Unsafe levels of a paint thinner chemical have been discovered in batches of gravy in the UK just one week before families sit down to a Christmas roast dinner.

Irish families could be wasting as much as €1,000 a year because of confusion over certain foods being unsafe to freeze.

Lidl has recalled three of its products in the UK after failing to list potentially deadly allergens on the packaging.

Raqia Hassan risked her life by openly criticising ISIS on Facebook. Her friends, family, and fellow activists remember her determination to tell the world the grim truth about life in Syria. 

The US is giving TOW anti-tank missiles to the Free Syrian Army. 

Russian Tu-95 bombers with a nuclear weapons payload flying along the Irish coastline should be a wake-up call that “neutral” Ireland is seen by Russia as a de facto member of Nato. EU leaders attend Nato meetings and, by EU membership, Ireland is no longer seen as a neutral country. 

THE key to good health is to be a food-label detective. Knowing how to decode the hidden sugars and the fat content of foods will lead to a longer, healthier life.

There has been a significant rise in the amount of contaminated chickens bought in Ireland.

There has been a significant rise in the amount of contaminated chickens bought in Ireland, according to the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI).

Ten Iraqi peshmerga fighters have entered Kobani, the first of a group of 150 Kurdish troops on their way into the embattled Syrian border town, activists said.

For the first time since the Islamic State group launched an offensive on the Syrian border town of Kobani last month, a small group of Syrian rebels yesterday entered the town from Turkey in a push to help Kurdish fighters there battle the militants, activists and Kurdish officials said.

A small group of Syrian rebels have entered the embattled border town of Kobani to help Kurdish fighters battling Islamic State (IS) extremists, according to reports.

Turkey is to allow hundreds of Syrian rebels to head to the embattled town of Kobani along the Syrian-Turkish border to help Kurdish fighters in the battle against Islamic State militants.

In June, 2012, the New York Times reported that arms were being "funnelled" across the Turkish border into Syria in a covert operation aided by CIA officers.

High street lender Santander has been fined £12.4 million after the City of London watchdog uncovered “serious failings” in investment advice provided by the bank.

Confidence in the two new financial services regulators will be at risk unless more is done to attract and retain staff, the public spending watchdog has warned.

A former in-house lawyer for Morgan Stanley has told a court the English financial regulator deferred to the Irish regulator in relation to the so called “Maple Transaction” in July 2008.

A suspected illegal animal slaughter house and meat cutting plant has been uncovered in the North, the Food Standards Agency has said.

The biggest banks in Denmark’s €402bn mortgage market say hedge funds looking for ways to bet against the industry are setting themselves up for losses.

Horsemeat has been found in tinned beef sold in the North, it was revealed.

Jihadi-led rebel fighters in Syria killed at least 190 civilians and abducted more than 200 during an offensive against pro-regime villages, committing a war crime, an international human rights group said.

Syrian government forces have reached an agreement with local officials of a vulnerable Sunni village in a region dominated by President Bashar Assad’s Alawite sect to end hours of deadly shelling in exchange for the surrender of dozens of opposition fighters, an activist group said today.

THE crisis over chemical weapons in Syria has underlined a central dilemma for the West as it tries to deal with the country’s civil war — the lack of attractive alternatives to President Bashar Assad.

Two men have been arrested as part of an investigation by British police into the horsemeat scandal, it was revealed today.

Ireland’s food safety watchdog wrote to the British parliamentary committee to complain about possible breaches of data protection and the committee’s “bizarre” notion of a conspiracy on the part of Irish authorities.

Accountancy firm Ernst & Young & is being sued by a market trading company specialising in spread betting for alleged negligence over its auditing services.

Pressure is mounting in the UK on disgraced former HBOS bosses amid anger over mammoth pension pots and nearly £1m of “bonuses for going bust”.

Asda said it informed customers “immediately, and in the most high profile way possible” about bute detected in a corned beef product initially withdrawn from sale more than a month ago.

Asda is recalling all corned beef from its budget range after traces of veterinary drug phenylbutazone were found in some batches.

Former HBOS chief executive James Crosby has stepped down as non-executive director of catering firm Compass Group and said he wants to be stripped of his knighthood in the light of last week’s scathing report into the bank’s collapse.

A stinging report into the collapse of Halifax Bank of Scotland (HBOS) recommended that former senior executives at the bank should be barred from working again in financial services and severely rebuked the regulator for failing to prevent its collapse.

British lawmaker Andrew Tyrie has said Britain’s finance regulator must ensure customers are being treated fairly as a result of Bank of Ireland raising interest rates for some mortgages.

Plans to make it easier for new banks to challenge the dominance of the current “big four” players were announced by policymakers in the UK today.

Horsemeat weighing 40kg (88lb) has been sold to shoppers in the UK while wrongly labelled as beef, the country's Food Standards Agency said.

A bank that was last year forced to set aside £950m to cover the cost of a mis-selling and money-laundering scandal has declined to comment on reports its chief executive will receive a bonus of around £2m.

The Food Safety Authority of Ireland yesterday issued a new protocol for testing the authenticity of foods as gardaí turned their attention to a Tipperary meat plant as part of the investigation into the horsemeat saga.

Scotland’s councils have been told not to use any frozen beef products after a burger containing horse DNA was found in a school kitchen.

Farmers could end up the fall guys because of the horsemeat scandal in the North, it has been claimed.

British government ministers were warned in 2011 that horse meat was illegally entering the human food chain, it was claimed.

Officials in Britain investigating the horse meat mis-labelling scandal will continue examining evidence today after three more plants were raided.

The Standing Committee of the Food Chain and Animal Health with experts from EU countries met to approve the series of tests proposed by agriculture ministers earlier this week as the horsemeat controversy widened further yesterday.

Larry Goodman’s ABP Food Group was at the heart of yet more horsemeat controversy last night as it emerged its meat was contained in bolognese sauce which has been withdrawn by British retailer Asda.