Taoiseach Leo Varadkar will sack junior health minister Catherine Byrne if she abstains in a vote of no-confidence in Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy today.

The Independent Alliance has confirmed that it will be supporting Leo Varadkar in the vote for Taoiseach on Wednesday, writes Daniel McConnell of the Irish Examiner.

The Egyptian ambassador has declined an invitation to appear before an Oireachtas committee and discuss the ongoing detention of Irish teenager Ibrahim Halawa in a Cairo jail.

A weather forecaster for French state television has been fired after releasing and promoting a book criticising politicians, scientists, and others for what he calls an exaggerated view of climate change.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has pledged to allocate 0.7% of gross national product (GNP) to overseas development aid as part of a United Nations target.

Kitty Scully looks at the ecosystems of soil for UN Year of Soils and shows how intrinsic it is to all human life.

Global emissions of carbon dioxide are set to rise again this year to reach a new record high, scientists said.

Nuclear watchdogs in Britain have ordered the Sellafield plant to improve waste containment and fire safety after inspectors found breaches at the site.

He’s just 4ft 7in in height, bald, not much of a talker, and almost impossible to cuddle, but the new guy in Joanne O’Riordan’s life might just be the man of her dreams.

A Cork teenager has been asked to address the United Nations on the issue of women, technology and disability next week.

An inspiring Irish teenager who helped force the Government into a U-turn on plans to cut disability benefit is to address the UN in New York.

An Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality will hear presentations on the proposed mental capacity legislation today.

The European Commission (EC) has rejected claims of financial waste despite its own figures revealing a multi-million-euro bill for travel and entertaining by senior staff and officials.

SINCE the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008, a huge amount of media attention has been focused on the collapse of other financial institutions as well as the perilous state of the public finances in many countries.

PRODUCING food to combat world hunger and under-nutrition among children was the focus of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation forum yesterday in Rome, Italy, as part of the UN’s World Food Day initiative.

Cuts announced by the nations responsible for most of the world's greenhouse gas emissions will fall short of the level needed to limit disastrous climate change, the UN said today.

Thousands of protesters took to the streets of Copenhagen today as part of demonstrations around the world to demand a fair and binding new global deal to tackle climate change.

Australia’s Parliament defeated legislation to set up a greenhouse gas emissions trading system today, throwing a central plank of the government’s plans to combat global warming into disarray.

A new opposition party leader today vowed to scupper Australia’s plans to become one of the first nations with a carbon trading system to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

The Green Party have voted to campaign for a 'Yes' in the Lisbon Treaty referendum at their special conference in Dublin today.

AUSTRALIA and the Netherlands yesterday joined a growing Western boycott of a United Nations conference on racism over fears it will be used as a platform for unfair criticism of Israel.

Today is the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty.

BONO, Bob Geldof and Brian Cowen were today joining forces at the United Nations to try and end world hunger.

Western leaders have attacked Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe’s presence at a UN summit on hunger given his role in leading his own country toward starvation.

JAPAN took over the presidency of the Group of Eight club of the world’s leading economies yesterday, with Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda vowing to put a focus on climate change and environmental issues.

Climate change delegates from Europe and America went head-to-head today over whether to include guidelines for greenhouse gas emissions in the plan for a new international agreement.

THE Green Party yesterday led the Irish political tributes to former US Vice President Al Gore following the announcement that he was the joint winner of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.

The European Commission today urged EU governments to live up to international commitments to cut back fish catches to sustainable levels, and help ensure the future survival of stocks.

Children’s charity, the ISPCC, today called for a total ban on smacking as part of a ten-point plan to protect youngsters from abuse.

THE Government will launch a national campaign to combat the stigma surrounding people with HIV/Aids later this year.

AMNESTY International’s million faces petition comes to Limerick tomorrow week.

THE Government will continue to seek the closure of Sellafield and its MOX reprocessing plant despite suffering a setback from the European Court of Justice.

THE Government yesterday declared its decentralisation programme was on track as an extra €200 million plus was pledged towards the scheme in the 2006 Estimates.

A UN technology summit in Tunisia was set to get down to business today as it focused on giving more communications, including internet access, to countries where the cost has been too high and the technology too low-tech.

IN his column (Irish Examiner, September 16), Pat Brosnan highlighted the Irish public’s worry that our Government will renege on its new promise to meet the 0.7% target for overseas aid.

THIS week’s UN world summit is indeed a missed opportunity. But we in turn must not miss the historic success that has been hidden amidst the overall failure.

Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza yielded swift returns on the world stage yesterday: praise from Qatar and an unusual meeting between the Arab emirate’s foreign minister and his Israeli counterpart.

The chief US envoy to talks on ending North Korea’s atomic weapons programme met today with his North Korean counterpart seeking to break a stalemate, and said afterward that the negotiations are still “in business".

KOFI ANNAN must have had a feeling of déja vu in the UN building on Wednesday night when Taoiseach Bertie Ahern pledged to meet the target for overseas aid.

Ireland is to meet the UN target of spending 0.7% of its Gross National Income on overseas development aid by 2012, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern pledged tonight.

United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan today urged world leaders to agree a range of measures on helping the developing world.