International

• Friday, October 10th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Teeming biodiversity in ocean volcanoes off SE Australia

  

  CSIRO's Wealth from Oceans Flagship team has discovered hundreds of new marine species and dozens of undersea mountains, in a project to monitor the Commonwealth Marine Reserve Network off southern Tasmania.

• Friday, October 10th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Russian and eBay solutions for bankrupt Iceland

  

  In a surprise move, which reverberated across the international community, Russia issued a four billion Euro state loan to Iceland. The statement on Russia's central bank website reads that the loan maturing in three-four years and an interest rate as low as 30-50 basis points above Libor has been given the green light by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

• Friday, October 10th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Nobel Peace for “mediator” and sponsor of Kosovo

  

  The Norwegian Nobel Committee announced on Friday the award of the Nobel Peace Prize for 2008 to former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari for his important efforts, on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts.

• Friday, October 10th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Flurry of meetings to calm markets and unfreeze credit

  Finance ministers from leading industrialised nations have pledged action to tackle the financial crisis after a torrid week on stock markets. The G7 nations said they would take “decisive action and use all available tools”, after a meeting in Washington.
  
  They issued a five-point plan aimed at unfreezing the flow of credit.

• Friday, October 10th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  G-7: situation calls for “urgent and exceptional action”

  The Group of Seven finance ministers and central governors released on Friday, following their meeting in Washington, the following plan of action to address financial disruptions

• Thursday, October 9th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  IMF ready for the rescue with seven recommendations

  

  The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has activated an emergency finance mechanism to help countries hit by the financial crisis. IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Khan said the lending procedure would allow the IMF to react quickly to support countries facing funding problems.

• Wednesday, October 8th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  UN sponsored accord to protect manatees, whales and dolphins

  Dolphins, small whales and manatees living in the waters off West Africa or islands in the mid-Atlantic Ocean will now receive greater protection after 15 countries signed an agreement under a United Nations-backed treaty that aims to conserve wildlife and habitats.

• Wednesday, October 8th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Great Britain announces bank rescue plan

  

  The British government has announced plans to partially nationalise the country's major banks, in a package using up to £50bn ($87.5bn) of taxpayers' money.

• Wednesday, October 8th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Google 24 hour tool tracks endangered ocean habitats

  

  Conservationists working with Google Inc. have unveiled a tool that lets people view protected marine areas with the click of a mouse, a bid to harness the Internet's top search engine to raise awareness of endangered ocean habitats.

• Wednesday, October 8th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Oil below 90 USD prompts OPEC emergency meeting

  

  OPEC is consulting on whether to hold an emergency meeting on November 18 to discuss the impact of the global financial crisis on the oil market, Libya's top oil official said on Wednesday.