Raising the spectre of a Greek exit, the German chancellor said “solidarity for the euro” was threatened by the ongoing political crisis in Athens.

Stock markets around the world fell sharply with fears mounting that a euro break-up could lead to renewed financial turmoil. The FTSE-100 index of Britain’s major companies fell by two per cent to 5465, with bank shares hit particularly hard. Read More...

Speaking exclusively to The Sunday Telegraph, Theodoros Pangalos said he was "very much afraid of what is going to happen" after Greek voters rejected the deal in elections last Sunday. "The majority of the people voted for a very strange mental construction," he said. "We want to be in the EU and the euro, but we don't want to pay anything for the past."

The main beneficiary of the election, the hard-Left Syriza coalition, came a startling second on a promise to tear up the deal, which promises EU loans to keep massively-indebted Greece afloat, but demands crippling spending cuts in return. Germany, the principal lender, has said it will stop payments if Greece breaks its promises on spending. Read More...

The deep uncertainty over what will happen next in Greece unnerved financial markets. On May 7th the euro touched its lowest value against the dollar since January while in Athens the stockmarket fell by 7% and bank stocks by 13%. Greek bonds also took a hit, with the yield on the ten-year bond rising to 22.9% (from 20.5% at the end of April). Investors piled into the havens of German government bonds and American Treasuries. The Dow Jones Euro Stoxx 50 fell to its lowest level so far in 2012. Read More...

I have a piece in the dead-tree TIME this week that looks at the election of Francois Hollande in France and connects it to the democratic revolt happening over in Greece. What do they have in common? Both are reactions to the increasingly discredited—or at the very least disliked—austerity policies that have been put in place to fix the euro-zone crisis. That hasn’t happened yet—countries like Italy and Spain are in recession and nations like Greece are in worse straits. In fact, the one thing we know austerity causes is the end of political careers. Read More...

So voters in France and Greece sent an inescapable signal to the euro zone: No more austerity. In doing so, they showed that the average guy on the street understands economics better than the people in power. Read More...

Thousands of pills filled with powdered human flesh have been discovered by customs officials in South Korea, it was revealed today.

The capsules are in demand because they are viewed as being a medicinal 'cure-all'.

The grim trade is being run from China where corrupt medical staff are said to be tipping off medical companies when babies are aborted or delivered still-born. Read More...

French voters chose Socialist Francois Hollande as their new president Sunday in a race that will have implications for Europe's debt crisis, the Afghanistan war and global diplomacy. Hollande, largely unknown outside French borders, beat out conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy, who faced widespread anger and disappointment over his handling of the economy. Read More...

The inhabitants of the Solomon Islands - east of Papua New Guinea - are very dark-skinned - but have puzzled scientists with their blond hair. Now Stanford researchers have solved the ridddle. Read More...