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BY KEITH NUTHALL

TRANSATLANTIC joint inspections of American, European Union (EU) and third country pharmaceutical plants are to be piloted by the European Commission, the European Medicines Agency (EMEA) and the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This was one of a series of priority projects to improve medicine regulatory cooperation between the European Union (EU) and the United States agreed at a meeting of the Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC) in Brussels.…

BY MARK ROWE and MONICA DOBIE

GENETICALLY modified foods have split opinion across the world; hugely unpopular in Europe but embraced in the United States. But GM technology does not only apply to foodstuffs. Increasingly, scientists are looking at the extent to which altering the genetic components of a range of products that are used for textiles can influence the make-up of the clothes we wear.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

AGENCIES of the United Nations have released a draft action plan committing them to continue until 2016 protecting people and the environment from the fallout from the 1986 Chernobyl accident.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF); the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP); UN cultural and scientific organisation UNESCO; the UN scientific committee on the effects of atomic radiation (UNSCEAR); the World Bank; the Word Health Organisation; plus the Red Cross, have agreed to undertake detailed tasks.…

BY LIZ HALL, in Alicante

SPAIN is no stranger to the threat of terrorism. For decades its soil has been the scene of terrorism at the hands of Basque independence group ETA. Increasingly, however, the threat from ETA appears to being outweighed by that of terrorist activity from Islamic extremists.…

BY MARK GODFREY, in Beijing

WORRIES about inflation and food shortages have left the Chinese government struggling to balance efforts to temper inflation with its ambitious biofuels development programme. Increasing demand for food and biofuels in China have been a key driver in increasing global consumption of fats and oils at an average 4% per year according to the United Nations Food & Agriculture Organisation (FAO).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

LAST May, a coordinated attack on essential computer networks in the tiny Baltic republic of Estonia set nerves upon edge amongst European Internet security specialists. Following the removal of a Russian war memorial from the centre of its capital Tallinn, a still unidentified group of computer users bombarded Estonian political, government, media and banking websites with so much data, they were forced offline.…

By Alan Osborn

A committee of the European Parliament is seeking a number of improvements in the EU’s Erasmus Mundus university co-operation and student mobility programme (2009-13), including the introduction of a specific visa for the students taking part. The MEPs say also that if tuition fees are claimed by universities taking part, these fees should always comply with national legislation, making it possible to include countries where the fees are not allowed, like Denmark.…

BY KARRYN CARTELLE

AUSTRALIA is currently ranked as the eighth largest market in the world – third largest within the Asia-Pacific region after Japan and Hong Kong – in terms of its total stock market capitalisation of AUD$1.63 trillion (USD$1.53 trillion) in 2007 (World Federation of Exchanges figures).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE UN World Tourism Organisation wants the global tourism sector to use CO2 efficient cars to serve growing demand for international leisure motoring. It warns road transport tourism already accounts for 2% of global CO2 emissions, and this proportion is expected to rise, especially with the growing middle classes of China, India and Brazil taking more holidays.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE CREATION of a powerful European Union (EU) energy infrastructure agency – with authority over both electricity and gas networks – has been proposed by the European Parliament’s industry committee.

Its amendments, if successful, would change European Commission proposals to create two separate agencies: the European Network of Transmission System Operators for electricity (ENTSOE) and gas (ENTSOG).…