An Irish diplomat who went searching for a portion of the Russian crown jewels 40 years after they were returned to the Soviet Union said he was not able to locate them, recently released state papers reveal.

The US feared the Russians could be plotting an undercover Cold War spy base in a disused Cork dockyard, newly declassified government documents suggest.

Palestine could have been wound up in 1967

On September 29, 1938, Czechoslovakia was sacrificed to Nazi Germany by the UK and France, in their catastrophic hurry to appease Hitler. That lesson is still relevant today, writes Yuriy Filatov

Here is your lunchtime bulletin...

Holidays are for reading all those books you’ve been discussing with your friends for weeks, but haven’t actually read.

It starts officially tomorrow although celebrations have been underway for a little while. The 30th anniversary of Ireland’s Euro 88 adventure. Specifically, tomorrow marks 30 years since Ray Houghton’s goal.

The @SSEAirtricityLg account didn’t even run a list of full-time scores during Cork City’s game against St Patrick’s Athletic on Saturday, writes Brendan O’Brien

The Bolsheviks’ efforts to change the world remain relevant in our own time of popular disaffection with establishment politics and brutalist economics, says Geoffrey Roberts

A decade after the onset of the property and banking crash, mortgage debt means households

Analysts are pouring over market charts of the Cuban missile crisis in the early 1960s and the war of words over North Korea to assess whether investors’ fright will calm any time soon.

We’re six games and nine months into the latest qualifying campaign, one that started with a brilliant result and an awful display against Serbia in Belgrade, writes Brendan O’Brien.

A rising number of attacks against government sites and industrial control systems shows the need for ever-greater vigilance by national authorities, writes Peter Apps

As an ex-communist, Russian president, Vladimir Putin will be respectful of the revolutions of that shaped his country, but will not endorse too much freedom, says Geoffrey Roberts.

THIS year marks the centenary of the most important event in 20 century global history: the Russian revolutions of 1917.

75 years on, the consequences of Pearl Harbour have yet to be fully played out, writes Geoffrey Roberts

Ray Brady, former Ireland international, has passed away at the age of 79.

US domestic and economic policy are likely to change utterly now Donald Trump is in power, but his foreign policy remains a mystery, writes TP O’Mahony.

In an update to her weekly column, Victoria White, argues that we can never come to the beginning of the end of atrocities such as Nice if we don't understand that Bastille Day doesn't mean the same thing to many Arabs as it does to the French.

Your letters, your views...

Mikhail Gorbachev’s latest book contains plenty of righteous anger at the state of modern Russia but is marred by being one-sided and presenting a lack of context for the general reader, writes Neil Robinson.

We are the Boys in Green, the best you’ve ever seen

The infamous spies who infiltrated Britain in the 1950s and ‘60s came from the wealthy upper classes and went unchallenged in their roles, writes Neil Robinson.

Leicester boss Claudio Ranieri thinks comparisons between Jamie Vardy and Sergio Aguero are unfair as the two strikers go head-to-head in the top-of-table clash at Manchester City.

Check out our guide to the best TV shows on tonight.

I stand accused by Dr Frank Giles (Letters, Irish Examiner, July 2) of blaming the recent Tunisian mass murders on Western foreign policy and military interventions.

The oil market is working: High-cost production is being retired and new projects are delayed or cancelled while demand is again surging.

The Soviets were crucial to the Allied victory in WW2, but 70 years on there is a rift again, says Geoffrey Roberts

Greece has been cast as Europe’s bad boy, with other states happy to deliver a kicking, but in fact it fulfilled many of its troika commitments, writes Europe Correspondent Ann Cahill

It seems there were major disagreements within Garret FitzGerald’s government in the early 1980s when it came to making a decision about what to do with struggling industries in the Cork Harbour area.

Bells tolled in celebration and teachers halted lessons as President Raul Castro told his country Cuba was restoring relations with the United States after more than 50 years of hostility.

Larry Summers and Lant Pritchett have written a paper predicting a Chinese growth slowdown. In 2013, Barry Eichengreen, Donghyun Park, and Kwanho Shin wrote a paper with much the same message, which accurately predicted the recent Chinese slowdown from about 10% annual growth to about 7.5%.

Whether a victim of a coup or ill health, his absence raises fears of military action, writes Christopher Harress.

Henry Kissinger

I wish to bring some historical perspective to the hype of the D Day invasion:

EU leaders pressed Russia to start discussions with Ukraine within the next few days about withdrawing from Crimea or face asset freezes and visa bans.

It might be close to 30 years ago, but Mickey Walsh remembers the goal like it was yesterday.