A record crop of UK strawberries has been grown this year and the season is expected to continue into December, industry leaders have said-

Eight tigers and a lioness belonging to a Russian travelling circus died during a 20-hour truck journey across Siberia, police said today.

Mining company Celtic Resources Holdings has agreed to sell 20% of The South Verkhoyansk Mining Company ("SVMC") for $80m (€66.3m) cash.

Racism and xenophobia are growing at an alarming rate in Russia, rights groups said today, problems fuelled by economic hardship and what they say is the government’s failure to come up with a plan for reducing ethnic tensions.

An explosion tore through the engine room of an oil tanker in north-eastern Siberia, killing four crew members, the Emergency Situations Ministry said this morning.

Grieving relatives, friends and officials held a funeral today for the 22 children killed when their wooden Siberian schoolhouse burned down in one of two deadly fires at schools in Russia last week. They were buried in a common grave.

A FIRE in a boarding school for the deaf in southern Russia killed 28 children and seriously injured 17 others yesterday, as rescuers raced from bed to bed to awaken students who could not hear alarms.

Twenty-eight children were killed today in southern Russia when a fire roared through a boarding school for the deaf.

ISEQ-listed Celtic Resources Holdings, which aims to become one of the largest gold producers in Russia and Kazakhstan by 2007, has reminded shareholders that the £3m Open Offer of 2,222,222 new shares following a 10:1 share consolidation closes at 3pm next Tuesday.