document
stringlengths 0
39k
| summary
stringlengths 1
329
| id
stringlengths 8
8
|
|---|---|---|
It is an opportunity that two young singers from Northern Ireland, who feature in an upcoming documentary, were lucky enough to receive.
"I've always been convinced that there are plenty of acts out there, solo artists and bands who are brilliant and they write their own music but who are not getting heard or at least not heard by very big audiences," Joan said.
"I thought I would like to try and help them," she said.
"I put out the word that I was looking for local acts, 56 of them to support me on the tour."
Two of those acts, Jason Clarke and Triona, who supported Joan feature in a new BBC Radio 2 documentary which follows their journey ahead of their performances.
Caitriona Carville, whose stage name is Triona, is 16, is from Teconnaught, outside Downpatrick, County Down. She began singing at an early age and performs in bars across Northern Ireland.
She supported Joan at her concert at Vicar Street in Dublin.
Triona is from a large family, she is one of eight children and has almost 80 first cousins so family sing-alongs have become a bit of a choir event.
"My family were delighted when they found out Joan had selected me, they thought it was a great opportunity.
"I've been song writing since I was 14, it's in my blood, my uncles and my dad all do song writing, it's just a way of expressing emotion," she said.
Triona writes her own songs and has recently released her first EP which she has been distributing to local radio stations.
"One song I wrote was about my brother going away to Australia, because we are such a close family and I decided to write a song," she said.
"It's called Please Come Home and well it didn't really work - he got his citizenship not that long ago."
Triona's parents are closely involved in their daughter's career and both of them are helping her.
For dad William, helping Triona has given him a new lease of life.
"A lot of years back I was having a wee bit of bother with drink so I stopped drinking and to keep my head occupied I lifted the guitar.
"Caitriona was the only one who couldn't escape because she was in a baby bouncer and I think that's when she was programmed with music. Her wee foot was just going to the beat.
"Looking back I've seen both sides of life. I've seen the pain, the downside, the depression with alcohol. I thought my life was over. Well now it's good fun. I wake up every morning and I'm happy," he said.
"Her singing has given me a new lease of life, travelling with her, setting up her gigs and doing all the things we are doing together."
As Triona's career begins to blossom, it brings challenges as well. Joan offered her some advice ahead of the gig.
"Joan has been a great help, she advised me to keep doing what I was doing. Keep gigging and to have the faith.
"She was also giving me advice on contracts and management and the business side of things," said Triona.
Triona's mum, Caitriona Sr, has some concerns about her daughter being taken advantage of in what is traditionally seen as a very tough industry.
"I've spent 29 years raising my children and I don't give them up easy," she said.
Jason Clarke, 26, from Belfast, works for a soft drinks company and he supported Joan with his band at the Millennium Forum in Londonderry.
"I read online that Joan was looking for acts to support her. I've grown up listening to her and thought it would be an honour to support her," he said.
"She listened to every single entry and chose some to support her. She wanted to give exposure to new acts to her audiences, which are always sold out. She also released a compilation CD with all of our songs on it," he said.
Jason said the first time he met Joan he was surprised how much she knew about him.
"We met Joan initially at Anfield in Liverpool. I was at the catering van and out of the corner of my eye I saw Joan. She came straight over to me and said 'Hello Jason, I really like your songs', then she listed the four songs on my EP and she said she liked my music video. I couldn't believe it, she had such a genuine interest in me and my music," he said.
"She is very welcoming. When we got to Derry she came straight out to see me and chatted away, she wasn't one of these divas who hid away in her dressing room. it was like talking to your auntie."
Jason explained how his love for music began at an early age.
"When I was aged 10 or 11 at primary school I fancied this girl and she was in the choir so I thought I would maybe join the choir just so I could talk to her for the first time and from there I just started singing and the choir master saw something and asked me to do a solo in the school play that year. That's where it began.
"I went onto Methody and started writing poems and then turned them into songs," he said.
"Supporting Joan was a great experience. When she came on stage she was very kind and talked about how she liked my music."
Armatrading's Singer Songwriters will be broadcast on BBC Radio 2 on 11 February 2013 at 23:00 GMT. More information about the 56 singer-songwriters can be found on the Local Talent UK website. | It is always a struggle for new singer-songwriters to get noticed in the industry but over the last few months Grammy Award nominee Joan Armatrading has been giving the next generation of stars a rare opportunity. | 21383772 |
A sample taken from Chernova at the 2009 World Championships tested positive for a banned steroid.
The Russian anti-doping agency has banned her and annulled her records from 15 August 2009 to 14 August 2011.
Chernova, now 27, won world gold in Daegu, South Korea, on 30 August 2011.
Ennis, then the defending world champion, had to settle for silver.
However the following year Ennis - now Ennis-Hill - took Olympic gold in London, where Chernova finished third.
Chernova's two-year ban has been backdated to 22 June 2013.
Compatriot Yulia Zaripova, the Olympic women's 3,000m steeplechase champion, has been banned for two and a half years by the Russian anti-doping agency.
The ban has also been backdated, to July 2013, leaving her eligible for Rio 2016.
The 28-year-old's biological passport showed the use of a banned method for replicating high-altitude conditions.
Zaripova won gold at London 2012 with a personal best, but that result has been annulled and she could lose the medal.
The Russian missed the August 2013 World Championships in Moscow after injuring her leg in training, and then said she was taking a break to have a baby.
Last week, Russia's athletics head coach Valentin Maslakov resigned after a number of athletes from the country were found guilty of committing doping offences.
The World Anti-Doping Agency is investigating allegations of widespread doping and corruption in Russian athletics after claims were aired in a recent German television documentary, with a report due to be published by the end of the year.
The IAAF said last week it was concerned about the number of Russian doping cases in the sport. | Russian heptathlete Tatyana Chernova has been banned for two years for doping and stripped of two years' results - but keeps a gold medal she won by beating Britain's Jessica Ennis. | 30964828 |
The bombing campaign in the skies over Yemen is in its sixth month now. Every day, residents of the capital, Sanaa, listen nervously for the rumble of jets. They know what will follow: a flash in the sky, a sickening pause, then the thud and boom of explosions as the missiles strike.
The aim of the Saudi-led coalition is to oust Houthi rebels from the city. The Houthis took Sanaa last year, with the help of forces loyal to Yemen's ousted former president Ali Abdullah Saleh and the support of Iran.
In response, Saudi Arabia, Iran's regional rival, has imposed a blockade on the north of the country, controlling what comes in by land, sea and air.
"Yemen is one of the world's worst crises," says Tariq Riebl, head of programmes in Yemen for the charity Oxfam.
"We have bombings every single day via airstrikes. We have ground fighting of very heavy levels. The country is facing famine which could start in a couple of weeks or months if things continue the way they are. We have more than a million people displaced across the country."
Away from the capital, towards the Saudi border, the bombing is even more intense. We travelled across the mountains that ring Sanaa to investigate reports of deliberate attacks on civilians - attacks that could amount to war crimes.
On the evening of 29 August, Ahmed Al Beyna, 13, had dinner as usual with his parents and his brother Mohammed. They live in the village of Alrabu Matwara, near the town of Abs in the north-west of the country. Just before 6pm, the brothers set off for work at a nearby water bottling plant.
They were coming to the end of their night shift when the missile struck.
"There was an explosion, then everything burst into flames," says factory worker Khalid al-Hababi.
"Most of the workers came out like pieces of coal, buried beneath the rubble."
"Everything is gone," said Akram, another worker who witnessed the aftermath. "There's nothing left. No factory, no people. We found the workers burned on to the machines."
When we arrived, two days after the strike, smoke was still rising from piles of molten plastic.
The owner showed us a list of who was working that night. More than half were killed, 13 men in total, including Ahmed and his brother.
The Saudis said the bottling plant was in fact a weapons factory and a training camp for African mercenaries. We saw no evidence of that.
The bottling plant near Abs is just one of dozens of civilian targets that have been hit since the Saudi-led campaign began at the end of March.
The airstrikes are backed by a resolution at the United Nations Security Council. But the UN's top humanitarian official in Yemen, Johannes van der Klaauw, says attacks on civilian infrastructure are violations of the laws of war.
"Schools and hospitals, markets, enterprises and factories should not be stricken, should not be shelled. Even in warfare there are certain rules, and they are being violated in this conflict," he said.
Since the conflict started, more than 2,000 civilians have been killed. Some are victims of months of vicious ground fighting between the two sides. Houthi soldiers, some of them no more than teenagers, are accused of firing heavy weapons in built-up areas.
But it is the Saudis and their coalition partners, mainly Gulf Arab countries including the United Arab Emirates, who have overwhelming force.
The coalition's efforts are supported by Britain and the United States. Both countries continue to sell arms to Saudi Arabia, and are providing the Saudi-led coalition with liaison officers and technical support.
Oxfam, whose own warehouse in Yemen has been hit by an airstrike, says the UK could be in breach of domestic and international laws on the sales of arms.
"It's difficult to argue that a weapon sold to Saudi Arabia would not in some way be used in Yemen," says Mr Riebl.
"Or if it's not used in Yemen it enables the country to use other weapons in Yemen."
The Arms Trade Treaty, which came into force in December 2014, prohibits the sale of weapons where there is a clear risk they could be used for war crimes.
The British government says it is not participating directly in the Saudi-led operations, but acknowledges it is providing technical support and precision-guided weapons to Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Air Force has a fleet of British and American-made fighter jets, including F15s, Tornados and Eurofighter Typhoons.
In July, a consignment of Paveway IV missiles, a highly accurate 500-pound bomb originally earmarked for the RAF, was delivered to Saudi Arabia.
"The UK is digging into its own weapons supplies to replenish Saudi stocks," says Michael Stephens of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI).
The majority of the Saudi airstrikes are being carried out by American-made F15 jets. The Saudi-led coalition has publicly given few details of which weapons are being used in Yemen. Saudi Arabia is also involved in the air campaign over Syria in airstrikes against Islamic State targets. But Mr Stephens says British missiles are being used in Yemen.
"They're firing UK-supplied weapons," he says.
The combined effects of intense ground fighting, airstrikes and the blockade are having a devastating effect on the country.
A million and a half people have fled their homes, seeking shelter in makeshift camps. Half the population of Yemen doesn't know where the next meal will come from.
That number now includes Ibrahim and Khadija Al-Beyna, the parents of Ahmed and Mohammed, who were killed in the airstrike on the water bottling plant. The brothers were the only breadwinners in a family of nine.
Ahmed was a typical teenager, his mother, Khalidja, remembers: always on his bike or chasing pigeons.
"They took our children," says Ibrahim. "Not one but two. Mohammed and Ahmed. Together, in one moment, in one day. Whoever did this to us, may God repay them."
In recent days, the airstrikes have intensified. In the capital, there is talk of an impending advance by pro-Saudi forces.
This war is part of the wider regional struggle for power between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
In Sanaa, the Houthis do not enjoy universal support - far from it. But with every airstrike, and every civilian death, resistance to the Saudis and their allies is growing.
Part two of Gabriel Gatehouse's special report from Yemen is on Newsnight on Friday 11 September. You can also catch up on on iPlayer afterwards. | The BBC's Gabriel Gatehouse has just returned from Yemen, where he had rare access to the scale of the humanitarian crisis caused by what some are calling the "forgotten war". | 34211979 |
Redbridge-born Adams, 22, was recently released by Birmingham when his contract expired.
He was on West Ham's books before joining Birmingham in 2011, since which he has had loan spells at Lincoln City and Kilmarnock.
Adams made two first-team appearances during his time at Birmingham.
Find all the latest football transfers on our dedicated page. | National League club Dagenham & Redbridge have signed former Birmingham City midfielder Charlee Adams on a two-year deal. | 40484808 |
Hooker Elloway joined the Pirates from Gloucester in 2007 and played 229 times for the Penzance-based club.
He played twice for the German national team, and spent time on loan at London Welsh in the Premiership in 2015.
"With a two-year-old and another on the way in July, I want to spend more time with my wife and children," he said.
"I feel excited to start the next chapter in my life and keen to find a role where my positive nature and enthusiasm will make a difference." | Cornish Pirates' former Germany international Rob Elloway will retire from professional rugby at the end of the season. | 39053157 |
The incident happened at the Scotmid shop on the town's Lochside Road at about 15:00 on Tuesday.
The white, spaniel-type dog bit the 21-year-old resulting in him having to have medical treatment at Dumfries Infirmary.
The dog was later taken away by a woman with blonde hair. Police said she may have been unaware of the incident. | A man has been bitten on the knee by a dog tied up outside a convenience store in Dumfries. | 39217044 |
The 68-year-old, who is originally from Glasgow, was attacked in HMP Edinburgh on Wednesday. His injuries are not believed to be life threatening.
A 30-year-old man has been reported to the procurator fiscal.
Tobin is serving three life sentences for murdering Polish student Angelika Kluk, Scots schoolgirl Vicky Hamilton and Essex teenager Dinah McNicol.
A Police Scotland statement said: "Police Scotland can confirm that a 30-year-old man has been reported to the procurator fiscal in connection with a serious assault on a 68-year-old man at HMP Edinburgh."
The incident happened at about 12.30.
Tobin was convicted of murdering 23-year-old Ms Kluk at a church in Glasgow in 2006.
The following year, the bodies of 18-year-old Ms McNicol, from Essex, and Ms Hamilton, 15, from Redding in Falkirk, were found in the garden of Tobin's former home in Margate, Kent.
In 2006, Strathclyde Police set up Operation Anagram to establish whether Tobin could be linked to or ruled out of other crimes. | Convicted serial killer Peter Tobin has been taken to hospital after being slashed in prison. | 33363006 |
Sarah Keegan, 32, who is due to give birth in June, admitted being concerned in the supply of heroin in April last year at a caravan park in Beattock.
A court heard she did not want to be in custody when her baby was born.
However, Judge Lord Boyd told her the offence was too serious to receive a non-custodial sentence.
Defence counsel Susan Duff told the High Court in Glasgow: "She is due to give birth on 18 June and she doesn't want to be in custody when she gives birth.
"She is asking for a non-custodial sentence to be considered."
Lord Boyd told her he could understand her wish not to have the baby while in prison.
He said she was drug-free and had said the right thing about wanting to be a "role model" to the child but added the crime was too serious not to result in a prison term.
"You have yourself been an addict," he said.
"You should know the misery that drugs bring to people and the communities blighted by it."
Keegan was arrested along with former co-accused Jason Jolley, who was jailed for five years, following a police operation codenamed Operation Boswell.
Police believed that Jolley, 45, and Keegan, both originally from Manchester, were flooding the Dumfries area with drugs.
Prosecutor Allan Nicol said: "Intelligence suggested that Jolley was directly supplying others and had local dealers working for him."
Jolley and Keegan based themselves at the Moffat Manor Country Park in Beattock, and were organising deliveries of the drug from this location into Dumfries and the surrounding area.
Officers swooped on this location on 27 April 2016, and recovered heroin and cutting agent worth a potential £65,000 from within the caravan occupied by Jolley and Keegan.
Inside the caravan police found drugs paraphernalia including a set of scales and 22 knotted bags of heroin.
Jolley and Keegan's DNA and fingerprints were found on various items throughout.
A small amount of heroin was also found in Keegan's underwear during a strip search at Loreburn Street Police Station.
Lord Boyd told Keegan: "I fully accept that Jason Jolley was the moving force behind the operation.
"However, your DNA was found on various items and you were clearly involved."
Ms Duff told the court that at the time of the offence her client had been a heroin addict.
"She doesn't want that lifestyle again and is not prepared to take any drugs that may harm her baby," she said. | A pregnant drug dealer who asked not to be jailed because she did not want her baby born in prison has been given a two-year sentence. | 39588964 |
The charity Morayvia plans to establish a science and technology centre at a former primary school site near Forres.
Those plans have now been given a "massive boost" after successfully tendering for one of the search and rescue helicopters.
The Lossiemouth Sea Kings were mothballed and replaced with helicopters run by the private sector.
Stan Barber, chief executive of the Morayvia Science and Technology project, said: "We are absolutely overjoyed to be able to announce that the MoD's Disposal Services Agency has agreed that Sea King Mk3 XZ592 should be sold to Morayvia.
"This is the result of the fantastic effort and support we have had from civic, community and political leaders from throughout Moray, as well as from people far beyond our region with a love and understanding of just what the Sea King means to people in this part of the world.
"Above all it has been the support of the general public that has inspired us to put in so much time and effort to secure this fantastic aircraft."
Morayvia chairman Mark Mair said: "The total cost of establishing the Sea King in Moray will be around £30,000 - a considerable sum and thanks to the generosity of people in recent months we have some of this funding in place.
"However, we are some way short so in the next few days we will be launching a crowd funding effort aimed at securing all the funding required to ensure we have in place a fitting tribute to the SAR service in Moray for future generations to appreciate and admire." | A bid to retain a retired RAF Sea King helicopter in Moray to be exhibited has been successful. | 33009240 |
About 100kgs (220lbs) of the fruit, worth about £300, were stolen from Hill Farm in Lenham Road, Ulcombe.
Kent Police initially said the fruit had been coated with a chemical that could cause "poisoning", but later said the it posed no risk to public health.
It is believed the same people have committed previous thefts from the farm, a police spokeswoman said.
The thieves got into the farm by cutting a fence, before a vehicle was loaded with the strawberries sometime between midnight on Friday and 10:00 BST on Monday, police said.
The force initially said the strawberries had been coated with a chemical which could cause "poisoning to the stomach".
A police spokeswoman then issued a statement saying: "It has come to my attention that the strawberries mentioned below do not pose a risk to public health." | Strawberries worth hundreds of pounds have been stolen from a Kent farm. | 40522579 |
The first minister was speaking after meeting Theresa May for talks with other leaders in Wales.
Ms Sturgeon warned time was running out for the prime minister to "square the circle" of different Brexit votes and "heed the voice of Scotland".
Mrs May pledged to engage the devolved governments in the process, but said they "will not agree on everything".
She also said the Supreme Court ruling on triggering Article 50 had set out "beyond doubt" that relations with Brussels would be determined by the UK government.
The Joint Ministerial Council (JMC) meeting in Cardiff between the UK government and devolved administrations included talks on the Scottish government's proposals for maintaining access to the single market.
Proposals to remain in the single market have also been put forward by Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones and Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood.
A communiqué issued following the meeting said "consideration of the proposals of the devolved administrations is an ongoing process", adding that "work will need to be intensified ahead of triggering Article 50 and continued at the same pace thereafter".
Ms Sturgeon has previously warned that Mrs May's plans to take the UK out of the single market "undoubtedly" made a second referendum on Scottish independence more likely.
Following the latest meeting, she told the BBC: "If the Prime Minister is serious about doing what she wanted to do in July, and find a UK-wide approach before Article 50 triggered, if she's serious about seeing the UK as a partnership of equals, then I think its incumbent on her and the UK government to meet the devolved administrations halfway.
"So far there's no sign of that happening. And I'm very clear that time is running out for that to happen.
"The next few weeks are going to be really critical if we are to be convinced - and I'm far from convinced - that Scotland's voice is going to be heard or listened to at all."
Ms Sturgeon said her government was prepared to compromise, but had seen no such willingness from Mrs May's administration.
She said: "I came down here determined to go the extra mile, to find compromise, to try to find a way to square the circle of the UK vote to leave and the Scottish vote to Remain.
"I also came here with a very clear message for the prime minister, that so far the only compromise has come from the Scottish government, there's been no attempt at compromise on the part of the UK government.
"What the meeting did today was to intensify the work of considering proposals from the Scottish government and other devolved administrations ahead of trigger Article 50.
"But I was very clear that we have to see a step change in the engagement of the UK government and their willingness to substantively compromise in order to convince me that they're serious about listening to Scotland."
Among the other politicians at the event were Arlene Foster and Michelle O'Neill of the Northern Ireland Assembly, Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones, UK Brexit Secretary David Davis, and the Scottish, Northern Irish and Welsh secretaries.
The Welsh government said Mr Jones had "welcomed a firm commitment" from Mrs May that Brexit "would to be use as cover for a 'land grab' on devolved powers", and noted the two had discussed "full single market access and its vital importance to the Welsh economy".
They noted that "the positions are not identical, but not irreconcilable at this stage".
The JMC communiqué said the prime minister had provided "an updated on the objectives for the UK's exit from the EU".
It added that ministers "explored how the four administrations can most effectively support businesses to trade and invest", and said they "talks about the principles which should govern relations between the four administrations".
Scottish Secretary David Mundell confirmed "inter-governmental discussions" on proposals brought forward by the devolved administrations would be intensified.
He said: "The question is not about can there be differentiation [for Scotland], the question is whether Scotland would benefit from differentiation, and that's what really has got to be at the heart of these intense discussions.
"Is it necessary to have a separate deal for Scotland, is the wish for a separate deal for Scotland driven by ideology or is it really based on economic fact and Scotland's future needs?
"That is what we need to have a full and frank discussion about in the weeks ahead."
Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson added that Ms Sturgeon's comments amounted to "more sabre-rattling", saying: "Nicola Sturgeon should be using these talks to work with others from across the UK to get the best Brexit deal for all of us. Instead, she's trying to pick fights to promote her own political agenda." | Nicola Sturgeon has said "the next few weeks are going to be really critical" in building a UK-wide Brexit position. | 38790544 |
Liam Buchanan's strike was one of just four goals scored in the division on Saturday.
Two of those came late on at Hampden Park as Queen's Park drew 1-1 with Brechin.
Iain Russell's goal gave Airdrie a 1-0 win at home against Stenhousemuir, with Alloa held by East Fife while Albion Rovers and Peterhead was also goalless.
Buchanan's shot, with just six minutes left, extended Livingston's lead to nine points at the top of the table.
Stranraer sit two points above the relegation play-off position after their first loss in eight games.
Brechin City seemed set to move up to third after Andrew Jackson's 84th-minute strike put them in front at Hampden, but Ryan McGeever levelled for Queen's Park six minutes later.
David Marsh earned a straight red card for Stenhousemuir on 84 minutes for a foul on Aidrie goalscorer Russell.
The win saw Airdrie move level on points with Brechin and East Fife, but they remain outside the play-off places on goal difference.
Second-placed Alloa's four-match winning run came to an end as they were held to a goalless draw by third-placed East Fife. | League One leaders Livingston left it late to secure a 1-0 win away to in-form Stranraer. | 39316586 |
A representative said the former broadcaster died on Sunday evening surrounded by his wife and family.
He penned the 1980s BBC television series, starring Paul Eddington and Sir Nigel Hawthorne, with Jonathan Lynn.
Sir Antony's career began in the BBC's current affairs department where he was a founding member of the Tonight team.
He later scripted the documentaries Royal Family and Elizabeth R: A Year in the Life of the Queen, after which he was appointed Commander of the Royal Victorian Order for personal services to the Royal Family.
Yes Minister, which ran for three series between 1980 and 1984, followed the travails of MP James Hacker, minister for administrative affairs, and his battles against unflappable Whitehall civil servant Sir Humphrey Appleby.
The subsequent Yes, Prime Minister, broadcast for two seasons between 1986 and 1988, portrayed Hacker's life after he entered 10 Downing Street. Then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was known to be a great fan of the series.
Lynn told BBC Radio 4's Today programme he and Sir Antony were "very, very good friends", adding: "Tony was someone I was immensely fond of."
"We didn't really agree about a great many things - he was a right-wing Conservative and I would describe myself as sort-of left leaning."
He admitted he first thought Sir Antony's idea to write a comedy about the Civil Service was "dull" and he didn't follow it up for three years, until he was looking for a new project.
Lynn said: "There were no bad memories - except about his illness. We didn't have a cross word in 30-something years. We always got along well - we only had a good time."
Michael Dobbs, who wrote House of Cards, said Sir Antony had helped him when he started out as a writer, adding he was "so generous with his time".
He said Yes Minister was "a programme that could actually engage the attention of Margaret Thatcher", adding: "She never watched television, she didn't have time - yet Yes Minister was one of her extraordinary favourites, and I think it was unique."
Lord Dobbs added Sir Antony and Lynn "really got to the heart of so much of what goes on in Whitehall and Westminster".
The BBC was given permission to shoot exteriors in Downing Street, and Eddington was allowed to walk through the famous door.
Sir Antony and Lynn returned to the comedy in recent years collaborating on a stage version of Yes, Prime Minister in 2010, while writing three general election-inspired sketches aired on BBC's Newsnight in the same year.
Derek Fowlds, who starred as Principal Private Secretary Bernard Woolley in both comedies, said: "We had seven wonderful years together.
"Sir Antony Jay was a genius, quite frankly - I was totally in awe of him. He was very charming, a real true gent. I adored the man."
Earlier this month, the duo reunited again to write a new Yes Minister sketch published in the Guardian newspaper, inspired by the UK's vote to leave the EU.
In his later years, Sir Antony had become an outspoken critic of the BBC, recommending in a 2008 report for the centre-right think tank the Centre for Policy Studies that the corporation be slimmed down to BBC One, Radio 4 and a news department.
He also criticised the BBC for being "biased" on climate change, and suggested staff were "anti-industry" and "anti-monarchy".
Follow us on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, on Instagram, or if you have a story suggestion email [email protected]. | Sir Antony Jay, the co-writer of TV political comedies Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister, has died aged 86 after a long illness. | 37167744 |
Labour's Keith Vaz said the claims were "chilling" and shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper demanded an inquiry.
According to The Guardian, GCHQ had access to data covertly gathered from leading internet firms in the US.
GCHQ said it operated within a "strict legal and policy framework".
The Guardian says it has obtained documents showing that the secret listening post had access to the Prism system, set up by America's National Security Agency (NSA), since at least June 2010.
The documents were said to show that the British agency had generated 197 intelligence reports through the system in the 12 months to May 2012 - a 137% increase on the previous year.
By Gordon CoreraSecurity correspondent, BBC News
Britain's GCHQ has an incredibly close relationship with its US counterpart - and that is now drawing it into controversy.
At issue is whether America's Prism programme has been used to cast a significantly wider surveillance net over communications.
Is Prism simply a means of accessing forms of communication information in a more streamlined way (by directly accessing servers) or does it involve collecting whole new categories of information? And about whom?
Critics will ask whether GCHQ could have used this to get round existing restrictions on whom it collects on.
That's something the spy agency seems to be pushing back against by saying that everything it does is within a legal and policy framework to make sure it is authorised, necessary and proportionate.
It should come as no surprise that spy agencies spy - and that they don't like talking about how they spy or on whom.
But this revelation will lead to questions from the public about whether those agencies might be spying on them.
The newspaper said that the Prism programme appeared to allow the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) to circumvent the formal legal process required to obtain personal material, such as emails, photographs and videos, from internet companies based outside the UK.
Mr Vaz, the chairman of the Commons Home Affairs Committee, said: "The most chilling aspect is that ordinary American citizens and potentially British citizens too were apparently unaware that their phone and online interactions could be watched.
"This seems to be the snooper's charter by the back door. I shall be writing to the home secretary asking for a full explanation."
Ms Cooper called on the prime minister to ask the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC), which oversees the work of MI5, MI6 and GCHQ, to investigate "the UK's relationship with the Prism programme, the nature of intelligence being gathered, the extent of UK oversight by ministers and others, and the level of safeguards and compliance with the law".
"It is important for the UK intelligence community to be able to gather information from abroad including from the United States particularly in the vital counter terror work they do," the Labour frontbencher added.
"However there also have to be legal safeguards."
The UK's data protection watchdog, the information commissioner's office (ICO), has raised its concerns with its European counterparts.
It said there were "real issues about the extent to which US law enforcement agencies can access personal data of UK and other European citizens".
"Aspects of US law under which companies can be compelled to provide information to US agencies potentially conflict with European data protection law, including the UK's own Data Protection Act."
A GCHQ statement did not deny the Guardian's story.
A spokesman for the agency, based in Cheltenham, said: "Our work is carried out in accordance with a strict legal and policy framework which ensures that our activities are authorised, necessary and proportionate, and that there is rigorous oversight, including from the secretary of state, the Interception and Intelligence Services Commissioners and the Intelligence and Security Committee."
US spies have been accused of tapping into servers of nine US internet giants including Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Google in a giant anti-terror sweep. All deny giving government agents access to servers.
But the Prism programme has been strongly defended by James Clapper, director of US national intelligence.
And President Barack Obama said it was closely overseen by Congress and the courts and that his administration had struck "the right balance" between security and privacy.
He also stressed that the surveillance of phone call "metadata" did not target US citizens or residents and government agencies were not listening to telephone calls.
Civil liberties campaigners in the UK have said they are deeply concerned.
Lib Dem MP Julian Huppert, a long standing campaigner against the government's proposed Communications Data Bill - dubbed a "snooper's charter" by critics - said he would "raise the issue as soon as possible in Parliament".
The data bill, which would have authorised the retention of every UK citizen's web browsing records, was dropped because the Lib Dems did not support it.
But the home secretary has talked of its importance to national security, following the killing of Drummer Lee Rigby in Woolwich.
The director of civil rights group Liberty, Shami Chakrabarti, said the reports "suggest a breach of trust on the grandest scale... showing contempt for privacy, legality and democracy itself".
She added: "Have those who failed to persuade in the Parliament chamber decided to smuggle blanket surveillance in through the back door?"
Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, said the revelations were "deeply concerning".
He said: "I call on all web users to demand better legal protection and due process safeguards for the privacy of their online communications, including their right to be informed when someone requests or stores their data."
Nick Pickles, director of campaign group Big Brother Watch, said: "There are legal processes to request information about British citizens using American services and if they are being circumvented by using these NSA spying arrangements then that would be a very serious issue." | Prime Minister David Cameron has been urged to launch an investigation into allegations that Britain's electronic listening post GCHQ has been gathering data through a secret US spy programme. | 22813893 |
Gayle Nix Jackson is also seeking $10m (£6.6m) in compensation over the film shot by Orville Nix in November 1963.
He sold the film to a news agency that year but it was later handed to the government for its inquiries.
Ms Nix Jackson says she was told this year the government agency believed to be in possession did not have the film.
The 8mm Nix film was shot from the opposite side of the presidential limousine from where the famous Zapruder film was taken on 22 November 1963.
Why the legend of JFK endures
The Nix film shows the bullet hitting the president, First Lady Jackie Kennedy climbing on to the boot of the limousine, and secret service agent Clint Hill jumping into the vehicle.
The film is shot from Dealey Plaza, showing Zapruder across the street and the famous grassy knoll, from where some witnesses thought they heard a shot fired.
It is not as complete as the Zapruder movie, as it shows only part of the assassination.
However, the lawsuit cites the Warren Commission - which investigated the assassination - as saying the Nix film was "nearly as important as the Zapruder film".
The government purchased the Zapruder film for $16m in 1999 in a settlement with his heirs.
Orville Nix sold his film to UPI for $5,000 with an agreement for its return after 25 years.
But it was handed over to the government for the inquiry.
Its last known sighting was with the House Select Committee on Assassinations in 1978.
It was believed to have been handed to the National Archives and Records Administration, but the lawsuit says the agency has told Ms Nix Jackson, who lives in Fort Worth in Texas, it no longer has the movie.
Ms Nix Jackson told the Associated Press it was incomprehensible authorities would lose "an important piece of historical evidence".
She said: "I can understand little clerical issues. I don't understand the loss of evidence like this." | A woman whose grandfather filmed the assassination of President John F Kennedy as a home movie is suing the US government for its return. | 34907705 |
Emily Tabassi-Gill, from East Sussex, discovered the bones in February during a walk organised by the island's Dinosaur Isle museum.
The fossil is approximately 120 million years old and is the left side of the animal's horse-like skull.
Mrs Tabassi-Gill donated her find to the Sandown-based museum.
The mother-of-two said she was "delighted" her fossil would go on display and added: "We will definitely be back to see it."
Dinosaur Isle's community learning assistant, Alex Peaker, said dinosaur skulls are "incredibly rare" because they are fragile and less likely to become fossils than other bones.
He said: "We are really grateful to Emily for her donation.
"Her generosity and that of so many other people is what helps us maintain a fantastic display and helps our understanding of the past progress."
Mr Peaker added that what is most unusual about the fossil is that the remains come from the Cowleaze Chine, made up of layers of clay and sandstone which rarely preserve dinosaur bones. | The remains of an "incredibly rare" fossilised iguanodon skull found by a family visiting the Isle of Wight have gone on display. | 37044018 |
Murdoch, who started his career with Falkirk, has signed a two-year contract with the Scottish Premiership club.
He left the Bairns to join Fleetwood in 2013 but only made 13 appearances for the side that finished 10th in the season just passed and was released.
Murdoch spent two months on loan to Northampton Town, playing 10 times for the League Two outfit.
He had made 48 appearances for Fleetwood in the previous season, helping them win promotion.
The Aberdeen-born player also has spells on loan to Berwick Rangers and East Fife while with Falkirk.
Murdoch becomes County's second signing in two days following the addition of former Hartlepool United left-back Darren Holden. | Ross County have signed Stewart Murdoch after the 25-year-old midfielder left English League One side Fleetwood Town. | 33178568 |
The ambitious, three-act Before the Dawn show played for 22 nights at Hammersmith's Apollo in 2014, her first full live performances since 1979.
Speaking about the shows for the first time, the star told BBC 6 Music she was "nervous every night" of the residency.
Her biggest fear was losing her place mid-song, she told Matt Everitt.
"I naturally tend to race ahead in my mind," Bush explained. "I'm always thinking about situations and running them through.
"I think, maybe it's that kind of primeval thing where you're trying to think, 'Can I get to that tree before the tiger gets me?'
"So my head is always moving ahead, just trying to get to the conclusion of whatever this journey is. And once we started running the show I had to be absolutely in that moment.
"But I was so terrified that if my mind wandered off that when I came back I wouldn't remember where I was."
Bush has spent the last two years preparing a live album documenting the show, which will be released on 25 November.
Like the concert, the album is divided into three parts - the first covering hits like Hounds of Love, Top Of The City and Running Up That Hill; while the second and third more conceptual movements were focused on two suites of songs: The Ninth Wave and A Sky Of Honey from her Hounds Of Love and Aerial albums respectively.
Bush declined interview requests before and after the concerts but will delve into the shows on a special hour-long programme, Kate Bush on 6 Music, at 13:00 GMT on Sunday 20 November.
In these exclusive excerpts, she speaks about her decision to perform live again, the problems she experienced and whether she has started working on new music.
What changed your mind about doing the live shows? This is the first big question, isn't it?
I'd done two albums in really quite quick succession and I felt like doing something different. I really wanted to do something that wasn't going to mean sitting in the studio for a couple of years just putting an album together. So it just felt like the right time.
Can you recall that moment of thinking, "Okay, this might interest me"?
Well, I suppose there'd been odd moments when I'd thought this before: "It might be nice to do some shows". But actually pushing the button to go was something that I had to really seriously build up to.
Were you quite nervous?
Yeah, I was terrified. The idea of putting the show together was something that I found really interesting and really exciting... but to actually step into it was something that I had to really work hard on because I was terrified of doing live work as a performer again.
As opposed to the studio, the disciplines involved with live work are very, very different. The ability to exert control is wrested from your hands. How did you cope with that?
I was really nervous every night as a performer, but had complete faith in everybody on the stage, everybody in the team, all the sound guys.
The most difficult thing for me was to be continually in the now because I naturally tend to race ahead in my mind. I think maybe it's that kind of primeval thing where you're trying to think, 'Can I get to that tree before the tiger gets me? Will I be able to get up high enough?'
So my head is always moving ahead just trying to get to the conclusion of whatever this journey is. And once we started running the show I had to be absolutely in that moment.
But I was so terrified that if my mind wandered off that when I came back I wouldn't remember where I was. So I had to really fix myself, so that I would remember where I was in the song.
It was obviously a really creatively fulfilling thing to do the shows - and you're smiling at me already because you know the question that's going to come in a second. You enjoyed it and you managed to achieve something very special, something that maybe hadn't been done with a live pop music show for a long time. Is there the temptation to do it again in some form?
The thing about that show is that most of the material was already written. And to start something like that from scratch is another whole world of work, isn't it?
It was an extraordinary thing to be involved in, especially to have got the response that we did. It was really magical. But I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to do next. I want to just do something new. I've been working [on] this project for a really long time now.
In terms of your songwriting at the moment, how has that been affected by the political state the world finds itself in? Because it's difficult to avoid - no matter what side of the political fence you sit on. Is that something that you've been inspired to write about?
No! [laughs]
That was a really well thought-out question and it was just shot down! Nothing?
I haven't written a song for ages. I haven't been writing.
How come?
Well, sir, I've been quite busy. I've been putting a live album together.
I mean, tell me there's going to be another album at some point. This is not a full stop or anything, is it?
Oh no, I don't think so. I think it's just a rather big comma.
Kate Bush on 6 Music will be broadcast at 13:00 GMT on Sunday, 20 November.
Follow us on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, on Instagram at bbcnewsents, or if you have a story suggestion email [email protected]. | Kate Bush has confessed she was "terrified" by the critically-acclaimed concerts that marked her return to the stage two years ago. | 37924894 |
They are thought to be being held near the city of Hobyo.
The Al Kausar was one of three vessels to be hijacked after a five-year lull.
On Sunday sailors from the Indian, Pakistani and Chinese navies freed the crew of a Tuvalu-registered vessel which had been boarded by pirates.
The two crew members who were rescued were in a car that the pirates abandoned after they were chased, Mohamed Hashi Arabey, vice president of Galmudug state, told Reuters news agency.
Pirates contacted by Reuters said they would keep the crew to try to secure the release of more than a hundred pirates jailed in India.
Piracy in the waters off Somalia and Yemen peaked in 2011, with more than 200 attacks.
But it has dropped significantly in recent years, in part because of extensive international military patrols as well as support for local fishing communities.
However, the factors that drove many Somali coastal fishermen to become pirates nearly a decade ago are still there, says the BBC's security correspondent Frank Gardner.
Somalia is currently in the grip of a famine. Poverty is widespread with few employment options for young people.
There is also continued local resentment at the poaching of fish stocks off the coast by Asian trawlers. | Somali security forces have rescued an Indian cargo ship seized by pirates earlier this month, but the hijackers took nine of the 11-man crew when they fled ashore. | 39561904 |
The Local Government Association called for a "timetable for action", saying it was "paramount" to press on with extending broadband to all of the UK.
Ministerial changes after the Brexit vote must not delay work, it added.
The government insisted it was on track with its broadband coverage plans.
The promise to give every household a legal right to high-speed broadband was announced in the Queen's Speech in May, as part of measures to make the UK a "world leader in the digital economy".
Universal broadband - how, why, how much?
Want superfast broadband? Do it yourself
The village that is cut off from the UK
The government expects an initial minimum speed of at least 10 Mbps (megabits per second) by 2020 under the new "broadband universal service obligation" (USO).
The pledge is included in the Digital Economy Bill, which will also include powers to direct Ofcom to regularly review the speed provided to ensure it is "still sufficient for modern life".
Council leaders said they supported the creation of a national minimum broadband speed, but called for a "safety net" for those who were unlikely to be covered by the plan.
The government plans to set a reasonable cost threshold above which the remotest properties could be expected to contribute to the cost of their connection.
Mark Hawthorne, from the Local Government Association (LGA), said good digital connectivity was "a vital element of everyday life", and key to the economy.
A minimum speed was "a good start", but it must keep pace with national average speeds, especially at peak times, he stressed.
"Without this there is the real possibility of some areas - particularly in rural and hard-to-reach areas - falling into a digital twilight zone."
The LGA's call comes a day after Ofcom announced proposals to make BT's Openreach division a distinct and legally separate company from BT to ensure "faster, more reliable broadband."
But Ofcom stopped short of calling for Openreach - which runs the UK's broadband infrastructure - to be spilt off entirely.
Responding to the LGA's intervention, Digital Minister Matt Hancock said nine out of 10 UK homes and businesses could already get superfast broadband, and Britain was on target to reach 95% coverage by the end of next year.
Fast and reliable broadband was "a must these days", he added, saying the bill to make the minimum speed requirement law was currently going through Parliament. | Councils have urged the government to "reaffirm its commitment" to a minimum broadband speed to stop thousands of homes and businesses falling into a "digital twilight zone". | 36900892 |
It is estimated more than four million people were waiting for operations in June - a figure last seen in 2007.
The rise is partly because of growing demand and the NHS performing more procedures.
But some doctors argue the higher numbers reflect growing strain on the health service.
The NHS in England is failing to meet its target to operate on 92% of people within 18 weeks.
Since June last year there has been an increase of more than 21% in the numbers waiting longer than 18 weeks to 373,182.
NHS England said: "Last month 1.4 million patients started consultant-led treatment, and more than nine out of 10 patients were waiting less than 18 weeks.
"We're working hard to cut long waits, and the number of patients waiting over a year for treatment has dropped by nearly 13,000 since March 2011 to being just over 1,500 now."
The confirmed figures shows that 3.83 million people are waiting to have surgery, but missing data means the NHS believes the figure may in fact be "just over four million patients".
Other targets missed include the four-hour target in A&E and urgent referrals for cancer care.
John Appleby, the director of research at the Nuffield trust, said: "These figures show that the NHS continues to be systematically unable to meet its main targets.
"This puts the NHS on the back foot as we approach winter, with problems both at the 'front door' of A&E departments and at the 'back door', as hospitals struggle to send people home or onto further care." | The number of people waiting for routine surgery in England is at its highest level for a decade, figures from NHS England show. | 40886598 |
Slovenia was the first former Yugoslav republic to join the European Union, in May 2004 - shortly after joining Nato.
Unlike Croatia or Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia's independence from Yugoslavia was almost bloodless. The country also found the transition from a state economy to the free market easier than most.
Long regarded as one of the best-performing new EU members, Slovenia was dragged into a deep recession by the European financial crisis in 2012.
Slovenia's relations with Croatia have been strained on account of a rumbling dispute over sea and land borders dating back to the break-up of Yugoslavia.
Population 2 million
Area 20,273 sq km (7,827 sq miles)
Major language Slovene
Major religion Christianity
Life expectancy 76 years (men), 83 years (women)
Currency euro
President: Borut Pahor
The prime minister of a centre-left government between 2008-12, Borut Pahor was elected president in December 2012, beating incumbent Danilo Turk by a thumping margin of 34% of the vote.
However, the low turnout - only one in three eligible voters made it to the polls - was seen as a sign of widespread disenchantment with Slovenia's political class.
The election took place against a background of popular discontent at the centre-right government's austerity measures, with many Slovenes taking to the streets to call for the resignation of the political elite.
The role of president is largely ceremonial, but carries authority in defence and foreign affairs.
Prime minister: Miro Cerar
Miro Cerar was appointed prime minister in August 2014, after month-long coalition negotiations in the aftermath of parliamentary elections.
Originally a lawyer and an academic, he acted as a legal advisor to parliament and expressed opinions on various constitutional matters for years.
His SMC party won 34.5% of the vote and secured 36 seats in parliament as the leading faction even though it was established only a month before the elections.
Mr Cerar faced the tough task of putting the eurozone country's finances back in order after the past two governments fell after little more than a year after being hit by corruption trials and political infighting.
Slovenia's media scene is diverse and free.
The main papers are privately-owned.
The broadcasting sector is a mix of public and private ownership. Many households are connected to cable, satellite, or internet protocol TV (IPTV). There is an advanced digital terrestrial TV (DTT) network.
By the end of 2015 almost 73% of the population was online.
Some key dates in Slovenia's history:
1918 - After the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire, Slovenia joins the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. The kingdom later becomes known as Yugoslavia.
1941 - Slovenia is occupied by Nazi Germany and Italy during the Second World War.
1945 - At the end of the war, Slovenia becomes a constituent republic of socialist Yugoslavia.
1991 - Slovenia, along with Croatia, declares its independence. The Yugoslav federal army intervenes. Slovene forces defend the country. About 100 people killed. The EU brokers a ceasefire. The Yugoslav army withdraws.
2004 - Slovenia joins the EU.
2013 - Ratings agency Moody's cuts Slovenia's credit rating to junk status. Economy recovers over subsequent years. | Slovenia is a small country in Central Europe, but contains within its borders Alpine mountains, thick forests, historic cities and a short Adriatic coastline. | 17846376 |
The witness lived at St Joseph's in Termonbacca, Londonderry, in the 1950s.
He said he became a zombie, introverted and fearing the next beating.
The Historical Abuse Inquiry is investigating abuse claims against children's residential institutions from 1922 to 1995.
Termonbacca and another Derry home, Nazareth House, were run by the Sisters of Nazareth.
The former Termonbacca resident said he lay soaked in urine at night in an attempt to dissuade any sexual abusers.
The man, now 65, said he was never told he had brothers in the same home and sisters in another nearby.
He said he witnessed an eight-year-old boy being sexually abused, a 10-year-old boy being raped and that he had been hit on the head with a steel industrial ladle.
He said he complained about his treatment to a priest after leaving the home.
The response was: "You must never speak about this, you must understand... you and the other orphans are bastards. You are the product of an evil and satanic relationship. You never had a chance."
The witness said: "That was the day I left the Catholic Church."
He added: "The truth is setting me free today more than this commission knows. I have come here to tell the truth and as I am reaching out, I am reaching out in healing and trying to forgive, but at this moment I cannot.
"I have waited 65 years to say this. When I was reared by the Sisters of the Congregation of Nazareth it was equivalent to being reared by the Taliban, such was their sadism, their lack of empathy, their fundamentalism, their lack of dignity to the little helpless boy."
He said he ran away but was brought back time after time.
One nun smirked and said: "Welcome back, your majesty," the witness said. "Then the beatings would start."
The inquiry, being held in Banbridge, County Down, is chaired by retired judge Sir Anthony Hart and is considering cases in 13 residential institutions.
Public hearings are due to finish in June 2015, with the inquiry team to report to the Northern Ireland Executive by the start of 2016. | A priest told a former resident of a children's home in Northern Ireland he was the product of an evil and satanic relationship, an inquiry has heard. | 25948005 |
Having won the 2005 World title and 2008 UK crown, Murphy stays on course for a career 'triple crown', after making two breaks of 103 to advance.
He will meet Mark Allen who beat Joe Perry 6-4 earlier in the day.
"For long periods of that match, it was embarrassing," Allen told BBC Sport. "I just could not get anything going.
"I was delivering the cue so badly."
Allen went 3-1 ahead, before England's Perry made breaks of 50, 68 and 67 to make it 4-4. But Northern Irishman Allen made a break of 55 and then clinched the 10th to progress.
Allen went through into his second Masters semi-final but will have to improve significantly if he is to trouble Murphy.
Scotland's Maguire opened with breaks of 137 and 67, before Murphy responded with 103 as he levelled at 2-2.
Some superb potting allowed Englishman Murphy to go ahead in the match for the first time at 4-3, and another century plus the 10th frame gave him victory. | Shaun Murphy reached his third Masters semi-final after an enthralling 6-4 victory over Stephen Maguire at Alexandra Palace. | 30854077 |
Amendments to the Counter Terrorism and Security Bill would, if passed, make ISPs log more of what people do online.
It would also make the logged data more easily accessible to law enforcement and security services.
The 18-page addition was "ill-judged" and "regrettable" said the ISP Association (Ispa).
The Open Rights Group, which campaigns on issues of digital freedom, said the amendment was an "abuse of procedure".
The amendment to the Counter Terrorism Bill has been proposed by a group that includes a former Conservative defence secretary, a former Metropolitan police commissioner, a former Labour defence minister and a Liberal Democrat peer.
The amendment comes as the UK intelligence services seek more powers to gather and analyse data which they say is needed to thwart attacks such as those seen earlier this month in Paris.
Ispa said the clauses inserted in the Counter Terror Bill were lifted from an earlier draft Communications Bill that a joint Lords and Commons committee scrutinised in 2012. It said that Committee called for more consultation with experts and industry before the proposals could become part of any draft legislation.
The industry group said the committee had "substantial concerns" about the collection of data on web browsing habits and how access to this stored information would be controlled.
"We urge Parliament to reject this attempt to insert complex legislation into an existing Bill at the last minute," said Ispa in a statement.
The Open Rights Group also criticised the amendment saying in a statement: "The Lords cannot have time to properly consider the bill, and would deny the Commons the opportunity to consider the clauses as well."
The amended Counter Terrorism Bill is due to be debated in the House of Lords on Monday.
Lord Carlile, a spokesman for the group behind the amendment, told the Guardian newspaper that action was needed now and that it had re-worded the amendment to remove parts that were found to be unacceptable.
The increased powers to inspect gathered data would be confined to the police and intelligence services, he said. | UK net firms have criticised attempts to revive a "snoopers' charter" by adding it into draft legislation currently before the House of Lords. | 30952592 |
The 31-year-old centre, who has 22 caps, is in his fifth season at Bayonne after joining them from Toulon in 2012.
"Gaby's comfortable playing 12 or 13," said director of rugby Dai Young. "That gives us more options, particularly during the international period.
"He's got really explosive power onto the ball, and the pace, agility and footwork to beat defenders."
Lovobalavu will cover the departure of Samoan international Alapati Leiua, who is moving to Bristol, and former Scotland centre Nick De Luca, who has already announced his intention to retire from professional rugby at the end of the season. | Fiji international Gaby Lovobalavu is to join Wasps for the 2017-18 season from French Top 14 side Bayonne. | 39104070 |
Twenty-two people died and 116 were injured in a suicide bombing at Ariana Grande's concert on 22 May.
Trustees for the We Love Manchester Emergency Fund, which has raised £6.9m, agreed on Wednesday to release £1m in the first round of funding.
Councillor Sue Murphy said the money would be "distributed to those who need it, and when they need it most".
Bomb survivor 'told of daughter's death'
"We're moving quickly to ensure that the charity is set up so that it can get support out as soon as possible."
The initial funds will be in addition to emergency financial aid that has already been distributed for immediate needs, including hotel bills, food and clothing.
They will be released as gift payments, with no conditions on how recipients spend the money.
Further funds will be given in phases, with priority given to those who have been bereaved or seriously injured, a spokesperson for Manchester City Council said.
About £2m was raised in 24 hours for the fund, which has been led by Manchester City Council and the Manchester Evening News, along with the British Red Cross.
More donations are expected in the coming week, including after Ariana Grande's return for the One Love Manchester concert on Sunday.
Initial payments will include: | About £1m will be released "urgently" to the victims and survivors of the Manchester Arena attack. | 40121715 |
We are nearly entering the final month of 2015 and, while the weather cools down, the Football League action heats up. Here are some of Saturday's best bits.
The phrase 'dream debut' might never be more applicable than for Oliver McBurnie's first appearance in a Newport County shirt.
The 19-year-old striker, who joined John Sheridan's side from Swansea just before Thursday's loan deadline passed, came off the bench as a 58th-minute substitute with the game against Luton in League Two goalless. What happened next was remarkable.
McBurnie found the net three times in the space of 23 minutes to give his side a 3-0 victory over the Hatters, having never previously scored in the Football League.
"I scored a couple of hat-tricks at youth-team level when I was at Bradford, but they didn't let me keep the matchball," McBurnie told BBC Radio Wales.
"I think there was a little bit of an argument about whether I was allowed to keep it or not. I was going to have to pay for it at one point, but there's no taking this off me."
At this time of year, everyone is seeking value for money - something fans at Stevenage's League Two match against Morecambe got in abundance.
The 2,415 spectators - including 66 who had made the trip from Lancashire - saw seven goals and three penalties, two of which were missed, on a thrilling afternoon in Hertfordshire.
After Ben Kennedy had a spot-kick saved by Shrimps keeper Barry Roche, Chris Whelpdale went on to score a hat-trick to make it 4-1 - despite having his own penalty effort kept out by Roche.
And there was late drama to come as Paul Mullin showed Stevenage how to do it from 12 yards and Kevin Ellison pulled the visitors back to 4-3, but Teddy Sheringham's men held on to go five matches unbeaten.
Sheringham told BBC Three Counties Radio: "I wouldn't say we got lucky but we were fortunate there wasn't another five minutes after their third goal."
You would think that by the time the chilly nights of December come around most teams would have had at least one off day in the league and found themselves on the losing side.
Not Brighton. The Seagulls are still yet to taste defeat in their 18 league matches so far this campaign, with their only loss in 2015-16 coming against Walsall in the League Cup.
Chris Hughton's side finished 20th in the Championship last season, but head the table now after goals from March and Bobby Zamora gave them a 2-1 victory over promotion hopefuls Birmingham City.
A winding-up petition, an administration petition, a long-winded takeover, a stand still waiting to be developed and players and staff not being paid by the club.
That barely scratches the surface of everything that has happened at Northampton Town in the last few months. But, while off the field has been almost chaotic, on the pitch Chris Wilder's side have been storming up League Two.
Saturday's home match against Yeovil marked the first under the ownership of Kelvin Thomas - and the Cobblers extended their unbeaten run to eight matches with a 2-0 victory at Sixfields to go second in the table.
When a manager leaves his post, quite often you will see a team have a resurgence in form. Not with League One side Colchester United on Saturday.
Tony Humes left by mutual consent on Thursday as - according to chairman Robbie Cowling - "he felt that his presence at the club now was detrimental to the club".
His old side had the worst defensive record in the Football League going into Saturday's match against Burton, and that record did not improve.
The U's, under the caretaker charge of Richard Hall and John McGreal, lost resoundingly 5-1 at Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink's Albion.
Despite the defeat, Cowling told BBC Essex he is "looking internally first before going external" for a new manager. | The nights are drawing in, the shops are teeming with desperate bargain-hunters and children will shortly be disappointed by the quality of their advent calendar chocolate. | 34954999 |
The 26-year-old, who won Commonwealth gold at middleweight in 2014, will train alongside Tony Bellew under Dave Coldwell.
He will debut on the undercard of Kell Brook's IBF welterweight title defence against Errol Spence at Bramall Lane.
"I think being British champion in 18 months is a good target for me," Fowler said.
The six-time ABA champion and cousin of former Liverpool striker Robbie added: "I waited for Rio because I wanted to go to the Olympics but I was also gaining experience fighting the best of the best.
"As a pro I think that's going to show as there's very few people in England that can live with me and it's only the very elite in the world that beat me in the amateurs. So I think I am going to shine as a pro and my style is great for it."
Media playback is not supported on this device
Fowler, who aided Carl Froch as a sparring partner prior to his final bout against George Groves, follows Rio Olympians Joe Cordina and Josh Kelly in signing with Matchroom Sport.
Silver medallist Joe Joyce and bronze medal-winner Joshua Buatsi are also expected to turn professional. | Great Britain's Rio 2016 boxing captain Anthony Fowler has turned professional and will make his debut on 27 May. | 39658436 |
Members of the Women's Auxiliary Territorial Army were working at a top-secret rocket testing range in Ynyslas, Ceredigion.
It is thought at least 30 women helped test missiles in the hope of fighting back against Germany's flying bombs.
The Ynyslas experiments continued after the war and contributed to Britain's post-war space programme.
By 1946 the women had joined forces with American and even German technologists to track the first rocket using radar.
The British women were later sent to Australia where they could test rockets over a 1,200 mile range - 40 times the distance available at Cardigan Bay.
Margaret Herterich, who was part of the Ynyslas testing team, said: "We were responsible for the results of the experiments costing thousands of pounds.
"We knew that we were working on something special when we girls received letters from the Ministry of Supply, asking if we would like to go to Woomera, Australia, to carry on the work of the Blue Streak rocket."
Britain's space programme led to the establishment of the European Launcher Development Organisation in the 1960s - the forerunner of today's European Space Agency.
The pictures were discovered at the National Army Museum by staff at the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales who were researching the location's coastal heritage.
They show the women at the secret Ceredigion site during the war. | Newly discovered World War Two photographs show the first women to track a rocket by radar. | 30228953 |
Jamie Mines was injured at the Kendrick Industrial Estate in Swindon just before Christmas.
A fund to help the semi-professional football player from Frome has already raised £113,000.
Local people have also organised a football tournament at his former club - Frome Town - to raise more funds.
Mr Mines, who also plays for Radstock, Larkhall and Paulton football clubs, is well-known locally where he is described as a "goal machine".
Following the accident, into which the Health and Safety Executive is investigating, the 33-year-old was placed in an induced coma at Southmead Hospital in Bristol.
He also missed his first Christmas with his five-month-old twins Isabella and Savannah.
Family friend Billy Wright said he was "doing really well" and undergoing "intensive rehabilitation" at a specialist centre in Oxford.
"There's no doubt that the support the town of Frome, the entire country and the footballing community have shown James, has really, really helped him," he said.
"He's completely overwhelmed - the support that's come through has really given him the positivity to fight." | A scaffolder who had to have his leg and hands amputated after suffering an electric shock has been "completely overwhelmed" by community support. | 39320123 |
Steven Haggerty, 27, from Hamilton, abused a 27-year-old woman at a house in the South Lanarkshire town in 2012.
He also abused and raped another woman between 26 and 30 December 2014.
At the High Court in Edinburgh, judge Lord Pentland told Haggerty he would serve a minimum of six years in jail but may never be released.
Addressing Haggerty, the judge said: "I formed the strong impression from seeing and hearing both the complainers in the witness box that they were each vulnerable individuals.
"The picture which emerges from your criminal record is of a persistent offender who has difficulty in controlling his behaviour. You have a marked propensity to resort to violence.
"I am entirely satisfied that the risk criteria are met and that an order for lifelong restriction is necessary and appropriate to protect the public from serious harm."
Following conviction, it emerged that Haggerty was convicted of lewd and libidinous behaviour in October 2005 following high court proceedings.
The court heard how the offending behaviour on that occasion related to children who were aged between 12 to 14.
He also had convictions for violence and knife possession.
Det Ch Insp Samantha McCluskey, who led the inquiry into Haggerty, described him as "a dangerous individual who preyed on vulnerable women".
"The two victims in this case were previous partners of Haggerty, who were brave enough to speak out about the serious sexual violence they endured at his hands," she said.
"He is finally being brought to account for his actions, and I hope that this result brings some form of closure for his victims, who have shown real courage in coming forward and going through this difficult process." | A violent rapist who was convicted of attacks on two women he met through internet dating sites has been given an order of lifelong restriction. | 38103689 |
"It had to fall to someone else... I felt it had to fall to me," he said.
The justice secretary was set to back his fellow Leave campaigner. Mr Johnson pulled out after Mr Gove's switch.
Home Secretary Theresa May, who backed staying in the EU, is favourite to win the contest and become prime minister.
The other contenders are Work and Pensions Secretary Stephen Crabb, who backed Remain, former defence secretary Liam Fox, who backed leaving the EU, and energy minister and Leave campaigner Andrea Leadsom.
Nominations for the Conservative Party leadership closed at midday on Thursday.
The winner of the contest - sparked by David Cameron's decision to resign after the UK voted to leave the EU - is set to be announced on 9 September.
Mr Gove's decision to run for the leadership and Mr Johnson's subsequent decision to bow out of the contest sent shockwaves through the political world in a day of high drama.
In an interview with the BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg, Mr Gove, explaining his reasons for standing, said following last week's Brexit result he felt the country needed a leader "who believed heart and soul in leaving the European Union".
"I also believed we needed someone who would be able to build a team, lead and unite. I hoped that person would be Boris Johnson," he said.
But he added: "I came in the last few days, reluctantly and firmly, to the conclusion that while Boris has great attributes he was not capable of uniting that team and leading the party and the country in the way that I would have hoped."
Mr Gove said he had only decided to run for the leadership late on Wednesday evening, and was still to speak to Mr Johnson about his decision.
He rejected as "just not true" accusations from Mr Johnson's supporters that he had betrayed the former London mayor by deciding to stand for leader, rather than throw his weight behind him.
He said he had been "trying hard to persuade" Conservative MPs over the course of the week that Mr Johnson was the right candidate to be leader but after reflecting on conversations with colleagues "I realised it was not going to work".
"So I tried as hard as I could but last night, reflecting on this, I came to the conclusion that ultimately Boris could not build that team, could not provide that leadership and that unity.
"It had to fall to someone else. As someone who had argued consistently that we should leave the European Union, and as someone who's experienced at the highest levels in the Cabinet, I felt it had to fall to me," he said.
Mr Gove - who along with Mr Johnson was a prominent figure in the Leave campaign - also confirmed he had not discussed his decision with Chancellor George Osborne.
Echoing arguments he made during the EU referendum campaign, he said he would work to bring down immigration outside the EU to a "manageable" level, built on an Australian points-style system.
"I'll negotiate with toughness, and with great attention to detail to get the best possible deal for Britain. It's only when we are outside the European Union that we can at last bring those numbers under control in the way that the public want," he said.
Setting out his Brexit plan, Mr Gove said he would not trigger Article 50 - the formal process for leaving the EU - until he was ready to do so.
"The decision to trigger Article 50 is in the hands of the next prime minister. If that is me, I will make a judgement as to when is right for Britain and I won't be hurried or hassled by anyone into pressing that button or triggering that article until I believe it is right for this country," he said. | Michael Gove has said he chose to run for the Conservative Party leadership after deciding "reluctantly but firmly" that Boris Johnson was not capable of uniting the party or the country. | 36677028 |
The 43-year-old woman was found dead in Hill Street, Kingswood, near Bristol, at about 00:45 GMT on Sunday.
The man, 38, was arrested on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving and failing to stop after an accident. He has been bailed until 6 March.
Police said the woman's injuries were "consistent with her being involved in a road traffic collision". | A man arrested in connection with the death of a woman whose body was found on a road has been released on bail. | 38968289 |
Luther Ankonum, 26, is charged with four counts of attempted grievous bodily harm and two counts of criminal damage as well as public order and driving offences.
Mr Ankonum, who is also known as Luther Smith, appeared at Peterlee Magistrates' Court.
He was remanded into custody to appear at Durham Crown Court on 11 May.
It is alleged Mr Ankonum, of Fairclough Court in Peterlee, drove at people in the Little Eden area. | A man accused of driving a car at pedestrians before spending five hours on a house roof has appeared in court. | 39593494 |
The 51-year-old is accused of killing Craig Guy, 34, who was found with fatal injuries at the Beacon in Catterick Garrison, North Yorkshire, at around 23:30 BST on Thursday.
He will appear before York magistrates on Monday.
The Beacon offers housing to single veterans "who are homeless or at risk of homelessness", its website says.
It is believed that Mr Guy had been stabbed. | A man has been charged with the murder of a resident at a centre for former soldiers. | 39611380 |
Its shares dived more than 14% after it said sales fell 0.4% in the run-up to Christmas and added full-year profits would be at the low end of forecasts.
Next also warned that 2017 would be "another challenging year", and predicted a fall in profits.
The news hit shares in other retailers, with M&S down 6.1% and Primark owner Associated British Foods dropping 3.7%.
The falls weighed on the FTSE 100. The UK's benchmark index had closed at a record high on Tuesday, but spent most of the day in negative territory. However, at the close it was up 11.85 points to another record high at 7,189.74.
Shares in housebuilders helped to bolster the index after upbeat comments from Deutsche Bank. Barratt Developments rose 4%, while Persimmon and Taylor Wimpey were 2.8% and 3.8% higher respectively.
In the FTSE 250, B&M shares rose nearly 9.5% after the discount retailer reported a 7.2% increase in UK like-for-like sales in the three months to 24 December.
On the currency markets, the pound rose 0.45% against the dollar to $1.2293 and slipped 0.29% against the euro to €1.1727. | (Close): Shares in Next slumped after the retailer reported falling sales and issued a gloomy outlook for next year. | 38505342 |
Police chief Khalid Abu Bakar said they were detained a few days ago and were assisting with the investigation.
Thailand has launched a manhunt for those responsible for the bombing which killed 20 people and injured 120.
Thai police have arrested two people and are searching for a third man, said to be from China's Xinjiang region.
Mr Khalid told reporters on Monday that the three suspects are a Pakistani man, a Malaysian man, and a Malaysian woman, who were arrested based on a tip-off from Thai authorities.
He said the suspects would not yet be transferred to Thailand, as Malaysian police are still investigating. He did not give further details on the reason for their detention.
No group has stepped forward to claim responsibility for the attack at the Erawan shrine on 17 August, but Thailand has alleged that a network which includes foreigners was behind the bombing.
Over the weekend, Thailand issued an arrest warrant for a 27-year-old Muslim man called Abudusataer Abudureheman, also known as Ishan, from Xinjiang.
He is reported to have left Bangkok for Bangladesh one day before the bomb blast, and is believed by police to have played a prominent role in the attack.
Thai authorities have already arrested two other suspects: Adem Karadag, whose nationality has yet to be verified, and Yusufu Meraili, who officials say is a Chinese national born in Xinjiang.
Xinjiang is home to a significant number of Uighur Muslims, and Chinese authorities have faced criticism for the perceived harsh restrictions placed on religion and culture in the region.
Thailand recently found itself in the spotlight following its forced repatriation of more than 100 Uighurs to China. | Malaysian police have arrested two Malaysians and one Pakistani in connection with last month's deadly bombing at a shrine in Bangkok. | 34242205 |
There's also a very impressive armchair shaped like a cactus, a DJ, and free-flowing cocktails made with the potent Mexican spirit Mezcal.
It's clear the organisers are trying to send a message of a very sophisticated Mexican design industry.
Mario Gonzalez is from Pro Mexico, the Mexican government's trade and investment agency that organised the event.
"Tonight is our first ever showroom with Mexican designers," he says. "The idea is to position Mexican designers in the UK. They're very well known in the States or other areas, but not in Europe.
"The idea is to bring it all together, have a unique message - which is [that] Mexico is talented, it's original, it's colourful, but it can also be modern - and bring it to buyers, bloggers, editors, people from the fashion world, and to normal people as well."
Maria Fernanda is one Mexican designer in attendance at the event. Her leather handbags feature richly coloured panels of embroidery, sewn by craftspeople in the south of Mexico.
"All the materials are Mexican," she says. "We collaborate with artisans to try to protect our culture and not to fade away. We try to give them work and pay them well, to bring all this Mexican culture into the world."
Fashion designer Juan Acevedo was born in Mexico but decided to base his menswear company East Club, in Soho, London.
He's also incorporating some aspects of traditional Mexican design into his work.
"I'm doing a women's collection for next year. I'm going to have a lot of details from Mexican culture.
"What people think of Mexico is cheap tequila and sombreros, but that's not it. If you take something like an icon and turn it into something cool and contemporary, it can be quite trendy."
Overcoming folksy stereotypes is only part of Mexico's image problem. The designers here say international news reports on the country focus exclusively on crime - especially murder among the drug cartels - when there are other stories to be told.
"Somehow the image in the UK of Mexico is really negative because the only thing you hear from Mexico is drug violence, but it's actually that day-to-day life in Mexico is very different from that," says Mr Acevedo.
"There are definitely problems... but it's actually an incredibly creative place."
Mexico's ambassador to the UK, Diego Gomez Pickering, admits that the country has to work hard to overcome negative stereotypes.
"It is a challenge," he says. "But it's a happy challenge in the sense that not many things are said about Mexico, other than headlines in newspapers talking about organised crime.
"So this [design event] is a great way of telling all the other stories that happen in Mexico."
But can promoting local creative talent really change people's perceptions?
Jonathan McClory is an expert on soft power, the art of promoting a country through cultural and economic means, at London-based communications and public affairs company Portland Consultancy.
He says: "While Mexico has its advantages, it also has stereotypes that it has to deal with - drug cartels, violence, corruption in government, and perhaps economic reforms that aren't going quickly enough.
"So they do need to get out there and get their story across and promote themselves, and I think culture and creative industries is a good way to do that."
Mr McClory adds: "And in fact, if you look at investment in Mexican government bonds long term, they're actually quite popular with foreign investors right now.
"It's an interesting comparison between long term bonds and short term bonds, which are much less popular.
"So it's almost like people feel that Mexico is a good long term bet."
Back in the pop-up showroom in London, Ms Fernanda has high hopes that the event will help introduce her accessories range to international buyers.
She says: "We would like obviously to gain the market in the United States and especially London, Milan - the capitals of fashion. We hope with this opportunity we can achieve that."
Next year, Mexico plans to bring pop-up stores to London, Madrid and Berlin.
While stories of drug wars will always make the headlines, the country is trying hard to promote creative businesses that can reflect a different national identity overseas.
Vivienne Nunis' radio report on Mexican fashion for the BBC World Service's World Business Report programme can be heard via the BBC's iPlayer Radio website. Full episodes of World Business Report programmes are also available. | At the Mexican Design pop-up showroom in central London, colourful displays of carefully hung couture line the walls. | 34639400 |
His agent said his death on Friday was doctor-assisted, legal practice in Canada from earlier this year. No other details about his health were given.
Kinsella published more than 30 works spanning poetry, fiction and non-fiction and won the Order of Canada, one of the country's highest honours.
But it is the baseball-themed fantasy Shoeless Joe that he is best known for.
In it, a farmer hears a voice urging him to build a baseball field in the middle of his corn crop. When he does the spirits of great players from the past come to play.
The novel was adapted into 1989 film Field of Dreams, starring Kevin Costner.
After suffering a head injury in car crash, CBC reported, Kinsella said he lost interest in writing fiction and instead spent his time playing Scrabble online.
However he did resume writing and his final work Russian Dolls is due to be released next year. | Canadian author WP Kinsella, whose book Shoeless Joe became the hit film Field of Dreams, has died aged 81. | 37395028 |
The Dow ended the day's trading up by 72.80 points or 0.33% at a record 21,963.92.
The S&P 500 index edged up by 6.04 points or 0.24% to 2,476.35, while the tech-focused Nasdaq index climbed 14.81 points or 0.23% to 6,362.94.
On the S&P 500, shares in Under Armour finished down by 8.59% after it cuts its sales forecast.
The sportswear maker said it now expected full-year revenue growth of 9%-11%, down from its previous prediction of 11%-12%.
Shares in Apple - which was due to report results after the close of trade - were up by 0.89%.
Shares in car manufacturers were hit by reports of a sharp fall in sales in July, driven by lower rental fleet sales and weaker consumer demand.
Shares in General Motors closed down, 3.39%, Ford's were 2.41% lower and Fiat Chrysler's were unchanged. | The Dow Jones headed further into record territory on Tuesday, closing in on the 22,000 level. | 40794650 |
The four were abducted at a checkpoint near the city of Sirte, where they were teaching at a university.
The Islamic State (IS) group has a strong presence in Sirte, hometown of former leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Libya has descended into chaos since Gaddafi's death in October 2011, with various militias fighting for power.
The teachers, from the southern Indian states of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, were working with the University of Sirte.
They were kidnapped on their way back to India on Wednesday.
"They were returning to India via Tripoli and Tunis, when they were detained at a checkpoint approximately 50km (31 miles) from Sirte," an Indian foreign ministry spokesperson said.
It is still not clear who kidnapped the teachers, but the spokesperson said the Indians "have been brought back to the city of Sirte".
On Friday afternoon, a tweet by India's foreign minister, Sushma Swaraj, said the government was "able to secure the release" of two of them - named as Lakshmikant and Vijay Kumar.
"Trying for other two," the tweet said.
Most of Sirte fell to IS in May. Last July, a group of 65 Indian nurses were trapped in fighting in Libya.
The nurses, who had been working in hospitals in the country, safely returned to India in August.
In June 2014, 40 Indians - all construction workers - were kidnapped in the violence-hit Iraqi city of Mosul. Their fate is still not known. | Four Indian teachers have been kidnapped in Libya, India's foreign ministry has reported, adding later it had secured the release of two of them. | 33729341 |
The shadow home secretary said the 27-year fight Hillsborough families had to endure showed how the odds were stacked against families seeking the truth.
He will also ask MPs to back stage two of the Leveson Inquiry - looking at the relationship between police and press.
In April the Hillsborough inquest ruled the 96 victims were unlawfully killed.
The jury also found police errors added to a dangerous situation at the 1989 FA Cup semi-final at Sheffield Wednesday's ground where the 96 fans died as a result of a crush.
Mr Burnham said: "The 27-year struggle of the Hillsborough families exposes how the odds are all too frequently stacked against ordinary families seeking truth and justice.
"Hillsborough must mark a moment of real change when Parliament rebalances the police and criminal justice system and puts more power in the hands of ordinary people.
"We must call time on the uneven playing field at inquests where public bodies spend public money like water on hiring the best lawyers when ordinary families have to scratch around for whatever they can get."
Mr Burnham has become heavily involved with the Hillsborough campaign for justice since 2009 when he addressed fans at the 20th anniversary memorial at Anfield but was interrupted by chants demanding "Justice for the 96".
The anger of fans prompted the MP, then serving in the government as the culture, media and sport secretary, to join calls for any information held relevant to the tragedy to be made public .
He is now planning to propose an amendment to the Policing and Crime Bill which would give families a legal right to receive the same amount of funding as the police so that they can also have the best quality lawyers.
The Leigh MP believes this would put more power in the hands of ordinary people.
Mr Burnham will also repeat Labour's call for the second stage of the Leveson Inquiry to go ahead.
The first part of the inquiry, in 2011-2012, examined press ethics, but hearings into ties between newspapers and the police were put on hold amid criminal inquiries over phone hacking.
Downing Street said in February that no decision had been taken about whether to continue with the inquiry. | Andy Burnham is to urge MPs to back a "Hillsborough Law", which would ensure legal funding for bereaved families at inquests where police are involved. | 36513825 |
The White House has outlined his plans for executive action, which focus on background checks.
Most of the actions can be carried out without Congressional approval.
"That's why we're here, not to do something about the last mass shooting, but to prevent the next one," he said.
"The gun lobby may be holding Congress hostage right now, but they can't hold America hostage," Mr Obama said.
He gave his remarks surrounded by survivors and relatives of victims of shootings, recalling mass shootings in the US in the past few years and everyday gun violence in cities like Chicago.
An emotional President Barack Obama employed all of his rhetorical skill to justify what are, in reality, executive actions that modestly expand federal regulation of firearm sales.
Standing in a room filled with victims of gun violence, he explained that the murder of schoolchildren in Newtown, Connecticut, changed him - and that he hoped it would change the country.
Three years have passed since that school massacre, however, and the country hasn't changed. While some states have toughened their laws, others have expanded gun rights and the US Congress has taken no action.
So Mr Obama did what he could, and wrapped the move in language that sounded more appropriate for a ceremony announcing the passage of sweeping legislation that, in today's political environment, has no chance of reaching his presidential desk.
And even this small move will likely be fiercely challenged in court, in Congress and at the ballot box by whichever Republican wins the nomination fight to replace him in 2017.
Gun violence is significantly higher in the US than in other advanced countries, killing about 30,000 people each year.
Congress has been reluctant to pass any laws restricting gun ownership, facing pressure from gun owners and the powerful National Rifle Association.
Mr Obama tried to pass expanded background check legislation in 2012 after the shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, that left 20 children and six adults dead but it failed in Congress.
The executive actions include:
The announcement is already shaping up to be an issue in the 2016 presidential election.
Leading Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton tweeted: "@POTUS is right: We can protect the second Amendment while protecting our families and communities from gun violence. And we have to."
Republican candidate Senator Ted Cruz tweeted that the executive actions are unconstitutional, with a link to sign up for his campaign correspondence on a webpage that says "Obama wants your guns" with a photo of the president in an army jacket and hat.
Former Florida governor Jeb Bush tweeted that he would repeal the actions and protect the Second Amendment.
During Mr Obama's speech, comedian Amy Schumer, cousin of New York Senator Chuck Schumer, was in the audience. Two women died in a shooting at a movie theatre in Louisiana during a showing of her movie Trainwreck.
Gabby Giffords, a former congresswoman who survived a shooting, was there as well, in addition to many relatives of victims and survivors of mass shooting.
Why Obama is powerless - the roadblock at Congress
Are you mad or criminal? - the question a gun seller asks
Texas women and their firearms - a photographer taught to shoot at an early age
Do tighter gun laws work? - a state where guns are a way of life
Guns at home - the question parents hate to ask before a playdate | An emotional US President Barack Obama has unveiled new restrictions on gun purchases at the White House, saying the "constant excuses for inaction" have to stop. | 35236630 |
The lights went out with under two minutes left which led to a long delay.
Leinster led 23-6 at half-time after tries from Dominic Ryan, Rory O'Loughlin and Peter Dooley
However despite a further Zane Kirchner Leinster score, tries from Adam Ashe, Lee Jones and Finn Russell put Glasgow ahead before a Joey Carbery penalty.
Carbery's penalty restored Leinster's lead in the 74th minute shortly before the floodlight failure.
Leinster were already certain of a home semi-final heading into Friday night's game while Glasgow's slim mathematical hopes of clinching a place in the play-offs were finally ended by their defeat.
More to follow.
Leinster: Z Kirchner; A Byrne, R O'Loughlin, T Daly, F McFadden; R Byrne, N McCarthy; P Dooley; J Tracy, M Ross; R Molony (capt), M Kearney; D Ryan, J van der Flier, Leavy.
Replacements: R Strauss, J McGrath, M Bent, I Nagle, P Timmins, J Gibson-Park, J Carbery, N Reid.
Glasgow Warriors: T Seymour; L Sarto, N Grigg, S Johnson, L Jones; P Horne, H Pyrgos; A Allan, F Brown, S Puafisi; B Alainu'uese, J Gray; T Swinson, C Fusaro, A Ashe.
Replacements: P MacArthur, G Reid, Z Fagerson, R Harley, M Fagerson, A Price, F Russell, A Dunbar. | Floodlight failure late in the contest held up Leinster's Pro12 game against Glasgow for 20 minutes before the leaders edged a 31-30 win at the RDS. | 39730951 |
The Belfast Coroners' Court inquest into the murders more than 40 years ago was hearing from a barrister for some of the victims' families on Wednesday.
The 10 men were ordered out of a bus and shot in January 1976 in what became known as the Kingsmills massacre.
No-one has ever been convicted in connection with the killings.
Speaking in court, the families' barrister referred to a Police Service of Northern Ireland review of the case that was conducted after a report by its Historical Enquiries Team in 2011.
The barrister said the police review linked a "prime individual" to 46 murders that happened between 1974 to 1976.
The killings included 22 civilians, one of whom was a seven-year-old boy.
The other murders involved 21 soldiers, two police officers, and a paramilitary activist.
The inquiry into the massacre is also seeking clarity on the status of so-called 'on-the-run' letters after it was claimed that a number of suspects in the massacre received the controversial correspondence.
The controversial letters were issued by the government and assured the recipients that they were not being sought by police.
During the cross-examination of a police intelligence officer on Wednesday, the barrister asked if forensic evidence that is not new "dies a death" because of the letters.
The police witness said he did not know and therefore could not answer the question.
The coroner said he was also not clear on the status of the letters and the hearing would keep "an open mind" on the question.
He said it may be that some other witness will be required to provide an answer.
The inquest into the killings has resumed this week after being adjourned last year due to a police investigation.
It also heard on Wednesday about a secret intelligence document that recorded details of a self-confessed member of the IRA providing a list of 11 suspects.
The hearing was also informed of police intelligence that linked a "crack unit" of the IRA in Whitecross in County Armagh with the massacre. | An inquest into the IRA killing of 10 Protestant workmen in County Armagh has been told that a key suspect has been linked to almost 50 murders. | 39954543 |
Dauda, 27, a Nigerian with Swedish citizenship, arrives on loan from Dutch side Vitesse Arnhem until the end of the season.
He has previously won league titles with Red Star Belgrade in Serbia and Kalmar in Sweden.
"He's got pace, power, I'm sure he'll score goals," said Robbie Neilson.
The Hearts coach added:. "The fans will see a top quality player who's played at the top level in three European countries.
"He was our number one target at the start of the month but we thought the deal wasn't going to happen, but it was back on again and I'm delighted to get him."
Dauda declared himself "really happy" after concluding negotiations.
"I spoke with Robbie on the phone and he told me he has followed me for quite a while now, and as a player it is a dream to hear a coach say that," he told the Hearts website.
"Now I have to go on the pitch and show him he made the right decision. I'm really looking forward to meeting my team-mates and learning the team's style of play."
The Sow deal is yet to be completed, with the winter transfer window running longer in China.
The 25-year-old Swede moved to Tynecastle on a two-year deal in the summer of 2014 following a 12-month stint at Crystal Palace.
He has scored 11 goals in 27 games this season for the Premiership side, after netting 12 goals in his first term at Hearts as they ran away with the Championship title.
The Edinburgh club have also signed former Watford, Cardiff and Wigan midfielder Don Cowie and sent Morgaro Gomis on loan to Motherwell. | Hearts have signed striker Abiola Dauda on loan after agreeing to sell top-scorer Osman Sow for a fee in excess of £1m to an as yet un-named Chinese club. | 35463763 |
James Hutchinson, 43, pleaded guilty to murdering mother-of-two Nicola Woodman at her home in Bankholme Court, Bradford.
Miss Woodman, 39, received multiple injuries during the attack which involved two knives and a wooden pick-axe handle, Bradford Crown Court heard.
Hutchinson was told he must serve at least 23 years in prison.
Judge Jonathan Durham Hall QC said earlier that Hutchinson would only be considered for early release if the parole board deemed him to be safe.
Read more about this and other stories from across Yorkshire
On the day of the murder, Hutchinson, who drank and used drugs, was on conditional bail from prison for another offence he committed in November 2016.
Prosecutor Jonathan Sharp said: "Either, while he was in custody, or shortly afterwards, he began to become obsessed with the idea that Nicola was being unfaithful to him."
The court heard there was no evidence to justify Hutchinson's opinion though.
Miss Woodman suffered at least 102 external injuries, including more than 20 stab wounds.
Her severely injured body was found when Hutchinson rang the emergency services on Boxing Day. They also found a pregnancy test kit nearby.
DNA testing later proved the unborn child was Hutchinson's.
He was arrested the following morning asleep in Miss Woodman's car.
He told officers her denials of infidelity had enraged him.
"People just snap, you know what I mean," he said.
The judge said Miss Woodman had been a good woman who had fallen in love with a bad man.
"You sponged off her and she loved you to the bitter end.
"The attack was frenzied, it was cruel, it was with a ferocity that defies belief even in the hardened experience of this court."
"You say it took an hour. It must have been a nightmare and a lifetime for Nicola and she must have known what was happening."
Miss Woodman's family said her death had been a "hammer blow" and had left a "massive hole" in their lives. | A man has been jailed for life for killing his pregnant partner on Christmas Day. | 40409428 |
However, manager Mixu Paatelainen is hopeful the 32-year-old will join the club early in the New Year.
United agreed to sign the Japan and former Standard Liege player as a free agent in November, but work permit issues have delayed the move.
"Eiji's not ready to play yet," said Paatelainen. "He's not here. He will come here in a week or so."
Jordan Moore and Ola Adeyemo have followed Aaron Kuhl and Adam Taggart in leaving Tannadice ahead of the January transfer window and Paatelainen hopes to add to his squad.
"We're hoping to bring in one or two during January," said the Finn.
"Whether we're successful with that or not, we'll see.
"There will be one or two leaving also I expect, but it's not 100%. We'll see how things develop on that."
Asked if there had been interest in any of his players, Paatelainen replied: "Not directly but through agents obviously.
"The agents are doing their work and things are developing."
United, who are seven points adrift at the bottom of the Scottish Premiership after drawing with Inverness Caledonian Thistle at the weekend, next face Motherwell.
"It's a massive one, as are all of them," said Paatelainen of the Boxing Day game.
"Where we are in the league table, every match is vitally, vitally important for us and this one is no different.
"We're getting closer. We need to do better. Everybody realises what they must do on the pitch. Every player is looked at, their actions and performances."
Motherwell are fresh from having beaten leaders Celtic in Glasgow.
"They've got a dangerous team, they've got a very good team," said Paatelainen.
"If they can beat Celtic, they can beat us. It's up to us to make sure that it won't happen.
"Their confidence will be sky high after beating Celtic. We need to be at our best to take anything from the game.
"We all know that our game has improved. We all know that we are performing better. We all know that we're not getting the desired results.
"We want victories. We need to keep working hard. Until we get victories, we're not satisfied."
Second-bottom Kilmarnock are on a seven-match winless run and the Tangerines boss is confident of catching the Ayrshire side and those further up the table.
"They're the next club up the league table, so absolutely," he explained.
"It won't happen straight away because there's a little gap, but we know we can close that gap and overtake one or two clubs." | Goalkeeper Eiji Kawashima will not be available for Dundee United over the festive period. | 35170408 |
The United States businessman's organisation brought Doonbeg resort from the receivers.
Mr Trump issued a statement revealing the resort would be renamed the Trump International Golf Links, Ireland.
He said Doonbeg was an already terrific property that would soon be unparalleled and have the highest standards of luxury.
Speaking from New York later, Mr Trump said he was switching his focus to Ireland after a Scottish judge rejected his legal action against a wind energy project off the Aberdeenshire coast, which he claimed would spoil the view from his luxury golf course there.
"We will appeal this decision, and in the meantime we will be focusing all of our investment and energy towards our new acquisition on the Atlantic Ocean in Ireland," he said. | American billionaire Donald Trump has bought a golf resort in County Clare in the Republic of Ireland. | 26142938 |
"It's also the case," Sun editor-in-chief Tony Gallagher told the BBC, "that we knew much more than we published and that remains the case."
Any future revelations won't alter the complaint sitting in the press watchdog's in-tray.
"Queen backs Brexit" was a headline that stuck in the monarchical craw.
It wasn't supported, as far as the palace is concerned, by any of the quotes in the Sun article.
Before the Queen was in its sights, the tabloid had criticised Prince William for being work shy - an accusation echoed in other newspapers.
It's led some to question whether this signals the start of a shift in how the papers portray the royals.
The reality is more likely to be that recent coverage serves as a reminder of the media's complex relationship with the Windsors - a family which over time has been both praised and pilloried in print. | It was a robust defence which offered the possibility of more to come to bolster the claim that it's a Eurosceptic Queen that reigns over us. | 35773992 |
Mr Trump told reporters on Air Force One that a "brand new order" could be issued as early as Monday or Tuesday.
It comes after an appeals court in San Francisco upheld a court ruling to suspend his original order.
It barred entry from citizens from seven mainly Muslim countries.
It is unclear what a new US immigration order might look like.
Mr Trump said that it would change "very little", but he did not provide details of any new ban under consideration.
Despite his suggestion on Friday, Mr Trump's administration may still pursue its case in the courts over the original order, which was halted a week ago by a Seattle judge.
"We'll win that battle," Mr Trump told reporters, adding: "The unfortunate part is it takes time. We'll win that battle. But we also have a lot of other options, including just filing a brand new order."
A unnamed judge from the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals, which on Thursday upheld the stay on the original order, has called on all 25 judges of that court to vote on whether to hear the appeal again.
Technically known as an en banc review, a second hearing of the case would involve an 11-judge panel, rather than the three who initially heard the appeal.
Mr Trump's travel ban, which was hastily unveiled at the end of his first week in office, caused chaos at US airports and sparked protests across the country.
Read more on this story:
On Thursday, the appeals court said the administration failed to offer "any evidence" to justify the ban, which the president said was necessary to keep the US safe from terror attacks.
However Mr Trump insisted that the executive order was crucial for national security and promised to take action "very rapidly" to introduce "additional security" steps in the wake of the court's decision.
He spoke as Virginia state lawyers argued in court that his policy "resulted from animus toward Muslims".
Their challenge focuses on the travel restrictions imposed by the ban, rather than the four-month suspension of refugee admissions.
But lawyers for the US government in Virginia wrote that "judicial second-guessing" amounted to "an impermissible intrusion" on Mr Trump's constitutional authority.
The appeals court ruling means that visa holders from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen can continue to enter the US, and refugees from around the world, who were also subject to a temporary ban, are no longer blocked either.
But the ruling does not affect one part of Mr Trump's controversial executive order: a cap of 50,000 refugees to be admitted in the current fiscal year, down from the ceiling of 110,000 established under his predecessor, Barack Obama. | Donald Trump is considering a new executive order to ban citizens of certain countries from travelling to the US after his initial attempt was overturned in the courts. | 38941016 |
Although he still has one film due to be released later this year - Phantom Thread, based on the fashion world of 1950s London - after he finishes its promotion he "will no longer be working as an actor".
Whether he can be tempted back out of retirement remains to be seen, but here are nine other stars who have quit the profession.
You might not have realised, but Cameron Diaz hasn't been in a film since 2014's Annie, nor does she have any films in the pipeline.
She recently explained why she stepped out of the spotlight at an event run by her best mate, Gwyneth Paltrow.
"I just went, 'I can't really say who I am to myself.' Which is a hard thing to face up to. I felt the need to make myself whole," she said at a Goop Wellness Summit.
In the years since, she has married Good Charlotte singer Benji Madden and published two books - The Body Book, a health and fitness manual, and The Longevity Book, about the art and science of growing older.
Once voted the sexiest man of the 20th Century, James Bond star Sir Sean Connery quit acting after filming The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen in 2003.
He didn't officially confirm his retirement until he received the American Film Institute's lifetime achievement award in 2006.
Although according to his friend Sir Michael Caine, it was the movie business that retired the Bond star "because he didn't want to play small parts about old men and they weren't offering him any young parts in romantic leads".
Sir Sean has since been enjoying retirement, spending his days playing golf and has been spotted at the odd tennis tournament.
Canadian actor Rick Moranis rose up Hollywood's ranks after appearing in hit films such as Ghostbusters, Spaceballs, Little Shop of Horrors and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.
However he began scaling back his acting work after his wife died of cancer in 1991 and retired from on-screen work completely in 1997 to concentrate on raising his children.
"I'm a single parent, and I just found that it was too difficult to manage raising my kids and doing the travelling involved in making movies," he told USA Today in 2005.
"So I took a little bit of a break. And the little bit of a break turned into a longer break, and then I found that I really didn't miss it."
One of the most famous child actors, Shirley Temple was awarded a special juvenile Oscar in 1935 for her contribution to film that year when she was just seven years old.
But as she grew older her appeal declined and she retired from acting in 1950 at the grand old age of 22.
She returned to the spotlight in the late 1960s as a politician and diplomat, and became the US ambassador to Czechoslovakia in 1989.
She continued to work in public service including for the United Nations until she died in 2014 aged 85.
As King Joffrey on hit TV show Game of Thrones, (SPOILER ALERT) Jack Gleeson played one of the most hated characters on TV for three years, but when his character was killed off in season three, the star decided to kill off his acting career too.
"I've been acting since age eight," he told Entertainment Weekly. "I just stopped enjoying it as much as I used to... whereas up until now it was always something I did for recreation with my friends, or in the summer for some fun - I enjoyed it.
"When you make a living from something, it changes your relationship with it. It's not like I hate it, it's just not what I want to do."
Gleeson went on to study philosophy and theology at Dublin's Trinity College, although he dipped a toe back into performing when he took a puppet show, called Bears in Space, to the Edinburgh Fringe in 2014 and London's Soho Theatre in 2015.
Amanda Bynes hit the big time in her teens when she scored her own programme - The Amanda Show - on Nickelodeon.
A string of teen films followed which you may have seen more than once or twice on TV recently - What a Girl Wants (2003), where she finds out her dad is Colin Firth who is trying to become prime minister; She's the Man (2006), a modern take on Shakespeare's Twelfth Night; and the big-screen adaptation of the musical Hairspray.
Once touted as a young Lucille Ball, her last film role was in 2010 - the same year she tweeted: "If I don't love something anymore I stop doing it. I don't love acting anymore so I've stopped doing it."
In the years since, she's had more than one brush with the law for drunk driving and substance abuse, but the actress - who is now 31 - recently gave an interview saying she was now three years sober and wanted to start acting again.
"I want to be alone," Greta Garbo was famed for saying - and in the end, she really meant it.
The actress was one of Hollywood's most enigmatic stars in the 1930s. Desperate for privacy, she never gave any interviews, signed autographs or attended premieres - much to the frustration of the press.
She retired from acting when she was 36, saying she was "tired of Hollywood" and "wanted to live another life".
But her early retirement and subsequent reclusiveness meant she remained eternally young on screen and in people's minds.
After a five-decade career and Oscar wins in 1971 for The French Connection and 1992 for Unforgiven, Gene Hackman told veteran US TV host Larry King in 2004 he was retiring.
Four years later in an interview with Reuters he said although he missed acting, he didn't want to do it any longer.
"The business for me is very stressful. The compromises that you have to make in films are just part of the beast, and it had gotten to a point where I just didn't feel like I wanted to do it anymore," he said.
Since he retired, he's written three novels.
Doris Day was one of the biggest stars by the 1960s thanks to her double-threat singing and acting career, in films such as Calamity Jane, Pillow Talk and Move Over, Darling.
Her last film was in 1968 and after a brief stint on TV, announced she was retiring from acting in 1975.
Now 95, she has since dedicated her life to working as an animal welfare advocate, and set up the Doris Day Animal Foundation in 1978.
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email [email protected]. | Daniel Day-Lewis surprised Hollywood this week by announcing his retirement from acting. | 40356293 |
Armitstead, 25, overhauled Pooley with 7km to go to win her first gold after silver medals at Delhi in 2010 and the London Olympics two years ago.
Pooley, 31, who now retires from cycling, cried as she crossed the line for her second silver of the Games.
South Africa's Ashleigh Pasio was third and Scotland's Katie Archibald seventh.
Armitstead becomes the first English woman to win a road race title at the Commonwealths.
She summed up the achievement as "special, surreal", adding: "This is something I have always dreamed about; it means so much to me. I am always a runner-up."
In what proved an aggressive race from the start on a seven-lap route around the streets of Glasgow, Australia spearheaded numerous attacks and the field of 63 riders was soon whittled down.
But England, with Dani King, Laura Trott and Hannah Barnes alongside Armitstead and Pooley, reeled in any breakaways as they sought to control the race.
The decisive break came with about 40km remaining and was led by Armitstead and Pooley, a five-strong group initially getting away before Archibald, who had won a bronze medal on the track, and Australia's Gracie Elvin managed to bridge the gap.
Pooley, who claimed silver in Thursday's time trial, then launched a concerted solo effort in an attempt to break up the leading pack and prevent a bunch sprint, enabling Armitstead to seize the initiative as heavy rain began to fall.
"I am really happy," said Armitstead, who had won the national title on the same course in 2013. "That was the best cycling teamwork I have ever been a part of. It's such a shame Emma is retiring today - it was a fantastic job from her and all the girls and I am really proud of them."
Pooley, who will now focus on triathlons and marathons, added: "That was unexpected! We were working for Liz and I wanted to do everything for her. When she came past me and I was still clear [of the chasers], I thought I might as well keep going.
"It's been a long nine years, and it was nice to finish on a high." | England's Lizzie Armitstead and Emma Pooley claimed gold and silver in the 98km women's road race at the Commonwealth Games. | 28628858 |
The Grade II listed Opera House in Tunbridge Wells town centre, which still has its stage, balconies and audience boxes, became a pub in 1996.
It is hosting two performances of opera favourites from the last 400 years by The Merry Opera Company.
"I love the fact that we are using the building as an opera house," said landlady Melanie De freitas.
"We are closed to the public all day and it is a massive change to the usual clientele."
The Merry Opera Company, based in Edenbridge, Kent, is performing its show Kiss me, Figaro!
Manager Matthew Quirk said Sunday would be the fifth time he had been involved with a performance in the pub.
"We love it because it was built as an opera house," he said.
"It has the most marvellous acoustics and it is just great fun to go there."
The Opera House opened in 1902, but became a cinema in the 1930s and a bingo hall in the 1960s.
Wetherspoons took it over 18 years ago but about twice a year it invites performers in and reverts to its original use.
The venue usually sells about 40 tickets, but makes only about half its normal £3,000 pub takings.
"Not as many people as we would like in Tunbridge Wells appreciate opera," said Ms De freitas.
"It's not something I am that fond of myself but it is great to have it here." | A Kent pub is closing to drinkers for the day to return to its origins - as an opera house. | 26683721 |
The financial markets have reacted very strongly to the British referendum decision.
At bottom it is because investors view leaving the EU as likely to be bad for the UK economy, especially in the near future.
The International Monetary Fund warned just last week that, in the more adverse scenario it considered, the economy could contract next year.
Many other official economic organisations and independent economists also concluded that leaving would damage the British economy.
That view is disputed by many Leave supporters and some economists, especially over a longer-term horizon, but it is widely believed in the markets.
When the likely result became apparent, it was the pound that took the brunt of the storms, though there were also some sharp falls in Asian share prices. The Nikkei index in Tokyo ended down 8%.
Sterling was at one point 10% lower against the dollar.
When European markets opened, the turbulence spread. In London the FTSE 100 share index dropped by 9% before recovering partly. House builders and banks were especially hard hit with falls well in excess of 20% at the open.
They are exposed to the ups and downs of the domestic British economy. Many other companies in the index are more international and less at risk from UK developments and so they were more moderately affected.
The wider FTSE 250 index was down more sharply - the companies included in it are more UK focused.
The sharp declines also affected share prices in the eurozone, which is seen as especially susceptible to any economic fallout from the vote. Germany's main index was down 10%. In Greece the initial fall was 15%.
There has also been a wider move among investors away from assets that are seen as relatively risky towards what are known as safe havens. That's especially apparent in the market for government debt.
They have been selling the debts, or bonds, of countries with stressed government finances, such as Italy and Spain, which can have the effect of increasing their borrowing costs.
The reverse has been happening with Germany, which already pays very little to borrow money. In fact it could borrow at an interest rate of less than zero in some circumstances.
The UK government's borrowing costs have also declined. The debts, known in the market as gilts, are still seen as a very safe investment despite the concerns about the economic outlook.
There has also been a rise in the price of that oldest refuge in a financial storm - gold.
Risk aversion has also been a factor in the currency markets.
The Swiss franc is a favoured safe haven, a status that has often tended to push its value higher.
That is unwelcome to the Swiss authorities.
It makes the country's exporters less competitive. It has been happening again since the UK vote and the Swiss National Bank has intervened in the currency markets, buying foreign currency such as euros with Swiss francs.
Some of these moves in the markets have been partly, though not fully reversed.
And that has prompted London consultancy Capital Economics to pose the question: "Has the Brexit storm already passed?"
In a note to clients, the firm described the initial reaction as "knee-jerk" and wrote: "It has dawned on investors that a long period of negotiation, rather than sudden upheaval, now lies ahead."
It does nonetheless suggest that a further decline in the value of sterling may be on the way, mainly because of the response it anticipates from the Bank of England - some combination of cuts in interest rates and extra quantitative easing, both of which would tend to make sterling less attractive to international investors. | For once, that overused word turmoil is justified. | 36618804 |
The UK's unemployment rate remained at 4.9%, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
According to the ONS, the number of people on the claimant count in July, the first month since the Brexit vote, was 763,600, down 8,600 from June.
Wages excluding bonuses rose 2.3% in the three months to June compared with a year earlier, the ONS said.
Including bonuses, earnings growth was 2.4%.
"The labour market continued on a strong trend in the second quarter of 2016, with a new record employment rate," said ONS statistician David Freeman.
"However, little of today's data cover the period since the result of the EU referendum became known, with only claimant count and vacancies going beyond June - to July for the former and to May-July for the latter," he added.
The jobless total is now at its lowest for eight years, while the unemployment rate is at its lowest since the summer of 2005, according to the ONS figures.
The employment rate reached a record high of 74.5%, with 31.8 million people in work in the three months to June - 172,000 more than the previous quarter.
Howard Archer of IHS Global Insight said that the UK economy showed "impressive resilience in the run-up to the EU referendum and the immediate aftermath of the vote to leave".
However, he warned: "It is premature to draw any firm conclusions from this... It remains likely that softening economic activity and heightened uncertainty will take a toll on the labour market over the coming months."
Hargreaves Lansdowne economist Ben Brettell said that while forward-looking surveys to gauge business confidence had suggested the Brexit vote had delivered a shock, "surveys are driven by sentiment, and can therefore overreact".
"The dramatic fall in confidence may not ultimately be borne out by activity, and today's claimant count number is a tentative sign that things might not turn out as bad as many predicted," he said. | The UK unemployment total fell by 52,000 to 1.64 million between April and June, official figures indicate. | 37105028 |
Although the 2014 Academy Awards ceremony has come and gone, its after-effects are still being felt in Kenya.
The first wave of activity happened soon after Lupita Nyong'o was announced Oscar winner for best actress in a supporting role in 12 Years A Slave.
The media, especially on Twitter, went wild with jubilant Kenyans sending and sharing the news, joy and jokes.
One Kenyan created much laughter by asking: "Which is this Oscar guy that Lupita has won over?"
Yet others began to wonder whether it was now time to seriously analyse what the waters of Lake Victoria - on the shores of Kisumu in Western Kenya - actually contained.
That region of the country and its Luo community have made global history for a second time.
It was the home of both Barack Obama's father and Lupita Nyong'o's family. Indeed, her father, Anyang Nyong'o is the Senator for Kisumu county and some of Kenya's sharpest minds come from this region.
And thanks to her comments, we now have a blue Nairobi. The Kenyan capital has always been known as the green city in the sun, because of its parks and trees. Although with weather patterns running amok, it often feels like the great sun in the city.
But not any more. Thanks to Lupita's comment that the beautiful light blue dress she wore at the Oscars reminded her of Nairobi, we now have Nairobi blue.
Whether this is a new colour, city, dress or state of mind, I can't tell.
What I know for certain is that Lupita's "your dreams are valid" statement in her acceptance speech has become a catch-phrase and a rallying call for Kenyans, especially the youth, to dream big.
You'll now hear young artists and upcoming entrepreneurs saying that they will push themselves to rise to the highest ranks - because their dreams are valid.
Lupita's victory at the Oscars is a demonstration that the African craft of telling or portraying stories is at the highest global standard.
The fact that she won and faced the world without lightening her dark skin complexion, or extending her short African hair, makes another statement - that an authentic African identity does not have to be negotiable for Africa to be heard loud and clear across the planet.
Proudly African, Lupita even gave the Western world collective heart failure as they struggled to pronounce her second name correctly.
As an ever-optimistic believer that Africa will soon take over the world, I feel the time has come for the continent to dream mega and now use its own voice to narrate the African experience.
Hollywood is one of the biggest factories and exporters of Western culture and the American experience. And Africa is a big importer of the same.
But the boot is gradually shifting to the other foot with Africa already exporting its sporting talent, its innovations and some of its culture from sources such as the Nigerian Nollywood film industry.
Now we must export our thinking. When the world begins to think what we think and why we think it, our story will move from what author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie describes as the single story, to being understood in its truly complex weave of the African.
For this to happen we have to believe that our dreams are valid and that only we can validate those dreams.
It's also about believing in ourselves as Africans - that we can change the world, even if it's one colour at a time.
Lupita's Nairobi blue certainly seems to have the potential of becoming the new black on the global fashion scene.
If you would like to comment on Joseph Warungu's column, please do so below. | In our series of letters from African journalists, broadcaster and media trainer Joseph Warungu reflects on the aftermath of Lupita Nyong'o's historic success at the Oscars. | 26517823 |
4 August 2013 Last updated at 08:42 BST
Kirobo will provide company for a Japanese astronaut who's due to arrive at the station later this year.
It is part of a study to see how machines can help people who are on their own for a long time feel less lonely.
Before blast off the 14 cm tall robot said that his journey was 'one small step for me, a giant leap for robots!
The android took off from the island of Tanegashima in an unmanned rocket also carrying supplies for crew onboard the ISS. | A talking robot is on its way to the International Space Station (ISS) for the first time. | 23565559 |
Survivors will gather at Stormont to reveal details of a compensation scheme that they want the incoming executive to adopt.
They will set out recommendations for out-of-court payments as an alternative to civil court proceedings.
The report will also recommend two categories of compensation.
These include a "common experience payment" for all former residents of homes where abuse was endemic, as well as compensation in individual cases.
Margaret McGuckin, of Survivors and Victims of Institutional Abuse (SAVIA), said: "Abuse victims have waited their whole lives for an acknowledgement from the state for letting us down so badly when we were vulnerable kids.
"Part of that acknowledgement must be redress, to try to make up for what we suffered and what we lost."
Jon McCourt, of Survivors North West, said: "Today, victims come together to set out clearly the sort of redress scheme which we want to see put in place.
However, Mr McCourt said: "Nothing will really make up for the damage done to us when we were children - awful damage which has led to an early grave for too many of our fellow residents and friends."
The Historic Institutional Abuse (HIA) Inquiry is examining allegations of child abuse in children's homes and other residential institutions in Northern Ireland from 1922 to 1995.
The HIA began its public evidence sessions at the former Banbridge Court House in January 2014.
It is scheduled to report to the Northern Ireland Executive in January 2017. | A redress scheme for victims of historical child abuse must be part of the new programme for government, abuse survivors will tell politicians later. | 36289249 |
Debating plans for further devolution to Cardiff Bay, Welsh Secretary Alun Cairns suggested AMs would have powers to force people to cast their ballot.
But Welsh Affairs Select Committee chairman David Davies told BBC Wales he would be "wary" of any such moves.
He said: "If politicians can't persuade people to come out and support someone, the fault lies with us not the public."
Mr Davies, MP for Monmouth, added: "Trying to convince ourselves that we're all relevant and popular by forcing people to vote and punishing them in some way is not the answer in my opinion."
Although there are no indications they are planning to do so, AMs would be able to introduce compulsory voting under UK ministers' plans to devolve further powers to Cardiff Bay, including control of assembly elections and income tax varying powers.
The devolution proposals, contained in the Wales Bill, were debated by MPs on Tuesday.
Labour Cardiff Central MP Jo Stevens told BBC Radio Wales she had "always been a fan of compulsory voting".
Speaking on the Good Morning Wales programme she said: "I consider it a bit like jury service - you know, it's your duty as a citizen."
"Provided there are options for people who don't want to chose a particular party, or can just term up and register the fact that they've arrived at the ballot box and not register to vote, then I'd be in favour of it."
Jonathan Edwards, Plaid Cymru MP for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr, said compulsory voting would be a "major change, moving voting from a civic right to a civic duty".
"I'm not entirely convinced that's the way to do it," he said.
"What we should be looking at is electoral reform, that's a necessity."
In April, Labour Welsh Government minister Ken Skates said compulsory voting should be considered to boost assembly election turnout and he was "personally in favour" of it.
Labour has previously rejected the idea, as have the Conservatives, Plaid Cymru, the Liberal Democrats and UKIP.
Eleven countries enforce participation in elections - including Australia, which issues fines - and a dozen more have some kind of mandatory voting legislation that is not enforced.
Turnout in May's assembly election was 45.3%, the highest since the first election in 1999. | A senior Welsh Tory MP has said he would oppose any plans for compulsory voting in assembly elections. | 36532056 |
Beachgoers saw a "massive fire" spread quickly up East Cliff on Bournemouth beach at about 15.30 BST.
Firefighters said a patch of gorse was alight behind some beach huts near Undercliff Drive and Pier Approach and part of the promenade was evacuated.
Dorset Police advised people to avoid the area and said no injuries had been reported.
Bournemouth Council said its seafront rangers guided beachgoers away from danger and ensured the area was clear.
Bournemouth East MP Tobias Ellwood posted on Twitter: "Huge praise for Bournemouth's Emergency Services in responding to major grass fire that spread rapidly on East Cliff cliff top above packed beach." | A packed beach was evacuated when a large fire broke out in heathland. | 40312433 |
Universities UK (UUK) said that, under some circumstances, such seating would be allowed if requested by speakers from orthodox religious groups.
PM David Cameron told Channel 4 News the guidance "shouldn't say that".
UUK, which has withdrawn part of the guidance, says it may need to be tested in court.
The umbrella body has written to the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) asking it to either seek clarification in the High Court or to "provide a clear and public statement about the law and the relevant policy considerations".
The controversy hinges on a hypothetical case study featuring an external speaker invited to talk about his orthodox religious faith.
In the case study, now withdrawn pending the EHRC review, the speaker requests segregated seating areas for men and women.
The UUK guidance - published last month - stated that, when considering the request, university officials should consider both freedom of speech obligations as well as discrimination and equality laws.
It concluded that "if neither women nor men were disadvantaged and a non-segregated seating area were also provided, it might in the specific circumstances of the case be appropriate for the university to agree to the request".
It added that the guidance was not prescriptive and that its aim was to provide "practical assistance to universities in making decisions about who they choose to invite to speak on campus, steering them through all the different considerations, legal and otherwise, that apply".
Business Secretary Vince Cable, whose department has responsibility for universities, has now written to UUK urging it to clarify its position.
"I am clear that forced segregation of any kind, including gender segregation, is never acceptable on campuses," he said.
"But how the law applies where segregation is voluntary is unclear.
"That is why I am writing to Universities UK asking them to clarify that distinction between private worship on the one hand and public areas of learning on the other, and to amend their guidance accordingly."
On Friday evening, the prime minister said he was "absolutely clear that there shouldn't be segregated audiences for visiting speakers to universities in Britain".
"That is not the right approach - the guidance shouldn't say that," he told Channel 4.
"Universities should not allow this and I'm very clear about that."
UUK chief executive Nicola Dandridge said the organisation agreed with Mr Cameron that universities should not enforce gender segregation on audiences at the request of guest speakers.
But "where the gender segregation is voluntary, the law is unclear," she said.
"We are working with our lawyers and the EHRC to clarify the position.
"Meanwhile, the case study which triggered this debate has been withdrawn pending this review."
EHRC chief executive Mark Hammond, meanwhile, has said that, while segregation by gender in premises being used for religious purposes was legal, it was "not permissible" in an academic meeting or in a lecture open to the public.
Baroness Perry of Southwark, chairwoman of the House of Lords backbench education committee, said she was "outraged" by the guidance.
She told BBC Radio 4's Today programme it was contrary to "the long struggle that the brave women of the early academics in the 19th Century had to get the provision to sit in lectures".
"There is no university campus in the whole of Britain which separates men and women and allows it."
Tariq Ramadan, professor of contemporary Islamic Studies at the Oxford University, said: "Depending on who is organising and when they are asking me, I don't have a problem talking in universities, in rooms and public venues where the people are together men and women.
"And some organisers are separating men and women."
He added: "If every time there is segregation I'm not going to talk then I'm not reaching the people that I want to reach and for them to listen." | Ministers have written to university leaders asking them to clarify advice on allowing men and women to be segregated at talks by guest speakers. | 25378713 |
The 33-year-old from Marks Tey, Essex, was arrested on Saturday morning in Parkway, Chelmsford, after failing a roadside test. He was later released.
Officers then spotted him driving the same car in Chelmsford that afternoon, and arrested him again.
Sgt Colin Shead said: "The stupidity and recklessness beggars belief."
The man was initially arrested on suspicion of driving while over the prescribed drug limit.
Officers had taken him into custody and bailed him until January, pending blood analysis.
By driving his Alfa Romeo again, in Broomfield Road at 15:35 GMT, he was in breach of his bail conditions as he had been told not to drive.
He was taken into custody and released until his original bail date. | A driver who tested positive for cocaine was arrested twice in one day after he drove the same car within hours of being bailed. | 35019904 |
The 22-year-old, who began his career as a trainee with Arsenal, most recently played for Boreham Wood on a one-year deal during 2016-17.
He scored three times in 26 appearances for Wood last term, including the winner against Sutton in November.
"After seeing the whole set up and a great group of players, it became an easy decision to make," Jeffrey said.
"I had many offers but this feels right on all levels and I can't wait to get going." | Sutton United have signed former Forest Green Rovers winger Anthony Jeffrey on a one-year contract. | 40688653 |
Aquila Singh, who was brought up in the Christian faith from birth, is to be ordained and inducted into Fernhill and Cathkin Parish Church in Rutherglen.
Pakistan-born Ms Singh moved to Scotland when she was two.
The former teacher worked at Belmont House School in Newton Mearns near Glasgow before her ministry training.
She said she was "delighted" that she had been called to her first charge and excited at the prospect of leading the congregation and working with the local community.
"I don't feel like a trailblazer but I like to think that maybe I can break down some misconceptions about who can be a minister."
Ms Singh is following in her paternal grandfather's footsteps.
He was a minister for the American Mission Presbyterian Church in India and instrumental in building a place of worship in Moga in the Punjab region in 1934.
Ms Singh, who was raised in Glasgow, said: "When I was first discerning my call I would wonder why God called me, although I grew up in the church, because I was just an ordinary person.
"But someone told me that God takes you as you are and tweaks you and I definitely believe this is true."
Joint clerk of the Presbytery of Glasgow, Rev Dr Graham Blount, said it was always encouraging to see a new minister take up their first charge.
"Each one brings something unique to the life of the church," he said.
"Aquila is well known and liked in Glasgow Presbytery, and we are delighted to see her begin her ministry in Fernhill and Cathkin.
"It will be an exciting night for the congregation and for Aquila as they begin a new journey together." | Church of Scotland's first Asian female minister has said she hoped to break down misconceptions about who could join the ministry. | 38595101 |
The visitors dominated the first half and came close to taking the lead early on when Grimsby keeper James McKeown denied Luke Howell from close range.
Padraig Amond nearly put the Mariners ahead shortly after only for James Russell to deny him from 12 yards.
Russell went on to pull off a string of impressive saves in the second half to deny Grimsby taking all three points.
Grimsby remain third in the table while Boreham Wood stay 21st, but are now one point from safety.
Grimsby Town manager Paul Hurst told BBC Radio Humberside:
Media playback is not supported on this device
"Yes it was obviously frustrating.
"Before the game you're hopeful it's going to be an opportunity to get three points at home. It doesn't matter who we play, we always think that.
"Credit to them - I thought they came and worked extremely hard. Conditions were very difficult, I think most people could see that.
"It looked hard work for the lads out there but the important thing from my point of view is we didn't lose the game. We would have liked to have won it but I saw effort out there." | Promotion-chasing Grimsby and strugglers Boreham Wood played out a scoreless draw in the National League. | 35510287 |
Harding joined City in March 2015 after her proposed move to Washington Spirit in the United States fell through when she was denied a visa.
The 26-year-old's exit comes after City signed Sweden striker Kosovare Asllani.
"To the Man City fans I want to say a special thanks and let you know how much your support has meant to me during my time at City" she tweeted.
"You made me feel welcome from day one and I appreciate everything you have done for me, I'll never forget it."
Harding spent five years at Cardiff City before switching to Bristol Academy in 2012.
She was appointed Wales vice-captain by manager Jayne Ludlow in 2015. | Wales striker Natasha Harding has left Women's Super League side Manchester City. | 35395318 |
During their three-day trip they will also visit the set of the TV series Game of Thrones in the Titanic Quarter.
The visit gets under way on Monday 23 June and will finish on Wednesday 25 June.
The royal couple will also attend a Royal British Legion reception in Coleraine, County Londonderry.
City Hall will play host to the Queen and Price Philip where they will be guests at a lunch celebrating the 'Best of Belfast' hosted by Lord Mayor Nichola Mallon. Guests will include representatives of communities and groups across the city.
The royal couple will stay at Hillsborough Castle during their visit and will meet with Secretary of State Theresa Villiers and First Minister Peter Robinson and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness at the castle in their first engagement.
It will be their 21st visit to Northern Ireland.
Their last was in June 2012, as part of Her Majesty's Diamond Jubilee celebrations.
During that visit, the Queen and Mr McGuinness, a former IRA leader, shook hands for the first time.
In April, Mr McGuinness toasted the Queen during a banquet at Windsor Castle as part of the state visit of Irish president Michael D Higgins. | The Queen and Prince Philip will take a tour of Crumlin Road Gaol in Belfast during a visit to Northern Ireland next week. | 27909959 |
Ms Dugdale received 90% of the support from constituency Labour parties who nominated a candidate.
She is also backed by 80% of the local councillors who nominated a leadership candidate, and 10 trade union and affiliate groups.
She is standing against Ken Macintosh in the contest to replace Jim Murphy.
MSP Richard Baker has secured the most constituency Labour party nominations in the contest for deputy leader.
Ms Dugdale, a Lothians MSP, is supported by 30 of her fellow parliamentarians, while Mr Macintosh, currently the party's social justice spokesman, is backed by seven and the Scottish Co-Op group.
He has 10% of the support from constituency Labour parties, and 20% of the support from councillors.
Following the close of supporting nominations, Ms Dugdale said: "To have the support of the overwhelming number of local party members, councillors and trade unions is an honour.
"I take nothing for granted and will work hard to change this support into votes when the ballot opens a week on Monday.
"The support I have received so far shows I am winning the argument amongst party members, but the real task is to win back people across the country."
Mr Macintosh has previously said he offers "a change in direction" for the Scottish Labour party.
He said: "I want to break up the party machine and put the members and supporters in charge of this party."
Mr Baker secured 20 constituency Labour Party nominations, compared with 18 for rival deputy leader candidate MSP Alex Rowley and 11 for Glasgow City Council leader Gordon Matheson.
Mr Baker said: "I'm grateful to members across the country who have put their trust in me through constituency nominations.
"My platform is clear: I want us to be a strong, united party in next year's election, with policy formed by members across Scotland." | Kezia Dugdale has secured the majority of supporting nominations in her bid to become Scottish Labour leader. | 33489026 |
The review could result in a price cap being imposed on the postal operator.
The regulator said the inquiry will examine the "efficient and financially sustainable provision" of the UK's universal postal service.
The universal service is the Royal Mail's commitment to deliver to all of the UK for the same price.
Shares fell closed down 3.5%, or 18.5p, to 508.5p.
The company is worth about £5bn and the shares are up 14% since its float in October 2013.
Ofcom, which first announced the review last month, is concerned at the reduction in competition in parts of the letters and parcels markets.
The letter delivery service arm of Whistl and parcel firm City Link both folded in recent months.
The collapse of the letter service run by Whistl, formerly known as TNT, left Royal Mail with no national competitor in this market.
Ofcom said it will also consider Royal Mail's position in the parcels market and "assess the company's potential ability to set wholesale prices in a way that might harm competition".
The regulator said it could roll back some of the commercial flexibility given to Royal Mail in 2012, which included the ability to raise prices.
In May Royal Mail reported pre-tax profits of £400m for the year to 29 March, down from £1.66bn for the previous 12 months.
Royal Mail said it would participate fully in Ofcom's review.
"We will be highlighting the need for a consistent approach to regulation. Ofcom's existing framework, put in place in 2012 was to have provided certainty for seven years," the company said.
"Royal Mail believes it has used the commercial freedoms granted by Ofcom in a responsible and appropriate manner to help secure the financial sustainability of the universal service in the face of significant ongoing change across the postal market."
Ofcom's review is expected to be completed next year. | Shares in Royal Mail fell on Friday after Ofcom confirmed the scope of a review into the company's operations. | 33563153 |
A loud-mouthed billionaire encouraged by his poll numbers to believe he can insult his way to the White House has up until this week dominated the battle for its presidential nomination.
As for Donald Trump's most recent rival, the retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who this week topped his first national poll, he has a tendency to speak like doctors commonly write, which is to say his words are often mumbling and almost unintelligible.
Despite a soothing bedside manner, he also has a tendency to make jolting statements, such as that Obamacare was worse than the attacks of 9/11 and abortion is like slavery.
It must be a huge concern for the GOP high command that Trump and Carson, supposed fringe candidates, are attracting the support of roughly 50% of the Republican base, and that no other contender comes even close.
Establishment favourites, like Jeb Bush, have struggled to make much of an impression, precisely because they are seen as establishment favourites in a party that is increasingly and defiantly anti-establishment.
The nerdy secretary of the high school stamp collecting club to Trump's football captain, Bush is struggling to find his voice and even to explain his candidacy. It heightens the sense that he is running out of a sense of dynastic entitlement.
Away from the campaign trail, on what should be the sunny uplands of Capitol Hill, the Republicans have been in chaos. For party elders, filling the House speakership, a job commonly regarded as Washington's second most powerful, has been just as tortuous as selecting a presidential nominee.
The Freedom Caucus, a rump of 40 or so ultra-conservatives, not only forced John Boehner from the job, but barred his obvious successor, Kevin McCarthy, from being promoted.
Instead, the apparent winner is Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney's running mate from 2012, who has promised to show what a "common sense conservative agenda looks like".
But common sense is in short supply in the modern Republican Party, where ideologues have displaced pragmatists.
In a measure of how far the party has lurched to the right, Ryan is regarded by many Tea Party figures as dangerously moderate. To them, common sense equates to ideological betrayal. Little wonder Ryan was so reluctant to put himself forward for the post.
With majorities in both houses of Congress, the Republican Party should be in the ascendant. Not only did it sweep last year's congressional mid-term elections, its domination of the House of Representatives, where it has 247 seats compared to the Democrat's 188, should continue after next year's races.
Republicans also occupy 31 of America's 50 governorships. After eight years of the Obama administration, the party should be well placed to regain the White House, if only because of the cyclic nature of politics and the natural appetite among electorates for change.
But the Republican's traditional nickname, the Grand Old Party, now sounds oxymoronic. Its nominating contest and congressional caucus could hardly be described as grand. At times both have been farcical.
Nor does it look like a properly functioning party. So intense and visceral has become the Republican Party's mistrust and hatred of government, it has almost itself reached the point of ungovernability. As David Brooks, a conservative columnist with the New York Times, astutely observed, modern-day Republicans are marked more by right-wing radicalism than traditional conservatism.
"Republicans came to see themselves as insurgents and revolutionaries, and every revolution tends toward anarchy and ends up devouring its own," he writes.
With the schism between pragmatists and ideologues ever harder to breach, the Republicans are in danger of becoming what the Democrats were in the 1970s and 1980s - a party that could win majorities on Capitol Hill, but which suffered a virtual lock-out at the White House.
Between the late-Sixties and early-Nineties, the Democrats won just one presidential election, in 1976 with Jimmy Carter - and that was with the winds of Watergate at their back.
During that unsuccessful era, the Democrats were cast by their opponents as the party of the hippy left, the home of angry African-Americans, radical feminists and anti-war demonstrators. In other words, a protest movement.
Large factions of the party operated outside of the mainstream, what Richard Nixon called the "silent majority". As Senator George McGovern discovered in 1972, winning the party's presidential nomination, which meant reaching out to leftist constituencies, and winning the White House, which meant moving back towards the middle, required too great a political leap.
He lost 49 out of 50 states (Massachusetts bucked the trend), but Democrats maintained their majorities in both the House and Senate.
In many ways, the radical right is to the GOP in 2015 what the hippy left was to the Democrats in 1972. It hasn't stopped them dominating Congress, but it has made it difficult for them to get the keys to the White House.
The GOP looks more and more like two antagonistic cabals - an establishment party represented by figures like Bush, Marco Rubio, John Kasich and Chris Christie, and an insurgent movement headed by the likes of Ted Cruz and Carson.
Again, there are parallels with the Democrats of old, a party that for much of the last century was an unhappy amalgam of northern progressives and southern segregationists.
The Democrats came up with a solution to this problem that kept them viable in presidential politics - they soft-pedalled civil rights, the defining issue that divided them.
But when Lyndon Johnson signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act into law, he knew he had written off what was then called the solid Democratic south, and also that white southerners would flock to the Republicans, even though it was the party of Abraham Lincoln.
The modern-day GOP is finding it harder to square the circle between its radical and more traditional wings, even though the issues that divide them, such as immigration, are nowhere near as stark, or historically charged, as segregation.
Since the civil rights era of the 1960s, the Republicans' success in presidential politics has been built on the "southern strategy", an appeal to whites disgruntled with the speed of racial change.
Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush all pursued variations on this theme. But the southern strategy has become obsolete, because of the demographic changes that have overtaken a country where the majority of children under five are now non-white.
Back in 1968, when Richard Nixon coined the phrase "the silent majority" whites without a college degree represented 80% of voters. By 2012, that figure was down to 44%.
While the support of blue collar whites has buoyed Donald Trump in the polls and given him a shot at winning the Republican nomination, it cannot, on its own, lift him to the presidency.
Moreover, his appeal has waned. Many of the viewers who turned up the volume in the early days of his candidacy when Trump appeared on screen are now turning it down.
Party chieftains this year hoped to broaden the demographic appeal of the party. It explains why Spanish-speaking Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio are establishment favourites.
But this year's race has so far been dominated by outsiders - Trump and Carson. The problem for the GOP is that they, like much of the party, may also be outside the new American mainstream. | For the chieftains of the Republican Party, Campaign 2016 has hardly gone to script. | 34650710 |
The group, known as the "hooded men" were interned in 1971.
Their lawyers were granted leave to seek a judicial review at the High Court in Belfast on Thursday.
They are calling the chief constable, secretary of state and Department of Justice to account over alleged failures to order a full inquiry.
Fourteen men said they were subjected to torture techniques after being held without trial back in 1971.
They said they were forced to listen to constant loud static noise; deprived of sleep, food and water; forced to stand in a stress position and beaten if they fell.
They said they were hooded and thrown to the ground from helicopters - despite being at near ground level, they had been told they were hundreds of feet in the air.
In 1978, the European Court of Human Rights held that the UK had carried out inhuman and degrading treatment.
However, the court fell short of defining this treatment as "torture".
Last year, the Irish Government said it would ask the European Court to revise this judgement.
Eleven of the men are now working with lawyers to secure a full inquiry.
Separate proceedings have also been lodged by the daughter of Sean McKenna, another of the group whose death has been blamed on his treatment.
Granting leave to seek a judicial review in both applications, Mr Justice Treacy ruled that they should proceed "in tandem".
He listed the cases for full hearing over four days starting on 30 November. | A group of men who said they were tortured in Northern Ireland have cleared the first stage in a battle to have their case fully investigated. | 33008186 |
The breaches were first publicised by security blogger Brian Krebs on Monday.
The companies denied their classified networks had been infiltrated.
However, the team that discovered the incidents has given the BBC access to an intelligence report, which indicates hundreds of files were indeed copied.
The documents, which were stolen over a period of many months, relate to:
Cyber Engineering Services (CyberESI) tracked the activities of the hackers over eight months between 2011 and 2012.
It said the data taken by the hackers suggested they had been after intelligence relating to Iron Dome.
Iron Dome is a complex anti-missile defence system, which can intercept and destroy rockets and shells.
The technology has been widely credited with preventing the deaths of many Israeli civilians during the ongoing conflict with militants from Gaza.
CyberESI's report, compiled in 2013, also indicates the attacks were made using highly sophisticated tools resembling those used by Chinese hackers to infiltrate US defence firms - an attack in which the Chinese government denies any involvement.
"The data collected makes strong indications that the actors behind this attack originated from China," it says.
"This assertion is based on the activity during the past year that Cyber Engineering Services has observed on compromised networks, as well as the geo-location of the IP [internet protocol] addresses retrieving the exfiltrated data."
"The nature of exfiltrated data and the industry that these companies are involved in suggests that the Chinese hackers were after information related to Israel's all-weather air defence system called Iron Dome."
CyberESI, which operates out of Maryland in the US, monitored data being stolen from two leading Israeli defence contractors:
A spokeswoman for IAI initially confirmed to Mr Krebs the attack had taken place and been "reported to the appropriate authorities".
However IAI subsequently said the "information reported regarding the leakage of sensitive information is incorrect" and only its "civilian non-classified" network had been hacked.
A spokesman for Rafael said the company did "not recall such an incident".
But the report seen by the BBC suggests sensitive data was taken from IAI and that Rafael's network was compromised, with hackers able to deactivate security software and harvest authentication data, including passwords.
In total, the report says, gigabytes of data were stolen from the Israeli companies, including:
Some of the stolen technical documents are said by CyberESI to have contained intellectual property data and were marked as being controlled by US government International Traffic in Arms (ITAR) regulations.
Both IAI and Rafael were heavily involved in developing the Iron Dome missile defence system, which allows Israel to intercept rockets fired by Hamas from the Gaza Strip.
The US, which already collaborates with Israeli firms over Arrow III - jointly designed by IAI and Boeing, now wants to invest in future versions of Iron Dome technologies.
In May 2013, the Pentagon accused China of carrying out a sophisticated cyber-spying campaign on US diplomatic, economic and defence organisations.
The raid on the Israeli companies bore similar characteristics, experts at CyberESI told the BBC, using tools that were "known to originate from" China.
The attacks were part of an advanced persistent threat (APT) - a form of highly organised and targeted hacking.
APTs have been used for industrial espionage in the past and tend to use sophisticated methods not easily available to the vast majority of cyber-thieves.
CyberESI's report also featured a third Israeli company, Elisra, originally a US company and now a leading supplier to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
Elisra, which is not involved in Iron Dome, appears to have been comprehensively infiltrated by the hackers, who stole data from folders named "Military Spacs" and "UAV" and infiltrated the email accounts belonging to the chief executive and several senior managers.
The attackers also stole passwords and sign-in details, allowing them to roam around the networks undetected.
Elisra did not respond to a BBC request for comment.
In January 2014, another security company reported that 15 Israeli defence computers had been compromised via a malicious email attachment. | The BBC has seen evidence that appears to confirm hackers stole several secret military documents from two government-owned Israeli companies that developed the Iron Dome missile defence system. | 28583283 |
Jeremy Hunt told the House of Commons the government was "committed to maintaining" the target.
But he said if the standard was to be "protected" it might need to be applied to only those patients with urgent needs rather than minor problems.
It comes as hospitals are reporting unprecedented pressures this winter.
Department of Health sources said there were no immediate plans to change the target but ministers wanted an honest conversation with the public about A&E.
Currently, every patient who goes to an accident and emergency department should be seen in four hours.
But hospitals have been struggling to achieve that - the target has not been met since the summer of 2015.
Mr Hunt said it was time to look at how the target - one of the most high profile in the health service - was measured.
He said no other country in the world had such a stringent standard for A&E treatment.
"This government is committed to maintaining and delivering that vital four-hour commitment to patients.
"But since it was announced in 2000, there are nearly nine million more visits to our A&E, up to 30% of whom, NHS England estimate, do not need to be there, and the tide is continuing to rise.
"So if we are going to protect our four-hour standard, we need to be clear it is a promise to sort out all urgent health problems within four hours - but not all health problems, however minor."
As well as raising the prospect of re-defining the target, Mr Hunt said he would be looking at new ways of managing the way patients used A&E services.
Some hospitals have started piloting a new system called streaming, which sees staff assessing patients when they walk through the door and sending them elsewhere if they are deemed to have only minor ailments.
Mr Hunt said it would allow hospitals to focus quick care on those "who actually need it".
But Liberal Democrat health spokesman Norman Lamb criticised the idea.
"This is a slippery slope towards the downgrading of standards," he said.
"If the health secretary thinks it is acceptable for patients to be left waiting indefinitely in A&Es, or that this is a solution to the severe pressures facing the NHS, then he is sorely mistaken."
Labour shadow health secretary Jon Ashworth said ministers needed to "get to a grip" on the problem.
And British Medical Association leader Dr Mark Porter said ministers should instead focus on increasing investment and developing a "long-term plan to protect patients who are enduring some of the worst conditions in decades". | Patients attending A&E units with less serious problems may no longer be guaranteed to be seen in four hours, the health secretary has suggested. | 38563742 |
Google and its London-based DeepMind division springs to mind. Facebook has hired some of the biggest thinkers in AI. Then there's IBM with its Watson project - and of course China is pouring vast sums into research, as it tries to replace factory workers with robots.
But today another contender is shouting out: what about us? Microsoft, the company that dominated the era of desktop computing, is holding an event at which it is showing off its expertise in artificial intelligence, and in effect demanding a bit more respect from the world.
The event is being held in London - a marker of how much the UK is now seen as a centre of AI research - and Microsoft's top scientists have flown in from around the world to demonstrate their work and lay out their vision of what direction this technology should take next.
One of the applications on display today is Seeing AI, a way to help people with a visual impairment get information about their world through the camera of a smartphone.
I got my own demo from one of the developers, Saqib Shaikh, who is himself blind.
He pointed his phone at a document and it read the text aloud. Then a series of bleeps guided him to the barcode on a drinks can and the app told him what it was. Next, he switched into "people mode" and the camera spotted me. I was described as a 52-year-old man, looking first neutral, then happy.
This may sound relatively straightforward but, as Saqib pointed out, behind the application are years of research into giving computers human skills such as vision, hearing and the ability to spot different emotions.
Steve Clayton, whose title is Microsoft chief storyteller, wove for me a convincing tale of 25 years of artificial intelligence research that had culminated in projects such as Seeing AI.
"The first three groups that were part of Microsoft Research were focused around AI - speech, language and vision," he explained.
"What you see in that application is that work really coming to life and taking computers into a new era where they can see, recognise and understand the world in a similar way to humans."
As well as showing how its AI expertise was feeding into products - from live translation for PowerPoint presentations to a system that scans closed-circuit video images to recognise specific events - Microsoft was keen to show it had a wider mission than just its own commercial interests.
It unveiled an initiative called AI For Earth, to give charities and other organisations access to tools that use the technology in areas such as combating climate change. As concern mounts about the potential of artificial intelligence to cause harm or reinforce prejudices, the firm also published what it called its design principles for AI.
Emma Williams, general manager for the Bing search engine, says at the heart of all this is putting the human first.
"The human is the hero - and we are creating AI technology that amplifies human ingenuity so that this can unlock a new era for human innovation and creativity."
I put it to her that this all sounded very nice but there were hard decisions to be made - for instance about bias in the algorithms that will have growing influence over our lives.
But she insisted that "fairness, accountability, transparency and ethics" would be at the heart of all their research. The company stresses that the ethics of AI is going to be a cross-industry issue where it is determined to be a leading voice.
Microsoft seems frustrated that all of its work in this field has made less of an impression on the public than Google's DeepMind, with its eye-catching victories at the Chinese game of Go, or IBM's Watson, now being promoted as an all-purpose AI service for all sorts of businesses.
Azeem Azhar, who writes the weekly Exponential View newsletter about artificial intelligence developments, says he can understand why Microsoft urgently wants its voice heard.
"AI, like many areas of technology, is likely to be a winner-takes-all game. We've seen that with firms like Google or Facebook, and if AI follows the same pattern, particularly with its demand for lots of data, those who come in the first ranks will win all the rewards and those who come in the second echelon will get nothing."
He does think, however, that Microsoft's pervasive presence in the world of business gives it a chance to be among the winners.
Having missed out on the mobile revolution and having been late to cloud computing, Microsoft has decided that it must not be left behind this time in a technology that some are comparing to electricity in its potential impact.
Now it just has to make the world listen. | Who is doing groundbreaking research into artificial intelligence right now? | 40580897 |
The 22-year-old former Arsenal and Bristol Academy midfielder has been capped more than 50 times.
James had been left without a club when Notts County Ladies folded one day before the start of the Spring Series.
"After the disappointment of what happened at Notts County, I'm delighted to join Yeovil Ladies," she said.
"I'm looking forward to working with Jamie [Sherwood, Yeovil's manager], who I can't thank enough and the talented group of players we have here.
"The ambition is to get maximum points from the next four games, putting us in a strong position leading up to the winter season." | Wales international Angharad James has joined Yeovil Town Ladies for the Spring Series, following her departure from defunct Notts County. | 39933876 |
His comments highlight the Bank of England's signal on Thursday that rates could go lower if the economy worsens.
On Thursday, the Bank cut interest rates from 0.5% to 0.25% - a record low and the first cut since 2009.
Asked if there was a real prospect of another cut in rates this year, Mr Broadbent replied: "Absolutely."
He told Today the Bank had acted after a series of surveys since the referendum on most aspects of the economy, including employment, the housing market and business confidence, which had turned down markedly.
He said that in the past, these had been reliable indicators of subsequent releases of official data.
The Bank on Thursday announced the biggest cut to its growth forecasts since it started making them in 1993. It now expects the economy to grow by just 0.8% in 2017, down from its previous expectation of 2.3% forecast in May.
The Bank's governor, Mark Carney, said that a majority of the nine-member Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) backed another cut if subsequent data showed the economy was deteriorating.
The Bank also attempted to boost the economy, with a £100bn scheme to force banks to pass on the low interest rate to households and businesses and the purchase of £60bn of UK government bonds and £10bn of corporate bonds.
These efforts have been criticised in some quarters, including from a former colleague on the Bank's interest rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee.
Economist Andrew Sentance has said this is one case where a central bank can do little to offset the shock to the economy.
Mr Broadbent told the programme: "I'm pretty confident it will have some effect... it is a substantial, coherent package... we have already seen mortgage rates fall."
This week's MPC meeting was the last one before it moves to meeting only eight times a year, meaning that it is not scheduled to meet again until 3 November, although it can call an extra meeting before then if it wants to. | The Bank of England deputy governor, Ben Broadbent, has told the BBC's Today programme there could be a further interest rate cut this year if needed. | 36984332 |
Chris Sutton, from business lobby group CBI Wales, spoke as General Dynamics (GD) opened its Merthyr Tydfil plant.
It will employ 250 people, assembling and testing the new fleet of Ajax armoured vehicles for the Army.
The Welsh government said it would continue to pursue opportunities to develop more industrial space.
But CBI Wales vice-chairman Mr Sutton said there were concerns over the shortage of factories available.
Aston Martin and Pinewood are among the companies which have taken over large sites.
At the end of December 2015, there was 11.39 million sq ft of floor space available across Wales.
This is a decrease of 9.7% over 12 months and a reduction of 43.5%, over three years according to global property firm JLL Research.
Mr Sutton, also the Welsh director of JLL, said companies looked for factories that are already built when deciding where to move so both the public and private sector should be involved in building them.
The Welsh government previously invested in developing business centres, called techniums, many of which closed as they failed to attract companies or create the jobs expected.
Mr Sutton was involved in the sale of the Merthyr site, a former forklift truck factory, to GD.
He said the building already had the right attributes, including a paint shop "which you can literally drive a tank into".
Mr Sutton said "grade A occupiers need grade A buildings" and unless the right facilities were available, there was a danger they would not be attracted to Wales.
"We need to look at a property strategy, to look forward to provide the right buildings and the right locations," he added.
"Sometimes the private sector will do this and sometimes in our more disadvantaged communities maybe the public sector has to do that.
"There's a real opportunity to generate more inward investment, not just industrial sector but also in the offices and services sector. But it needs the right buildings or indeed ready, developable sites."
A Welsh government spokesman said: "We are proud of the fact that factory space in Wales is fast filling up with high quality investments and good, skilled jobs.
"This underlines the incredible economic success of the last five years. We have worked hard to attract companies of the appropriate size to fill vacant industrial sites."
GD's expansion followed a £3.5bn contract from the UK government for a new fleet of 589 armoured vehicles.
It received a loan from the Welsh government to support the purchase of the facility, which will be named after the Welsh war hero, Sir Tasker Watkins VC, who was born nearby. His family will attend the opening ceremony.
The £390m defence contract for armoured fighting vehicles was announced by the prime minister last July.
Defence Minister Philip Dunne said: "It is another reminder of the importance of defence investment right across the UK: the Ajax programme alone is sustaining 2,800 jobs across the country, 550 of which are here in Wales." | Ministers should invest in building factories to ensure Wales can attract the best companies, a leading business figure has said. | 35725514 |
Writing in the journal Neurology, US researchers say depression increases in frequency in Parkinson's patients and is often left untreated.
Previous research suggests that the disease's impact on the brain can be a trigger for depression.
Parkinson's UK said depression could be due to a number of causes.
Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine examined 423 newly-diagnosed Parkinson's patients and tracked their mental health over two years.
At the outset, 14% of patients with Parkinson's disease were found to have depression, compared with 6.6% of a group of healthy volunteers.
During the follow-up, there was a small rise in the frequency and severity of depression in the group with Parkinson's, while in the control group a decrease was noted.
At the start of the study, 16% of patients with Parkinson's were taking an anti-depressant, and this increased significantly to 25% two years later.
But 65-72% of patients who screened positive for depression were still not being treated with medication, the study said.
Dr Daniel Weintraub, associate professor of psychiatry and neurology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, said depression in Parkinson's disease was under-recognised.
"There are psychological reasons why people who have been diagnosed with a neuro-degenerative disease like Parkinson's can become depressed, but their brain pathways are also affected by the disease and these are closely associated with mood."
Prof David Burn, from the University of Newcastle, who is funded by Parkinson's UK, said depression can be a sign of Parkinson's.
"It is well-recognised that people do get depression and anxiety up to 10 years before they develop Parkinson's disease.
"People recognise the tremor and movement problems of Parkinson's, but the disease actually starts in the brain, affecting certain chemicals.
"This can cause sleep problems initially and can also lead to minor forms of depression."
Depression can also be a side effect of Parkinson's drugs.
Because of the range of possible causes, Parkinson's UK says it is important that patients speak to their healthcare professional if they are worried about their symptoms.
After Robin Williams died in an apparent suicide last week, it emerged the actor - who had depression - was in the early stages of Parkinson's disease. | Depression and anxiety are twice as common in people newly-diagnosed with Parkinson's disease compared with the general population, research suggests. | 28801953 |
Commercial scallop fishing came to an end in the bay five years ago when it became a special area of conservation.
Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC), which launched the petition, described scallop dredging as "a highly destructive fishing method".
The Welsh government said a public consultation was being carried out.
Mick Green, of WDC, said: "We are delighted so many people support our view that the current proposal to open up protected areas to scallop dredging is wrong.
"We hope that the Welsh government will take notice of the high level of opposition to these proposals and withdraw them."
A Welsh government spokesman said it was "currently considering the establishment of a viable and sustainable scallop fishery", which was "in line with the evidence provided by the Bangor University study".
The public consultation ends on 17 February. | More than 27,000 people have signed a petition calling on the Welsh government to withdraw plans to restart scallop dredging in Cardigan Bay. | 35581642 |
The A330-300 will join the Saudi Arabia national carrier's existing fleet of 62 Airbus planes.
The aircraft wings are made at the factory in Broughton, Flintshire, which employs 6,000 people.
An Airbus spokesman said passenger demand was growing in Saudi Arabia. | An Airbus factory in north Wales has received an order boost after Saudi Arabian Airlines announced it would become the first in the world to use a new Airbus regional plane. | 33133734 |
Seven people were kept in hospital overnight after the leak on Sunday at the Wild Duck Holiday Park at Belton, near Great Yarmouth, Norfolk.
The park's owner Haven said grit jammed open a control switch.
This led to a "higher than acceptable amount of chemicals" entering the swimming pool, it said.
Hospitals in Gorleston, Norwich and Ipswich treated 40 people for the effects of breathing in gas and disinfectant fumes.
The pool was declared safe after the incident but remains shut.
People have been continuing their holidays at the park, but new arrivals on Monday were offered places at three other parks.
A spokesman for the park said: "Experienced technicians and mechanics have been on site overnight and have now completed their initial inspection.
"They have identified a problem with a flow switch in part of the pool's chemical and circulation system. This controls the amount of chlorine and disinfectant that is pumped into the pool on a regular cycle.
"Unfortunately a small piece of grit found its way into the switch and blocked it in the open position. This resulted in a higher than acceptable amount of chemicals entering the pool."
The Health and Safety Executive, Great Yarmouth Borough Council environment services and Norfolk Fire Service chemical leak unit are also involved in an investigation. | A chlorine leak at a swimming pool that led 40 people to be taken to hospital was caused by a piece of grit, an investigation has found. | 33229681 |
A court heard Ryan York pointed the air pistol at Sarah McLeod's feet and ordered her to "dance, dance, dance".
He then shot her in the leg and demanded that she cover up the attack when she went to hospital.
A sheriff told York he had treated Miss McLeod "like dirt" during the "despicable" incident in December 2014.
Depute fiscal Vicki Bell told Dundee Sheriff Court that staff at Ninewells Hospital had reported the injury to police as they believed it had been caused by a firearm.
Miss Bell said: "She provided a statement attempting to cover up the incident by saying she had been shot in the leg at a party and did not remember where she had been or who was there.
"The couple separated in October 2015 and after speaking to friends and family Miss McLeod decided to go to police."
The court was told that prior to the shooting, Miss McLeod and York had an argument after she refused to get him a glass of water.
Miss Bell said: "She saw him lean over the side of the bed and present an object which she knew to be a handgun at her.
"She assumed it was a replica or fake gun.
"However, he pointed the gun directly at her and shouted "get up and get water, you will go get it now".
"She turned and walked towards the door and heard a loud pinging noise.
"She looked down at her leg and observed heavy blood flow coming from her lower calf area."
York, 25, admitted a charge of assault to injury.
Sheriff Alastair Brown ordered York to be monitored in the community for a year after his release.
He was also banned from contacting Miss McLeod for five years.
Sheriff Brown said: "You did not simply assault her - you treated her like dirt, you treated her like your personal servant.
"You told the social worker that you pointed the gun at her and told her to 'dance, dance, dance'.
"That is despicable." | A Dundee man who shot his girlfriend when she refused to get him a glass of water in the middle of the night has been jailed for 32 months. | 39642428 |
Media playback is not supported on this device
John Fahey believes Armstrong ducked key issues relating to his cheating in a TV interview with Oprah Winfrey.
Both Fahey and the United States Anti-Doping Authority (Usada) want the disgraced cyclist to explain the full extent of his doping "under oath".
"That is his way forward if he is serious," Fahey told the BBC.
"Don't go on a show with a woman who will give benign questions, lead you to the answers and not follow up when you don't answer properly.
"But is he going to do it? Probably not. If he was prepared to do it, he probably wouldn't go down the Oprah Winfrey route in the first place."
Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles in 2012 after he was found guilty of doping, but had always maintained his innocence until he confessed to cheating in the first of a two-part interview with Winfrey, recorded on Monday and broadcast at 02:00 GMT on Friday.
If he wants to help cycling and redeem himself, he should expose all, and not just conveniently give a few titbits that really tell us what we already know
The American cyclist revealed he took performance-enhancing drugs in each of his Tour wins from 1999-2005 but said doping was "part of the process required to win the Tour".
He also said he did not feel he was cheating at the time and viewed it as a "level playing field" but now admits that "all the fault and blame" should lie with him and he was a bully who "turned on" people he did not like.
Armstrong added that he would now co-operate with official inquiries into doping in cycling.
But Wada president Fahey has called on the 41-year-old to name names.
"I think his credibility has suffered," Fahey said. "If he is serious about redemption, he will go before an appropriate tribunal, give evidence under oath, subject himself to cross-examination, name names, say who in the entourage was helping him cheat, who supplied the drugs, which officials warned him he might be tested and who in the way of riders was associated with it.
"He claims he was doing what everyone else was doing. If he wants to help cycling and redeem himself, he should expose all, and not just conveniently give a few titbits that really tell us what we already know."
Usada chief executive Travis Tygart has also called on Armstrong to explain himself before a court.
"If he's sincere in his desire to correct past mistakes, he will testify under oath about the full extent of his doping activities," Tygart said.
Usada was the agency that brought the charges against Armstrong after federal prosecutors in California dropped their investigation into alleged doping.
The American filed a lawsuit against Usada last July, accusing them of "corrupt inducements" to other cyclists to testify against him before stating in August that he would not fight doping charges filed against him. He was subsequently stripped of his titles since 1995 but maintained his innocence up until the interview with Winfrey.
"Lance Armstrong finally acknowledged that his cycling career was built on a powerful combination of doping and deceit," added Tygart.
"His admission that he doped throughout his career is a small step in the right direction."
Cycling's world governing body UCI came under scrutiny in the interview. It had been alleged that Armstrong had paid UCI to keep quiet about positive drugs tests.
But the president of the organisation Pat McQuaid said Armstrong's confession revealed there was no collusion.
"Armstrong's decision finally to confront his past is an important step forward on the long road to repairing the damage that has been caused to cycling and to restoring confidence in the sport," he said.
"Armstrong has confirmed there was no collusion or conspiracy between the UCI and Lance Armstrong. There were no positive tests which were covered up and he has confirmed that the donations made to the UCI were to assist in the fight against doping.
"Finally, we note that Lance Armstrong expressed a wish to participate in a truth and reconciliation process, which we would welcome."
But Fahey criticised the UCI for failing to do enough to tackle doping in the sport, and questioned McQuaid's future.
"They have got to make some moves that will change the way the sport operates, and if that involves current office bearers, so be it," Fahey said.
Armstrong faces a series of potential legal issues in the wake of his confession, although he would be unlikely to face perjury charges, despite making sworn testimony in a 2005 court case that he had never used performance-enhancing drugs.
New York defence attorney Stuart Slotnick told BBC Sport earlier this month that, under United States law, the Statute of Limitations means any prosecution must be launched within five years of the offence.
Armstrong said during his interview with Winfrey that he had not doped since 2005.
However, his former team-mate Floyd Landis - who was stripped of his 2006 Tour de France title for doping - has filed a federal whistle-blower lawsuit accusing Armstrong of defrauding the US Postal Service, which paid more than £18.7m to sponsor the team Armstrong competed for.
In addition, the Sunday Times is already suing Armstrong for £1m over a libel payment to him in 2004 after the newspaper alleged he had cheated.
Livestrong, the non-profit organisation set up by Armstrong to help those affected by cancer, said it was disappointed the American "misled" people during his career.
The Texan, who won his own battle with testicular cancer, stepped down as chairman after Usada published its findings.
"We at the Livestrong Foundation are disappointed by the news that Lance Armstrong misled people during and after his cycling career, including us," said the Livestrong statement.
"Earlier this week, Lance apologised to our staff and we accepted his apology in order to move on and chart a strong, independent course.
"We look forward to devoting our full energy to our mission of helping people not only fight and survive cancer, but also thrive in life after cancer.
"Even in the wake of our disappointment, we also express our gratitude to Lance as a survivor for the drive, devotion and spirit he brought to serving cancer patients and the entire cancer community." | Lance Armstrong's sincerity in apologising for doping offences has been questioned by the president of the World Anti-Doping Authority (Wada). | 21072339 |
The Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service is to vacate Inverness Castle and set up a new justice centre.
The Scottish government has been working with Highland Council and others to plan future uses of the site.
Most respondents to a survey carried out by the organisations want to see it turned into a free-to-enter attraction, but not a hotel.
Business Minister Fergus Ewing said there was a desire to give the castle a "wow factor".
He said ideas put forward have included using it for musical recitals and major art exhibitions, and also making it into a museum about Scottish clans and tartans.
Sittings of the High Court, sheriff courts and other hearings have been held at the landmark 19th Century property for many years.
More recently there has been a campaign to have the site transformed into a visitor attraction.
The courts service said in December last year that it plans to move its business from the castle to a new centre within three years. | People in Inverness do not want to see the city's castle turned into a hotel, according to the results of a survey. | 35505246 |
Ralph Clarke, of Erdington, Birmingham, is thought to be the oldest person convicted in British legal history.
Judge Richard Bond QC said Clarke had been guilty of "systematic abuse" between 1974 and 1983.
He was found guilty of 21 counts of abusing two girls and admitted nine charges relating to a boy during his trial at Birmingham Crown Court.
For more on this story and other Birmingham and Black Country news
The court heard the retired haulier abused the girls at his home in Holly Lane, Erdington, his garden shed, and in the cab of his truck.
The former RAF serviceman, who was born in March 1915, was given details of the sentencing by an intermediary.
Judge Bond said the passage of time did not mean abusers would escape justice.
He told Clarke: "You present as a fragile old man; however, what was plain to see was that, despite your guilty pleas, you have no remorse whatsoever."
The judge added: "Those who were sexually abused even in the distant past can rest assured that any complaint will be treated with sympathy and compassion."
The court heard Clarke is the "oldest person tried in English criminal court".
He had been able to follow proceedings because special arrangements had been made.
Passing sentence, Judge Bond said the effect of a jail term on him would be "enormous" and he would sentence in a "measured and reflective manner" due to his age and infirmity.
However, he said the case was so serious "only a lengthy sentence" was justified.
Looking pale, Ralph Clarke walked into court using his walking stick, wearing a zip-up cardigan. As Judge Bond outlined the reasons behind his sentencing, Clarke shook his head.
His victims sat with their heads bowed and were crying as the judge spoke. Many of their family members were also in tears as details were given of the "systematic abuse" they had suffered.
The court heard Clarke had been aged between 59 and 68 when he committed the offences.
Judge Bond revealed details about how the victims had been affected, which included how one said she had never felt loved or cared for and still suffered nightmares.
Another victim said it had an impact on everything she had done and contributed to the breakdown of her marriage.
Clarke's victims reported the offences to West Midlands Police in August last year after seeing Facebook posts celebrating his 100th birthday.
Clarke admitted two counts of attempting to commit a serious sexual offence, two of indecency with a child and five indecent assaults on a boy.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said Clarke's age and wellbeing were considered but the serious nature of his offences, breach of trust and vulnerability of his victims meant a "prosecution was in the public interest".
"Ralph Clarke used fear and intimidation to control the victims and sexually abuse them," a spokesman said.
The police and CPS also praised the victims' courage and bravery in bringing Clarke to justice.
The NSPCC said: "Clarke not only inflicted appalling abuse on his victims, he put them through the harrowing ordeal of a crown court trial - and did not show a shred of remorse throughout.
"This case sends out a clear message that it is never too late for survivors of abuse to speak out." | A 101-year-old man has been jailed for 13 years for committing 30 child sex offences. | 38367103 |
Mr Turnbull has confirmed that Australian warplanes were involved in Sunday's mistaken attack.
Russia called an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to discuss the strike.
The US has also expressed "regret" for the "unintentional loss of life".
It has said the attack was "halted immediately when coalition officials were informed by Russian officials that it was possible the personnel and vehicles targeted were part of the Syrian military".
Russia says the attack killed at least 62 Syrian troops fighting Islamic State and wounded 100 more.
The attack caused a bitter row between the US and Russia at the United Nations Security Council.
Speaking in New York, Mr Turnbull expressed "regret" for the deaths, confirming that "Australian aircraft were involved in the sortie that's been the subject of the recent news reporting".
"I can say that as soon as the coalition commanders were advised by the Russian command in the region that Syrian forces had been affected, that sortie was discontinued."
But he said there was "obviously a lot of politics" behind Russia's complaint at the UN, citing "contradictions" with its own actions in Syria, including the reported bombing of hospitals.
US envoy Samantha Power has accused Russia of "pulling a stunt" by calling an emergency meeting of the Security Council.
Her Russian counterpart Vitaliy Churkin said he had never seen "such an extraordinary display of American heavy-handedness".
A ceasefire deal agreed by the US and Russia went into effect in Syria last Monday, but important terms of the deal, such as the safe passage of aid, have still not been fulfilled.
The cessation of hostilities does not include attacks by the US on IS or other jihadist groups.
Russian has said the ceasefire is now in danger of collapse, and that the US would be to blame. | Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has expressed regret for the loss of life in a US-led airstrike which killed dozens of Syrian soldiers fighting the so-called Islamic State. | 37382312 |
Media playback is not supported on this device
Bas Dost headed the Dutch in front before Wales equalised as Joe Ledley struck on the rebound after Jasper Cillessen saved Joe Allen's penalty.
Arjen Robben's incisive run and shot restored Netherlands' lead but Emyr Huws' firm header made it 2-2.
Dutch captain Robben had the final say as his cool finish sealed victory.
Relive Wales v Netherlands as it happened.
Wales had lost all seven of their previous meetings with the Netherlands, conceding 21 goals and scoring just three.
And although they suffered another loss against the Oranje, an experimental Wales team produced a creditable display against a Dutch side wounded by their failure to qualify for Euro 2016.
Wales were without their talismen Gareth Bale and Aaron Ramsey for the first time since a 2-0 friendly defeat to the same opposition in June 2014.
With Hal Robson-Kanu and David Cotterill also missing, manager Chris Coleman made five changes from October's final Euro 2016 qualifying win against Andorra as he selected a new-look side that included a first start for Leicester forward Tom Lawrence.
The 21-year-old Blackburn loanee started brightly, leading Wales' attack energetically and forcing Cillessen into an early save.
This game was essentially an audition for the likes of Lawrence and midfielder Jonny Williams to secure their squad places for next summer and, although the Dutch starved Wales of possession for long periods, the pair provided convincing cases for their inclusion.
Reeling from their failure to qualify for Euro 2016, the Netherlands had earmarked this game as the start of a new era.
One of the casualties of manager Danny Blind's rebuilding process was record goalscorer Robin van Persie, who was left out of the squad.
His replacement Dost vindicated Blind's decision after half an hour, finding space at the back post to head in from Daryl Janmaat's cross despite the sprawling efforts of Wales goalkeeper Wayne Hennessey.
The Netherlands took control of the game at this point, but Wales equalised moments before half-time.
With the Dutch unable to clear a Welsh corner, Ben Davies' volley struck the arm of Terence Kongolo and referee Benoit Bastien pointed to the spot.
Allen's penalty was pushed away by Cillessen, but only as far as Ledley, who calmly side-footed the ball into the far corner.
With the draw for Euro 2016 taking place on 12 December, Wales have already been to France to inspect potential training bases as preparations gather pace.
The match against the Netherlands was an opportunity for Coleman to experiment with his squad and see how his side could cope without their leading players.
They showed resolve to come from behind twice against Netherlands, who took the lead for a second time with a trademark dribble and finish from the increasingly influential Robben.
Substitute midfielder Huws is another hoping to cement his place in Wales' squad for Euro 2016, and he enhanced his prospects with a fine header to make it 2-2 with 20 minutes left.
But it was Robben who had the final word, the Bayern Munich winger skipping through the Welsh defence before slotting the ball into the bottom corner.
The Netherlands captain was a thorn in the Welsh side, running at defenders at pace and scoring two fine goals.
Wales manager Chris Coleman: "It was a good exercise, they are a good team who have been criticised a lot (after failing to qualify for Euro 2016) but they are still have top-quality players.
"We knew it would be tough and we always want to win, but we got a lot of other things out of the game.
"We were competitive. We used our full number of six subs and were still competitive.
"We scored two goals without Bale and Ramsey, which is a big thing when you look at who was getting the goals for us in the qualification campaign.
Netherlands manager Danny Blind: "We played a good game, we played as a team but we had some problems in the first period.
"In the second half we should have scored four or five but the goals we conceded were a concern.
"It was a hard job to motivate them after we missed out on the Euros but the team were focused and put a lot of energy in the game.
"We play Germany on Tuesday and France and England in March, the big countries."
Match ends, Wales 2, Netherlands 3.
Second Half ends, Wales 2, Netherlands 3.
Jeffrey Bruma (Netherlands) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by James Collins (Wales).
Corner, Wales. Conceded by Jeffrey Bruma.
Substitution, Netherlands. Georginio Wijnaldum replaces Quincy Promes.
Substitution, Netherlands. Riechedly Bazoer replaces Jordy Clasie.
Bas Dost (Netherlands) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Foul by James Chester (Wales).
Attempt missed. Tom Lawrence (Wales) right footed shot from outside the box is too high from a direct free kick.
Jeffrey Bruma (Netherlands) is shown the yellow card for a bad foul.
Foul by Jeffrey Bruma (Netherlands).
Joe Allen (Wales) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Goal! Wales 2, Netherlands 3. Arjen Robben (Netherlands) left footed shot from the centre of the box to the bottom left corner. Assisted by Bas Dost with a through ball.
Attempt missed. Arjen Robben (Netherlands) left footed shot from the centre of the box is close, but misses to the right.
Attempt missed. George Williams (Wales) right footed shot from outside the box misses to the left. Assisted by Andy King.
Foul by Jordy Clasie (Netherlands).
Ben Davies (Wales) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Foul by Joël Veltman (Netherlands).
Tom Lawrence (Wales) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Arjen Robben (Netherlands) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Foul by James Chester (Wales).
Substitution, Wales. Owain Fon Williams replaces Wayne Hennessey.
Attempt missed. Arjen Robben (Netherlands) left footed shot from the left side of the box is too high. Assisted by Wesley Sneijder with a through ball.
Goal! Wales 2, Netherlands 2. Emyr Huws (Wales) header from the centre of the box to the bottom left corner. Assisted by Joe Allen with a cross following a corner.
Corner, Wales. Conceded by Terence Kongolo.
Foul by Jeffrey Bruma (Netherlands).
Tom Lawrence (Wales) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Substitution, Wales. Adam Henley replaces Chris Gunter.
Substitution, Wales. Paul Dummett replaces Neil Taylor.
Foul by Daley Blind (Netherlands).
Joe Allen (Wales) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Attempt missed. George Williams (Wales) right footed shot from the centre of the box misses to the left. Assisted by Tom Lawrence with a cross.
Attempt blocked. Quincy Promes (Netherlands) right footed shot from the centre of the box is blocked. Assisted by Arjen Robben.
Offside, Wales. Wayne Hennessey tries a through ball, but Tom Lawrence is caught offside.
Substitution, Wales. George Williams replaces Jonathan Williams.
Foul by Jordy Clasie (Netherlands).
Jonathan Williams (Wales) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Attempt missed. Terence Kongolo (Netherlands) left footed shot from the left side of the box misses to the right. Assisted by Quincy Promes.
Substitution, Wales. Emyr Huws replaces Joe Ledley. | Wales were dealt a setback in their preparations for Euro 2016 as they were beaten 3-2 by the Netherlands in an entertaining friendly. | 34742189 |
Pienaar, who is leaving Ulster at the end of this season, sustained the injury in the warm-up before Saturday's defeat by the Ospreys.
The South African, 33, started Saturday's contest but was forced off after 20 minutes.
Ulster's hopes of reaching the play-offs semi-finals now look remote.
Les Kiss' side are now five points behind fourth-placed Ospreys and only a huge bonus-point victory over the leaders this weekend - allied to a heavy Ospreys defeat - would see Ulster sneaking into the semi-finals.
Pienaar will round off his Ulster playing career in the game the Barbarians at Kingspan Stadium on 1 June.
Stuart Olding will miss the Leinster game after picking up a leg injury in Saturday's defeat while Charles Piutau also picked up a knock in the weekend game.
For the latest rugby union news follow @bbcrugbyunion on Twitter. | Ruan Pienaar may have played his final Pro12 game for Ulster as a back spasm means he is a doubt for Saturday's contest with Leinster. | 39769618 |
Italy's omnium winner Viviani, 27, joins Mark Cavendish and Britain's record medal winner Sir Bradley Wiggins on the start line.
Also competing are Welshman Owain Doull, Australia's Jack Bobridge and Dutch time trialist Tom Dumoulin.
The tour begins in Glasgow on Sunday 4 September at 11:00 BST and ends in London on Sunday 11. | Elia Viviani will lead Team Sky at the Tour of Britain, meaning six Olympic medallists will take part in the race. | 37228640 |
The duo have come in for Barry Ferguson, who resigned as manager last month with the Bully Wee sitting eighth in the table.
"We're both confident in our abilities and we played at a decent level," MacDonald told Clyde's website.
"I think we've got the respect of the boys and we're coming from a player background," McGovern said.
The Cumbernauld side, who are 14 points behind fourth-placed Annan Athletic, have not won a league match since November and have lost nine of their last 11 games in the division.
Defeat by Montrose in midweek saw the Bully Wee slip to ninth in the table.
"The main thing we're going to ask for is hard work, because we will structure the players in the way we think is needed," added MacDonald.
"We're asking for a willingness to change, even just for themselves, to get three points on the board."
Clyde host Forfar Athletic on league duty at Broadwood on Saturday. | League Two outfit Clyde have appointed Peter MacDonald and JP McGovern as their interim management team. | 39153145 |
Media playback is not supported on this device
The 39-year-old moved ahead of the retired Peyton Manning on the list, which includes regular and post-season games, with Brett Favre third on 199.
Brady, in his 17th season, took 264 career games to set the record, while Manning needed 293 games for his 200.
"That's what it's all about - winning," said Patriots coach Bill Belichick.
Brady, who threw a touchdown pass in Sunday's victory, is a four-time Super Bowl winner and last week became only the fifth NFL quarterback to reach 60,000 passing yards.
"He still comes to work like he hasn't accomplished anything," said Patriots cornerback Malcolm Butler.
Brady returned in October after serving a four-match suspension for his role in a scheme to deflate match balls to give his side an advantage. | Tom Brady set a new NFL record for wins by a quarterback with his 201st victory as the New England Patriots beat the Los Angeles Rams 26-10. | 38205821 |
Later the campaigners are expected to hand in a petition calling on the Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust to reconsider plans to put pathology, sterile services and IT out to tender.
The trust said the process would secure additional investment, support and expertise.
It added it would also ensure taxpayers' money was spent efficiently.
Campaigner Dr Jurg Ehmann, who works at the hospital, said: "This an NHS issue, not a local issue, and breaking up the service will just lead to increased inefficiency.
"The NHS is being completely ruined."
A Department of Health spokesman said the use of the private sector in the NHS represented 6% of its budget.
He said: "Charities, social enterprises and other providers continue to play an important role for the NHS as they have done for many years.
"By taking tough decisions, we've been able to increase the NHS budget by an extra £2 billion for the next year financial year."
Gavin Barker, a member of the trust's shadow council of governors, said: "The health service in Treliske [the Royal Cornwall Hospital] has always been about care and concern for patients and it's not about a business.
"I just do not see privatisation as the answer."
Last year, plans were announced to privatise up to £75m worth of NHS services - including outpatient appointments, follow ups and non-complex operations in cardiology, gynaecology and general surgery.
They were later abandoned after the clinical commissioning group, NHS Kernow, said procurement of the services was now not the way forward. | Dozens of people have protested outside the Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro against plans to privatise services. | 32066747 |
The video appears to show the suspect drop his pistol and fall to the ground.
It then shows a policeman shooting him at close range, before a colleague runs over and kicks him.
In August eight policemen were convicted of murder after a bystander filmed them tying a taxi driver to the back of their van and driving away.
Both incidents happened near Johannesburg.
Police attention was brought to the most recent incident after South Africa's Sunday Times newspaper published the CCTV footage.
According to the Sunday Times, the suspect attempted to rob a hardware shop in Krugersdorp, west of Johannesburg on 19 October.
The newspaper says the police, acting on a tip-off, were waiting nearby and after the suspect left the shop he fired shots at the police van.
It quotes the spokesman for the Independent Police Investigative Directorate, Robbie Raburabu, as saying the post mortem showed shots to the head, chest and arm. | Four South African police officers have been arrested on murder charges after a video emerged allegedly showing them shooting dead a suspected robber. | 34699483 |
If agreed, the Cardiff Capital Region City Deal will see £734m invested in the Metro transport scheme and £495m on other projects.
The councils - expected to contribute a total of £120m - will vote on the agreement over the next few weeks.
They will be "locked in" to the deal for five years before any can quit.
Most of the money will come from the UK and Welsh governments, with the hope that private investment will be attracted too.
Councils' contributions will be based on population, with Cardiff providing 23.7% of the local authority money.
If a council decides it wants to get out of the deal after the five-year lock-in period, it will have to give one year's notice and pay to cover certain costs and liabilities.
A regional cabinet will be created in March to develop potential projects and formulate the business plan.
It will initially spend up to £50m of UK government money.
Rhondda Cynon Taf council leader Andrew Morgan, who chairs the city deal council leaders' group, said it would bring about an "economic and social step-change" in the region.
Some Labour councillors in Cardiff told BBC Wales they were "reassured" the agreement gives councils a way out of the deal if they can't agree on projects.
But Cardiff North Conservative MP Craig Williams has said councils must see the votes as "binding". | Details of the way ten councils in south east Wales will work together on a £1.2bn investment deal have been published. | 38689782 |
Australia's second largest net provider iiNet said it had turned the servers off "as a precautionary measure" as the city experienced temperatures topping 44.4C.
It left thousands of customers offline for about six-and-a-half hours.
Many of them later took to Twitter to vent their frustration and question why the meltdown occurred.
"Our Perth data centre was subject to a partial failure of both the mains and back-up air-conditioning systems yesterday," iiNet's chief technology officer Mark Dioguardi said in a blog post.
"This, along with the extreme heat necessitated a shutdown to a portion of our servers.
"Although our plans ensured over 98% of customers remained unaffected, some customers experienced issues reconnecting to the internet," he admitted.
The net closure affected users in Western Australia, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia.
Many still managed to find a way to get on to Twitter and Facebook to complain about the issue.
The tweet below summed up the mood of many.
The UK's Internet Service Providers' Association (Ispa) told the BBC the problem was unlikely to be replicated in the UK.
"Data centres and networks are designed with resilience in mind. Whilst we wouldn't expect 44 degrees in the UK, ISPs and data centre operators are very much prepared for the unpredictable British weather," said Ispa secretary general Nicholas Lansman. | Extreme heat in the Australian city of Perth has forced one ISP to shut down servers in its data centre. | 30695534 |
The offence is a form of contempt of court, but has not been successfully prosecuted since 1931.
It is committed by publishing anything that ridicules the judiciary to the extent that it is likely to bring the administration of justice into disrepute.
The Law Commission is consulting on the law in England and Wales.
Examples of the offence include being extremely offensive to a judge, or accusing him of corruption.
It is also know as scandalising judges while in Scotland it is called "murmuring judges".
In the leading case, from 1900, a journalist was found guilty for describing a judge as an "impudent little man in horsehair, a microcosm of conceit and empty-headedness".
But the law is vague, and it is questionable whether it is compatible with the right to freedom of expression, and the European Convention on Human Rights.
There was also controversy surrounding the issue of whether there was any justification for retaining such an offence in a well-established democracy, the Law Commission said.
The consultation opens on Friday and closes on 10 October.
In May this year, former Northern Ireland secretary Peter Hain was accused of the offence after criticising a Belfast judge in his memoirs. However, the charge was dropped after he wrote to Northern Ireland Attorney General John Larkin clarifying the remarks. | The ancient offence of scandalising the court is to be reviewed to see if it is still necessary. | 19204860 |
The country still has a long way to go until it catches up with Japan, among others, but on the evidence of the conference, it is only a matter of time before robots are cooking us dinner and cleaning up afterwards too.
China is already the world's biggest market for industrial robots, according to the International Federation of Robotics.
But many analysts at the conference said the future lay with "service robots", helping out around the home and office.
Robot waiters are already a popular draw at some restaurants and tourists sights in China.
In a world of declining birth rates, robots could increasingly keep the young, and old, company.
But despite rapid catch-up, China still lags far behind Asian robot giants Korea and Japan.
The conference also hosted discussions on the opportunities - and perils - of artificial intelligence.
Robotics expert Toshio Fukuda, from Japan's Nagoya University, laughed when asked about the possibility robots might one day become our masters.
"Maybe in 30 or 40 years," he said. "But I'm not worried. I won't still be alive." | The World Robot Conference in Beijing has drawn big crowds to its showcase of "jiqiren", or "machine people", in Chinese. | 34918338 |
Anthony McSweeney, 68, abused the 15-year-old while working at Grafton Close Children's Home in Hounslow.
He assaulted the boy with his friend John Stingemore, the manager of the care home, who died before the trial.
As part of his defence, he had said he was too fat to fit a teenager on him.
McSweeney, who has been described as morbidly obese, used the defence when he denied molesting boys between 1979 and 1981.
As well indecent assault, he was also found guilty of three counts of making indecent images of children.
The priest was investigated as part of a police probe into allegations of a paedophile ring at Grafton Close.
At his sentencing at Southwark Crown Court, Judge Alistair McCreath said: "He has a voyeuristic interest in children, either in seeing them unclothed, or in seeing them sexually abused by others."
McSweeney showed no reaction.
The judge said the priest had abused his position of trust and there was no doubt the children observed by the priest had suffered sexual harm of a psychological nature.
Judge McCreath added that McSweeney posed a "high risk of serious harm" to children, via sexual assault and exploitation through sexual images.
Earlier in the trial, the priest confessed to jurors he had watched children in the shower and collected indecent videos of children.
The priest said he watched footage featuring boys as young as 10 on a home cinema with his friend John Stingemore, who died before the trial.
Prosecutor Sarah Plaschkes QC said: "This was a joint enterprise by both men, to use the victim for their own sexual gratification.
"There was grooming behaviour used against the victim - both men used the washing routine at the home as an excuse to confuse the child."
She said McSweeney had specifically targeted a "particularly vulnerable child".
Ms Placshkes said: "Not all children at the home were abused. He (the victim) was targeted because he was a vulnerable boy isolated from his family."
Police said the priest worked at Grafton on an ad hoc basis as a "helper" and the council never formally employed him.
During the trial, it emerged the Catholic Church nearly dropped him when his cleaner found sex toys, truncheons and indecent videos of teenage boys at St Peter's Catholic Church in Essex in 1998.
But after six months he was moved to a new parish, St George's, in Norwich - after he was threatened with being "banished" from the priesthood, the court heard.
TV cook Delia Smith once asked McSweeney to hold a special football service at Norwich City and he also officiated at Frank Bruno and his now ex-wife Laura's wedding. | A "voyeuristic" Catholic priest who sexually assaulted a teenage boy at a children's home in west London has been jailed for three years. | 32086627 |
Subsets and Splits
No saved queries yet
Save your SQL queries to embed, download, and access them later. Queries will appear here once saved.