International

• Friday, January 10th 2014 - 06:35 UTC

  France fines Google for ignoring local law on tracking and storing users info

  

  France's data protection watchdog has fined Google 150,000 Euros after the US search engine ignored a three-month ultimatum to bring its practices on tracking and storing user information in line with local law.

• Friday, January 10th 2014 - 06:27 UTC

  Construction of Monsanto plant in north Argentina halted on environmental grounds

  

  A labor appeals court in north-central Argentina ruled that the construction of a Monsanto plant is unconstitutional, halting work on the site. The three judge court ruled 2-1 in favor of the activists who filed a legal appeal against Monsanto’s GMO seed plant on environmental protection grounds in the municipality of Malvinas Argentinas, located in central Cordoba Province.

• Friday, January 10th 2014 - 06:22 UTC

  Safest airline is Australia's Qantas with a fatality free-record in the jet era (1951)

  

  AirlineRatings the world's safety and product rating website has announced its top ten safest airlines for 2013 from the 448 it monitors. Top of the list is Qantas which has a fatality free record in the jet era (since 1951).

• Friday, January 10th 2014 - 06:11 UTC

  Europe short of bees to pollinate crops, warns report from Reading university

  

  Europe needs an extra seven billion bees to pollinate its crops, with Britain in the poor position of having less than a quarter of the honeybees it requires. The demand for insect pollination across Europe is outpacing the growth of honeybee colonies as farmers grow more oil-bearing crops like oilseed rape and sunflowers, and also fruit.

• Thursday, January 9th 2014 - 19:00 UTC

  End of the golden age of antibiotics, which has become a 'truly global issue'

  

  The growing threat of antibiotic resistant organisms is once again in the spotlight. Prof Jeremy Farrar, the new head of Britain's biggest medical research charity the Wellcome Trust said it was a “truly global issue”. Prof. Farrar told BBC Radio 4's Today program that the golden age of antibiotics could come to an end unless action is taken.

• Thursday, January 9th 2014 - 18:45 UTC

  Violence threatens to thwart Iraqi oil resurgence

  

  By Nicholas Cunningham - A wave of violence has swept parts of Iraq at the start of 2014 as the central government fights back against Al-Qaeda aligned militants in Anbar Province. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) reportedly took control of Ramadi and Fallujah, bombing police headquarters and killing dozens.

• Thursday, January 9th 2014 - 15:03 UTC

  Active online poll from “The Telegraph” shows Falklands should be under Argentine sovereignty

  

  According to an active online poll released in the British newspaper “The Daily Telegraph”, a clear majority, almost double, of the voters affirmed that the Falklands Islands should be under Argentina’s sovereignty. Almost half the majority of respondents rejected the idea and supported Britain, while the rest answered that the territory should be under “shared sovereignty.”

• Thursday, January 9th 2014 - 07:05 UTC

  Police acted lawfully when they shot a man whose death triggered London's 2011 rioting

  

  British inquest found that police acted lawfully when they shot and killed a man whose death sparked a wave of rioting in 2011 in the worst civil unrest in the country in decades. Mark Duggan, 29, died after he was shot by police who suspected he was armed at the time.

• Wednesday, January 8th 2014 - 21:21 UTC

  Visit Britain thinks Germans are rude, Australians intolerant and Russians cold

  

  VisitBritain, the UK government’s agency with a budget of nearly £30 million a year and tasked with bringing as many visitors to the UK as possible, releases a detailed inside guide on tourists from most destinations for use by British hoteliers and operators.

• Wednesday, January 8th 2014 - 20:59 UTC

  Gibraltar/La Linea unions and business groups call for free flow of persons across the border

  

  Gibraltarian and Spanish unions and business organizations on Tuesday called on their respective governments to act and implement measures that will guarantee the free flow of persons across the border. In a memorandum that will be sent to the European Commission and the European Parliament, the cross-border group expressed its “absolute aversion” to the current situation at the frontier, reports the Gibraltar Chronicle.