Normally bustling streets were empty as trade unions began a paralysing national strike in oil-rich Nigeria today, angered by soaring fuel prices and decades of government corruption.

In the wake of growing consumer interest in carbon footprints, a new awareness of our water consumption has led to the notion of a ‘water footprint’. Andrew Wigley explores some of the reputational challenges for business

This is an enormously likeable and accomplished hour from Humphrey Ker, better known as one third – the tall, posh third – of sketch troupe the Penny Dreadfuls. In his debut solo show, Ker plays to his acting strengths, spinning a bonkers wartime yarn in which he plays a heavily accented array of characters from a Geordie killing machine to a Texan belle and a Romanian conjuror.

The UK is sending emergency drinking water to one of Japan's worst tsunami-stricken regions in response to an urgent request from the Japanese authorities, the Department for International Development (Dfid) said.

The UK Young Scientist of the Year award has been won by a woman for the first time.

Military aircraft dropped supplies to towns cut off by floods in northeastern Australia as the prime minister promised new assistance yesterday to the 200,000 people affected by waters covering an area larger than France and Germany combined.

The authorities in Northern Ireland came in for heavy criticism yesterday after water shortages affected tens of thousands of homes, some of which have had no running water for a week.

Water bosses tonight faced demands to quit as engineers struggled to repair leaking pipes to tens of thousands of homes in Northern Ireland, amid fears the drinking water fiasco could develop into a major health emergency.

An entrepreneur has said he plans to save Britain's most exclusive brand of spring water from drying up.