TWO hundred years ago the bean goose was one of the commonest winter migrant wild geese in Ireland.

THE robin is the bird most associated with the Christmas season and, I suppose, if you had to pick a mammal you’d have to go for the reindeer.

A Siberian mammoth undergoing tests in Japan could finally explain why the beasts were driven to extinction – and shed light on the history of global climate change, scientists said today.

A helicopter crashed in northern Siberia today, killing at least six of the 15 people on board.

A FIRE in a boarding school for the deaf in southern Russia killed 28 children and seriously injured 17 others yesterday, as rescuers raced from bed to bed to awaken students who could not hear alarms.