The News Matrix: Tuesday 3 December 2013

Victims of violence turned away

More than 150 women a day are being turned away from domestic violence refuges as successive budget cuts push the system into “a state of crisis”, a report has indicated. A snapshot of refuges across England on a typical day this year found that 155 women with 103 children were turned away from the first they approached. MORE

Coral sperm bank for Great Barrier Reef

The Great Barrier Reef is shrinking fast, but scientists have now come up with perhaps the most imaginative scheme to save it: the coral sperm bank. Using human fertility techniques, the scientists plan to freeze coral sperm in the hope of creating new coral. MORE

Hawking warns on NHS ‘privatisation’

The NHS “must be preserved from commercial interests who want to privatise it”, Professor Stephen Hawking has warned. Professor Hawking said that he would not be alive today without the NHS, which he described as “Britain’s finest public service”. MORE

Putin says ‘outside actors’ caused riots

Vladimir Putin blamed “outside actors” for the protests against the government, which he said amounted to an attempt to unsettle Ukraine’s legitimate rulers. There were violent protests for a third day yesterday against the decision to spurn EU accession talks. MORE

Nine victims’ bodies found at crash site

The bodies of nine people killed when a police helicopter crashed into the roof of a pub have been recovered, as investigators revealed that no Mayday call was made from the aircraft. The wreckage of the three-tonne Eurocopter was yesterday removed from the building.

Protesters reject Yingluck’s talks plea

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra appeared to try and dampen the deadly protests against her premiership. Activists, who claim she is the puppet of her brother Thaksin, say they will press on. MORE

UN claims evidence of regime war crimes

The UN has evidence of war crimes committed by the Syrian government, including President Bashar al-Assad, the body said yesterday. Navi Pillay, the UN’s commissioner for human rights, said that war crimes in the country’s ongoing civil war were authorised at the “highest level” of the Syrian administration.

Britain deemed most generous nation

Britain is the most generous developed nation in the world when it comes to giving to charity, according to a report published today. More than three-quarters of British people give to good causes in a typical month, the highest proportion of any developed country surveyed.