% to 1,376.32.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index closed up 246.37 points at 22,821.43 but the Shanghai Composite slipped 3.5 points to 3,057.52.
Australia's S&P/ASX200 index rose nearly 1% to close at 5,210.80 points, led by mining and energy stocks.
Japan's Sony was one of the big stock movers of the morning.
Its shares rose by 3.5% in Tokyo trading after its entertainment unit cancelled the release of "The Interview" following a cyber-security attack, which US investigators reportedly believes stemmed from North Korea.
The comedy movie is about plans to assassinate North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Hackers incensed by the film leaked Sony documents and had threatened attacks on cinemas planning to show the film.
In South Korea, the Samsung Group's Cheil Industries made a strong trading debut, rising 6.6%, after pricing its initial public offering at the top end of the range.
Cheil operates theme parks and fashion outlets in the country and saw its shares double, outperforming the benchmark Kospi index which closed down 2.66 points at 1,897.50. | Markets in Asia were mostly higher after the US Federal Reserve pledged to be "patient" on raising interest rates from record lows. |
29,610,663 | His label, Warp Records, said "with great sadness" that he died last week from complications after an operation.
Bell and bandmate Gez Varley became known as electronica innovators through their act LFO in the early 1990s.
Bell went on to produce Bjork's 1997 album Homogenic and become one of her regular collaborators.
The former Sugarcubes star paid tribute by posting a link to LFO's Love is the Message track on her social media.
The band took their name from the acronym for low-frequency oscillators, synthesiser effects often heard in club music.
Sister Bliss, of dance act Faithless, paid her own homage on Twitter, remembering Bell as "a total legend".
Bell, who was born in Yorkshire, also worked with Depeche Mode on their 2001 album Exciter.
In a statement, his record label said his friends and family "request privacy at this difficult time". | Mark Bell, the influential British producer and electronic music pioneer who worked extensively with Icelandic star Bjork, has died at the age of 43. |
28,673,571 | Police were called to the North Lincolnshire airport on Tuesday morning after a vehicle was reported stolen in The Ridge Way in Grimsby.
Matthew George Dobson, 39, of no fixed address, was arrested after abandoning the car at the scene.
He will appear at Cleethorpes Magistrates' Court later.
The airport's operations were unaffected by the incident, Humberside Police said. | A man has been charged with burglary and driving offences after a stolen car crashed into a perimeter fence at Humberside Airport. |
37,012,203 | His keenness to cooperate with Vladimir Putin against the so-called Islamic State group in Syria has provoked consternation and outrage among many, both Democrats and Republicans.
The spokesman for House of Representatives, Speaker Paul Ryan, a Republican, has summed up a common attitude by saying simply: "Russia is a global menace led by a devious thug."
But, despite the chill between the two countries on a raft of other matters, are Russian and American interests in Syria really so far apart?
Since the beginning of the Syrian war five years ago, the Kremlin has steadfastly supported its long-term ally President Bashar al-Assad.
That has put Russia at direct loggerheads with the US.
Back in 2011, Barack Obama said President Assad's resignation was a precondition for any settlement.
But the growing threat from IS, which has conquered large swathes of northern and eastern Syria since 2013, has changed the equation.
Last September, Russia took much of the world by surprise by intervening directly in Syria, bombing what it called terrorist targets.
Most Western politicians and foreign policy analysts said that was just a pretext to cover a cynical Kremlin power play.
They said fighting terrorism was far from Russia's main concern.
Mr Putin, they said, had intervened to shore up Mr Assad and re-establish Russia as a major player in the Middle East.
Other aims, they said, were to distract the West's attention from Russia's support for rebels in Ukraine, to test and show off new Russian weaponry, to boost Mr Putin's popularity at home - and even to destabilise Europe by triggering a further exodus from Syria, what some called "weaponising refugees".
Some Russian air strikes seemed to confirm those suspicions.
Many have targeted not IS, but other Syrian opposition fighters supported by the West.
Evidence provided by human rights groups also suggests Russia has hit hospitals and other civilian targets, even returning for second strikes against rescue workers.
But Russia denies that.
It says it has a very real interest in combating terrorism.
Since 2001 about 1,000 of its citizens been killed in attacks blamed on Islamist extremists.
IS has established cells across Russia's predominantly Muslim north Caucasus region.
It is sending fighters north from Afghanistan to destabilise Russia's neighbours in Central Asia.
And Russia says it has hit IS in Syria harder than America has.
he US-led bombing campaign began a year earlier than Russia's, but achieved little in that time.
By late February this year, Russia was hitting about 60 targets daily; the US-led coalition about seven.
Russia has struck IS and other extreme Islamist groups such as the Nusra Front, until recently allied to al-Qaeda, many times.
And in March, Russian military backing enabled Syrian government forces to drive IS out of the historic desert town of Palmyra, the first big defeat for the extremists in Syria.
Of course, that also gave a victory to President Assad.
And more recently Russian air strikes helped his forces encircle what was once Syria's biggest city, Aleppo.
Rebels there are now fighting desperately to lift the siege.
But while the West insists President Assad is the cause of Syria's problems, Russia says any likely alternative to him would be far worse.
It points to the disastrous results of overthrowing the dictators Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, two countries where a vacuum of authority has let IS and other extremists establish themselves.
The Kremlin also questions how moderate the so-called "mainstream rebels" in Syria really are.
Many of the other main groups besides IS and Nusra, now renamed Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, are also fighting for a Sharia-run Islamic state.
Even parts of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which says it wants a pluralistic Syria, have sometimes cooperated with Nusra.
And US military chiefs believe the FSA includes many fighters whose views do not fit Western definitions of "moderation".
All this, Russia says, explains the West's half-hearted support for the Syrian opposition, which it has partially trained and equipped, but never substantially armed.
America - unlike Russia - appears not to know what it wants in Syria.
But it has taken Donald Trump - the great iconoclast - to shout that in public.
As he has said now more than once, "Assad is bad" but the Obama administration has been "backing people who they don't know who they are".
In fact, the idea of a Russian-American alliance against extremism is not new.
The two powers cooperated well during the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, after the 9/11 attacks.
And last October, Russia says, it invited the US, the UK and Turkey to coordinate action against IS in Syria, but the West ruled that out then because President Assad was also involved, and it feared any intelligence it passed on about anti-IS fighters in the FSA would actually be used to target them.
Now though, after long discussions in Moscow, US Secretary of State John Kerry says he has reached an outline agreement with Russia on coordinating air strikes.
The US would share intelligence in return for a Russian promise not to hit US-backed groups.
But many in Washington doubt the Kremlin could be trusted.
And some would regard any agreement with Russia as a betrayal of the forces the US has supported for the past five years.
It might take a Trump presidency - if there ever is one - with a different set of priorities, to make a US-Russia deal stick.
Would that mean defeat not just for IS, but for all President Assad's enemies? A gloating, vengeful triumph? Or, perhaps, an opening for genuine compromise imposed by both powers?
Certainly, the deal would be a U-turn for America, humiliating for many.
Its Syria policy would become less ethical - but also, perhaps, less contradictory. | Donald Trump says if he becomes the next US president, he would like to "get together with Russia" to "knock the hell out of Isis". |
37,820,093 | A medical witness for the defence said Mr Jutting also suffered from the effects of cocaine and alcohol abuse.
Mr Jutting has pleaded not guilty to murdering Sumarti Ningsih and Seneng Mujasih in 2014 on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
He did plead guilty to manslaughter, but the prosecution rejected that.
Defence witness Richard Latham, a consulting forensic psychiatrist in the UK's National Health Service, said Mr Jutting's disorders had progressed to the "most severe end of the spectrum" by the time of the killings.
His ability to control his behaviour was "substantially impaired", Mr Latham said.
Read more: Sumarti Ningsih's story
Mr Jutting's defence lawyer, Tim Owen QC, said that his client had had a troubled upbringing.
He was sexually abused during his boarding school days at the prestigious Winchester College in the UK, and his father attempted to kill himself while he was 16, he said.
Both the prosecution and the defence agree that Mr Jutting killed Sumarti Ningsih and Seneng Mujasih.
The crux of the argument is Mr Jutting's psychiatric state at the time - and hence, whether he had diminished responsibility or not.
The difference between murder and manslaughter has significant implications for the sentence - a murder conviction leads to a mandatory life sentence, and while the maximum sentence for manslaughter is also life, lower jail sentences are also possible.
The defence witness, Dr Richard Latham, would not say whether he believed Mr Jutting had mental responsibility for his actions or not - but did say that the four mental disorders he had diagnosed Mr Jutting with had substantially impaired his ability to control his behaviour.
Mr Jutting sat calmly in court as the witness gave evidence, surrounded by three police officers. He appeared to be observing proceedings carefully, reading through documents as the court referred to them.
The court has previously been shown videos showing Mr Jutting torturing Sumarti Ningsih, 23.
In other videos filmed on his iPhone, Mr Jutting also takes cocaine, consumes alcohol and explains why he tortures women.
The gruesome details of the murder case has captured international attention. It is the biggest murder trial in Hong Kong in years, as the city is considered one of the safest in the world. | A British banker accused of killing two women in Hong Kong had been diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder and sexual sadism, the court has heard. |
33,714,428 | Londoner Joshua, 25, is undefeated in 13 fights since turning professional after winning Olympic gold in 2012.
WBA, IBF and WBO champion Klitschko, who has trained with the Englishman, said: "Joshua has the qualities that not many guys have had.
"He definitely has the potential to become a real big star in boxing."
In May, Joshua beat American Kevin Johnson, who had not been stopped in 36 previous fights.
Johnson had also gone the distance with Wladimir's brother, Vitali, a former world champion.
Klitschko, who fights Britain's Tyson Fury in October, said he was also impressed by Joshua's all-around attitude.
"Anthony has all the tools to become that great champion inside and, most importantly, probably, outside of the ring," said the 39-year-old.
The Ukrainian, who has not lost a bout in 11 years, added that he "could not exclude" the chance of fighting Joshua in the future.
"He needs to improve and eventually it will happen, if I stay where I am today." Klitschko told BBC Radio 5 live.
"You cannot pass me since I've been holding the titles for many years, so if you want to get onto my mountain then you will have to face me."
Listen to the full Klitschko interview on the 5 live boxing podcast. | World heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko says Britain's Anthony Joshua is the most promising boxer he has seen "in 25 years". |
32,708,398 | Simon Hamilton spent his first day in the post meeting nurses at a conference in the Ulster Hospital, Dundonald.
He said nurses were the cornerstone of the health service and praised their dedication.
"When we are talking about budgets and shillings and pence, we don't think about people who are every day doing fantastic jobs," he said.
"You have a unique role that sees you from the happiest to saddest times of life."
Mr Hamilton said he did not need to be in his job for "one day, 100 days or even 1,000 days" to appreciate the "immense pressure" faced by everyone working in the modern health service.
"Everybody understands and appreciates that, as our health service moves forward and we face the challenges in Northern Ireland and those faced by health services across the world, that we need to change how we do things - but we need to change how we do things for the better," he said.
"We shouldn't be afraid of change, we shouldn't be afraid of reform, we shouldn't be afraid of transformation."
He told the nurses and midwives who had gathered for a conference on Tuesday, International Nurses' Day, that they made "a wonderful difference" to the lives of people.
"Our health service continues to experience significant pressures yet despite this, nurses ensure dignity and respect for everyone they care for," he said.
"They are often the first person a patient sees when they come into contact with the health service and they remain in close contact throughout the patient's journey. The lasting impressions made by nurses underpin the continued respect and belief in our NHS and I thank them for that."
Mr Hamilton said that he was "optimistic" that health workers would embrace "the transformation and change and reform that is required to ensure that our citizens get the standard of health and social care that they need". | Northern Ireland's new health minister has urged nurses and doctors to embrace reform and not to fear it. |
33,587,800 | Is Senior General Min Aung Hlaing the most powerful man in Myanmar?
Quite possibly.
He has control over how and where the army wages war, coupled with far reaching political powers.
In accordance with the military drafted constitution the 59-year-old has the right to appoint key ministers, choose a quarter of the MPs in the parliament and - as events last month showed - the ability to block any attempt to erode that power.
Getting an interview with him was not easy.
Why Myanmar's elections matter
For decades the Burmese army has regarded the foreign media, and the BBC in particular as an enemy of the state, too close to the pro-democracy movement.
But there have now been four years of reforms and we've opened a bureau in Yangon. So, in hope rather than expectation we sent our letter off.
The first response came back a month later. We'd fallen at the first hurdle having foolishly used the phrase "Burmese" rather than "Myanmar" army.
Having remedied that there then followed a series of increasingly bizarre meetings.
Late-night rendezvous, USB sticks handed over in coffee shop car parks and dark walks taken along Nay Pyi Taw's yawningly empty streets. I felt like a drug dealer.
There were no emails exchanged, and I never learnt the phone number or even the surname of the contact I was dealing with. But it was clear that unlike his predecessor Than Shwe, this senior general wanted to talk.
The most recent picture of Than Shwe shows him learning to use an iPad with a young relative - but the thought of him taking an active interest in Facebook and social media would have been laughable.
Min Aung Hlaing is different. Like many of the country's senior leaders his aides actively curate a Facebook page, paying for sponsored posts that stay near the top of congested Burmese news feeds.
He's got more than two 220,000 "likes" and provides updates ranging from which aircraft have been purchased to social projects he's visited.
It's part of a charm offensive, he told me, to reconnect the people and the army.
"If the people get the right information about the army they will understand us," he said, after thanking me for my Facebook follow.
"They'll see the military is defending the interests of the people and implementing the interests of the people and defending against threats to the country."
Min Aung Hlaing is charismatic, and there's a ready smile during the interview. It's in marked contrast to the much cooler style of President Thein Sein when I spoke to him in March of this year.
But there's an uncompromising message.
A clear thread running through our discussion was that as long as political parties played by the rules of Myanmar's so called "disciplined democracy" then the carefully limited space for debate and political activity would remain.
But there was no sign that he wanted to reduce the military's grip on Burmese political life and truly hand over to civilians.
That will need to wait, he said, until ceasefires and peace deals have been concluded with all of Myanmar's many ethnic armed groups.
"It could be five years or 10 years - I couldn't say," he said.
Those who've watched the glacial progress of talks with ethnic armed groups fear it might take much, much longer to disarm and reintegrate everyone.
One clear and positive message was that there would be no repeat of 1990 when a landslide victory for the NLD was ignored and annulled.
The ruling USDP are facing electoral disaster - but its relationship with the military has soured in the last two years, making a partisan intervention less likely.
"I believe the election will be free and fair," Min Aung Hlaing said. "That is our true wish. We are committed to helping make that happen anyway we can. When the election commission announces the result we have to respect it. Because it will have been democratically done."
But thanks to an infamous clause of the constitution the leader of the party that seems certain to win can't become president. Despite her best efforts to build bridges with the army, Aung San Suu Kyi is still barred and that appears unlikely to change.
Min Aung Hlaing's name has been mentioned as a possible presidential candidate, and he told me he was planning to retire when he turns 60 next year.
So would he stand for president if asked?
"The duty of the soldier is to serve the country in whatever role," he said coyly, while noting that he had 40 years of experience.
A final decision would depend on whether he meets the qualifications (he does, Suu Kyi doesn't), and whether he's asked. It was a "yes" in all but name.
Whether he gets that chance will depend on how the election pans out.
With a quarter of the Hluttaw's (parliament's) seats already under his control he has, if he wants it, a bye to the final three, and a guaranteed job at least as vice-president.
Whether he is then voted into the presidency will depend on the makeup of the Hluttaw. In addition to the military bloc he'll need the support of some elected MPs .
That may prove a big ask, and if the NLD falls short of a majority it's possible that Thein Sein would be better positioned to reach out to ethnic parties and secure a second term.
Although a nationwide ceasefire has proved elusive, the current president has earned plaudits for his efforts to deliver peace. | In a rare interview, Myanmar's commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing tells the BBC that the military will not step back from politics until a peace deal is reached with all the country's ethnic armed groups - but it will respect the results of the forthcoming general election even if the opposition win. |
38,700,809 | Joe Ralls hit the post from 18 yards for the visitors before John Swift swept Reading in front from Garath McCleary's neat back-heel.
Cardiff soon levelled when Ralls tucked home from the penalty spot after Liam Moore tripped Sean Morrison.
But Yann Kermorgant fired in the winner direct from a free-kick after he was fouled by Sol Bamba.
Reading's victory lifts them back above Leeds and leaves Jaap Stam's team six points behind the two automatic promotion places.
The home side dominated the game in terms of possession but Cardiff, who remain 16th after this loss, always carried a threat and registered more attempts on goal than their hosts.
After the Royals went in front for the second time, home goalkeeper Ali Al-Habsi tipped over Junior Hoilett's free-kick and clawed away Kermorgant's sliced attempted clearance.
Kadeem Harris also clipped an effort across the face of goal for the Bluebirds but Reading held on.
Reading manager Jaap Stam:
"The teams around us are close so it's good to keep the momentum going and keep winning games.
"Cardiff kept us going until the end. We knew what their qualities were and how they played. We saw them a couple of times.
"They tried to stop us playing at the start by getting everyone compact and not giving us the space to get through.
"We didn't make the right choices always. We needed to move the ball more from side to side, to wear out Cardiff."
Cardiff City manager Neil Warnock:
"I wouldn't have swapped too many players on the different sides today but we've lost the game.
"I know the style I want, we want to excite people, and I don't think we're far away from being a very good side."
Match ends, Reading 2, Cardiff City 1.
Second Half ends, Reading 2, Cardiff City 1.
Yann Kermorgant (Reading) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Aron Gunnarsson (Cardiff City).
Attempt missed. Rhys Healey (Cardiff City) left footed shot from the centre of the box is high and wide to the left.
Attempt blocked. Kadeem Harris (Cardiff City) right footed shot from the centre of the box is blocked. Assisted by Sean Morrison with a headed pass.
Corner, Cardiff City. Conceded by Danny Williams.
Attempt blocked. Rhys Healey (Cardiff City) right footed shot from the right side of the box is blocked.
Substitution, Cardiff City. Peter Whittingham replaces Joe Ralls.
Foul by Tyler Blackett (Reading).
Aron Gunnarsson (Cardiff City) wins a free kick on the right wing.
Attempt saved. Sean Morrison (Cardiff City) header from the centre of the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by Aron Gunnarsson.
Attempt missed. Kadeem Harris (Cardiff City) right footed shot from a difficult angle on the right misses to the left. Assisted by Aron Gunnarsson.
Yann Kermorgant (Reading) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Aron Gunnarsson (Cardiff City).
Corner, Cardiff City. Conceded by Chris Gunter.
Attempt blocked. Yann Kermorgant (Reading) right footed shot from outside the box is blocked.
Corner, Reading. Conceded by Lee Peltier.
Paul McShane (Reading) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Junior Hoilett (Cardiff City).
Attempt missed. Junior Hoilett (Cardiff City) right footed shot from outside the box is high and wide to the right. Assisted by Joe Ralls.
Substitution, Cardiff City. Matthew Kennedy replaces Greg Halford.
Substitution, Reading. Jordan Obita replaces Roy Beerens.
Corner, Cardiff City. Conceded by Liam Moore.
Attempt blocked. Junior Hoilett (Cardiff City) right footed shot from the centre of the box is blocked. Assisted by Aron Gunnarsson with a cross.
Liam Kelly (Reading) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Aron Gunnarsson (Cardiff City).
Chris Gunter (Reading) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Lee Peltier (Cardiff City).
Paul McShane (Reading) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Junior Hoilett (Cardiff City).
Attempt missed. Sol Bamba (Cardiff City) header from the centre of the box misses to the right. Assisted by Junior Hoilett with a cross following a corner.
Corner, Cardiff City. Conceded by Ali Al Habsi.
Attempt saved. Junior Hoilett (Cardiff City) right footed shot from outside the box is saved in the top centre of the goal.
Hand ball by Liam Kelly (Reading).
Substitution, Cardiff City. Kadeem Harris replaces Kenneth Zohore because of an injury.
Attempt missed. Paul McShane (Reading) header from the centre of the box is high and wide to the left. Assisted by Liam Kelly with a cross following a corner.
Corner, Reading. Conceded by Greg Halford.
Attempt missed. Rhys Healey (Cardiff City) right footed shot from outside the box is high and wide to the right. Assisted by Joe Ralls with a headed pass.
Goal! Reading 2, Cardiff City 1. Yann Kermorgant (Reading) from a free kick with a right footed shot to the bottom left corner. | Reading reclaimed third place in the Championship with a hard-fought victory over Cardiff City. |
20,853,142 | Ms Dastjerdi was also the first woman minister in the 30-year history of the Islamic republic.
While no reason has been given, the dismissal is being linked to her call for drug price rises to fight shortages caused by international sanctions.
Mr Ahmadinejad rejected her comments, saying her budget needs had been met.
Analysts say international sanctions have done significant damage to the Islamic republic's economy and led to a steep currency plunge.
Although they do not directly target medicines, they limit their importation because of restrictions on financial transactions.
Prior to her dismissal, Ms Dastjerdi said that because of the rise in the foreign exchange rate, there would be an inevitable increase in the price of medicine.
She complained of her department's inability to get access to foreign currency she had been promised.
"In the first half of the current year, the Central Bank has not allocated any exchange for the import of drugs and medical equipment," she said.
"We need $2.5bn (£1.6bn) in foreign exchange to meet the needs of the medical sector for the year, but only $650m has been earmarked."
But President Ahmadinejad said in a TV interview that enough money had been allocated to the health ministry.
"No-one has the right to raise the price of medicine," he added.
Mohammad Hassan Tariqat Monfared has been appointed as interim health minister, the Reuters news agency reports.
The EU and US recently announced new sanctions over Iran's nuclear plans.
They suspect Iran is seeking to develop nuclear weapons, something it denies.
Ms Dastjerdi was the first woman minister of the Islamic republic, although a woman did serve as vice-president for the environment under Mohammad Khatami. | Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has sacked Health Minister Marziyeh Vahid Dastjerdi, the sole woman in his cabinet, state television reports. |
35,670,602 | Whether it was acquiring land, licences to build her pharmaceutical factory or getting access to finance, she says it was one hurdle after another.
That was in 2004. Today the business is thriving, employing more than 100 people at the Murli Krishna Pharma plant in western Maharashtra.
But despite the Indian government's promises to make the country an easier place to do business, Mrs Vadlamani says there's still a long way to go.
"I am yet to see any change on the ground for small and medium sized businesses like ours to say that it has got easier to do business in India," she says during a panel discussion for the BBC World News TV programme Talking Business.
And Mrs Vadlamani, who only managed to get her initial bank loan after an industrialist friend agreed to act as guarantor, says finance is one of the biggest problems.
"India's banking laws are still not good for business; banks should be able to give longer moratorium to entrepreneurs.
"That is not happening, as when businesses apply for loans, they have to show how fast they can start making profits.
"Factories and businesses need some time to start making money, and banks should be able to understand that."
Posters at Mumbai's airport boast that the country climbed 12 places in the World Bank's ease of doing business index in 2015. What those adverts do not mention is that it still ranks only 130th in the world.
And India's reputation for red tape remains.
Setting up a business here takes on average 29 days, according to the World Bank. Unethical practices, delays in approvals, high financing costs, taxes, and the availability of skilled labour pose major obstacles in the operation and growth of business in India.
And then there's the country's fragmented system of state government, with each state having its own rules and regulations.
While most people agree that a lot of these barriers could be swept aside with a new goods and services tax - making taxation more unified and less complex - successive governments have dragged their heels on making this long-held ambition a reality.
That's something firms like the drinks giant Diageo wants to see - as it tries to do business in a nation renowned for its love of whisky.
Abanti Sankaranarayanan, business head of Diageo subsidiary United Spirits, says that because the 29 states and seven union territories all have their own rules on alcohol - from tax to labelling - it makes being an efficient business extremely difficult.
And she argues her industry is a great example of where it definitely is not easy to do business.
The one solution for this excessive regulation would be the passing of the goods and services tax bill, she says.
"We are really hoping the goods and services tax bill gets passed in the upper house of parliament with alcohol included in the amendment bill.
"'This is very important for this industry as this is the once in a lifetime opportunity for the government and this industry to get progressive and get rid of the plethora of different taxation.
"This will make a big impact on issues with corruption because of excessive regulation."
Admitting to the complex business environment in India, Amitabh Kant, the mastermind behind India's Make in India campaign and the secretary of the government's department of industrial policy and promotion, says that "a lot of the dismantling of unnecessary rules, regulations and procedures has started.
"The government is very determined to make India one of the easiest places to do business in, and all of that is work in progress."
The hope is that the construction of industrial corridors between major cities like Delhi to Mumbai, Chennai to Bangalore, and Chennai to Vishakhapatnam will drastically bring down logistics costs for manufacturing companies.
Despite the high costs, many think this may be the best time to be in India because it is one of the fastest-growing large economies in the world.
How the government will capitalise on this is something to watch on Monday, when India's Finance Minister Arun Jaitley unveils the annual budget.
Business leaders in India and investors abroad will be listening carefully for any announcements that can help simplify business processes in India.
For more on doing business in India and the economic reforms that are needed, check out this week's episode of Talking Business. The programme is broadcast on the BBC News Channel on Saturday 27 February at 20:30 GMT, and on BBC World at 00:30 GMT and on Sunday 28 February at 12:30 and 18:30 GMT | It didn't take Satya Vadlamani long to get a taste of India's bureaucracy. |
36,939,751 | The 40-year-old man, known only as "Mike" is alleged to head a network of 40 individuals behind global scams worth more than $60m (£45m).
His operations involves using targeted malware to take over systems, use compromised emails and romance scams.
Nigeria's anti-fraud agency was also involved in the arrest.
Africa Live: More on this and other stories
"In one case, a target was conned into paying out $15.4 m (£11m)," Interpol said in a statement.
"Mike" also allegedly ran a money laundering network in China, Europe and the US.
"The network compromised email accounts of small to medium businesses around the world including in Australia, Canada, India, Malaysia, Romania, South Africa, Thailand and the United States," it said.
The suspect and an accomplice, who was also arrested in the city, face charges including hacking, conspiracy and obtaining money under false pretences.
They are currently out on bail as investigations continue, the statement said. | A Nigerian behind thousands of online scams around the world has been arrested in the southern oil city of Port Harcourt, Interpol alleges. |
34,698,630 | But an exception to the bill means the Fort Kinnaird retail park in Edinburgh, which the Crown Estate has a 50% stake in, will not be devolved.
The Scottish government has called for the retail park to be handed over to Holyrood along with the rest of the Crown Estate's assets in Scotland.
But the UK government has said it has no intention of doing so.
So what is the row about?
The Crown Estate is owned by the Queen but managed by an independent board, known as the Crown Estate Commissioners.
It is an independent commercial property business which holds one of the UK's largest property portfolios as well as much of the UK's coastline, seabed and farmland.
The majority of the portfolio is made up of residential property, commercial offices, shops and business and retail parks, and includes almost all of Regent Street in London's West End.
The total value of The Crown Estate in Scotland was £261.5m in 2014/15, a £5.5m decrease from the previous year - which represents 2.6% of the UK total value of the Crown Estate.
It also has a 50% interest in an English Limited Partnership which owns Edinburgh's Fort Kinnaird retail park, as well as properties on Edinburgh's George Street.
Under the current funding arrangement, all profits from the estate are paid to the Treasury and 15% of this money is then given to the Queen, known as the Sovereign Grant - £37.9m in 2014 - which goes towards supporting her official duties.
Across the UK, the estate manages 16 retail parks and 3 shopping centres, including Fort Kinnaird retail park.
Fort Kinnaird is a large outdoor retail park, south-east of Edinburgh, with more than 50 high street shops.
It generated £5.7m of profit for the Crown Estate in 2013-14.
Ownership of, and revenue from, the retail park is split equally between the Crown Estate and property trust the Hercules Unit Trust.
In 2007, Fort Kinnaird was estimated to be worth £480m by British Land, who manages the facility on behalf of the Crown Estate and the Hercules Unit Trust.
It has had more that 13 million visitors in the last year with an average spend of more than £118, according to British Land.
The Scotland Bill states that the Treasury may transfer all the existing "Scottish functions" of the Crown Estate Commissioners to Scottish Ministers.
However, the bill excludes property, rights or interests held by a limited partnership.
This means that in Scotland, all of the Crown Estate's assets will be devolved to the Scottish government - with the exception of Fort Kinnaird, which is the only land in Scotland that the Crown holds in partnership.
David Mundell, the Scottish secretary, said that the shopping park would not be devolved "because of its legal ownership structure".
In a letter to the Scottish Parliament's Devolution (Further Powers) Committee, Mr Mundell said that a distinction under Scots law compared to the law in England and Wales on limited partnerships meant that the retail park could not be devolved to the Scottish government.
This means that the Crown Estate's share of the revenue for the shopping park would still be paid to the UK treasury.
Rural Affairs Secretary Richard Lochhead has previously called the Crown Estate proposals in the Scotland Bill "needlessly complex", and accused UK ministers of trying to "exclude economic assets" from the Scottish government.
Speaking last month, he said: "We are focused on making the proposals simple and workable and to deliver a faithful and effective implementation of the Smith Commission's recommendations.
"Devolution of the management and income of the Crown Estate in Scotland presents a genuine opportunity to deliver benefits to communities across Scotland.
"It will also ensure we retain income in Scotland, introduce greater transparency and take advantage of our natural assets. I want to minimise disruption and provide certainty and I believe this Stakeholder Group will help give a voice to those who have an interest in this process." | Revenues from the Crown Estate are set to be devolved under the Scotland Bill which is currently going through the UK Parliament. |
37,290,538 | Media playback is not supported on this device
Pearson has won 12 Paralympic medals, including 10 golds, in four Games.
The 42-year-old needs two more golds to overtake wheelchair racer Tanni Grey-Thompson as Britain's most successful Paralympian of the modern era.
"I am so proud and honoured to be the flagbearer for such a talented, strong and passionate group," he said.
"Being a diverse character myself means being voted by the athletes themselves has made this even more special."
ParalympicsGB chef de mission Penny Briscoe said Pearson had been "a cornerstone" of the equestrian team since the 2000 Games in Sydney.
"The team will be proud to march out behind him," she added.
Media playback is not supported on this device | Equestrian rider Lee Pearson will carry the flag for Great Britain during Wednesday's opening ceremony of the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games. |
40,777,965 | According to the RNLI, there have been a total of 16 deaths in that month over the past five years.
The charity said the number of near-fatal incidents was also highest in August, with Welsh crews launching their lifeboats the most that month.
The RNLI is calling on the public to "respect the water" this summer as part of a drowning prevention campaign.
Last August, crews in Wales launched their lifeboats for 278 emergencies - 23% of their total annual launches and the highest number between 2012 to 2016.
Over the same period, RNLI lifeguards responded to the most beach incidents in August than any other year - 690 cases, which accounted for 55% of their total annual incidents.
Helen Church, RNLI community safety partner for Wales, said: 'With summer holidays upon us and hopefully some hot weather, our fantastic beaches are naturally a draw for many people.
"But sadly this also means more people tragically losing their lives or getting into serious danger at the coast.
"We need to start a national conversation that encourages people to fight their instincts around water."
The charity has also raised concerns people do not know they should dial 999 to request help if they saw someone fall into open water.
It has previously issued advice on how to avoid cold water shock. | More people have died on the Welsh coast in August than in any other month of the year, figures have shown. |
37,188,899 | She indicated she would be prepared to consider deals with Labour that could involve candidates standing aside in some constituencies.
Counting of votes is due to start today in the Green Party leadership election, in which Ms Lucas is a candidate.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has previously rejected an electoral pact.
In a sign of the determination by the Greens' only MP to boost the party's presence in Parliament, Ms Lucas told the BBC she wants "all the options on the table" when it comes to the possibility of talking to other parties before the next general election.
She said: "It doesn't make sense for parties of the left to be constantly fighting each other and meanwhile the Conservatives come through and we've seen that time after time in the 2015 general election.
"I think what we are looking at is those marginal constituencies where some kind of agreement between progressive parties might be able to make a difference."
Asked whether this meant she was prepared to see a Green candidate drop out of a constituency race so long as Labour did the same elsewhere, the MP for Brighton Pavilion said: "Personally I would".
Such a pact could be designed to prevent the "left" vote being split between Labour and the Greens in some constituencies, allowing Ms Lucas' party to target certain seats while offering Labour a clear run elsewhere without Green opposition.
She stressed it was ultimately for the party to decide on what was her personal view on the issue.
But the call is unlikely to be welcomed by senior Labour figures and some in Ms Lucas' party have treated the idea with scepticism, although it has been supported by outgoing leader Natalie Bennett.
Jeremy Corbyn previously ruled out the idea of a deal with Ms Lucas to stop the Conservatives winning in Brighton, saying that cooperation with other parties did not "translate" into electoral pacts.
The debate over an electoral alliance has featured on several occasions during the Green party's leadership race, in which seven candidates are standing.
The ballot of the Greens' 53,000 members closed on Thursday night, with the result due to be announced at the party's conference in Birmingham on Friday, 2 September.
David Williams, another leadership contender, said that while he supported of the idea of talking to other parties he believed Labour would not co-operate.
He told the BBC: "We can make agreements I think with the Liberal Democrats, with Plaid Cymru, with the SNP but the advantages in terms of ousting the Tories as a result of that are quite marginal.
"They could be quite substantial if Labour would come along and join the alliance but I don't think they will."
He spoke as Green party activists campaigned at the Elder Stubbs allotment festival in Oxford in aid of the mental health charity Restore.
Another Oxfordshire Green Party activist Hazel Dawe said a "progressive" alliance would be "a wonderful thing" but believed it was unachievable.
She said: "I think there are a lot of obstacles to achieving it, not the least of which is that the Labour party is not committed to proportional representation."
Ms Lucas said the "prize" for her party is that any alliance would have an agreement over electoral reform "at its heart".
The party favours a system of proportional representation which would see the number of seats won at Westminster more closely reflect its national share of the vote.
At the 2015 general election the the Green Party won nearly 1.2m votes but took only one seat in Westminster. | Green Party MP Caroline Lucas has raised the prospect of an electoral pact with other parties to prevent them "fighting each other". |
40,879,380 | North Korea said it was considering a missile strike on the US military base in Guam, after US President Donald Trump threatened Pyongyang with "fire and fury".
The Dow Jones fell 0.17% to 22,048.7 and the wider S&P 500 index dipped 0.04% to 2,474.02.
The Nasdaq lost 0.28% to 6,352.3.
Mr Trump on Wednesday took to Twitter to boast about the US nuclear arsenal, while Secretary of State Rex Tillerson tried to inject calm into the situation, reassuring the American public that there was no imminent threat.
While stocks opened lower, they stemmed losses as the day went on, remaining near the record highs where they have traded for weeks.
Walt Disney weighed on the market. Its shares fell almost 4% after the company said it would invest in the launch of its own ESPN- and Disney-branded online streaming sites and end a distribution deal with Netflix in 2019.
Netflix fell by about 1.5%. | US stocks edged lower on Wednesday, but remained at near record levels despite an earlier sell-off triggered by rising tension between the US and North Korea. |
39,592,454 | Rutland Partners refused to sell the firm outright to food tycoon Ranjit Boparan last summer, letters released by the Work and Pensions Committee have revealed.
Instead it opted for a pre-pack administration - which "drastically reduced" the amount recoverable by its pension scheme.
This offloaded the pension costs on the state Pension Protection Fund (PPF).
Pre-pack administration arrangements allow a pre-arranged buyer to take on a company's assets, but without liabilities such as its pension deficit.
Bernard Matthews employs workers at Great Witchingham, near Norwich, in Norfolk, and Holton, near Halesworth, in Suffolk.
"This arrangement delivered a much-improved financial outcome for Rutland Partners, but drastically reduced the amount recoverable by the pension scheme to potentially less than 1p in the pound," the House of Commons committee said.
Frank Field, Labour MP and chairman of the committee, said: "I have confidence that the PPF working with the scheme trustees, will act in the best interests of the pensioners, but it's clear that the former owners passed up a better deal for pension scheme members in favour of lining their own pockets."
Rutland Partners, which took control of Bernard Matthews in 2013, declined to comment.
Proceeds from the £87.5m sale to Boparan Private Office (BPO) included a full payment of £46.4m to lenders Wells Fargo Capital Finance (UK) and PNC Financial Services UK Ltd, and up to £39m to owner Rutland Partners, as part of the pre-pack model arranged by administrators Deloitte last autumn.
The pension scheme, which has 700 members, has been left with a total deficit of £75m.
The PPF, which steps in to protect employees in some benefit schemes when firms go bust, was left to shoulder the financial burden.
The Work and Pensions Committee said the case "raises concerns" over the use of pre-pack administrations as a means to shed responsibility for pension liabilities and transfer them to "the PPF lifeboat". | A private equity firm has been criticised for rejecting a buyout offer for Bernard Matthews that would have protected the firm's pension scheme. |
34,401,259 | Left-arm-seamer Liddle, 31, had been at Hove since 2006 and was a regular in one-day cricket.
Zaidi, 34, made seven appearances in the County Championship this summer, scoring 354 runs and taking 11 wickets.
Fellow all-rounder Piolet, 27, played five times in white-ball cricket but has now retired from cricket to pursue a career in recruitment.
"It is always a sad time when we release any player," Sussex cricket manager Mark Robinson said.
"Lids has been with us for nine years and enjoyed much success, Ash proved to have a shrewd cricket brain and Steff was a fierce competitor." | Chris Liddle, Steffan Piolet and Ashar Zaidi have left Sussex following the end of the season. |
38,985,766 | Fusion Ball organises teenage events across Ireland and posted the advice on its Kilkenny page.
The post said: "Due to the deplorable dresses at the last ball it is necesary (sic) to fully enforce a knee length dress with NO PLUNGING NECKLINE dresscode for the mid-term ball."
"Keep it Neat and Discreet ladies".
But a number of responses accused the company of trying to dictate what young women wear.
The post illustrated pictures of models dressed in various styles of clothing with 'NO' stamped across them.
One comment said: "I don't have girls but I have to say I was very uncomfortable with your post. Are we raising independent women or going back to the 80s where young girls had babies in grottos and died?
"I felt the phrase 'keep it neat and discreet ladies' was a poor choice of words."
However many of the comments were in support of the advice.
One Facebook user wrote: "I totally agree with this stance of the organisers. All those critical of the organisers, please volunteer at the event and watch for yourself what teenagers get up to today and give your feedback on the dress code then."
The company responded on the Facebook page: "We organise these events for 15-year-old children to attend in a safe, supervised and fun environment.
"We put up a reminder of this before every ball and we also have it on the back of all tickets.
"The Dress-code is as follows: Boys Wear: Shirt and Tie, Slacks and Shoes. Girls Wear: A Dress and Shoes
"Shoes can be sandals, heels or flat pumps. Dress can be knee length or just above the knee". | A company's Facebook post describing teenage girls clothing at its past events as "deplorable" has provoked strong reaction on social media. |
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