Miss Ireland to compete later today

Lynda Duffy, the Irish entrant in the Miss World pageant will finally get the chance to compete for the title when the festival gets under way in London later today.

Contestants had fled from the original host nation, Nigeria, last month after more than 200 people were killed in rioting sparked off by the competition.

Several critics have said that the organisers should never have gone to Nigeria at all.

However the pageant's organiser, Julia Morley, says she had only let the competition go to Nigeria in the first place, in the hope that it would make a difference. " I thought if went in there we'd be much more positive in communication and doing things positively together," she said.