The government has lost its appeal against a first-tier tax tribunal decision.
The tax authority had argued that payments made to players and other employees should be taxable.
The Murray Group, which formerly owned Rangers, argued they were loans.
The first-tier tribunal (FTT) had issued a 2-1

The former leader of the Alliance party Lord Alderdice has criticised plans contained in the "Fresh Start" deal.

Article: The court had said in 2013 that whole-life sentences breached human rights because it was not clear if there was the chance of a review of such cases.
Judges have now said this is not the case with murderer Arthur Hutchinson, who challenged his whole-life sentence.
The UK was considered to be in line with human rights laws, they added.
The European court had previously said there had to be the possibility of a review at some stage and that current laws allowing for release in exceptional circumstances were unclear.
The Court of Appeal in the UK then said in 2014 that the law in England and Wales "is clear as to 'possible exceptional release of whole-life prisoners'".
It said the justice secretary had the power to release a prisoner on licence if they were satisfied exceptional circumstances existed that justified it on compassionate grounds.
The Strasbourg-based court ruled that in Hutchinson's case there had been no violation of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which relates to inhuman and degrading treatment.
The judges said in a written ruling: "In the circumstances of this case where, following the Grand Chamber's judgment in which it expressed doubts about the clarity of domestic law, the national court has specifically addressed those doubts and set out an unequivocal statement of the legal position, the court must accept the national court's interpretation of domestic law."
The ruling is perhaps more significant politically than it is legally.
In 2013, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights ruled that whole-life sentences passed on the most heinous murderers were incompatible with human rights and amounted to inhuman and degrading treatment. The reason was the lack of a proper review and so the lack of hope, however remote, of eventual release.
That caused political ructions. It was cited by the Conservatives in proposals published last year to scrap the Human Rights Act in favour of a British Bill of Rights and to ensure that Parliament was not bound by Strasbourg...

Summary: British courts do have the right to impose whole-life tariffs on prisoners who are jailed for life, the European Court of Human Rights has ruled.
###
Article: The problem should not occur, as fracking typically involves drilling more than a mile underground - far deeper than the water-bearing rocks (aquifers) from which we get our water supplies.
But another possibility of contamination occurs where the drill hole goes through the water-bearing rock.
If the borehole is not properly cased to stop leaks, the fracking water can escape into the aquifer.
This happened a lot in the early days of fracking in the USA.
Other problems can occur if the frackers drill horizontally too close to water-bearing rocks.
This is now considered bad practice, although it also happened in the USA, where small risk-taking companies pioneered fracking techniques before big operators took over.
Some areas have complained about high levels of the carcinogen benzene in underground water supplies as a result. In the UK, the Environment Agency says only chemicals non-toxic at small concentrations may be used.
The other possibility of pollution is when the water, which is mixed with chemicals and sand for the fracking process, comes back to the surface. It can be contaminated with heavy metals and radioactivity.
This wastewater needs to be contained in tanks before being disposed of or - preferably - cleaned up to re-use for more fracking.
The UK government has decided that with proper regulations, contamination of water from shale gas production should be avoided - and permission granted to start fracking.
We asked readers to send questions as the government gave the go-ahead to fracking in Lancashire.
The most popular questions were in relation to water, and Tim Glover asked: "Does fracking affect the water supply?"
Fracking has long been a controversial issue.
In 2011, all fracking was suspended in the UK after it was believed to have caused earthquakes near Blackpool.
The ban was lifted in 2012, but campaigners have continued to voice their opposition.
Pollyanna Steiner, from Friends of the Earth, said: "Fracking goes against everything we need to do to tackle climate change.
"The...

Summary: Fracking can contaminate water supplies if it is not done properly, because the fracking fluid injected into rock to enable gas to be released often contains chemicals.
###
Article: Upper tier tribunal judge Lord Doherty dismissed the appeal against a first-tier tax tribunal decision but referred several issues back to the panel.
The tax authority had argued that payments made to players and other employees should be taxable.
The Murray Group, which formerly owned Rangers, argued they were loans.
The first-tier tribunal (FTT) had issued a 2-1 majority verdict in November 2012 which favoured, in principle, the Murray Group and ordered that HMRC's Â£46.2m demands, about three-quarters of which referred to the liquidated club, be "reduced substantially".
The upper-tier appeal has largely upheld that verdict but some payments will be re-examined by the original tribunal, including termination and "guaranteed bonus" payments.
However, the Murray Group appeared to secure an additional victory relating to payments made to several people including former Ibrox chairman Sir David Murray, which it argued were not special cases.
The judgement, which has no impact on the current Rangers owners, reads: "The appeal is dismissed except in so far as it relates to the termination payments.
"I shall remit the case to the FTT with a direction to allow the taxpayers' appeals against the assessments relating to the payments to the sub-trusts of Sir David Murray, his sons, Mr McClelland and Mr MacMillan; to proceed as accords in relation to the termination payments, the payments in respect of guaranteed bonuses, and any related questions of grossing up.
"Standing my findings and my disposal, the remit should be to the FTT as originally constituted."
It is unclear how many termination payments were made but the FTT's decision referred to five "guaranteed bonus" payments.
In a statement, a spokesman for Murray International Holdings (MIH) expressed satisfaction with the ruling but said there were no winners.
He said: "We are pleased with the judgement which again leaves negligible tax liability and overwhelmingly supports the views collectively and consistently held by our advisers, legal counsel and MIH...

Summary: HM Revenue and Customs has lost its appeal over Rangers' use of Employee Benefit Trusts (EBTs) - the so-called "Big Tax Case".
###
Article: Lord Alderdice said proposals for a new international body to monitor paramilitary activity would have "much less power" than the panel he sat on.
He was a member of the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) which operated from 2004 to 2011.
The Liberal Democrat peer said the new body would only be able to produce a few proposals for the Executive.
"Which will then fall into disagreement about how they should be implemented," he said.
Lord Alderdice spoke on Tuesday's debate on the Northern Ireland Welfare Reform Bill in the House of Lords.
The former Church of Ireland primate Archbishop Robin Eames also used the debate to express his disappointment that the "Fresh Start" deal did not include any agreement on the legacy of the troubles.
Lord Eames, who was co-chair of a consultative group on the past, told peers he was well aware of the "desperate plight" of troubles' victims.
He urged the government to publish the legacy papers prepared during the inter-party negotiations, arguing that the victims "deserve nothing less".
Lord Eames expressed the hope that legacy issues might yet be tackled, adding that "perhaps the situation is not as bleak as it seems".
The government spokesman, Lord Dunlop, said the establishment of a new monitoring body to assess the impact of paramilitary activity on local communities is "a crucial part" of the "Fresh Start" deal.
Lord Dunlop said the government regretted the fact that an agreement on legacy issues could not be reached, and remained committed to continuing to work to build a consensus.

Summary:


The UK government has announced a new £1.5m fund to help small businesses in Scotland to develop new products and services.
The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) will provide up to £1.5m to help small businesses in Scotland to develop new products and services.
The SFC will also provide

New rules are urgently needed to protect the open seas, scientists have warned.

Article: They will include Aberfeldy-based furniture maker Angus Ross, Edinburgh designer Jennifer Gray and Fife-based creative studio Tom Pigeon.
Others taking part will be Linlithgow's Method Studio, Glasgow's Scotland Re:Designed and Scottish silversmiths.
National body, Craft Scotland, has arranged a showcase event for Ross and Gray.
Ross' products included the Unstable Stool, which is made from a single length of wood which is steamed and then bent into shape. The design was shortlisted for The Wood Awards in 2009.
Gray's jewellery has included a bracelet made to mark 20 years since the creation of Dolly the Sheep, a cloned sheep created at the Roslin Institute just outside Edinburgh.

Summary: Scottish makers are to exhibit their work at London Craft Week, which opens on Wednesday.
###
Article: Peers amended the legislation paving the way for the in-out poll, due before 2018, to lower the voting age.
But the move was overturned in a Commons vote, by 303 votes to 253 - a government majority of 50.
The government said it would be wrong to alter the "tried and tested" general election franchise for a single poll.
But Labour, the SNP and Lib Dems all favour allowing 16 and 17-year-olds - who were allowed to take part in last year's referendum on Scottish independence - to vote on whether to remain in the EU.
Labour's shadow foreign secretary, Hilary Benn, said the government's decision to block the move was "wrong-headed and unfair".
Speaker John Bercow certified that the changes proposed by the House of Lords were covered by "financial privilege" rules, because the government had estimated that it would cost about Â£6m to implement.
These rules can be used by the House of Commons "as grounds for overruling any House of Lords proposal that has cost implications".
But BBC assistant political editor Norman Smith said Labour peers still hoped to force the government to lower the voting age, and would table a fresh motion that did not fall foul of the rules, on Monday.
No date has been set for the referendum, but David Cameron has promised to hold it by the end of 2017.

Summary: MPs have rejected an attempt by the House of Lords to give 16 and 17-year-olds a vote in the planned referendum on Britain's EU membership.
###
Article: We'd been waiting for that. What we did not expect was for him to shoot off across the next 200 metres like a sprinter. We ran behind him, stumbling on the uneven surface.
Mr Gupta darted towards an unmanned railway crossing and waving his red flag, quickly shut and locked the gate there. Then he turned towards the train and waved the green flag.
The train moved forward, passed the locked gate - and stopped again. Mr Gupta opened the gate and raced back to the driver's cabin, with us closely behind. He could do this up to 16 times over a distance of 68km (42 miles), on a one-way journey.
"It's what I do. I'm the mobile gatekeeper," he says.
Some 11,500 of the more than 30,000 railway crossings in India are unmanned. Nearly 40% of train-related accidents and two-thirds of deaths on railway tracks - usually happens when people are crossing them - take place at these unmanned crossings.
The railways' response has been to shut down as many unmanned crossings as it can rather than staff them with gatekeepers. Or to create 'mobile gatekeepers' like Mr Gupta to do the work of many.
We are travelling on the crowded Dhamtari passenger train in the central state of Chhattisgarh.
The slow narrow gauge train is better known as the "labour train" for it ferries hundreds of migrant workers from nearby villages to the state capital, Raipur, in search of work.
It's a nine-station journey from Dhamtari to Telibandha, the last narrow gauge stop in Raipur. Only two or three of some 19 railway gates on the route are manned.
"My job is to open and shut the gates. I enjoy my work," says Mr Gupta, who earns less than 20,000 rupees ($331; Â£205) a month.
"Earlier there used to be permanent gatekeepers for these crossings, but now I have been appointed as the mobile gatekeeper. I used to lay and maintain railway tracks, but I was promoted to this position two years ago."
In the early stations on the route, a "mobile gatekeeper" can board one of the rear coaches after seeing the train through at one of the railway gates.
With the...

Summary: When Kanhaiyalal Gupta jumped off from the engine driver's cabin with a pair of red and green flags in his hands, we got off the slowing train too.
###
Article: A report to a UN ocean conference in New York points out that more than 60% of the ocean has no rules because it’s outside national jurisdiction.
It says the open ocean is at risk from climate change, over-fishing, deep sea mining, farm pollution and plastics.
The authors say one area – the Bay of Bengal - is at a tipping point which could impact on global fish stocks.
The report was commissioned to inform delegates preparing a UN resolution on governance of the open ocean.
Representatives in New York are preparing a text that could cover everything from establishing marine protected areas to distributing the benefits of valuable biotech products generated from the seas.
One of the report’s authors, Prof Alex Rogers from Oxford University, told BBC News: “This is very, very important. A lot of states are looking towards developing industrial activities in the ocean – fishing, deep-sea mining, renewable energy… even aquaculture offshore.
“It’s really vital that we come to some international agreement on how to protect or manage biodiversity on high seas in the face of all these pressures.”
The UN is focusing discussion on three areas:
Together they are categorised under a new UN acronym – BBNJ. That’s Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction.
Prof Rogers’ report is a review of new science over the past five years. He says he realises how little is known about some essential ocean processes, and mentions the Bay of Bengal issue as a source of great concern.
The issue there is nitrogen, which performs an positive role in fertilising algae at the bottom of the food chain, but can also have negative effects if there’s too much of it in the water.
At the moment, nitrogen fertilisers in the Bay of Bengal are running off farmland and over-fertilising algae. This in turn encourages bacteria, which capture oxygen. Slowly marine life in the area disappears.
But the Bay of Bengal is now on the verge of going one destructive stage more.
The report says if oxygen levels decrease further as a result of run-off or...

Summary:

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A man who was found dead in a care home in Cambridgeshire has been named as a "carer" of a woman who died in hospital.
The man, who is believed to be in his late 20s, was found in a bedroom at the home in Eynesbury, near St Neots

A man charged with murdering his wife at a care home has died before his court case could be heard.

Article: He was found guilty of bribery, abuse of power and "intentionally disclosing national secrets", China's official Xinhua news agency reports.
Until his retirement in 2012, Zhou was one of China's most powerful men.
He was put under investigation one year later as part of President Xi Jinping's major anti-corruption campaign.
State TV showed a clip of Zhou, 72, pleading guilty at a closed-door trial in the northern city of Tianjin. When responding to the judge, he said he would not launch an appeal.
"I've realised the harm I've caused to the party and the people. I plead guilty and I regret my crimes," he said.
BBC China editor Carrie Gracie: Power politics exposed by fall of security boss
How China is reacting
The verdict caught many people off guard.
It was expected that Zhou Yongkang's trial would be played out for the Chinese public; his failings strung out for every citizen to see.
In similar high-profile cases, like that of Zhou's protege, Bo Xilai, the foreign and Chinese media were given 48 hours' notice that Bo's trial would begin. Reporters camped outside the courthouse for days, breathlessly waiting for updates.
In March, the head of China's Supreme People's Court had promised that Zhou Yongkang's trial would be "open in accordance with the law". The trial was set to take place in the eastern port city of Tianjin. It seemed Zhou was set to follow Bo's pattern. Like other senior officials convicted of serious crimes, it was expected he would receive a suspended death sentence.
Months passed without any word. Some guessed that Zhou Yongkang was not co-operating with prosecutors. Others believed that his crimes were too much of an embarrassment for the government.
After all, Zhou Yongkang had held a seat at the very top of the Chinese government pyramid. If he was thoroughly corrupt, some in China might ask whether others at the top were rotten too.
In the end, the decision to keep Zhou Yongkang's trial secret matches the case surrounding him, and Zhou's own public persona: inaccessible and...

Summary: China's ex-security chief Zhou Yongkang has been jailed for life - the most senior politician to face corruption charges under Communist rule.
###
Article: The UK doctors told the Lancet Oncology there was now enough proof the hard-and-fast treatment worked just as well and did not cause more side-effects.
For a patient, the new regime would mean 17 fewer trips to hospital.
Nationally, it would free more than 150,000 visits, saving the NHS tens of millions of pounds each year.
Prostate cancer makes up more than a quarter of the workload of UK radiotherapy departments, and many cancer centres are already making savings by following the new regime
Prof David Dearnaley and his team, from the Institute of Cancer Research and the Royal Marsden Hospital, say others should do the same.
They estimate about 10,000 men a year could benefit from the new treatment regime.
The treatment is given over four weeks instead of seven and a half, and uses higher doses of radiation to zap the prostate gland and kill the cancer.
Studies in thousands of men suggest giving 20 high doses for a month is as effective as giving 37 standard doses over two months.
Prof Dearnaley said: "There are no losers with this. Everybody wins - the NHS and patients."
The work was part-funded by the Department of Health and Cancer Research UK.
Prof Arnie Purushotham, of Cancer Research UK, said: "It is clear that this is safe and effective, so it is now up to the NHS to ensure all men who are suitable are offered this treatment immediately."

Summary: The NHS could save money and patients' time by giving fewer but stronger doses of radiotherapy treatment for prostate cancer, say experts.
###
Article: Toby Perkins, who is leading Liz Kendall's leadership campaign, said it suggested a "paucity of intellectual argument" on behalf of Ms Goodman.
Labour needed a serious debate about its future direction, he said.
Ms Cooper, Ms Kendall, Jeremy Corbyn and Andy Burnham are all vying to become Ed Miliband's successor.
The winner of the contest will be announced on 12 September, ahead of the party's autumn conference.
In an article for Huffington Post, Ms Goodman, shadow media minister and Bishop Auckland MP, set out why she would be supporting Yvette Cooper's candidacy.
She said that being a parent to two children was "much more important" than her political career.
"That's why I'm backing Yvette Cooper to be the next Leader of the Labour Party. As a working mum, she understands the pressures on modern family life," she wrote.
Ms Goodman added: "We need a leader who knows what challenges ordinary people face day to day, and who is committed to helping them."
Asked about her comments Mr Perkins told BBC2's Daily Politics programme he was "disappointed" by the article.
"The idea that you say 'because one of the candidates is a mother they are the one that you should back' suggests a paucity of intellectual argument that the Labour Party really should have moved beyond," he said.
Mr Perkins said Labour suffered its worst electoral performance since 1983 at the general election.
The idea that the party could "go back to the electorate with the same programme but get a different outcome is intellectually bankrupt".

Summary: Helen Goodman's decision to back Yvette Cooper as the next Labour leader because she is a "working mum" has been criticised by a rival's campaign chief.
###
Article: Brendon Constant, 87, was accused of smothering his 86-year-old wife Jean with a plastic bag at Poppyfields care home in Eynesbury, near St Neots.
He died in hospital after suffering "catastrophic" head injuries in a fall at home, Cambridge Crown Court heard.
Mr Constant, of Richmond Road, Wisbech, did not enter a plea to the murder charge before his death.
Cambridge Crown Court heard he had attempted to kill himself at the same time as his wife was killed last August but survived and faced court proceedings.
His barrister, Sally Hobson, said he suffered a fall at home on April 27 after celebrating his grandson's birthday and that there was "no suggestion he took his own life".
She said: "When he retired to bed, he spoke briefly to his great-granddaughter, then went upstairs and fell and suffered catastrophic head injuries."
Mr Constant was taken to Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge and his family agreed to switch off his life support machine the following day.
"He had hoped to end his life together with his wife in August last year in circumstances they hoped would cause the least distress and discomfort," Mrs Hobson said.
Judge David Farrell voiced concerns over the fact Mr Constant had been granted bail and fell at home.
He said: "Everyone thought he was in a safe environment so I'm concerned all proper care was given to him."
A post-mortem examination concluded that Mrs Constant died of asphyxia in association with heart disease.
Her body was discovered by police who were called to Poppyfields care home in Chapman Way, Eynesbury, near St Neots, on August 22.

Summary:


The Bulls' relegation from the Conference Premier has been confirmed.
### Article: The Bulls' relegation from the Conference Premier has been confirmed.
### Article: The Bulls' relegation from the Conference Premier has been confirmed.
### Article: The Bulls' relegation from the Conference Premier has been confirmed.
### Article:

Hereford United have been expelled from the Football Conference following the club's failure to pay their bills.

Article: The royal couple were among the guests invited to attend the global financial firm ICAP's 23rd annual charity day.
Traders in London taught them how to close deals at the Central European interest rates desk.
ICAP gives away one day's revenue and commissions every year, which enables them to fund philanthropic projects and research around the world.
The event raises millions each year for charities that the duke and duchess are patrons of such as SkillForce, Place2Be and Sports Aid.
Since ICAP's fundraising day was started in 1993, nearly Â£120m has been raised for charity.
The duchess danced in celebration after the couple closed deals worth millions of euros over the phone.
The duke later joked about the "dodgy" outfits worn by some of the staff, which ranged from gangsters and molls to belly dancers and comic book characters such as Batman and Iron Man.
He was guided through the trade by broker Dan Lebeau, who was wearing three-inch heels.
Mr Lebeau said: "He was saying to me, basically 'where did you get them from?'
"It was very difficult to find size 10 high heels in a normal shop."
Also at the event were the prime minister's wife, Samantha Cameron, actor Jeremy Irons and broadcaster Jeremy Paxman.

Summary: The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have joined City brokers in fancy dress on the trading floor at a charity event.
###
Article: The government forecast an iron ore price of $46.70 a tonne by 2018, almost half the current level of $80.
The current price is supported by resurgent demand from China.
But the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science said that demand was unlikely to continue over the coming years.
The department also lowered its forecast for iron ore exports by 2% to 832.2 million tonnes for the fiscal year 2016-17.
Australia is the world's biggest supplier of iron ore and shares in the country's main mining companies fell after the report was released.
Hardest hit was Fortescue Metals which fell more than 3% in early trade, while commodity giants BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto also saw their shares prices drop.
In its forecast early last year, the department had predicted an iron ore price of $44.10 per tonne, but an increase in Chinese demand spurred the price to above $80.

Summary: Shares in Australian mining companies have fallen after the government forecasted a dramatic decline in iron ore prices.
###
Article: An independent panel of government advisers says health professionals should take every opportunity to discuss diet, exercise, smoking and drinking habits.
Ministers have backed the proposal from the NHS Future Forum to "make every contact count".
But the Royal College of GPs says the move could drive some patients away.
The recommendation is part of a series of papers from the panel of independent experts. Their first report last year outlined changes to the Health and Social Care Bill.
They are now setting out their conclusions on four other areas - public health, information, improving links between services and education and training.
The paper on public health states that everyone has a responsibility for their own health, but it also contends that the NHS is responsible for helping people to improve their health and well-being.
It goes on to argue that healthcare professionals should use every contact to do this, whatever their area of expertise or the initial purpose of the discussion.
The report points out that each day in England GPs and practice nurses see over 800,000 people, dentists see over 250,000 NHS patients, and 1.6 million people visit a pharmacy.
"There are millions of opportunities every day for the NHS to help to improve people's health and wellbeing and reduce health inequalities, but to take this opportunity it needs a different view of how to use its contacts with the public."
In particular, the report emphasises the importance of the four main lifestyle risk factors - diet, physical activity, alcohol and tobacco.
For example, it suggests that collecting medication from a pharmacy is a chance to offer help on cutting down on alcohol, or that a routine dental check-up could be used to discuss smoking.
The paper says to emphasise the importance of this responsibility, the government should seek to include it in the NHS Constitution.
The coalition government has accepted the forum's recommendations.
Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: "The NHS Future Forum has again provided invaluable...

Summary: NHS staff in England must adapt their roles to ensure they promote good health under plans being published.
###
Article: The Bulls' fate has been in the balance since the full extent of their financial worries emerged in the weeks since their dramatic final-day escape sent Chester down instead.
Chester have been reinstated as a Conference Premier club and Hayes & Yeading will stay in Conference South.
"Hereford United can have no complaints. The Conference bent over backwards to help them.
"I described the news of the board's offer of an extension on Friday evening as not so much 'last chance saloon', but rather 'last orders in last chance saloon' and United have seemingly chosen not to offer the league the assurances they were seeking.
"It is a desperately sad day for all Hereford supporters, but the Bulls have nobody to blame but themselves.
"You have to feel very sorry for those players who gave their all at Aldershot on the last day of the season to keep Hereford in the Conference Premier. Sadly, those efforts now count for nothing."
The Conference had originally offered a payment deadline of Thursday, 5 June.
The club's debt to their football creditors, including former boss Martin Foyle, members of the current squad, other club staff and clubs from whom the Bulls loaned players during the 2013-14 season, added up to £148,000.
That deadline was extended three times, to Friday, 6 June, then again to Saturday, 7 June and for a third time until Thursday, 12 June.
But it became clear on Tuesday that the Bulls, taken over last week by London businessman Tommy Agombar, would not make that deadline - and the Conference has now acted.
The last team to be expelled from the Conference was Chester City in February 2010.
They reformed as Chester FC two months later - and it is now they who have taken the Bulls' place, following a dramatic final day of the season when, almost simultaneously, a late Hereford winning goal at Aldershot and a Salisbury equaliser at Chester kept the Bulls up.
By way of an added twist, Chester announced on Tuesday that Kingsley James, who was in Hereford's team that day, has moved to Bumpers Lane.
26 April -...

Summary:


A man who plied two teenagers with alcohol before subjecting them to "horrendous" sexual abuse has been jailed for 21 years.
### Article: A man who plied two teenagers with alcohol before subjecting them to "horrendous" sexual abuse has been jailed for 21 years.
### Article:

Europe has begun to roll out a data superhighway in orbit above the Earth.

Article: In a speech read on his behalf at the ceremony in Sweden, he said he thought his odds of winning were as likely as him "standing on the moon".
The songwriter told those at the event in Sweden he was there "in spirit" and thanked the Academy for seeing his songs as works of literature.
Patti Smith performed his song A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall at the ceremony.
But the singer, who is a friend of Dylan's, had to apologise during her rendition after nerves got the better of her and she forgot the lyrics.
"Sorry, can we stop that section," she said as the audience began to applaud her. "I apologise, I'm so nervous."
In the speech, read out by the US ambassador in Sweden, Azita Raji, Dylan said he had joined the "rare company" of Nobel-winning writers.
He said from an early age he had read and absorbed the works of past winners and giants of literature such as Kipling, Shaw, Thomas Mann, Pearl Buck, and Ernest Hemingway.
But he said it was "truly beyond words" that he was joining those names on the winners list.
"If someone had ever told me that I had the slightest chance of winning the Nobel prize, I would have to think that I'd have about the same odds as standing on the moon," he wrote.
He said his win was surprising because he was a songwriter, rather than a writer of books and poems "taught in the schoolroom, housed in libraries across the world."
"Not once have I ever had the time to ask myself, 'Are my songs literature?'" he told attendees at the dinner, before thanking the prize-givers for "providing such a wonderful answer".
The folk singer explained that Shakespeare, the "great literary figure", probably thought of himself a dramatist.
"The thought that he was writing literature couldn't have entered his head," he said. "His words were written for the stage. Meant to be spoken not read."
Few predicted that Dylan would be awarded the prize when the announcement was made in October.
The 75-year-old singer waited two weeks to acknowledge the win and later said he would not travel to Sweden due to...

Summary: Bob Dylan said it was "truly beyond words" to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature.
###
Article: Mark Barnes said the attack on some versions of the Echo let him do almost anything he wanted to it.
Mr Barnes managed to enter the device's software innards via connections found on its base.
He said taking over the device was "trivial" once an attacker had access to an Echo.
Amazon's Echo uses artificial intelligence (AI) to respond to voice commands from users to carry out many different functions, including answering queries, playing songs and ordering goods from a retailer.
The hack started by peeling off the rubber base of the Echo to expose a grid of electrical contacts, wrote the researcher from MWR Info Security in a blog.
Connecting to one of the contacts let Mr Barnes watch the Echo's boot-up procedure and work out how it was configured. Armed with this knowledge Mr Barnes wrote software that, once loaded on a small memory card and connected to one contact pad, gave him control over the device.
Using this he examined how it handled audio and then created attack code which forwarded everything it heard to a remote server.
That deep access meant he had complete control over the code the device ran and what it did with customer data, he said.
Amazon did not comment directly on Mr Barnes' findings but said in a statement: "Customer trust is very important to us.
"To help ensure the latest safeguards are in place, as a general rule, we recommend customers purchase Amazon devices from Amazon or a trusted retailer and that they keep their software up-to-date."
The security researcher acknowledged that the requirement to get physical access to the device to carry out the attack was a "major limitation".
However, he added, it was possible that Echo owners would take their devices with them on holidays or business trips - situations that could expose them to attack. Second-hand devices may also be compromised in some way.
The attack was carried out on the versions of the Echo that were released in 2015 and 2016. More recent versions of the Echo are not susceptible to the same attack.
Mr Barnes recommended...

Summary: Amazon's Echo smart speaker can be hacked to send the audio stream of everything it hears to an attacker, says a researcher.
###
Article: Christopher Colebrook, 44, of Bowers Fold, Doncaster, pleaded guilty to repeatedly raping and assaulting a 16-year-old girl and 19-year-old man.
Police said they believed he may have attacked others and urged possible victims to come forward.
Colebook was jailed at Sheffield Crown Court.
Det Con Nichole Russell said: "He preyed on vulnerable teenagers, subjecting them to horrendous sexual offending after plying them with alcohol.
"This investigation revealed Colebrook's true predatory nature and we believe that there could be other victims of this man out there who are yet to come forward."
Colebrook pleaded guilty to four counts of rape, two counts of sexual assault and one count of assaulting a police officer.

Summary: A man who plied two teenagers with alcohol before subjecting them to "horrendous" sexual abuse has been jailed for 21 years.
###
Article: The first node in the network is a telecommunications satellite that was launched from Baikonur, Kazakhstan.
It will use a laser to gather pictures of the planet taken by other spacecraft and then relay them to the ground.
One benefit will be to put information on natural disasters, such as flooding and earthquakes, into the hands of emergency responders far faster than has previously been possible.
Currently, it can take hours to get the pictures taken by Earth observation satellites down on the ground.
Part of the reason is that spacecraft can only transmit their images when they pass over a receiving dish, and they will have visibility of this antenna for just 10 minutes in most cases during every 90-minute tour around the globe.
The European Space Agency's (Esa) answer is to fire the pictures upwards instead, via laser, to another satellite much higher in the sky that has a constant view of the ground station.
The agency recently put up two Earth observers that are equipped with optical transmission equipment. These will now be able to offload their data through the new relay satellite, which is to be positioned 36,000km above the equator at 9 degrees East.
Testing by Esa's industrial partner, Airbus Defence and Space, shows it should be possible for the system to put pictures on the desks of the people who need them within 20 minutes of those images being acquired.
For some applications - such as the monitoring of pollution incidents, or illegal fishing or ocean piracy - the time saved could be critical to achieving an effective response.
"Some important shipping routes go through the North Pole region, where thick ice flows can cause damage to vessels and even threaten human life," explained Magali Vaissiere, Esa's director of telecoms.
"It's also an environment in constant motion which means that data that is two days old is not only unhelpful - it could even be unsafe.
"We have already demonstrated quasi real-time performance of below 20 minutes for bringing monitoring information from the coast of...

Summary:


The European Court of Justice has ruled that airlines must pay compensation for delayed flights, but a number of airlines have yet to pay out.
The EU has ruled that airlines must pay compensation for delayed flights, but a number of airlines have yet to pay out.
The ruling is likely to encourage thousands of passengers with similar

A county court judge has ruled that airline Jet2.com cannot delay the payment of compensation due to passengers for delayed flights.

Article: Yorkshire Water said it was targeting seven locations across the city where there were build-ups of fat deposits.
The firm is deploying organically grown bacillus bacteria, which is commonly found in the human gut, to eat the fat, oils and grease.
The blockages are caused by waste cooking oils from homes being poured down plug holes.
As the fat cools it hardens and deposits gradually build up.
According to Yorkshire Water, in the past six months maintenance crews have attended 1,700 jobs in Hull to remove blockages in local sewers, with 350 jobs carried out in February 2012 alone.
Last year, across its entire 33,500 mile (54,000km) sewer network the firm said it had removed 2,000 tonnes of grease.
Patrick Killgallon, pollution manager at Yorkshire Water, said: "We continue to encourage customers to think before they pour things like fat down their sink, we're also looking at new and innovative approaches to tackling this age old problem to support current practices such as jetting sewers with a high pressure hose.
"The deployment of fat-busting bugs in our sewer network is an example of this, with these 'good' bacteria literally feasting on solidified fat in our sewer.
"And because these bacteria constantly multiply in the right environment, we can leave them to get on with their job in our sewers, seven days a week, 24 hours a day, without the need for regular dosing."

Summary: Fat-eating bacteria are being put into Hull's sewers to try to get rid of fat blockages.
###
Article: The bill, which raises taxes for the wealthy, came after lengthy talks between Vice-President Joe Biden and Senate Republicans.
The House is due to consider it later. Spending cuts have been delayed for two months to allow a wider agreement.
Congress missed the deadline to pass a bill, but few effects will be felt as Tuesday is a US public holiday.
Tax cuts approved during the presidency of George W Bush formally expired at midnight (05:00 GMT).
Without approval in the House, huge tax rises for virtually all working Americans will kick in automatically.
Analysts warned that if the full effects of the fiscal cliff were allowed to take hold, the resulting reduction in consumer spending could spark a new recession.
By Mark MardellNorth America editor
The compromise deal reached on Monday seeks to avoid this by extending the tax cuts for Americans earning under $400,000 (£246,000) - up from the $250,000 level Democrats had originally sought.
A huge spending cut that would see $1.2tn shorn from the federal budget over 10 years has been deferred for two months, allowing Congress and the White House to reopen negotiations.
The Senate approved the compromise bill by 89-8. "If we do nothing, the threat of a recession is very real," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat, said. "Passing this agreement does not mean negotiations halt, far from it."
In addition to the income tax rates and spending cuts, the package includes:
What if the US goes over cliff?
•       Rises in inheritance taxes from 35% to 40% after the first $5m for an individual and $10m for a couple
•       Rises in capital taxes - affecting some investment income - of up to 20%, but less than the 39.6% that would prevail without a deal
•       One-year extension for unemployment benefits, affecting two million people
•       Five-year extension for tax credits that help poorer and middle-class families
'Imperfect solution'
President Barack Obama welcomed the Senate vote.
"Leaders from both parties in the Senate came together to reach an agreement...

Summary: The US Senate has approved a deal to avert general tax hikes and spending cuts known as the "fiscal cliff".
###
Article: The five-game contest is being seen as a major test of what scientists and engineers have achieved in the sphere of AI.
After the match, Lee Se-dol said: "Yesterday I was surprised but today it's more than that, I am quite speechless.
"Today I feel like AlphaGo played a nearly perfect game," he said.
"If you look at how the game was played I admit it was a clear loss on my part."
Lee Se-dol is considered a champion Go player, having won numerous tournaments over a long, successful career.
In October 2015, AlphaGo beat the European Go champion, an achievement that was not expected for years.
A computer beat the world's chess champion in 1997, but Go is recognised as a more complex board game.
On Thursday, the Korea Times reported that locals had started calling AlphaGo "AI sabum" - or "master AI".
Three games remain, but Google only has to win once more to named the victor.
"Playing against a machine is very different from an actual human opponent," world champion Lee Se-dol told the BBC ahead of the first match.
"Normally, you can sense your opponent's breathing, their energy. And lots of times you make decisions which are dependent on the physical reactions of the person you're playing against.
"With a machine, you can't do that."
Go is thought to date back to ancient China, several thousand years ago.
Using black-and-white stones on a grid, players gain the upper hand by surrounding their opponents pieces with their own.
The rules are simpler than those of chess, but a player typically has a choice of 200 moves compared with about 20 in chess.
There are more possible positions in Go than atoms in the universe, according to DeepMind's team.
It can be very difficult to determine who is winning, and many of the top human players rely on instinct.
Google's AlphaGo was developed by British computer company DeepMind which was bought by Google in 2014.
The computer program first studied common patterns that are repeated in past games, Demis Hassabis, DeepMind chief executive explained to the BBC.
"After it's...

Summary: Google's AlphaGo artificial intelligence program has defeated a top Go player for a second time.
###
Article: The ruling is likely to encourage thousands of passengers with similar claims in the UK.
Jet2 argued the compensation payments should be delayed pending the outcome of a similar case in the Netherlands.
But the judge at Liverpool County Court ruled that "a line should now be drawn. Justice delayed is justice denied".
The EU has ruled that airlines must pay compensation for delayed flights, but a number of airlines have yet to pay out.
Four airlines in the UK have made applications to delay payments: Jet2, Thomas Cook, Ryanair and WizzAir.
The Jet2 case heard in Liverpool involved Kim Allen, who claimed â‚¬400 (Â£292) compensation after an almost seven-hour delay when flying from Manchester to Malaga in 2012.
"We've all been kept waiting for so long, but I'm really happy with today's decision," she said after the judge's ruling.
"Hopefully now it's time for the airlines to pay us what the law says they should."
Her solicitor, Kevin Clarke from Bott & Co, said he hoped "the airlines will now finally face up to their obligations to passengers and to settle the hundreds of thousands of legitimate claims outstanding.
"Sadly, the history of their conduct over the last decade would tell us to expect yet another legal challenge."
The issue stems from the 2004 European regulations that oblige airlines, in some cases, to pay compensation to passengers for cancellations and delays, if they are not due to extraordinary circumstances.
A further ruling by the European Court of Justice in 2009 confirmed that delayed passengers should be treated as if their flights had been cancelled, if the delay was longer than three hours, entitling them to cash compensation.
Despite the ruling, a number of airlines in the UK are still arguing that some technical problems should be classified as extraordinary circumstances, and as such, no compensation should be due.
They have also argued that paying compensation for delays of three hours or more is disproportionate and too great a burden.

Summary:


The Scottish government has announced a new £1.5m fund to help schools improve the quality of teaching.
The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) has announced a new £1.5m fund to help schools improve the quality of teaching.
The fund will be used to support the development of new teaching and

The deputy first minister is due to make a statement on the Scottish government's Named Person scheme later.

Article: Educational psychologist Prof Sir Godfrey Thomson tested the intelligence of almost every Scottish 11 year old in 1932, and again in 1947.
The research was recorded in 69 ledgers that were almost destroyed when the Thomson's family home in Edinburgh was demolished in 2008.
They will be displayed by Edinburgh University from 29 July to 29 October.
Despite his pioneering work, Prof Thomson - who advocated comprehensive education and firmly believed a child's chances should not be linked to status - faded from public view.
The results of the IQ tests in 1932 and 1947 were recorded in the Scottish Mental Survey ledgers, which hold the world's only record of IQ-type scores from full national year-of-birth cohorts.
Prof Thomson's findings have gone on to form the basis for much of the research into brain aging at the University of Edinburgh since the late 1990s, led by Prof Ian Deary.
His team now studies those who took part in the original surveys.
Prof Deary said: "Godfrey Thomson saw mental ability tests as an imperfect but useful means to give poor children a chance in life.
"He was determined to look past pupils' social status, and try to see their underlying ability.
"By all accounts he was modest, not motivated by money, and happy to share academic wins, which in part led him to fade from the history books."
The ledgers will go on show to the public from 29 July to 29 October at the University's Main Library Exhibition Gallery.

Summary: Rare ledgers by the man who pioneered the world's only nationwide IQ tests in the 1930s are to go on public display.
###
Article: Gail Kelly, the first female chief executive of a major Australian bank, will be succeeded by Brian Hartzer.
Mr Hartzer, who was born in America but is also an Australian citizen, is currently the head of the bank's financial services division.
Ms Kelly, 58, joined Westpac in 2008 as the financial crisis was wreaking havoc on global markets.
During her tenure, company revenue more than doubled from approximately A$50bn (Â£28bn; $44bn) to around A$104bn, Chairman Lindsay Maxsted said in a statement.
"Gail leaves the group in strong shape," Ms Maxsted said.
On Wednesday, Westpac's annual report showed Ms Kelly's A$12.8m annual salary made her the highest-paid banking chief in Australia.
In comparison, ANZ Chief Executive Mike Smith earned A$10.7m and Commonwealth Bank Chief Executive Ian Narev earned A$8.1m.
The South African-born Ms Kelly has been rated by Forbes as one of the 100 most powerful women in the world.
As the Australian business community pushes for more female board members and chief executives, Ms Kelly, a mother of four, is considered by some as a role model for aspiring leaders.
There had been speculation Mr Hartzer would succeed Ms Kelly after he joined Westpac in 2012 following senior postings at ANZ and the Royal Bank of Scotland.

Summary: The chief executive of Australian bank Westpac has announced that she will retire in February 2015.
###
Article: All secondary schools in the area will be disrupted by the two-day strike which will end on Thursday.
Members of the Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) have already carried out two one-day strikes.
The dispute centres on a plan to cut the number of principal teachers and run departments together as faculties.
Some teachers fear the move will add to their workloads and are concerned about what could happen in the long term to the pay of principal teachers who do not get one of the new posts.
West Dunbartonshire Council has said the system it is planning is already in use at a number of schools across Scotland.
Earlier this month the union rejected a proposal by the council to settle the dispute.
It had suspended a third set of strikes earlier this month to ballot members on a revised offer from the council.
EIS general secretary Larry Flanagan said: "EIS members in West Dunbartonshire are determined to stand firm against the authority's plans to cut principal teacher posts in secondary schools.
"These changes would have a detrimental impact on the operation of secondary school departments, and a negative effect on learning and teaching activity in secondary schools."
He added: "The EIS will have picket lines in place at all West Dunbartonshire secondary schools and will be holding a campaign rally today at Clydebank Town Hall, which we have invited representatives of all main political parties to attend.
"We will be asking each political party to share its views on these proposals and, in particular, the EIS will continue to urge the ruling Labour party group in West Dunbartonshire to abandon these unpopular plans once and for all."
A council spokeswoman said: "Following months of negotiations, proposals were jointly developed with the EIS to address all of the points the union raised in relation to the new management structure.
"We believed this compromise, which would have introduced an additional 18 principal teachers and two centrally-deployed staff, would bring the dispute to a positive end for the...

Summary: Secondary teachers in West Dunbartonshire are resuming strike action over a plan to shake up the way schools are run.
###
Article: John Swinney will address MSPs over a legal challenge to information sharing proposals within the Act.
The system would appoint a named person - usually a teacher or health visitor - to ensure the wellbeing of every child.
But judges at the UK's highest court ruled against the scheme in July 2016, citing concerns over information sharing.
The Supreme Court judges said some proposals breached rights to privacy and a family life under the European Convention on Human Rights.
However, the court said the aim of the Act, which is intended to promote and safeguard the rights and wellbeing of children and young people, was legitimate.
Speaking ahead of his statement to the Scottish Parliament, Mr Swinney said the Scottish government remained "absolutely committed" to the Named Person service as a way to support children and their families.
"Last year the Supreme Court ruled definitively that the intention of providing a Named Person for every child to promote and safeguard their wellbeing was 'unquestionably legitimate and benign'," he said.
"Their judgement did, however, require us to change the provisions relating to information sharing.
"Since the judgement, we have undertaken an intensive period of engagement with children, young people, parents, carers, practitioners and professionals.
"I will now update parliament on the next steps in this vital means of supporting, safeguarding and promoting the wellbeing of our children and young people."
The judges said in July that specific proposals about information-sharing were "not within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament".
And they said the legislation made it "perfectly possible" that confidential information about a young person could be disclosed to a "wide range of public authorities without either the child or young person or her parents being aware".
The appeal was brought by the No to Named Persons (NO2NP) coalition, which includes the Christian Institute, Care (Christian Action Research and Education), Tyme Trust and the Family Education...

Summary:


"The closure of Hatfield Colliery is a huge blow to the local community and the wider economy.
"The closure of the mine will have a huge impact on the local economy, with the loss of 430 jobs.
"The closure of the mine will also have a huge impact on the local community, with

The last lump of coal mined in South Yorkshire has been presented to Doncaster's mayor at a ceremony marking the end of mining in the region.

Article: The National Association of Head Teachers said reducing the per-place funding for such units from £10,000 to £6,000 a year would be "disastrous".
It also said the plans would not address the wide disparity in funding for children with similar needs.
The government says it has boosted high needs funding by £90m this year.
In its report, Getting it right: Funding pupils with complex needs, the NAHT looks at the impact of the proposed changes to the funding for children with high special educational needs.
The changes include basing the way funds are allocated to local authorities on the number of two- to 18-year-olds in the area.
This will then be modified by three factors - the number of children in bad health or on a disability benefit, low attainment and deprivation levels in the area.
But the NAHT says the proposals do not address the so-called "top up" funding for children with very complex needs, where there are big differences in funding.
The variability in funding levels means children with very similar needs could attract £2,000 of education funding in one local authority but £20,000 in another.
"This is clearly unacceptable and the DfE needs to develop parameters and controls to ensure that funding is fairly distributed within local authorities," the NAHT said.
Kim Johnson, president of NAHT and principal of Bradfields Specialist SEN Academy, says: "Those of us who are passionate about the education of children with high and complex needs have been pressing for this review of high needs funding for a long time.
"We desperately need a new approach that creates greater consistency and transparency.
"But we also need to be mindful that local authorities have taken very different approaches and that the transition to such an approach could result in some significant changes."
The NAHT also opposes plans to cut funding for special units within mainstream schools from £10,000 to £6,000 per pupil.
"Such a move would be disastrous for such units, leading to potential closures," the heads' union said.
Heads...

Summary: Plans to shake up special educational needs funding could see special units in mainstream schools close, a teaching union says.
###
Article: The footage revealed that the clever primates habitually make special water-dipping sticks - chewing the end of the stick to turn it into a soft, water-absorbing brush.
Primate researchers examined the "dipping sticks" and concluded they were made specifically for drinking.
The findings are reported in the American Journal of Primatology.
Lead researcher Juan Lapuente, from the Comoe Chimpanzee Conservation Project, in Ivory Coast, explained that using similar brush-tipped sticks to dip into bees' nests for honey was common in chimpanzee populations across Africa.
"But the use of brush-tipped sticks to dip for water is completely new and had never been described before," he told BBC News.
"These chimps use especially long brush tips that they make specifically for water - much longer than those used for honey."
The researchers tested the chimps' drinking sticks in an "absorption experiment", which showed that the particularly long brush-tips provided an advantage.
"The longer the brush, the more water they collect," said Mr Lapuente.
"This technology allows Comoe chimpanzees to obtain water from extremely narrow and deep tree holes that only they  - and no other animal - can exploit, which [gives] them a superb adaptive advantage to survive in this dry and unpredictable environment."
This suggests that this particular population of chimpanzees has what the researchers call a "drinking culture" - a custom shared throughout this group of making these special water-dipping sticks to help them through the dry season.
The population belongs to the Western Chimpanzee sub-species, now critically endangered.
Follow Victoria on Twitter

Summary: Researchers have used camera traps to film tool-use that is unique to chimpanzees in Ivory Coast.
###
Article: "If I was giving individual feedback on a daily basis as a teacher I would see my kids scores just skyrocket, but in some classrooms there might be 70, 80 students, and you can imagine how overwhelming that is for one teacher."
From her experience, Ms Maraviglia, a 32-year-old American who had moved to Kenya to help start a program to support teachers, came up with the idea of teaching via mobile phone text messages.
Together with co-founder Kago Kagichiri they set up their business in Nairobi in 2011.
Eneza says it wants to make "50 million students in Africa smarter".
"Eneza is a virtual tutor and teachers' assistant," explains Ms Maraviglia.  "It's a way for students to access courses through a low-cost cell phone.
"A lot of people [wrongly] think that our company is non-profit, because I am a woman, and because it's in education.
"We are a mission-based, for-profit company - what we do is charge an extremely low cost to our users and our business model is based on large scale."
For many young people across Africa, the education available to them is often both under-resourced and costly to students and their families.
Limited public funds leave classrooms over-crowded, teachers over-stretched, and textbooks in short supply, while private schooling is prohibitively expensive for many.
Ms Maraviglia, who started out as a teacher in inner city New York after graduating from the University of California, jokes that she is the teacher who hated technology, and her Kenyan co-founder Mr Kagichiri is the techie who hated teachers.
"What really changed my mind about what's possible is Kago," she says. "When a technologist and a teacher put their heads together they are able to really think of solutions that work."
Eneza's 500,000 users access courses and quizzes almost exclusively by text messages, for a cost of just 10 Kenyan shillings (10 cents; six pence) per week, which is deducted from pre-paid airtime on their mobile phones. The company has also developed Android and web-based versions of the app, but text...

Summary: "I realised the burden of what teachers go through here when I was living in this rural village," says Toni Maraviglia, co-founder of Eneza Education, a mobile phone based education tool in Kenya.
###
Article: Hatfield Colliery closed in June with the loss of 430 jobs after almost a century of production.
The short ceremony took place at the mine, near Doncaster.
John Grogan, chairman of the Hatfield Employee Benefit Trust, which has run the mine since 2013, said it was "the end of an era".
He said: "On Monday the company will be wound up in the High Court and that will represent the end of coal mining in South Yorkshire after many generations.
"In 1980 there were 50,000 miners in South Yorkshire. On Monday morning when we're in the High Court there will be none.
"We're presenting this piece of coal as a symbol of our respect for all the miners who have gone before us in South Yorkshire and helped build the economy of our country and keep the lights on for many decades."
Accepting the gift the Mayor of Doncaster Ros Jones said: "On behalf of Doncaster and South Yorkshire I'm humbled to accept this."
The only remaining deep coal mine in England, Kellingley colliery in North Yorkshire, is due to close later this year.

Summary:


A man who was convicted of killing his wife and her lover in a jealous rage has been jailed for life.
The court heard how the pair were found dead in their home in the early hours of the morning on August 20, 2015.
The court heard how the couple had been married for just over a year.

The man accused of murdering his ex-girlfriend whispered to a friend "she'll pay for what she's done" five days before she was killed, a court heard.

Article: Up in the hills of central Laos, it shimmers to the horizon, punctuated by treetops breaking the surface and long-tail fishing boats buzzing past.
"I think they could turn this place into a tourist attraction," says 75 year old Kam Kong, as he untangles his nets on the edge of the water.
This postcard-perfect scene is actually the reservoir for the Nam Theun 2 dam - one of the biggest hydroelectric projects in Southeast Asia.
Its opening may mark a turning point for Laos as it hopes to move from being the sleepy, under-developed backwater of Indochina to, as its government has put it, the "battery" for this increasingly power-hungry region.
As the water is released from the reservoir, it rushes downhill and into a rather utilitarian white-and-green power station, where turbines hum as they produce more than a thousand megawatts of electricity.
Pylons march across the hill into neighbouring Thailand, which is taking almost all the power produced by Nam Theun 2.
In theory, the figures should add up nicely for Laos. Revenue from the project may bring the government some $2bn over the next 25 years, a serious amount for one of the world's least-developed countries.
According to one of the project's backers, the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Nam Theun 2 could provide almost a tenth of the national budget in a good year.
But the spectre of the so-called "resource curse" hangs over any developing country that suddenly gains a windfall from energy, with funds siphoned off by a greedy few instead of being used for the greater good.
Laos insists that is not going to happen this time, despite its low ranking on Transparency International's "perceptions of corruption" index.
"Nam Theun 2 is business, but we need the revenue for the development of the country," says Sivixay Soukkharath, a government worker in charge of resettling villagers affected by the dam.
"The government will give people education, healthcare and infrastructure, and it will allow us to protect the environment throughout the country."
The financial...

Summary: At first glance, the vast body of water stretching across the Nakai plateau does not seem to have much in common with a set of Duracells.
###
Article: For the 2016 Games, in addition to changes in the sporting arena - with sports like rugby sevens and golf added - there are also important sponsor changes.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has relaxed the rules around athletes - such as six-time gold medal winner Usain Bolt - who have commercial deals with firms that are not official Olympic sponsors.
For the first time those athletes can feature in promotions for their brands during the Rio 2016 period. Previously the IOC's Rule 40 had imposed a blackout period throughout the Games for this type of "non-official" advert.
In the case of the UK, as long as advertising campaigns were up and running by 27 March, and were approved by the British Olympic Association, they can continue throughout the duration of Rio 2016 - something unheard of before.
"There was a lot of negative feedback from the athletes at London 2012 about the advertising restrictions they faced, and the IOC said they would review the rules because of this unhappiness," says Karen Earl of the European Sponsorship Association (ESA).
"Athletes, who are often at their earnings peak during an Olympic Games, became angry four years ago as they could not financially capitalise on their fame at a time when they were in the global spotlight.
"There was never much possibility that there would be a total relaxation by the IOC of Rule 40. But what they have done has allowed athletes and their backers to think carefully outside the box and come up with creative advertising."
However, certain restrictions remain in place, with certain banned phrases still not allowed, including "Olympic", "Rio", "gold" and "Games".
And any adverts from non-sponsors must also "not create any impression of a commercial association with the Olympic Games".
(In addition, if an advertising campaign is to be run in a number of countries during the Games period, then it needs the approval of the IOC as well as the home Olympic association.)
The IOC says Rule 40 is in place for various reasons, including:
Among those...

Summary: As the greatest sporting show on earth gets under way in Rio, there is an Olympic buzz not only among fans, but in the world of sports sponsorship too.
###
Article: The Institute for Fiscal Studies said the Tories had very few tax or spending commitments in their manifesto.
Labour, in contrast, was proposing very big increases in tax and spending.
However, the IFS said Labour's plans for paying for its proposed expansion in state activity would not work.
IFS deputy director Carl Emmerson said neither manifesto gave voters an honest set of choices or addressed the long-term challenges the UK faced.
"For Labour, we can have pretty much everything - free higher education, free childcare, more spending on pay, health, infrastructure. And the pretence is that can all be funded by faceless corporations and 'the rich'," he said.
"There is a choice we can make as a country to have a bigger state - that would not make us unusual in international terms. But that comes at a cost in higher taxes, which would inevitably need to be borne by large numbers of us."
Meanwhile, the Conservatives offered spending cuts the party had already promised, Mr Emmerson said.
"Additional funding pledges for the NHS and schools are just confirming that spending would rise in a way broadly consistent with the March Budget," he told a briefing in London on Friday.
"Compared with Labour, they are offering a relatively smaller state and consequently lower taxes. With that offer come unacknowledged risks to the quality of public services, and tough choices over spending."
The IFS said the Tory plans "imply at least another five years of austerity, with the continuation of planned welfare cuts and serious pressures on the public services including on the NHS".
Labour's calculations that £49bn a year could be raised from the wealthiest individuals and companies were flawed and would raise £40bn at most in the short term, and less in the long term, it said.
The Conservatives' plan to impose what the IFS called "very big cuts" to working-age welfare benefits would save £11bn annually by 2021-22, but would significantly cut the incomes of the poorest working age households.
"Labour's manifesto in fact commits...

Summary: Neither the Conservatives nor Labour are being honest with voters about the economic consequences of their policy proposals, an influential think tank has warned.
###
Article: Shana Grice ended her relationship with "obsessed" Michael Lane who stalked her when she started up a new relationship, Lewes Crown Court has heard.
The 19-year-old's body was discovered with her throat slit in her bedroom, which had been set alight, in August.
Mr Lane denies murder.
Giving evidence, his friend Natalie Fines said she bumped into him during an evening out with her parents on Saturday, 20 August.
Ms Fines told the court: "He told me she'd dumped him and gone back to her ex. He wasn't very happy about it, he told me he was depressed.
"As we were all leaving and hugging goodbye, he whispered in my ear 'she'll pay for what she's done'."
During cross-examination by Simon Russell Flint QC, defending, she added: "I didn't think that much of it. He'd often say things like that.
"For example, that he'd kill himself, and do it that night, but he didn't act on it."
The trial has previously heard Mr Lane, of Thornhill Rise, Portslade, East Sussex, put a tracker device on Miss Grice's car after hearing about her rekindling of the relationship with Ashley Cooke.
He was also cautioned by police after he stole a key to her back door before letting himself into her bedroom in Chrisdory Road, Portslade, to watch her sleep.
The trial continues.

Summary:


The number of marriages registered in Scotland has fallen by more than a third in the past decade.
The number of marriages registered in Scotland has fallen by more than a third in the past decade.
The number of marriages registered in Scotland has fallen by more than a third in the past decade.
The number of marriages

The number of marriages in Gretna topped 3,500 last year - a slight rise compared with the previous 12 months.

Article: The gains came at the expense of all the other parties though it lost one seat - Tadcaster - to an independent.
UKIP failed to hold its two seats on the authority whilst the Liberal Party lost its two county councillors.
The Conservatives now have 55 of the 72 seats. There are 10 councillors who are independent and have no party affiliation.
Labour lost three of the seven seats it was defending and the Liberal Democrats lost two of the five seats they held previously.
Election 2017: Full results from across England
Conservative leader of the council, Carl Les, said: "It is a vindication of the way the party has been leading the council now for almost a quarter of a century.
"I do not believe we have a monopoly on wisdom and we will listen to other parties and other members if they come forward with practical and reasonable suggestions for us to consider.
"We have not finished with austerity, we will still have to find savings and we will do that."

Summary: The Conservatives have strengthened their hold of North Yorkshire County Council gaining 10 seats.
###
Article: If passed, the childcare bill will grant the entitlement to families where all parents are working.
The changes aim to help 600,000 children a year from 2017.
However, nursery providers say the existing scheme is underfunded with the budget for free childcare falling 20% short of the cost of provision.
Neil Leitch, of the Pre-school Learning Alliance, said: "As a result, many are being forced to increase the cost of paid-for hours [those hours above and beyond the free entitlement], resulting in higher childcare costs for parents."
The group represents the owners of 14,000 childcare groups across England.
The plans had been outlined in the Conservatives' election manifesto and Mr Cameron said at the time that its Â£350m-a-year cost would be funded through reductions in tax relief on pension contributions.
Currently, all three-and-four-year-olds in England are entitled to 570 hours a year of free early education or childcare at nurseries, play and pre-school groups, Sure Start children's centres, or with childminders. Two-year-olds from the poorest families also qualify.
The 570 hours equate to 15 hours a week over a 38-week school year but can be spread over the year.
Mr Cameron had said this was an improvement on the "shocking" situation the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition inherited in 2010, "where couples were spending as much on childcare as one of them took home in earnings".
Previously "for many second earners, work didn't pay because the cost of childcare was so high", he had said.
The measures announced in the Queen's Speech only apply to England because responsibility for childcare is devolved to national governments.
The Scottish government offers all three and four-year-olds 600 hours of funded nursery provision per year, while all those in Wales are entitled to 10 hours per week in term time.
In Northern Ireland, pre-school education is funded for two-and-a-half hours a day, five days a week during term-time.
New legislation will require councils to publish information about childcare in...

Summary: Access to free childcare for three-and-four-year-olds in England is to double to 30 hours a week under measures announced in the Queen's Speech.
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Article: There will be a grace period for projects which already have planning permission, the Department of Energy and Climate Change said.
Energy firms had been facing an end to subsidies in 2017.
The funding for the subsidy comes from the Renewables Obligation, which is funded by levies added to household fuel bills.
After the announcement was made, Fergus Ewing, Scottish minister for business, energy and tourism and member of the Scottish parliament, said he had warned the UK government that the decision could be the subject of a judicial review.
Analysis: Roger Harrabin, environment analyst
The Conservatives promised in their manifesto to hold down bills and increase renewable energy.
But onshore wind is the cheapest readily-available form of clean energy in the UK. That's why some experts have described their decision to kill the onshore wind programme as bizarre and irrational.
Speaking to business leaders in London last night, Amber Rudd said it was time to shift subsidies from onshore wind to other technologies that needed them more. But she did not say what those technologies would be, and the government has not announced compensatory subsidies for other forms of energy.
Some of the business leaders are baffled why ministers will give local people a unique veto over wind turbines, when they cannot veto shale gas fracking or even a nuclear power station on their doorstep.
The government's policies are seen by green groups as nakedly political. Another reason may be partly at play - the right-leaning think tank Policy Exchange calculates that the energy subsidies programme has simply run out of cash.
If this is accurate, it presents a formidable challenge to an energy secretary who says she is committed to transforming the UK into a low-carbon economy.
"The decision by the UK government to end the Renewables Obligation next year is deeply regrettable and will have a disproportionate impact on Scotland, as around 70% of onshore wind projects in the UK planning system are here," he added.
The move was part of a...

Summary: New onshore wind farms will be excluded from a subsidy scheme from 1 April 2016, a year earlier than expected.
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Article: A National Records of Scotland report said the Dumfries and Galloway village remained a "popular venue".
There were 3,511 marriages registered in 2015 compared with 3,499 in 2014.
However, last year's total is more than a third down on the record total for Gretna which dates back to 2004 when there were 5,555 weddings.
Nonetheless, it can still claim to be the "marriage capital" of Scotland and accounts for 12% of all weddings.
It is particularly popular for "tourism marriages" and some 84% of the weddings held in Gretna last year did not involve a resident in Scotland.

Summary:


The UK's biggest ever firework display was held in the grounds of the Royal Albert Hall in London on Saturday night.
The event, which was organised by the London Fire Brigade, was the biggest ever in the UK.
The display, which was organised by the London Fire Brigade, was the biggest ever in the

A huge naan bread made by firefighters has been confirmed to be the biggest the world has ever seen.

Article: The claim: The cost of borrowing for the UK government is at record low levels. The government should take advantage of this to improve the UK's economic performance.
Reality Check verdict: The yield on UK government bonds has been falling to record lows, making borrowing cheaper, despite the recent cut in the UK's credit ratings. Borrowing to invest has the potential to reduce the need for future borrowing, but that's not guaranteed and it could further damage the UK's credit.
He's right about the cost of borrowing. The yields on 10-year UK government bonds have indeed been at record lows in trading over the past week, and that's a good indicator of the sort of amount the government would have to pay to borrow money.
You can only tell what will actually happen when there is a bond sale, as there was on Tuesday morning.
The government sold £2.5bn of bonds maturing in five years, at a record low yield.
The low bond yield is in some ways a bit surprising, as the downgrades from the ratings agencies S&P and Fitch mean they reckon that lending money to the UK government has become less safe.
But, in fact, what has happened is that the yield on government bonds has fallen because in uncertain times people look for relatively safe investments, such as government bonds.
It's not just the yields on UK government bonds that have been falling. The Swiss 50-year government bond has a negative yield for the first time, meaning that investors are prepared to pay to be able to lend money to the Swiss government. German government bonds also have negative yields, while US 10- and 30-year Treasury bonds are also at record low yields.
The rate of interest the government pays on its debt is important because the UK is currently in debt to the tune of £1.6 trillion (excluding holdings in public sector banks), so a small rise in interest rates would be very expensive for the public finances. The amount the country borrows each year (the deficit) has been falling, but the total debt has kept rising.
The Office for Budget...

Summary: Work and Pensions Secretary Stephen Crabb told BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday that the price of borrowing was at "record lows", and that if he became prime minister he would take advantage of this to invest in infrastructure.
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Article: Leader Tim Farron, whose party campaigned to stay in the EU, says it would be "completely unfair" if voters were not given a say on the deal devised by Brexit ministers.
He denied suggestions he was trying to overturn the 23 June referendum, when a majority backed the UK leaving the EU.
Brexit Secretary David Davis wants a "national consensus" for the UK's exit.
But Mr Farron says voting for Britain's departure from the EU "is not the same as voting for a destination".
"What the British government is now, one assumes, in the process of doing... is putting together the potential deal for what Britain will get in the future - what will free movement look like? Will there be a points based system? Apparently not. Will there be additional money for our health service? Apparently not. What will the relationship be with the single market? What will that mean for pricing?
"Our proposal today is the deal would come to the British people - we'd vote on that. If we voted 'yes' for that deal, then Britain would leave the European Union as we've already indicated... If we voted 'no' to that deal - if that's not satisfactory to the British people - we'd remain members of the EU."
Mr Farron told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that despite being opposed to the UK leaving the EU, he remained a critic of the institution and continued to campaign for it to be reformed.
He insisted that he "respected" the referendum result and did not want to see "a re-run" of the vote - just an opportunity for the people to decide on any deal put forward by the government over Britain's departure.
The 23 June referendum resulted in 52% of people voting for Britain to leave the EU and 48% voting for it to remain.
"None of us voted for whatever it is that we might get from the deal that is arranged or negotiated by David Davis and co," said Mr Farron.
Referring to Theresa May, who succeeded David Cameron as prime minister after he quit over the result, Mr Farron added: "It seems completely wrong for an unelected prime minister to enforce a deal...

Summary: The British public should have a chance to vote on government plans for the UK to leave the EU, the Lib Dems say.
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Article: Wales and Real Madrid football star Gareth Bale surprised children at a Cardiff hospital by turning up unannounced with bags full of toys.
Lucy Griffiths, whose son Jayden was at the Children's Hospital for Wales with breathing difficulties, said: "It made our Christmas."
She said Bale, who is from Cardiff, wished the children a merry Christmas as he gave out the gifts.
"He just turned up as a surprise - not even the nurses knew about it," said Ms Griffiths, from Newton Abbot in Devon, who was visiting her sister in Cardiff when Jayden became ill.
"It was a lovely thing to experience. He gave Jayden two presents, wished him a merry Christmas and said to get well soon.
"There were quite a few children there and to have someone like that come to do that was amazing. Jayden had a huge smile on his face."
Ms Griffiths said Bale turned up at the hospital with his pregnant girlfriend, Emma Rhys-Jones, at about 16:30 GMT on Thursday.
Jayden, who has asthma, was allowed home later that evening.

Summary: Santa Claus was not the only one handing out presents on Christmas Eve.
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Article: Led by fire officer Dave Curry, the team created a giant Indian bread, weighing 26kg (57lb 5oz) and measuring 3.79m (12ft 5in) by 1.4m (4ft 7in).
The cooking feat, carried out at the Eastleigh Mela in Hampshire on 6 July, was confirmed as successful on Tuesday by the Guinness World Records.
This beats the 2008 record naan, which weighed 9.5kg (20lb 15oz).
That creation was cooked by Loblaw Companies Limited in Brampton, Ontario, Canada and measured 2.89m (9ft 6in) by 1m (3ft 4in).
Mr Curry said they were "absolutely thrilled" to have the record confirmed.
"We were also able to raise several hundred pounds for charity through selling the naan at the Eastleigh Mela," he said.
"As well as being a record-breaker, it tasted good too as it quickly sold out."
The Hampshire firefighters' enormous naan bread, which was sold for Â£3 per portion with a curry, raised money for The Fire Fighters Charity, Water Wells Project and Hampshire Hurricanes.
It was created with the help of Badi Mirchi and Sanjha restaurants.

Summary:


A new report has found that the number of people in Northern Ireland who are living in poverty has increased by more than a third in the last decade.
The report, by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA), found that the number of people in poverty in Northern Ireland has increased by more than a

Almost 1,000 people in the South Eastern Health Trust are waiting for an urgent appointment to see a cardiologist, according to a report.

Article: 17 March 2016 Last updated at 07:14 GMT
George Osbourne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is responsible for setting out how the government plans to spend its money each year in his budget.
In his budget speech he announced that he wants head teachers of English secondary schools to scrap traditional "home time" and decide for themselves what time the school day will end.
He's offering these schools a pot of money to help pay for additional classes or extra-curricular activities like art and sport.
Schools in other parts of the UK won't be affected.
The Chancellor says his plans mean "every child gets the best start in life".
But some teachers say it's more complicated, and that they're already offering after school activities.
Malcolm Trobe, who is in charge of the Association of School and College Leaders, an organisation that represents head teachers across the UK, said that the money on offer wouldn't be enough to help all schools in England, and that "potentially youngsters in some schools would be in an advantageous position over others."
Ricky's been finding out what you think...
Read our full guide to the Budget here.

Summary: Head teachers in England will be allowed to extend secondary school hours, it's been announced.
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Article: An advertising campaign is being launched to publicise the change, which means from 20 June people can be fined without actually driving the car.
There are estimated to be about 1.4 million motorists without insurance.
At the moment uninsured drivers are prosecuted only after they have been caught actually driving.
Although police cars have number plate recognition technology which can check cars against a database, it still requires police time to enforce.
The new offence will allow motorists to be prosecuted for simply owning a vehicle without insurance.
Letters will be sent to drivers and, if they do nothing, they face a £100 fine followed by court action.
If the vehicle remains uninsured - regardless of whether the fine is paid - further action will be taken. If the vehicle is on public land it could then be clamped, seized and destroyed.
Alternatively court action could be taken, with the offender facing a fine of up to £1,000.
Motorists who have declared their car as off the road will not be fined.
Ministers say the change will allow police to concentrate their efforts on hard core offenders, who drive unregistered cars which the automatic system will not be able to trace.
Road Safety minister Mike Penning said: "Uninsured drivers are a danger on our roads, killing 160 and injuring a further 23,000 people each year, and they cost honest motorists £500m in extra premiums.
"That is why we are introducing this tough new law which will leave uninsured drivers with nowhere to hide.
"Our message is clear - get insured or face a fine, court action or seeing your car seized and destroyed."
Ashton West, chief executive at the Motor Insurers' Bureau, said the change in law is a "stepping up of enforcement activity".
He added: "Now the registered keeper must make sure that their vehicle is insured all the time.
"Around four percent of vehicles have no motor insurance at any given time, and this needs to change so that is why this new enforcement approach is so important."

Summary: Motorists are being reminded that a new law comes into force in a month's time which will require them to make sure their vehicle is insured.
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Article: The new .22-calibre revolver is named Nidar, it weighs a mere 250g (8.8 ounces) - that's half of .32-calibre Nirbheek's 500g (1.1lb); and it costs 35,000 rupees ($513; Â£357) - Nirbheek came with a steep price tag of 122,360 rupees ($1,990; Â£1,213).
Manufacturers say Nidar is made with an aluminium alloy which makes it very light, but has "strength similar to steel", it has a 40-mm barrel and is just 140mm in length which makes it "small enough to fit into a palm".
Both Nirbheek and Nidar are synonyms of Nirbhaya - the nickname given by the Indian press to Jyoti Singh, the 23-year-old victim of December 2012 fatal gang rape on a bus in in Delhi. All three words mean fearless in Hindi.
They are produced by government-owned factories, and their manufacturers say carrying them will make people more confident and "fearless".
An official at the state-run Rifle Factory Ishapore, near the eastern city of Kolkata (Calcutta), said Nidar was aimed at "professional Indian men and women".
"I believe our customers would be people who travel a lot, who have security risks. They will buy this gun for their personal safety," factory in-charge PK Agarwal told the BBC.
He said he expected the gun to be more popular with women.
"I think it will be ideal for women. If a woman takes a taxi at night, the driver will think 10 times before trying anything with her because he knows she has a gun in her purse," he added.
But can carrying a gun make people safer?
Not really.
Most places in India do not allow guns - even the licensed ones - and there are metal detectors at many offices, malls, cinemas, markets and other public places to enforce this.
So even if "professional Indian men and women" were to get a gun, it will be of little use to them because they will not be able to carry it around with them.
Anti-gun campaigners also say that arming citizens is never a good idea - and that the way to tackle women's safety and reduce crimes is by better policing and changing attitudes.
The manufacturers of Nidar, however, are confident...

Summary: Two years after India launched Nirbheek, a handgun pitched as the country's "first gun for women", a state-run arms factory has launched a similar gun which it says is India's lightest gun.
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Article: That compares with just 300 people in the largest trust area, Belfast.
It is thought that the problem in the South Eastern Trust is down to staffing issues in that area.
The trust - which covers Newtownards, County Down and Lisburn, said it has been unable to fill two consultant cardiologist posts.
There is also the added problem of staff sickness and increase in the number of referrals.
The South Eastern Trust serves a population of approximately 345,000 people with a budget of almost Â£500m.
The figures also show that 364 people are waiting up to a year for their first urgent consultant-led appointment at the Ulster Hospital, while in every other trust the waiting list for this type of appointment is zero.
In a statement, South Eastern Trust said:  "We have recently lost two consultant cardiologists who both required to relocate.
"Despite strenuous efforts, we have, so far, been unable to fill these vital posts and, combined with the constant increase in the number of cardiology referrals, this has led to an unfortunate increase in waiting times for appointments.
"We are taking every possible measure to address this."

Summary:


A new study has found that the brain is capable of repairing itself after a stroke.
The study, published in the journal Nature Neuroscience, found that the brain's own stem cells can repair the damage caused by a stroke.
The researchers say the findings could lead to new treatments for stroke.
The study, led

Transplanting cells into livers has the potential to completely regenerate them, say scientists.

Article: Women and the National Childbirth Trust (NCT) contacted the BBC after being told home births would not be possible.
In response the Health and Social Services Department said there had been no change to its policy on home births.
Anita Davies, from NCT, said the number of women giving birth at home was small, but uncertainty was leaving people distressed and anxious.
A spokesman for the Health and Social Services Department said there had been occasions in the past when the department had not been able to support home birth requests to "ensure appropriate resources are available to provide safe clinical care".
They said home births were given careful consideration but it is by no means a routine approach.
He said: "If assurance of safe care cannot be achieved at the same time as scheduling for two midwives to attend a planned home birth, this is when alternative arrangements have to be made.
"This has meant that on some occasions, requests for planned home births have to be managed in discussion and with agreement of mothers-to-be."
The news follows major changes at the Loveridge Ward, the island's only maternity ward, after the release of a critical report into the supervision of midwifery services.
Among the expectant mothers to comment on the BBC Radio Guernsey Facebook page was Louise Gallienne who is 17 weeks pregnant and wrote "just been told I am not allowed a home birth due to the lack of staffing".
"I was very disappointed. I am hoping they will be able to get the staff so in the future it will be a service they can offer again," she added.
Joey De Mouilpied, due in May, told a similar story saying she had been told last week her home birth would not be possible due to "staffing issues".
However, Amber Furby, who is due on Thursday, said there had been no suggestion her home birth would not go ahead, but suggested maybe no new bookings were being approved.
Ms Davies said normally fewer than 10 women in Guernsey gave birth at home each year, but the core of the issue was a woman's right to choose.
She...

Summary: Home births are not available due to a lack of staffing, according to some pregnant women in Guernsey.
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Article: The authors of a new study say there was a 48% fall in planned coal units, with a 62% drop in construction starts.
The report, from several green campaign groups, claims changing policies and economic conditions in China and India were behind the decline.
However, the coal industry argues the fuel will remain essential to economic growth in Asia for decades to come.
Between 2006 and 2016, India and China together accounted for 85% of the coal plants built around the world.
But according to the Boom and Bust 2017 report, put together by Greenpeace, the Sierra Club and CoalSwarm, there has been a huge swing away from coal in these two countries in just 12 months.
The main causes of the decline are the imposition of restrictive measures by China's central government - with the equivalent of 600 coal-fired units being put on hold until at least 2020.
The Indian go-slow was prompted, according to the authors, by the reluctance of banks to provide funds. Work at 13 locations is currently not going ahead.
However, there have also been significant retirements of coal plants in Europe and the US over the past two years, with roughly 120 large units being taken out of commission.
"This has been a messy year, and an unusual one," said Ted Nace, director of CoalSwarm.
"It's not normal to see construction frozen at scores of locations, but central authorities in China and bankers in India have come to recognize overbuilding of coal plants as a major waste of resources.
"However abrupt, the shift from fossil fuels to clean sources in the power sector is a positive one for health, climate security, and jobs. And by all indications, the shift is unstoppable."
The study comes as other groups analyse the potential for investments in coal to become stranded assets if governments continue to restrict CO2 emissions. The International Energy Agency (IEA) says that hundreds of billions of dollars could be at risk.
"The decline in new coal plants in Asian countries is truly dramatic, and shows how a perfect storm of factors is...

Summary: Twenty-sixteen saw a "dramatic" decline in the number of coal-fired power stations in pre-construction globally.
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Article: A judge ruled Ashers Baking Company discriminated by refusing to make a cake with a pro-gay marriage slogan.
Melissa and Aaron Klein, who run Sweet Cakes in Oregon, were fined $135,000 (Â£87,000) in April for refusing to make a wedding cake for a lesbian couple.
They have now closed their shop and sell cakes from their home.
Mrs Klein said it had been a difficult few years for her family but they were going to appeal and "fight it as far as they can".
Mr Klein said he did not regret what had happened and believes he made the right decision by refusing to serve the couple.
"I believe in the Bible and I believe the Bible is God's inherent word. He said that marriage is between a man and a woman and also said not to take part in another man's sin," he told the BBC's Good Morning Ulster programme.
"Even though there has been a lot of stress it's a pure joy to stand on God's word."
In the case in Northern Ireland, Ashers was found to have discriminated against gay rights activist Gareth Lee on the grounds of sexual orientation as well as his political beliefs.
The judge said she accepted that the County Antrim-based firm had "genuine and deeply held" religious views, but said the business was not above the law.
Damages of Â£500 were agreed in advance by legal teams on both sides of the dispute.
The firm's general manager Daniel McArthur said they were "extremely disappointed" by the ruling and were considering an appeal.
Mrs Klein said she felt the judgement against the McArthur family, which owns the bakery, was "ridiculous".
"They should have the right to be free not to express something they don't agree with," she said.
"To me, being a baker, the cake is our canvas and we get to put our artwork on it.
"When you make a cake, you are putting your signature on it and they should have the right not to do it."
The Democratic Unionist Party is attempting to build into Northern Ireland's equality law a conscience clause that would allow businesses to refuse to provide some services if they clash with their strongly...

Summary: A US couple who run a Christian bakery have encouraged a Northern Ireland firm to appeal against the judgement that it discriminated against a gay customer.
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Article: The Medical Research Council team showed severely damaged organs in mice could be restored to near-normal function.
They say the findings, published in Nature Cell Biology, could eventually help people stuck on a waiting list for a transplant.
Further tests are now taking place with human tissue.
The liver does have a remarkable ability to heal itself. Even if half of the organ is removed, it can grow back.
The team, based at the University of Edinburgh, has been investigating the regenerative potential of the liver.
Normally, the main type of cell in the liver - hepatocytes - is able to restore the organ.
But one of the researchers, Prof Stuart Forbes, said: "The hepatocytes normally divide beautifully, but eventually they give up that ability to keep dividing, they become senescent, and that is something we see in all forms of severe liver injury."
So the Edinburgh team turned to a closely related group of stem cells from the biliary duct.
Injecting these cells into damaged mouse livers led to near compete regeneration.
Prof Forbes added: "The big aim would be to develop a clinically applicable cell therapy for patients with severe liver failure where transplantation is not an option."
The team say tissue from livers unsuitable for transplant could be a source of these cells.
However, Prof Forbes said liver transplants would remain the main option for patients and encouraged people to join the donor register.
Further studies will now focus on repeating the results with human tissue.
Dr Rob Buckle, the director of science programmes at the Medical Research Council, said: "This research has the potential to revolutionise patient care by finding ways of co-opting the body's own resources to repair or replace damaged or diseased tissue."

Summary: