The decision that no one will face charges over the mining accident in Chile that left 33 men underground for 69 days has left many speechless

The Carlton Intercontinental hotel on the exclusive Promenade de la Croisette in Cannes was the setting for an extraordinarily brazen diamond heist at the weekend, in which a lone gunman strolled into a jewellery exhibition taking place at the hotel and stuffed a suitcase with millions of pounds worth of Leviev diamonds before walking out. The owner of Leviev diamonds, Lev Leviev, is yet to comment on the theft. Apart from being a billionaire with an amazingly alliterative name,  just who is this wronged bling merchant?

In profit...

Bob Crow, the RMT general secretary, will seek to exploit Labour’s wranglings with trade unions by urging the movement to break ties with Ed Miliband and create a party that “speaks for working people”.

Miners managed to dig themselves out yesterday after weeks of being in the red as the US bellwether Alcoa reported better than expected results. The aluminium producer is the first to report earnings in the US each quarter, and beat expectations this time around. This, combined with better economic news across the board, a rise in metal prices and news of falling Chinese production costs sent metal miners soaring.

A better-than-expected US jobs report pushed the dollar up, which in turn melted metal prices yesterday and miners ended up buried at the bottom of the blue-chip index.

Even before Mandela’s illness, the political parties of South Africa were at loggerheads over their versions of the anti-apartheid struggle. Now the struggle is intensifying

Diamonds are forever for mining giant Rio Tinto, which today scrapped plans to sell or float its  $2 billion (£1.3 billion)  precious stones division.

The scandal-riven oligarchs behind mining group ENRC today looked poised for success in their attempts to buy the company for a knockdown price of £3 billion after they secured the reluctant backing of its biggest shareholder, and rival, Kazakhmys.

Bargain-hunters who began their spending spree on Thursday afternoon continued yesterday, and decided mining stocks were still a snip as they piled in. The gold miner Randgold Resources was shining toward the top of the benchmark index and added 122p to 4,881p, while Vedanta Resources put on 27p to 1,212p.

A shop steward from the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) was shot dead at one of Lonmin's South African mines yesterday, sparking fears of a renewed cycle of violence in the country's troubled platinum mining belt.

The England and Wales Cricket Board can begin the process of allocating matches for the 2019 World Cup after finalising the hosting agreement with the International Cricket Council.

Zorro returns?

Shares in the controversial FTSE 100 miner Eurasian Natural Resources (ENRC) dropped yesterday after it confirmed details of an unwanted attempted takeover bid by its oligarch founders and the Kazakhstan government.