United Kingdom

Four resplendent Siberian chipmunks with their pouched cheeks and striped fur are wanted dead or alive after fleeing from an enclosure in southern England. The Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs said the chipmunks could muscle out wood mice and bank voles in the fight for seeds, nuts and berries.

A rare volcanic eruption is expanding the size of Montagu Island in the uninhabited South Sandwich Islands chain, a remote British territory in the southern Atlantic Ocean, scientists said on Wednesday. New satellite images show that Montagu Island has grown by 20,23ha in the past month alone.

South Africa received a boost ahead of this weekend’s one-off Test with France as veteran fullback Percy Montgomery was freed to play after a hearing with the sport’s governing body, the International Rugby Board, in London on Tuesday. Montgomery was sent off in the Springboks’ victory over Wales last Saturday.

Football legend George Best remained seriously ill in a London hospital on Tuesday but was partly conscious and responding to some stimulus, his doctor told reporters. ”He’s alive and his brain is working and he’s partly conscious, so we’re going to go on with all the treatment,” said Professor Roger Williams.

The British government is pressing ahead with plans on Thursday to extend pub opening hours in England and Wales, amidst controversy surrounding the country’s growing binge-drinking culture. Denounced as the ”new British disease” by Prime Minister Tony Blair, binge drinking and the millions of young people who drink to get drunk every weekend has become an alarming problem in Britain.

Rugby Union may be a much-changed game but there are still few better ways of opening up a defence than a well-timed pass allied to an incisive running-line. Unfortunately for England the absence of this classic combination from their repertoire against New Zealand was as noticeable as the demolished south stand at Twickenham.

Democracy is taking firm root in the Middle East and North Africa where Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinians will make great strides in 2006, Britain’s influential magazine The Economist predicted on Friday. The international weekly news and business magazine’s Index of Political Freedom ranked 20 countries on 15 indicators of political and civil liberties for its annual preview of the year ahead.

Contemporary music, from pop songs to film and show tunes, is now almost as likely to be chosen for a funeral in Britain as traditional religious pieces are, according to a study released on Thursday. One of the country’s largest funeral providers found more than 40% of ceremonies involved modern music.

A Zimbabwean woman whose appearance on a reality television show caused a storm of protest in her home country has won her battle to stay in Britain. The British government gave Makosi Musambasi notice to return to Zimbabwe in August for breaching the conditions of her working visa by resigning from her job as a cardiac nurse to appear on the Big Brother programme.

British Olympic rowing great Matthew Pinsent has described China’s training of some young gymnasts for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing as tantamount to child abuse. In a report for BBC Radio, Pinsent described children in a Beijing gymnasium being pushed through the pain barrier and said one young boy had clearly been beaten by his coach.

A British woman is thought to have become the oldest person in the country to get baptised, after a 101-year wait to be blessed at the baptismal font. Ivy Smith, from Bishops Waltham, Hampshire, southern England, had always thought she was too old to undergo the blessing.

A British woman has been feeling constantly seasick for four years — even on dry land — following a holiday cruise around the Mediterranean, press reports said on Wednesday. Jane Houghton (41) developed Mal de Debarquement syndrome during a week-long trip from the Spanish island of Majorca in 2001 with her husband Neil.

England hero Andrew ”Freddie” Flintoff’s bat was saved at an auction from the clutches of a bitter Australian determined to burn it to ashes. All-rounder Flintoff was named man of the series after England won the Ashes against old enemies Australia in September for the first time in 18 years.

Making a last-ditch bid to win a parliamentary vote on holding terror suspects for up to three months without charge, British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Wednesday said two terrorist plots had been foiled since July’s attacks in London. A rejection of the plan would be Blair’s first legislative defeat since he came to power in 1997.

So much cocaine is being used in London that traces of the white powerded narcotic can be detected in the River Thames, the Sunday Telegraph newspaper said. It said an estimated 2kg of cocaine, or 80 000 lines, spill into the river every day after passing through users’ bodies and sewage treatment plants.

Under-fire Manchester United defender Rio Ferdinand said the 1-0 weekend win over Premiership leaders Chelsea has put a stop to the criticism that has bedevilled the club in recent weeks. With a vicious slating from skipper Roy Keane thrown in, the Red Devils could hardly have gone into Sunday’s encounter in a worse frame on mind.

Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho insisted on Monday that the Blues will not suffer the same fate as London rivals Arsenal did last season following their Old Trafford defeat. Chelsea’s 40-game unbeaten Premiership run came to a dramatic end with a 1-0 defeat at Manchester United on Sunday.