Reykjavik

An alternative beauty pageant to be held in a remote Icelandic town will reward contestants’ wrinkles, saggy breasts and other bodily imperfections and hopes to challenge Western ideas of beauty, organisers said on Wednesday. "Anyone can make the rules about what beauty is; we want to change the rules," one of the contest’s organisers, Matthhildur Helgadottir, said.

Iceland was embroiled in a political crisis on Monday as the country’s president appeared poised to veto a media law proposed by the government, a first in the Icelandic republic’s 60-year history. The draft law calls for the break-up of media groups if they concentrate too much power over media in their hands.

Environmentalists and the tourist industry on Thursday criticised Iceland’s decision to resume limited whaling, saying it was unnecessary and could hurt the country’s booming whale-watching businesses.