A cancer-causing toxin has been found in baby formula in China, the latest quality problem to hit the dairy industry since a 2008 poison scandal that killed six infants.

Forty-five grimy, exhausted Chinese coal miners trapped by a cave-in were rescued today, ending a 36-hour ordeal in the world's most dangerous country for the industry. Eight other miners were killed in the accident.

Rescuers are trying to reach 50 miners trapped after a cave-in at a coal pit in central China, official say.

A tourist spot in central China's Hunan Province is handing out free tickets to virgins over 22 years old.

A Chinese high-wire artist was left clinging to a tightrope 100 metres up in the air after he slipped.

TILLAGE farmers in some parts of Ireland are experiencing drought impacts that are at least as bad as their counter-parts in neighbouring European Union member states, according to industry analysts.

Work crews raced to drain fast-rising reservoirs on opposite sides of China today, following torrential rains that triggered deadly landslides in several mountain hamlets.

At least 25 workers have been killed in a fire at a coal mine in central China, state media reported today.

POLICE in central China detained 15 parents for a violent protest over factory pollution that left hundreds of children with lead poisoning, and accused them of links to the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement, villagers said yesterday.

More than 1,300 children have been taken ill in China's second mass lead poisoning case in a month.

Two passenger trains collided today in an accident that killed three people and injured 60 as train cars were derailed and nearby houses knocked over, Chinese state media and an official said.

EIGHT kilograms of radioactive uranium has gone missing in China, delaying the verdict in a trial of four men charged with attempting to sell it on the black market, state media said yesterday.

A stone bridge being built in China collapsed, killing at least 14 people and injuring 22, state media reported today.

LIVE rats are being trucked from central China, which is suffering a plague of a reported two billion rodents displaced by a flooded lake, to the south to end up in restaurant dishes.

China’s death toll from Typhoon Saomai rose to at least 104 today, with another 190 missing, as the most powerful storm to strike the country in five decades weakened into a tropical depression.

Typhoon Saomai, the most powerful storm to hit China in five decades, raged ashore today and churned across the crowded south-east, killing at least two people, wrecking houses and capsizing ships after 1.5 million residents were evacuated.

An explosion aboard a bus in southern China killed eight people today, a government news agency reported, just days after a similar explosion killed 11.

An underground explosion and flooding from a rain-swollen river have left at least 64 Chinese workers dead and seven others missing in separate disasters, state media reported today.

A coal mine explosion and resulting fire in central China today left three miners confirmed dead and six others missing, the government said.

A SIX-YEAR-OLD Chinese boy who contracted bird flu late last month is in a critical condition.

TURKEY announced five more human cases of bird flu countrywide, bringing to 14 the number of people stricken by the lethal H5N1 virus and raising fresh alarms over its menacing westward advance.

China today announced its eighth confirmed human case of bird flu, a six-year-old boy who was being treated in a hospital in central Hunan province, state media reported.

A FARMER in north-east China has tested positive for the H5N1 strain of bird flu, the government said yesterday, making her the country’s fifth confirmed human case of the disease.

BIRD flu has killed at least one person in China, officials said yesterday, confirming the spread of the deadly virus to people in another large Asian country where it might prove hard to contain.

China reported its first three confirmed human cases of bird flu today – two of them fatalities.

China said today that it is taking effective measures to prevent the spread of bird flu and keep it from infecting people as the world’s most populous nation reported three outbreaks of the disease in a week.

A bird-flu outbreak has killed 545 chickens and ducks in a village in central China in the country’s third case of the disease in two weeks, the government announced today.

A series of explosions ripped through fireworks workshops in southern China, killing 13 people, a local official and the government’s Xinhua News Agency said today.

The death toll in a coal mine fire in central China rose to 18 today after the bodies of the last missing miners were found by rescuers.

JAPAN confirmed a new outbreak of bird flu yesterday, thwarting its plans to declare an end to the scourge there, while China confirmed two more outbreaks among poultry in a central province.

FIVE people have died and more than 370,000 have been evacuated as huge holes were blown in dykes in east China to tackle flood waters that are at record highs, officials said yesterday.

A thunderstorm packing high winds and torrential rains hit the area around central China’s Dongting Lake today, raising the threat to already strained dikes protecting several cities and dozens of villages.

FLOODWATERS threatening several cities and dozens of villages along central China’s vast Dongting Lake held at dangerously high levels yesterday, but could rise as heavy rain was forecast.

AS green floodwaters rose into homes beside a huge, rain-swollen lake in central China, yesterday, 800,000 workers were racing to shore up dykes that protect six Chinese cities and dozens of villages.

China has mobilised almost a million people to shore up dykes that protect six cities and dozens of villages from a huge, rain-swollen lake.

Six people have been killed and two others injured when fireworks in an illegal workshop exploded in southern China's Hunan province.

Accidents blamed on natural gas leaks have killed at least 50 miners in three separate Chinese mines.

A gas explosion in a central China coal mine has killed 18 people and left three missing.