Women’s Six Nations

Ireland 5 France 10

I was greatly honoured to be invited as Grand Marshall of the Cork St Patrick’s Day Parade. Little did I think, growing up as the son of Irish emigrants on Chicago’s south side, that I would be a future Grand Marshall for Ireland’s second largest city.

Ireland Women 15 France Women 10

On a day when International Women’s Day was celebrated across the globe, the Ireland women’s rugby edged closer towards immortality.

History was made this lunchtime after one of the most senior members of the Orange Order addressed the Seanad, while the Grand Master was present for the speech.

RIGHT around the country, there are hundreds of people wondering whether or not to accept an offer to manage a club team or wondering just what the hell they’ve got themselves into when they said they would.

DR CROKES manager Harry O’Neill has pleaded with Kerry GAA chiefs to give his side a fixtures break after Sunday’s Houdini-act against Aherlow in the Munster Club SFC semi-final in Cashel.

LEBANON’S Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, one of Shi’ite Islam’s main religious figures who had a strong following world over, died yesterday after a long illness.

SADDAM HUSSEIN’S notorious cousin “Chemical Ali” was convicted yesterday of crimes against humanity, receiving a death sentence for his involvement in one of the worst poison gas attacks ever against civilians – one of several he faces.

Security forces clashed with crowds gathered for a memorial for Iran’s most dissident cleric today.

IRAN’S most senior dissident cleric, Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, who emerged as the spiritual father of its reform movement, died yesterday.

Grand Zafeen got her career off to the best possible start with a cosy victory in the Premier Sports Cafe Bar Median Auction Maiden Fillies' Stakes at Pontefract today.

Five in-a-row All-Ireland 60 x 30 handball winner Eoin Kennedy says authorities have missed out on a 'glorious opportunity' to promote the game by not including a representative from the GAA sport as one of the Grand Marshals for this year's St. Patrick's Day Parade in Dublin.

A bomb struck a pipeline carrying oil to refineries in southern Iraq today, wounding eight oil guards and disrupting the flow of crude, police said.

Tens of thousands of Shiite pilgrims defied fears of violence and converged around a gold-domed mosque in the first major religious procession since Shiite battles turned a procession into a scene of bloodshed.

An armed confrontation between two Iraqi army units left one soldier and one civilian dead, raising questions about the US-trained force’s ability to maintain control at a time when sectarian and ethnic tensions are running high.

The Orange Order tonight accused British Prime Minister Tony Blair of double standards over terrorism in the North and around the world.

IRAQ’s ruling Shi’ite Islamist parties struck a last-minute deal to patch up differences yesterday and agreed to register as a united bloc for December 15 polls where they face a new Sunni Arab alliance.

SUNNI insurgents determined to derail this weekend's constitutional referendum attacked the largest Sunni Arab political party yesterday, bombing and burning offices and the home of one of its leaders.

Newsweek magazine has apologised to readers for errors in a story alleging US interrogators at Guantanamo Bay desecrated the Quran. The accusations, which the magazine vowed to re-examine, spawned protests in Afghanistan that left 15 dead and scores injured.

Frankie Dettori will be without a ride in tomorrow’s Dubai World Cup at Nad Al Sheba after Grand Hombre was withdrawn.

Recent information links one of Saddam Hussein’s most notorious former generals to the massacres of Shiites in southern Iraq, a human rights group said today.

Leaders of the mostly Shiite Muslim ticket said today they have no intention of establishing an Iranian-style Islamic state in Iraq if they sweep next weekend’s national elections.

The Iraqi kidnapping scourge continued unabated today with the abduction of two Egyptians in Baghdad.

The government of Iraq has accepted the peace deal brokered by Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Husseini al-Sistani to end the occupation of the holy Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf.

Iraq’s most powerful Shiite cleric was expected to return home from Britain today in a bid to end nearly three weeks of fierce fighting between US forces and Shiite militants in the holy city of Najaf.

MASKED gunmen killed a Turkish hostage with three gunshots to the head, according to a video posted on the Internet, and the Turkish truckers' union said yesterday it would stop supplying US forces in Iraq, bowing to militant demands in hopes of saving two other captive Turks.

Iraq’s top Shiite cleric warned coalition forces against entering the holy cities of Karbala and Najaf to capture a radical cleric wanted for murder as US troops and Shiite militiamen fought in the south. Thirteen Iraqis died in clashes in the north and south.

Iraq’s constitution was in limbo today after Shi’ite leaders refused to sign it in a last-minute dispute that wrecked a planned ceremony and marred a landmark in US plans to hand over sovereignty.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan today came out against holding elections in Iraq before the June 30 transfer of power to Iraqis, but made no suggestions on how to form a transitional government.

THOUSANDS of Shi’ite Muslims marched through Baghdad yesterday clamouring for Saddam Hussein’s execution in the latest show of strength by people oppressed for decades by the former dictator.

American and British officials faced tough questions from UN Secretary General Kofi Annan today about the transfer of power back to the Iraqi people.

Wolverhampton 3 Rochdale 1

A majority of people in six European countries believe US foreign policy was partly to blame for the September 11 terrorist attacks, a survey has found.

Westminster MPs today issued an appeal to Orangemen in a bid to draw them into the decision-making process over parades and avert another summer of civil disturbances in Northern Ireland.