National / International News

For the first time since 2011, European auto sales went up according to new data out this morning. After 18 months of declining sales, new car registrations rose 1.7 percent for the European Union in April.

But don't celebrate yet. The reason for the uptick has a lot to do with this year’s calendar, as April has two more business days than it did in 2012. Click on the audio player above to hear more from the BBC's transport correspondent Richard Westcott.

Shug McGaughey is the trainer of Kentucky Derby winner Orb, who runs Saturday in the Preakness Stakes, the second leg of thoroughbred racing's Triple Crown. Despite his long record of success, no one seems as surprised as the 62-year-old McGaughey to be pursuing one of the sport's top honors.

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Liam Byrne says Labour must aspire to create "full employment" and sets out plans to tackle unemployment "blackspots".

It's been a big week for talk about farming and food on Capitol Hill. Both the House and Senate Agriculture Committees have passed separate versions of the farm bill, which is long overdue for renewal. Next Monday, the full Senate is set to debate the bill. Debate on the on the floor of the House is expected in June. 

The stickiest wicket has been around the size of the food stamp program, technically known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP. At last count, about one in five Americans received food stamps, many of them elderly or working-poor families with children. 

Use of food stamps has grown dramatically in the aftermath of the Great Recession, as more people struggled to get food on the table. Growth in the last decade has also come from easing of eligibility requirements for the program to make it more accessible. 

In the House, many politicians have expressed concerns that Americans are becoming too dependent on food stamps. After debates involving dueling Bible verses, the House Agriculture Committee passed a bill this week that would make it harder to qualify for food stamps, and cut more than $20 billion dollars to the program over the next ten years. 

About two million people, or four percent of participants, would lose food stamps under the current House bill, according to calculations from the non-partisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. It would be the largest cut in food stamps since the 1996 welfare reforms.   

The Senate’s current version of the bill would also make cuts to the food stamp program, though far smaller ones. Spending would shrink by about $4 billion over the next ten years. 

In an interview with Marketplace earlier this week, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack argued that food stamps not only help those in need but also stimulate the economy, with every dollar spent in the food stamp program generating almost twice as much in economic activity. 

“As more people can buy more at the grocery store, that generates opportunities for grocers to increase employment, for those who truck produce to grocery stores to keep employed, for those in the processing and shipping and packaging and warehousing of food products,” he said. 

”Those are all basic opportunities that are maintained or expanded because we’ve got this Food Nutrition Assistance Program.”

A Saudi man has died after setting himself on fire in protest at his treatment by authorities, the BBC has learned.

Computers and smartphones have become a "digital dummy" used by parents to pacify their children, says a head teachers' leader.

GPS data could provide faster and more accurate early warning systems for tsunamis, a German team of scientists suggest.

Explosions near two mosques in a village in the Malakand region of north-west Pakistan leave at least 13 people dead.

Coronation Street actor Michael Le Vell pleads not guilty to 19 sexual offences against a child.

Twenty-four hours of news photos: 17 May

The government of President Nicolas Maduro announced this week that it would import 50 million rolls of toilet paper to meet the growing demand. The oil-rich country already suffers from a shortage of medicine, milk and sugar.

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The government of President Nicolas Maduro announced this week that it would import 50 million rolls of toilet paper to meet the growing demand. The oil-rich country already suffers from a shortage of medicine, milk and sugar.

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What next for Bradley Wiggins after quitting Giro d'Italia

How did the government calculate the benefits of HS2?

Toulon's Jonny Wilkinson is among five nominees for European Player of the Year following his impressive Heineken Cup displays.

A smoking action group calls for more legislation to cut the number of adult smokers as figures reveal a fall of just 1% in six years.

Revelations that Costa Rica's president used a jet belonging to a Colombian with alleged links to drug trafficking have led to three resignations.

Police believe the mother of a 20-month-old girl whose body was found in a house in Oxfordshire has fled to Kenya.

The driver of a speedboat that crashed killing a father and daughter was not wearing the safety cord that could have stopped the engine, investigators say.

Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness, says the gun attack on police officers in west Belfast would have created only "huge misery and heartbreak" had they been killed or injured.