General news

• Morgan Schneiderlin alerts clubs as he closes in on Southampton exit

  24-06-2015 23:59
  
  • French midfielder believes he will reach a deal in coming days
  • Manchester United, Arsenal and Tottenham interested in player
  Morgan Schneiderlin is close to reaching a deal which would allow him to leave Southampton. The 25-year-old French defensive midfielder has been linked with a big money summer move away from St Mary’s Stadium, with Manchester United, Arsenal and Tottenham all reported to be possible destinations.Schneiderlin, who joined the Saints from Strasbourg in June 2008, wa
  
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• Michael Clarke’s Australia arrive for Ashes overshadowed by support act | Mike Selvey

  24-06-2015 23:59
  
  England’s battles with New Zealand could end up as the home side’s best moments of the summer but the Ashes is set to be harder fought than predictedThe Black Caps are returning home, most of them anyway, and they can carry with them our thanks for invigorating not just the first part of the summer but for their part in revitalising the whole culture of cricket in this country. The cricket they and England have played has been compelling all the way through, from the first Test match at Lord
  
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• Broken right arm costs Rhys Ruddock place in Ireland World Cup squad

  24-06-2015 23:51
  
  • Leinster flanker suffered the injury playing for Emerging Ireland
  • He had fractured same arm only six months before in European gameRhys Ruddock has been left out of Ireland’s World Cup squad after breaking his right arm for the second time in six months. The 24-year-old Leinster flanker sustained the injury while captaining Emerging Ireland against Uruguay.Ireland’s head coach, Joe Schmidt, confirmed that Ruddock, who missed the Six Nations after fracturing the arm during Leinster’
  
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• Alberto Salazar Q&A: Has Mo Farah's coach now cleared his name?

  24-06-2015 23:49
  
  Q. Does Salazar’s opus definitively prove his athletes were not doping?
  
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• Alberto Salazar: Plenty of words but throwing open records would say more

  24-06-2015 23:43
  
  The attention to detail was so relentless and fastidious that you can see precisely what leads Mo Farah to such unstinting devotion to the man who has turned him into a winner. We had waited three weeks for any sign of a defence from Alberto Salazar and these near 12,000 words were true to his reputation.
  
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• Nearly 80 per cent of British managers think 'over-politeness' could be costing their business money

  24-06-2015 23:36
  
  Research has revealed that the majority of British managers think that their over-politeness could be costing their organisation money.
  
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• Bend It Like Beckham: The Musical, Phoenix Theatre, First Night review: Joyous and refreshing revival of Gurinder Chadha's film

  24-06-2015 23:30
  This is the most irresistibly joyous musical-theatre make-over of a much-loved movie since Billy Eliot. It does more for genuine Girl Power in the span of an evening than an eternity of Viva Forever! (the short-lived Spice Girls juke-box venture) could have achieved.
  
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• Cancer teen weds days before death

  24-06-2015 23:25 via bbc.co.uk
  
  A terminally ill teenager marries his school sweetheart three days before dying from leukaemia.
  
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• Charlie McCoy interview: From Bob Dylan to Johnny Cash, the session man has played with the biggest names in pop

  24-06-2015 23:20
  Pick a landmark recording from the past 50 years of popular music and the chances are that Charlie McCoy has blown up a harmonica storm, shaded in a guitar fill, or even added a dab of sax, somewhere within its grooves.
  
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• Queen Elizabeth charms Europe's 'summit queen' on eve of EU negotiation

  24-06-2015 23:07
  
  By Erik Kirschbaum and Guy Faulconbridge BERLIN/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - On the eve of Britain's bid to renegotiate its European Union membership, Queen Elizabeth charmed Germany's Angela Merkel, Europe's most powerful leader, who Prime Minister David Cameron hopes will help him strike an EU reform deal. Cameron, who won an unexpectedly decisive victory in a national election last month, has promised to recast Britain's relationship with the 28-member bloc and hold a referendum o
  
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• Queen Elizabeth says must guard against division in Europe

  24-06-2015 23:05
  
  Queen Elizabeth urged Europe on Wednesday to guard against division in the continent, at a state banquet in Berlin where Germany's president declared: "the European Union needs Great Britain". On the first full day of her visit to Germany, the queen said she and German President Joachim Gauck had seen "the worst but also the best" of Europe in their lifetimes, adding: "we must work hard to maintain the benefits of the post-war world." The 89-year-old queen, now
  
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• New government programme is parachuting super heads into 'coasting' schools

  24-06-2015 23:00
  
  Superhead Craig D'Cunha is busy tackling classroom discipline at the school he has been tasked with turning around. If a pupil receives two formal warnings about bad behaviour they are taken out of a lesson, their parents are contacted and there is a discussion between teacher and pupil about why they have been removed. The strategy is working. "We've had a significant improvement in behaviour," says D'Cunha, adding: "Basically, it's about keeping the kids in the classroom at all costs. They ca
  
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• Others 'targeted like Ronan Hughes'

  24-06-2015 22:53 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Police are investigating claims that a number of people in Northern Ireland are being targeted by international crime gangs in the same way as schoolboy Ronan Hughes.
  
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• England U21 1-3 Italy U21

  24-06-2015 22:44 via bbc.co.uk
  
  England Under-21s' European Championship comes to an end in the group stages as they lose 3-1 against Italy.
  
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• Crowdfunding is growing up - but with great power comes responsibility

  24-06-2015 22:30
  
  In 2012, Emilie Holmes needed money to kit out her 1970s Citroen H van, and she needed it fast. With grand ideas for the old truck – she wanted to transform it into a travelling tea shop – she signed up as one of Kickstarter's first UK projects and raised £14,500 in five days, which was 45 per cent more than her target.
  
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• EU reform tops Cameron-Merkel talks

  24-06-2015 21:53 via bbc.co.uk
  
  David Cameron travels to Berlin talks on EU reform and other issues with Angela Merkel, ahead of an EU summit.
  
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• The Confederate banner isn't the only flag to cause controversy

  24-06-2015 21:50
  
  They are supposed to unite, but all too often flags become symbols of division. And for a piece of cloth, they certainly can induce charged responses. People rally together behind flags, burn flags, even die for them. They can represent notorious pasts and disrespectful claims. So the mounting pressure to withdraw the Confederate battle flag across the US doesn't come as a surprise. South Carolina lawmakers have requested that it be removed from the state house, insisting that it does not repre
  
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• Alberto Salazar denies all doping allegations in lengthy open letter on Oregon Project website

  24-06-2015 21:42
  
  Athletics coach Alberto Salazar has posted a lengthy open letter online addressing the accusations of doping and performance-enhancing drug use amongst his athletes.
  
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• Israel's far right seeks to cripple human rights groups which monitor government and army abuses in the Occupied Territories

  24-06-2015 21:35
  Questions about Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government’s commitment to democracy have intensified with the reintroduction of a bill designed to cripple the Israeli human rights groups that monitor government and army practices in the Occupied Territories.
  
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• A leap second will be added to time next week but watch out - chaos may ensue

  24-06-2015 21:30
  
  July will be late this year, because the last minute of June will have 61 seconds. In the unlikely event that you are awake as midnight (GMT) approaches next Tuesday, and looking closely at an atomic clock, you might even notice it. While 23:59 and 59 seconds normally turns to 00:00:00 – midnight – a strange additional second will make the time 23:59:60.
  
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• Britain to step up training of Ukrainian armed forces

  24-06-2015 21:29
  
  Britain said on Wednesday it would step up its training programme for Ukraine's armed forces as they battle pro-Russian separatist fighters in the east of the country. Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said Britain would announce at a NATO meeting with Ukraine on Thursday plans to double spending on the training to around 6 million pounds ($9.4 million). "We are doubling up our training of Ukrainian forces.
  
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• Queen speaks of need for unity

  24-06-2015 21:28
  
  The Queen has spoken of the need for unity in Europe and how the continent must strive to "maintain the benefits of the post-war world" in an speech to Germany and Britain's leaders.
  
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• Fracking: Decision on Lancashire shale gas site postponed amid extraordinary legal row

  24-06-2015 21:23
  
  A decision on whether or not to approve the UK’s first fracking site has been postponed amid an extraordinary legal row.
  
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• Queen: 'Division In Europe Is Dangerous'

  24-06-2015 21:22
  
  The Queen has warned about the dangers of division in Europe, as leaders grapple with the Greece crisis and the UK Prime Minister seeks reforms before a referendum. At a state banquet at the Bellevue Palace, the home of Germany's President Joachim Gauck, Her Majesty used her only speech of the state visit to talk about her thoughts on a united Europe. "We know that division in Europe is dangerous and that we must guard against it in the West as well as in the East of our continent.
  
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• Charles Darwin Disney film: Adventure movie will give naturalist the Indiana Jones treatment

  24-06-2015 21:15
  
  He is generally remembered as a bearded, balding, rather grandfatherly figure. But Charles Darwin looks set to be given the Indiana Jones treatment after Disney bought the rights to an adventure film based on his life.
  
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• Juncker names British EU veteran to steer UK negotiations

  24-06-2015 21:05
  
  EU chief executive Jean-Claude Juncker appointed one of the most senior Britons in Brussels to head a task force dealing with reforms demanded by Prime Minister David Cameron to keep Britain in the European Union. In a sign of the European Commission gearing up to negotiate with London ahead of a British referendum on whether to leave the bloc, Juncker named veteran EU administrator Jonathan Faull to the role on Wednesday as part of a shake-up of top posts that saw the Irish head of the civil se
  
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• Beware the four horsemen circling Europe: Greece, Russia, migrants and the Brexit

  24-06-2015 21:03
  
  Four horsemen are stalking Europe: the Greek financial crisis; illegal migration in the Mediterranean; Russian aggression; and Britain's reform-or-Brexit threat. Any of these could dominate the EU summit agenda: each could alter the fundamental character of the Union.
  
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• California judge strikes down measure calling for the killing of gays

  24-06-2015 21:00
  
  California’s attorney general has been told to ignore an initiative that called for the execution of anyone who engages in gay sex acts.
  
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• California judge strikes down measure calling for the killing of gay people

  24-06-2015 21:00
  
  California’s attorney general has been told to ignore an initiative that called for the execution of anyone who engages in gay sex acts.
  
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• Sleaford Mods: Boris Johnson, David Gandy and Russell Brand all come under attack in post-punk duo's new album Key Markets

  24-06-2015 21:00
  You’re nobody in public life until you have been soundly insulted by Sleaford Mods, the post-punk poets of the underclass. In which case Boris Johnson, Ed Miliband, Blur and model David Gandy should be flattered after coming under sustained verbal attack from the duo on their new album.
  
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• Homesickness in the modern age: Does technology make you feel better or worse?

  24-06-2015 21:00
  
  I'm standing outside a cottage in the Vienna woods. It's where I used to live when I was 22, and this is the first time I've been back since I left 10 years ago. The roads are steep here, and, as I walk up the hill from the tram stop, the slope feels reassuringly familiar. I recognise the ache in the back of my legs that tells me I am nearly there.
  
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• Alabama governor orders Confederate flags removed from Capitol grounds

  24-06-2015 20:58
  
  Alabama Governor Robert Bentley has ordered the removal of four Confederate battle flags from the grounds of the Capitol building.
  
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• Queen 'could move out of palace'

  24-06-2015 20:52 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The Queen may have to move out of Buckingham Palace temporarily to allow maintenance work costing £150m to be carried out, royal officials say.
  
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• Migrant crisis: Humanitarian groups urge leaders to put human lives ahead of politics instead of locking down 'Fortress Europe'

  24-06-2015 20:49
  European leaders debating migration in Brussels today must put human lives before short-term political goals, politicians and humanitarian groups have urged, cautioning against simply reinforcing borders and freezing out the world’s most needy refugees.
  
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• 40-year-old meat seized in China during nationwide smuggling crackdown

  24-06-2015 20:49
  
  Chinese officials have seized more than 100,000 tonnes of smuggled meat, some of which is more than 40 years old, in a major nationwide crackdown.
  
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• 100,000 tonnes of meat, some of it 40 years old, seized in China during smuggling crackdown

  24-06-2015 20:49
  
  Chinese officials have seized more than 100,000 tonnes of smuggled meat, some of which is more than 40 years old, in a major nationwide crackdown.
  
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• Two Met Police officers arrested over alleged corrupt links to businessmen

  24-06-2015 20:34
  
  Scotland Yard’s anti-corruption squad has arrested two police officers on suspicion of corrupt links to central London businessmen.
  
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• Donald Macintyre's Sketch: Amal Clooney drops in to chamber but wheelchairs are not welcome

  24-06-2015 20:28
  
  Two busy celebrities found time to drop into the Commons for Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday. One seemed wholly absorbed in the proceedings, watching closely as Harriet Harman interrogated David Cameron. That was George Clooney’s lawyer wife, Amal, sitting in the peers’ gallery, who was in town to press the case of the deposed Maldives president.
  
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• Crackdown on social media piracy

  24-06-2015 20:22
  
  Officers have taken down thousands of Facebook listings and seized dangerous goods in a crackdown on social media counterfeiting and piracy.
  
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• English Labour Party could be on its way, says former policy chief

  24-06-2015 20:22
  
  An “English Labour Party” could be launched next month, according to Jon Cruddas, who was Ed Miliband’s policy chief.
  
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• Briefing 'no criticism of Scotland'

  24-06-2015 20:13
  
  The keeper of the Privy Purse has insisted a briefing on royal accounts was "never intended to be a criticism of Scotland" after it was claimed that the Scottish Government could cut its contribution to the British monarchy if plans for further devolution go ahead.
  
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• Dzhokhar Tsarnaev apologizes to victims, survivors of Boston Marathon bombing before getting death sentence

  24-06-2015 20:13
  
  Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has apologized to the victims and survivors of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing before he officially was sentenced to death.
  
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• Will the death of a bricklayer and father of six finally make Brazil face up to its policing problems?

  24-06-2015 20:09
  
  When Amarildo de Souzawent missing from Rio de Janeiro’s biggest favela after being questioned by police, the case rocked the city’s efforts to bring peace to its most troubled communities.
  
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• Andy McSmith's Diary: Streetwise Cameron manages – at last – to get down with the kids

  24-06-2015 20:01
  
  David Cameron decided to try to look like he was down with the kids at Prime Minister’s Questions, and this time nothing went wrong.
  
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• Lovebirds avoid flying blind spots

  24-06-2015 20:00
  
  Lovebirds rotate their heads at lightning fast speeds to avoid blind spots when making rapid turns in flight, research has shown.
  
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• Glowing coral may help cancer fight

  24-06-2015 20:00
  
  Coral which glows with a rainbow of colours despite being found in deep water reefs could be used to help trace cancer cells, according to scientists.
  
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• Essential vitamin linked to acne

  24-06-2015 20:00
  
  Vitamin B12 may be an underlying cause of acne, new research has shown.
  
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• Saliva test hope for mouth cancers

  24-06-2015 20:00
  
  Saliva tests may provide a new way of diagnosing mouth cancers, new research has shown.
  
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• Crab named after deep-sea biologist

  24-06-2015 20:00
  
  The first species of yeti crab from the hydrothermal vent systems of Antarctica has been named after a British deep-sea biologist.
  
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• Queen baffled by 'royal-blue' horse

  24-06-2015 20:00
  
  The Queen appeared a little bemused by a blue pony in a painting presented to her by Germany's president and declared "That's a funny colour for a horse".
  
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