World News in Pictures

[Mr Lick]

U.S. half-dollar silver coins believed to have belonged to a U.S. soldier possibly killed in an 1846 Mexican-American War battle are seen in this handout picture taken in Monterrey May 14, 2011 and released to Reuters on June 6, 2011.



Pieces of broken pottery and animal bones are displayed at an archaeological site, where a 6,000-year-old settlement with a unique mix of central Balkans and Adriatic cultures was discovered, in Reshtan village, southwest of capital Pristina May 31, 2011.

[Mr Lick]

Oil Talks Break Down
Amid rising oil prices, OPEC members failed to agree on a proposal to boost crude production at a conference in Vienna on Wednesday. Here: UAE Minister of Energy Mohamed Bin Dhaen al-Hamli at the meeting.



Cooling Off
With much of the eastern U.S. in the grip of a sizzling heat wave, Carl Militello cools off at a theme park in Darien Center, New York, on Wednesday.

[Mr Lick]

Yemen After Saleh
In the wake of President Ali Abdullah Saleh's departure from the country, armed Yemeni men loyal to opposition forces ride in a truck as they patrol a street in the southern city of Taiz on Wednesday.



Gaddafi's Complex Targeted
A Libyan soldier stands in front of destroyed buildings near Muammar Gaddafi's Tripoli compound on Tuesday after NATO warplanes pounded the capital. The above image was taken during a guided government tour.

[Mr Lick]

Storms Pound Ohio
A giant maple tree rests on a destroyed car in Madison, Ohio, after fierce storms consisting of hail, rain and strong winds battered the area on Tuesday morning.

[Mr Lick]

Graduate fashion week



^ My initial thoughts that this was a tit left me disheartened when i realised it was actually a robin


The Birmingham City University crowd seemed to be going with their animal instincts. Paris Hawkins-Carr's taxidermy created a showstopping spectacle, along with Rachel Cogley's fur-and-hair creations and Isla Skelton's 'robin red-breast' affair



Some members here might recognise this 'ladyboy'



These 3 could easily pass a film audition for a Hollywood horror.



and these i suspect, wouldn't be too far behind



This is the pick of the bunch as it is part of the Salisbury show



I desperately want to lick the beautiful eyeballs of the girl in the centre and i suspect that she would enjoy every nanosecond of that undying and emotional attention



That's some diet this girl is on.



You can't keep a good smiley out of the picture it seems



Fashion isn't just about making clothes. Patrick Schmidt's entrance piece – an illustrated tent with matching deckchairs – reminded us that graphic art can bring something fresh to fashion marketing

[Mr Lick]

Ocean2012 EU fisheries exhibition

To mark the launch of the second annual European Fish Week, Ocean2012 will launch a photo and documentary exhibit at London zoo aquarium




Flatfish fill the holding tanks on a beam trawler, amid heavy seas in the North Sea. The bulk of EU fisheries subsidies have gone to large-scale industrial vessels mainly for modernisation and construction



A deckhand on a purse seine boat observes a scoop of mackerel and sardines coming over the rail and into the fish holds

[Mr Lick]

A large catch of horse mackerel aboard a small purse seine boat. More than 70% of EU fish stocks are overfished and many are at high risk of depletion. For 14% of the stocks there is “emergency” scientific advice that fishing should be ceased



A sample of the common bycatch species from an inshore prawn trawler. These are the different species of sea life caught in one three-hour tow

[Mr Lick]

A pair of fishing boats trawl in the Bay of Biscay for cod, hake and horse mackerel



A father and son team set octopus pots off the coast of Galicia, north-west Spain. There are about 85,000 vessels in the EU fishing fleet, varying from small artisanal boats to large factory ships operating across the globe

[Mr Lick]

Mafu, and Moses, workers from Senegal and Ghana, aboard the Andrekala Berria trawler, shovelling its catch of primarily blue whiting into boxes. Spain is the largest fleet in the EU in terms of the size and power, and its fish consumption continues to rise despite European fish stocks being in an extremely poor state



The inside of an average purse seine vessel, this one off Duarnenez, Britanny. Among the displays are directional sonar, plotters and radar. EU fleet has reduced in size by 2-3% per year since 2002, though this has been offset by technological advances and increased efficiency

[Mr Lick]

Vigo fish market workers hold up a large blue shark in Vigo, Spain. Sharks grow slowly, mature late and produce few young over long lifetimes, leaving them exceptionally vulnerable to overexploitation and slow to recover from depletion



Beam trawlers at the dock in Harlingen, the Netherlands. The total income generated by the fisheries sector in 2005 was €10.9bn – 0.1% of EU GDP

[Mr Lick]

A father-and-son team headi out early morning to set gillnets for cod in the Baltic sea. Employment in the EU fishing sector decreased by 23% between 1997 and 2005



A Scottish fisherman offloads boxes of whitefish from the hold of a trawler. Smaller, familly run fleets will continue to go out of business unless fishing rights are allocated fairly and with sustainability in mind

[Mr Lick]

A huge monkfish is proudly displayed aboard the trawler in Rossaveal, Ireland. Some scientists estimate that as much as 90% of the entire ocean's large fish have been fished out



A fish market auction in Vigo, Spain. Women make up a quarter of the fishing sector workforce in the EU

Ooooooooo, get you!

[Mr Lick]

The captain of the Glor Na dTonn (Gaelic for "voice of the waves"), a twin rig prawn trawler, mends his trawl in Rossaveal



A mackerel processing facility at Lunar Fishing near Aberdeen, Scotland



A man hauls in a trawl net in Wladyslawowo harbour, Poland

[Mr Lick]

Aston Villa make move for Roberto Martínez to succeed Gérard Houllier




Roberto Martínez has been given permission by Wigan Athletic to speak to Aston Villa about the vacant manager's position. The Spaniard has emerged as the frontrunner to succeed Gérard Houllier, although Owen Coyle is also in contention.

Wigan's chairman, Dave Whelan, confirmed Villa's approach but said he was confident Martínez would reject the chance to move to Villa, where neither Rafael Benítez nor Steve McClaren were under consideration for the job.

Martínez, who secured Premier League survival on the final day of last season – and who reduced the club's wage bill over his two years at the club – won many admirers last season with his refusal to change Wigan's attractive playing style

[Mr Lick]

Lord Coe forced on to the defensive over London 2012 ticket sales



The London 2012 chairman Lord Coe was yesterday forced to defend the ticketing process for the Games again in the face of mounting criticism from up to one million applicants who will receive nothing in the first-round ballot.

Coe and the London organising committee (Locog) chief executive, Paul Deighton, toured TV and radio studios in a bid to reassure the public that the process was fair and explain how tickets would be allocated.

"Those who failed in the first round will have every opportunity to bid in the next round for hundreds of thousands of tickets and those tickets are at all price points," Coe told the BBC. "We mustn't run away with the idea that somehow those people who have bid huge sums of money have suddenly got loads and loads of tickets, they almost certainly haven't."

[Mr Lick]

Manchester United leave rivals trailing with £16m bid for Phil Jones




Manchester United accelerated what promises to be a hectic summer of transfer business when they gazumped Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal with a £16m deal for Phil Jones of Blackburn Rovers and set about recouping the money by accepting a £12m bid from Sunderland for John O'Shea, Darron Gibson and Wes Brown.
Sunderland hope to conclude a deal for the three out-of-favour United players with the money they have received from Liverpool as part of the £20m package that has seen Jordan Henderson move to Anfield, with the striker David Ngog heading in the opposite direction as a makeweight valued around £7m.

[Mr Lick]

An injured Syrian limps to a Turkish ambulance on the border near the village of Guvecci in Hatay province, Turkey, on June 9. About 1,000 Syrians fleeing violence crossed into Turkey overnight, raising the total number of refugees in the country to 1,600, a Turkish official said Thursday. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said his country will continue to accept all Syrians who flee, but he also has urged Syria's government to adopt reforms aimed at ending the unrest.

[Mr Lick]

Thousands of people seeking relief from asthma gathered in southern India on Wednesday to swallow live sardines smeared with secret herbs that they believe will cure them.

[Mr Lick]

Thai Air Force officials excavate the wreckage of a U.S. World War II combat aircraft, a P-51D Mustang, in Pathum Thani province on the outskirts of Bangkok, Thailand on June 9.

The plane was shot down during World War II as it was dropping bombs at a military camp in Don Muang in then Japanese-allied Thailand. The owner of the land recently discovered the wreckage and alerted officials who plan to display the remains in the Thai Air Force museum in Bangkok.

[Mr Lick]

India's most highly prized artist MF Husain dies aged 95



One of India's most famous artists, MF Husain, has died in hospital in London aged 95 after years of self-imposed exile.

He had been unwell for several months.

Maqbool Fida Husain was India's most highly prized - and perhaps most controversial - painter and his work sold for millions of dollars.

His paintings of nude Hindu goddesses angered hardline Hindus who accused him of obscenity. He left India in 2006 and took up Qatari nationality in 2010.

Mr Husain has also made two Bollywood films, although both failed at the box office.

The maverick artist was often called the "Picasso of India" and influenced a whole generation of artists in the country.

[Mr Lick]

Deadly militant attack on Pakistan security checkpoint







More than 100 militants have stormed a security checkpoint in north-western Pakistan, killing at least eight soldiers, officials say.

At least 12 insurgents were also reported killed in the overnight gun battle that lasted some hours.

The attack happened near the town of Makeen in the tribal district of South Waziristan, near the Afghan border.

The area has seen a surge in missile strikes by US drone planes in recent days.

Only a few days ago, locals and officials said a US drone attack in South Waziristan had killed a top al-Qaeda militant, Ilyas Kashmiri.

[Mr Lick]

Attorney general rules against Dr David Kelly inquest



The attorney general has said he will not order an inquest into the death of government scientist Dr David Kelly.

Dominic Grieve said the evidence he killed himself was "overwhelmingly strong" and he had seen nothing to support allegations he was murdered.

Dr Kelly, who was at the centre of a row between the BBC and Labour government over Iraq intelligence, was found dead in 2003.

The inquest was suspended as the Hutton inquiry investigated his death.

Mr Grieve said the Hutton inquiry, which ruled the scientist had committed suicide, was "tantamount to an inquest" and there was not sufficient evidence to warrant a further hearing.

"There is no basis on which the High Court could possibly order an inquest. It would be dismissed...with what I would assume would be a certain amount of irritation," he told MPs.

[Mr Lick]

Former BBC man Peter Rowell arrested in rape inquiry



The former BBC presenter Peter Rowell has been accused of raping a child.
Mr Rowell, of Wickwar, near Bristol, also faces two counts of indecent assault against a girl aged under 16.

He has previously been charged with seven further counts of indecent assault against girls and possessing and making indecent images of children.

The 53-year-old is due to appear at North Avon Magistrates' Court later. At his previous court appearances he denied all charges.

Mr Rowell, originally from Sunderland, presented the Afternoon Show on BBC Radio Bristol and BBC Somerset.

He was also a bulletin reader on ITV West for more than 10 years and worked as a DJ for commercial radio station GWR in the 1980s.

[Mr Lick]

Outdoor poker being played in China's capital Beijing

[Mr Lick]

More than 200 guitars hang from trees in the german city of Dusseldorf.It's the work of artist Oekkes Yildirim who plans to sell them off following his project for charity.