Britons are collectively paying £9bn a year in interest on debts accumulated on their credit cards, new research has shown.   Britons owe billions of pounds in interest on their credit cards According to high street bank Abbey, more than two-thirds of people have at least one credit card, with the average person owing £3,256 [...]

China has “adequate ammunition” to fend off the worst effects of the global economic slowdown and is ready to add to already announced stimulus measures if needed, the country’s premier has said. Speaking to reporters at the end of the annual National People’s Congress (NPC) in Beijing on Friday, Wen Jiabao outlined a four point [...]

Pictures have been released showing Jade Goody’s joy and sadness as she ties the knot with Jack Tweed.   Wedding bliss: Jade and Jack kiss. Living/PA Wire The cancer-stricken reality star is seen beaming as she walks down the aisle, getting the giggles during the ceremony and wiping away tears as the emotion of the [...]

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has called the killing of 15 people by a teenager an incomprehensible crime that has left her nation in mourning. Her comments came in the wake of a shooting rampage by a teenage former student on Wednesday in southwest Germany. Tim Kretschmer opened fire at the Albertville high school in [...]

A new screening test for ovarian cancer can diagnose the disease long before women have any symptoms, research suggests.   New screening can pick up cancer earlier than it could previously be detected The biggest ever study of its kind has shown that a combination of blood tests and ultrasound checks can pick up nearly [...]

Iran has not decided whether to build a nuclear weapon bomb and does not have any highly enriched uranium to create one, senior US intelligence officials say. But Tehran is continuing to enrich uranium and is investigating how to build long-range missiles capable of delivering nuclear warheads, Dennis Blair, US director of intelligence, told the [...]

Five people, including a six-year-old child, have been killed in a two-car crash in Wirral, Merseyside.   Spital Road is near the M53 motorway Four of the victims were pronounced dead at the scene, ambulance officials said. A 64-year-old woman was taken to nearby Arrowe Park Hospital with multiple injuries but died later. Police said [...]

North Korea’s military has gone on full alert and threatened “merciless retaliatory blows” just hours before US and South Korean forces began annual military exercises. Pyongyang has also warned of war if what it calls a satellite launch – but what intelligence analysts believe is cover for a long range missile test – is shot [...]

Terminally-ill Jade Goody plans to undergo a christening ceremony with her two sons at a hospital chapel today.   Jade hopes to christen her children at the hospital’s chapel It had been hoped that the ceremony could take place in a church. But cancer-stricken Jade, who was transferred to the Royal Marsden Hospital after a [...]

The United States and Russia plan to have a new disarmament agreement by the end of the year, Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, has said. Clinton said the two countries had “agreed on a work plan” after she met Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, for a two-hour working dinner on Friday in [...]