the majority of Irish adults do not return to studying once they leave school, surprising new figures reveal.

THE number of pupils attending all-Irish primary schools in south Dublin has doubled since 2001.

COMMUTER-belt children are bearing the brunt of a growth spurt in primary school class sizes.

A record 20,000 applicants will not get a single offer from the CAO this year.

IT was the first day back in class for two creative schoolboys as poet Seamus Heaney and artist Robert Ballagh unveiled their latest creation.

A principal has resigned from his school following a probe which confirmed that some of his pupils were also enrolled in another school run by his wife.

A detailed biography of the legendary Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal shows him to be a complicated hero, an angel with dirty wings.

The literature of Hans Keilson, a doctor who escaped to the Netherlands from Nazi Germany, is getting new attention in America.

Julian Assange, the founder of the whistle-blowing Web site WikiLeaks, called Sweden's investigation of him for suspected sexual misconduct "some kind of legal circus."

Pakistan's top diplomat in Britain suggested on Thursday that three of his nation's cricket stars, accused of agreeing to take part in a betting scam, were "innocent" victims of a plot against them.

A dance squad from Ukraine, known as the Red Foxes, was pulled to avoid performing in front of Turkish government officials, but no one can agree as to why.

A German citizen has been arrested by United States troops in Afghanistan, the German Foreign Ministry said Wednesday.

The Dutch authorities said that they had freed two Yemeni men held on suspicion of terrorism after no evidence of wrongdoing or traces of explosives were found.

President Bronislaw Komorowski said Wednesday that the rising cost of the war in Afghanistan was hampering a program to modernize the military.

The body of a British spy, found dead in his apartment in London last month, had been padlocked into a gym bag and put in the bathtub, but how he died is not yet certain.

Labor Minister Éric Woerth conceded Thursday that he wrote a letter in 2007 to Nicolas Sarkozy pressing for a state award for his wife’s future employer.

The United Nations panel is to examine documents from Turkey and Israel and deliver its first progress report in mid-September.

As Slovakia held a day of mourning Thursday to honor the victims of Monday's violent rampage in the Slovak capital, Bratislava, a picture began to emerge of the killer.

Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin announced Thursday that Russia’s ban on grain exports would be extended well into next year because of continued uncertainty over production.

Karel De Gucht, the European commissioner for trade, was accused on Friday of “outrageous anti-Semitism” after comments he made in an interview about Israel’s role in Middle East peace talks.

Hundreds of Jordanians took to the streets in Amman on Monday, protesting the Israeli raid on a flotilla of aid ships bound for Gaza Strip. During a march from the Jordanian professional associations' headquarters to the Prime Ministry, the demonstrators chanted slogans against Israel, calling for closing the Israeli embassy in Amman. The demonstrators urged the government to expel the Israeli ambassador in Amman and annul the Wadi Arabia peace treaty Jordan and Israel signed in 1994. H ...

Inflow of some oil spill from the ships' collision in the Singapore Strait has so far caused minimal damage to Malaysia's seashore, said an environment official. Malaysia's Natural Resources and Environment Minister Douglas Uggah Embas told media on Tuesday that Malaysia and Singapore had adopted a standard operating procedure in dealing with the oil spill crisis. He said that more than 200 people were busy in dealing with the oil leakage at the affected areas, including those hired by th ...

The 25th summit between Russia and the European Union (EU) ended on Tuesday with a joint statement on the Partnership of Modernization, but no document was signed on the long-awaited lifting of the visa regime. At a joint press conference after the summit talks, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso hailed the two-day summit as fruitful, open and friendly. "In a world in which people ...

World military expenditure in 2009 totaled an estimated 1.531 trillion US dollars, representing an increase of 5.9 percent compared to 2008 and an increase of nearly 50 percent since 2000, according to new figures released Wednesday by Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). SIPRI Wednesday launched the 2010 edition of its Yearbook on Armaments, Disarmament and International Security. US military spending increases most despite hard economic times ...

Reuters - BP Plc is abandoning its failed "top kill" effort to smother and plug a Gulf of Mexico oil leak and is moving to its next option, Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles said on Saturday.

FORT WORTH, Texas (Reuters) - Phil Mickelson swiftly turned to his swing coach Butch Harmon for direction after squandering a promising start at the Colonial Invitational on Thursday.

The global economic collapse, which gutted industries and services across the map and erased 8.4 million jobs, instantly created a reserve pool of idled managers and senior executives. But struggling companies of all sizes and across the economy still face a massive shortage of top-tier management.

Four persons were killed and 24 others including eight women sustained injuries as a passenger bus and a car collided in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province on Thursday, police said. "The traffic accident occurred in Gereshk district at 01:00 p.m. local time due to reckless driving as a result four aboard the car were killed on the spot while 24 commuters on the bus including eight women were injured," Abdul Rahman Azizi the chief of police traffic in provincial capital Lashkargah told Xi ...

AP - The competition between Mama Sox and the shy paint store clerk comes to an end Wednesday on "American Idol."

An epic RPG tale with two sides—two complete adventures in one! Built from the ground up to take full advantage of the power of PSP system, extensively optimized to deliver virtually nonexistent load times, and boasting some of the most polished visuals and sounds found to date in a handheld RPG, Hexyz Force is the consummate gamer’s game. It also stands as one of the most narrative-driven portable RPGs of alltime, giving users not one, but two separate campaigns to embark upon. A rich fantasy tale told in two separate yet intertwined parts. Play as Cecilia, a young cleric, or as Levant, an elite knight, as they unravel the mysteries of their world¿s impending destruction; a total of 50 hours of engaging RPG play! An extraordinary level of polish provides players with quick, stress¿free battles, flexible strategy, and virtually no load times with a special option that allows players to install the game from UMD onto a Memory Stick. Adventure comes alive with approximately 20 minutes of anime cutscenes beautifully depicting the struggle of Creation versus Destruction. Events unfold inside a huge and colorful 3D world, amplified by detailed characters and a sweeping musical score. Release Date:Tue, 25 May 2010

The Reserve Bank of Australia on Tuesday said it has been taking "very seriously" corruption allegations about its subsidiary Securency International. The Reserve Bank on Tuesday said it condemned corrupt behavior "of any kind". "With the Australian Federal Police (AFP) investigation continuing, it would not be appropriate for the bank to comment on matters covered by the investigation," the bank said in a statement. "Any evidence of wrongdoing should be referred to the ...

The Special Branch of Bangladesh Police has arrested chief of the banned Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh Saidur Rahman from a house in capital Dhaka after nearly a three-year manhunt, Police chief said Tuesday. Inspector General of Bangladesh Police Nur Mohammad said at a press briefing on Tuesday that Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) chief Saidur was arrested on Monday night. He said Rahman took over after the execution of JMB chief Shaikh Abdur Rahman in 2007. JMB, campaigning for ...

Salvador Cabanas' mother Bailia Ortega told local media that the left-out Paraguay striker has been released Sunday from a rehabilitation clinic after a gunshot to the head. The Club America forward, who would have made the Paraguay World Cup squad if he had been fit, was shot at point-blank range on January 25 in a bar in Mexico City. He was treated by the Fleni Clinic on the outskirts of Buenos Aires, where surgeons opted to leave the bullet fragment lodged in his skull, judging that an ...

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner arrived in Beijing Sunday for the second round of the China-U.S. Strategic and Economic Dialogue. Chinese President Hu Jintao's special representatives, Vice Premier Wang Qishan and State Councilor Dai Bingguo, will join Clinton and Geithner, President Barack Obama's special representatives, to co-chair the meeting on Monday and Tuesday. Almost 50 minister-level officials from China and U.S. will exchange in-de ...

Top officials of the Communist Party of China (CPC) are holding discussions with more than 50 visiting party leaders from Europe on Monday on how to cope with global financial and climate woes. Organized by the International Department of the Central Committee of CPC, the two-day China-Europe High-Level Political Parties Forum starts on Monday in Beijing. The dates of the Sino-European event coincide with those of the strategic and economic dialogue between Beijing and Washington. Ch ...

If ever an album begged not to be judged by its opening track, this is it.

The World Trade Organization (WTO) on Tuesday set up an expert panel which would investigate and rule whether the European Union's antidumping duties on Chinese-made footwear violate global trade regulations. The panel was established following a second request made by China, which says the EU's anti-dumping measure is "inconsistent with related WTO agreements and impaired China's benefits." A previous request made last month was blocked by the EU in accordance with related procedures. It ...

Exit Smiling can give punters the last laugh by winning the feature race at Ripon. The eight-year-old is a regular at the North Yorkshire venue and is a course and distance winner.

Mike Leigh's latest project will kick off the British campaign for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.

LaDainian Tomlinson is primed for his first season with the Jets after nine years in the N.F.L. with the San Diego Chargers.