Leaders from China and the European Union are reportedly meeting for talks likely to be dominated by Europe’s debt crisis.

Premier Wen Jiabao is set to meet EU President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso in Beijing.

Europe is China’s biggest trade partner and the EU has courted investment in its bailout fund. Beijing has so far made no specific pledges of assistance. Greece passed a package of severe cuts late on Sunday demanded by the EU and IMF in return for a 130bn euro ($170bn; £110bn) bailout.

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Russia and China have handed Syria’s government a “licence to kill”, say opposition activists, after the two countries vetoed a UN resolution.

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The owner of a French breast implant maker at the centre of a safety scare has been arrested in southern France.

Poly Implant Prothese (PIP) founder Jean-Claude Mas, 72, was held at his home in Six-Fours-les-Plages, police sources told reporters.

In 2010, France banned PIP implants made with the low-grade industrial silicone, amid fears they could rupture and leak. Up to 400,000 women in 65 countries are believed to have been given implants

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Malaria-carrying mosquitoes are disappearing in some parts of Africa, but scientists are unsure as to why.

Figures indicate controls such as anti-mosquito bed nets are having a significant impact on the incidence of malaria in some sub-Saharan countries.They are uncertain if mosquitoes are being eradicated or whether they will return with renewed vigour.

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Jamaica’s Usain Bolt was disqualified from the final of the men’s 100m at the World Athletics Championships as countryman Yohan Blake took gold.

Defending champion Bolt caused shock in the stadium in Daegu as he came out of his blocks well before the gun.

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Many books have been written about 9/11 but is there one that embodies the era that the attacks inaugurated?

According to Bowker’s Books in Print database, which tracks print and e-books published and distributed in the United States, 164 such works have been written so far – they either directly address the event or use it as a peg to hang greater literary concerns about love, life and loss.

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Swat in north-west Pakistan is still recovering from a period of militancy several years ago.

Men and women deemed un-Islamic were killed by the Taliban and their bodies dumped on the street. Hundreds of girls schools were destroyed before the army ousted the militants in 2009. A local school girl and Swat’s first woman to train as a lawyer told Nosheen Abbas how life is changing.

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Ferocious winds from Hurricane Irene have begun to hammer New York, bringing torrential rain and the threat of flooding in the financial district.

New York City’s public transport system has been closed and the mayor said it was now too late for people to leave. Irene has already hit North Carolina and Virginia, causing damage and the deaths of at least eight people.

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The thieves who broke into the Natural History Museum in Tring during the early hours of Saturday morning probably thought it had been a good night’s work.

They took two rhino horns, weighing 2kg each and worth about £240,000 on the black market. Or so they thought.

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Schools in China have been told to run more classes in calligraphy because computer use and text-messaging are ruining children’s writing style.

Younger students should have classes every week specifically in writing Chinese characters, the education ministry said.

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Syrian security forces have attacked protesters at a mosque in the capital, Damascus, activists say.

Security officials stormed the al-Rifai mosque in the Kafar Susseh district, the activists said, reportedly wounding the mosque’s imam.

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Sexual relations between ancient humans and their evolutionary cousins are critical for our modern immune systems, researchers report in Science journal.

Mating with Neanderthals and another ancient group called Denisovans introduced genes that help us cope with viruses to this day, they conclude.

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It would be easy to laugh at Chris Nsamba, founder of the African Space Research Programme.

For a start, his research centre is based in his back garden where there’s not much evidence of the type of sophisticated tools and machinery I’d imagine you need for this kind of work. When I was there, most of the engineers were equipped with just sandpaper and paint brushes.

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Tougher action – including taxing junk food – is needed by all governments if the obesity crisis is going to be tackled, experts say.

The international group of researchers, who have published a series of articles in The Lancet, said no country had yet got to grips with the problem.

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Is it possible to work out which living athlete is the best?

Mathematician Rob Eastaway, co-author of The Hidden Mathematics of Sport, investigates.

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Japan’s beleaguered Prime Minister Naoto Kan has announced his resignation, clearing the way for the country’s
sixth leader in five years.

Mr Kan has been criticised for failing to show leadership after the devastating 11 March earthquake and tsunami, and ensuing nuclear crisis.

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There has been a bomb attack at the UN building in the Nigerian capital Abuja, the United Nations says.

The BBC’s Bashir Sa’ad Abdullahi, who is at the site of the explosion, says the ground floor of the building has been badly damaged.

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Police in Austria have arrested a man suspected of imprisoning and sexually abusing his two daughters in his village home over 40 years ago.

The man, now 80, denies the abuse, which allegedly began when one girl was aged 12 and the other four.

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Why does one person die younger and another survive to old age?

Lifestyle and genetic factors play a role, but argues Prof David Barker, a better predictor of future health is our birthweight and what it tells us about our development in the womb.

Heart disease, cancer, diabetes. These are some of the chronic diseases that determine lifespan.

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Growing up starved of calories may give you a higher risk of heart disease 50 years on, research suggests.

Researchers in The Netherlands tracked the heart health of Dutch women who lived through the famine at the end of World War II. Those living on rations of 400-800 calories a day had a 27% higher risk of heart disease in later life.

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