FIONNUALA Gill was a founding member of choral group Anúna, and a lead singer with Riverdance. The 43-year-old, who’s based in Portmarnock, now has a solo career and was encouraged by Eurovision winners Secret Garden.

Forest Whitaker is set to play Archbishop Desmond Tutu in 'The Archbishop and the Antichrist'.

Trinity College Dublin has been forced into a U-turn on controversial plans to have British National Party (BNP) leader Nick Griffin join a debate on immigration.

Mary Robinson’s presence in Africa this week focused world attention on the famine in Somalia, demonstrating the crucial role the famous play in highlighting the plight of the poor and dispossessed, says Georgina O’Halloran.

The 19th edition of the FIFA World Cup was today opened by a spectacular ceremony in Johannesburg, albeit in front of a less than capacity Soccer City.

A SURPRISED world greeted the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to US President Barack Obama with a mixture of praise and scepticism.

Former President Mary Robinson has been awarded the highest civilian honour in the United States - the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

ONE out of every four Irish adults are unable to read drug prescriptions, menus or work documents, with more than 10,000 people contacting support groups with their concerns since the start of 2008.

The spirits of hundreds of schoolchildren were lifted today as Archbishop Desmond Tutu visited one of the country's biggest regeneration projects.

IRISH people should count their blessings and put their economic woes in perspective, according to Nobel Laureate and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu has urged Irish people to put our current economic difficulties into perspective.

IN the face of economic crisis, we have seen what is achievable when countries unite in a common cause. But with the world at the brink of ecological disaster and millions of poor people already living on the frontline of climate change, it is essential that this ambition be heightened as world leaders meet at the UN climate negotiations in Poland.

Hollywood star Jonathan Rhys-Meyers received a royal welcome from Trinity College students at the weekend.

The US Supreme Court gave a reprieve to a Georgia inmate less than two hours before he was to be executed for the 1989 killing of an off-duty police officer.

Producer Timbaland has been chosen to receive an award from Ireland's prestigious Trinity College Dublin.

A band is to release a song celebrating Nelson Mandela’s 90th birthday after being encouraged to do so by Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Madonna today compared the “painful” struggle of her adoption plans controversy with the suffering women go through in natural childbirth.

The lasting legacy of the North’s peace process could be to point a way forward for other conflict zones around the world, a leading US statesman claimed today.

Police in riot gear fired warning shots to disperse more than 100 Buddhist monks who defied the Burmese military government’s ban on public assembly today by trying to penetrate a barricade blocking Rangoon’s famed Shwedagon Pagoda.

SOLDIERS, including an army division that took part in the brutal suppression of a 1988 uprising, converged on Burma’s largest city after thousands of monks and sympathisers defied government orders to stay out of politics and protested once again yesterday.

A group launched by former South African president Nelson Mandela to foster peace and resolve global conflicts will undertake its first mission to Sudan to highlight the crisis in Darfur, the organisation said today.

Politics – and not religion – is at the heart of the growing rift between the West and the Muslim world, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Monday after scholars, politicians and religious leaders convened in Turkey to discuss ways to improve the increasingly violent relations between the societies.

British business mogul Richard Branson today pledged to invest about 3$bn (€2.34m) over the next decade to combat global warming and promote alternative energy, saying that it was critical to protect the environment for the sake of future generations.

Hundreds of Irish volunteers are heading to South Africa to build more than 100 houses for slum dwellers, following an official launch of a charity project today.

Zimbabwe’s ruling party denounced South African Nobel peace prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu today, accusing him of playing into the hands of white racists.

Nelson Mandela’s grandson followed the former president’s example today by telling thousands of mourners at his father’s funeral that his mother had also died of Aids a year earlier.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu today branded the Guantanamo Bay prison camp a “disgrace”.

There were scenes of wild jubilation as South Africa today clinched the contest to stage the 2010 World Cup.

South Africa today won the contest to stage the 2010 World Cup.

FIFA’s ruling elite were today preparing to take an historic decision and award the 2010 World Cup to an African country for the first time.

South Africa tonight emerged as slight favourites to win the race to stage the 2010 World Cup but face a nerve-racking contest against challengers Morocco in tomorrow’s vote.

Bob Geldof and Archbishop Desmond Tutu are among the delegates at an international conference on combating HIV and Aids opening in Dublin today.

SINGER and third world campaigner Bob Geldof and Archbishop Desmond Tutu will be in Dublin later this month for the largest-ever conference on the escalating HIV/AIDS problem in Europe and Central Asia.