Anger Over Bomb Hurled At Belfast Police Car

An explosive device was thrown at a police vehicle in Belfast, just hours after a separate car bomb was found a few miles away.

A Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) spokesman said the officers targeted had escaped serious injury following the attack near the City Cemetery in the west of the city.

Paramedics treated up to four members of the public for shock but no one was badly hurt.

A PSNI spokesman said: "Police in west Belfast have escaped serious injury tonight after an explosive device detonated close to their vehicle on the Falls Road.

"The incident occurred shortly before 10.30pm close to the entrance of the City Cemetery.

Debris from the explosion. pic: Press Pix / Samuel Severn

"It is believed some form of explosive device was thrown at their vehicle."

SDLP councillor Claire Hanna tweeted: "Hoping no serious injuries following explosion. Throwback (to) terrorists reduced to trying to embarrass Northern Ireland over St Patrick's. Get off our backs."

The City Cemetery, at the junction of Falls Road and Whiterock Road, is one of Belfast's oldest public cemeteries.

Police in Northern Ireland have been urged to tighten personal security measures after a separate under-car bomb was found a relatively short distance away from City Cemetery on Friday morning.

It fell from the vehicle and failed to explode, and even though the target has not been positively identified, the PSNI has not ruled out the possibility it was meant for one of their officers.

The device was discovered at Blacks Road, a busy route close to the M1 not far from Woodbourne police station.

Dissident republicans have been blamed for planting the bomb in what appears to have been a deliberate attempt to embarrass Northern Ireland First Minister

Peter Robinson and deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, who are in Washington to meet senior members of the Obama administration as part of St Patrick's Day celebrations.

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West Brom Sack Anelka After 'Quenelle' Storm

West Brom say they have terminated Nicolas Anelka's contract for gross misconduct, following his ban for performing the controversial 'quenelle' gesture during a match.

In a statement on their website, the club said their decision was the result the player's conduct while celebrating a goal against West Ham on December 28 and his remarks posted on social media.

"The club considers the conduct of Nicolas Anelka on December 28, coupled with his purported termination on social media this evening, to be gross misconduct," it said.

"As a result the club has tonight written to Nicola Anelka giving him 14 days' notice of termination as required under his contract."

The 35-year-old, whose deal at the Premier League side was due to expire in the summer, had earlier announced he would leave the club over its response to his five-match ban and £80,000 fine from the FA.

He wrote on his Twitter account that he had decided to "put an end" to his contract, saying the club had proposed "certain conditions that I cannot accept".

The Frenchman's tweets on Friday evening

In three posts written in French on Twitter, the player said: "Following talks between the club and me, propositions were made to me in order to reintegrate me into the squad under certain conditions that I cannot accept.

"Wishing to retain my integrity, I have therefore taken the decision to free myself and put an end to the contract linking me with West Bromwich Albion to 2014, with immediate effect."

West Brom previously issued a statement in response, indicating Anelka's words had taken them by surprise.

It said: "The club has received nothing formally regarding the termination of Nicolas Anelka's contract from either him or his advisers.

"The club regards the release of such a statement on social media as highly unprofessional and will make a further statement when appropriate."

It was claimed the quenelle was anti-Semetic, but Anelka says the gesture was merely anti-establishment and made in support of his friend Dieudonne M'bala M'bala, a French comedian who has been convicted seven times of anti-Semitic crimes.

A Football Association commission found it was abusive and/or indecent and/or insulting and/or improper, and that it included a reference to ethnic origin and/or race and/or religion or belief.

It accepted there was no intent by Anelka to be anti-Semitic, but banned him for five matches and fined him £80,000. He was subsequently suspended by West Brom.

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Couple Jailed For Lee Rigby YouTube Videos

A man has been sentenced to five years and four months for posting YouTube videos glorifying the murder of Fusilier Lee Rigby.

Royal Barnes, 23, was sentenced at the Old Bailey on Friday, with his wife, Rebekah Dawson, getting a 20-month sentence.

The videos posted by the British Muslim couple were "offensive in the extreme", the court heard.

They published the clips shortly after the brutal murder of Fusilier Rigby in Woolwich last May.

Barnes filmed himself laughing as he passed flowers left for the soldier

The couple, from Hackney in London, made three videos - the first uploaded on the day after the attack, with Barnes calling it a "brilliant day".

It was edited together with pictures of a man holding a decapitated head, a scene from Woolwich, and images of the World Trade Center.

The second clip showed Dawson ranting about how British troops would be killed on London's streets.

Fusilier Rigby, 25, was hacked to death in broad daylight on May 22, 2013

A third video showed Barnes mocking the public's grief at Fusilier Rigby's murder and laughing uncontrollably as he and his wife drove past flowers at the murder scene.

Barnes pleaded guilty last month to inciting murder and three counts of disseminating a terrorist publication.

Dawson, 22, who insisted on wearing a full veil in court, also admitted charges of disseminating a terrorist publication.

Rebekah Dawson's video was posted shortly after the murder

Judge Brian Barker QC said the pair showed "a total and continuing disregard" for the effect it would have on the soldier's family and the wider public.

Fusilier Rigby's killers were jailed last month for the attack, which saw them hack the solider to death on the streets of southeast London.

Michael Adebolajo, 29, was given a whole-life term, and Michael Adebowale, 22, was jailed for at least 45 years.

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EuroMillions: Lucky Brit Wins £107.9m Jackpot

A British ticket-holder has scooped £107.9m on the EuroMillions draw, becoming the fourth biggest UK winner in the history of the National Lottery.

The winning ticket belongs to a single player.

Friday's winning numbers were 06, 24, 25, 27 and 30, while the lucky stars were 05 and 9.

A National Lottery spokesman said: "With the weather set fair for the coming week, this UK winner is set fair for the rest of their lives having just become a multimillionaire.

"This single UK ticket-holder will enter the exclusive top five on the National Lottery Rich List - at number four - and we've got the champagne on ice ready for the lucky winner to claim their prize."

Top of the National Lottery Rich List are Colin and Chris Weir, who won a £161m EuroMillions jackpot in July 2011.

The Scottish husband and wife said they were "tickled pink" by their winnings and reportedly bought a fleet of cars for friends, as well as a mansion.

The second largest jackpot of almost £150m was claimed by Adrian and Gillian Bayford, from Suffolk, in August 2012.

At the time, Mr Bayford said he would carry on running his music shop in Haverhill. Mrs Bayford, a children's ward healthcare assistant, said she would treat herself to her dream car, an Audi Q7.

However just 15 months after their win, the couple announced they were divorcing following the "irretrievable" breakdown of their marriage.

The third biggest jackpot of £113m was claimed in October 2010, but the lucky ticket-holder decided not to go public.

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Gove Says Number Of PM's Etonians 'Ridiculous'

Education Secretary Michael Gove has criticised the "ridiculous" numbers of Old Etonians in David Cameron's inner circle.

Speaking to the Financial Times, Mr Gove said such a "preposterous" concentration of individuals from the same privileged background at the top of government was unique among developed countries.

Labour said his comments showed the Conservatives were "out of touch" with the concerns of ordinary people in Britain.

Old Etonians around the Prime Minister - himself a former Eton pupil - include his chief of staff, Ed Llewellyn; the head of his policy unit, Jo Johnson; the minister for government policy, Oliver Letwin; and Chancellor George Osborne's chief economic adviser, Rupert Harrison.

The Prime Minister at a Cabinet meeting last year

Mr Gove compared them to the cabinet of Eton-educated Tory prime minister Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, the Marquess of Salisbury, who was accused of nepotism and cronyism.

"At the beginning of the 20th century, the Conservative cabinet was called Hotel Cecil," he said.

"The phrase 'Bob's your uncle' came about and all the rest of it. It is preposterous.

"It doesn't make me feel personally uncomfortable because I like each of the individuals concerned, but it's ridiculous. I don't know where you can find some such similar situation in a developed economy."

Mr Cameron's inner circle was compared to that of Robert Gascoyne-Cecil (R)

Mr Gove, who went to a fee-paying school in Scotland, said the concentration of Old Etonians at the top of the Conservative Party was due to the fact that "more boys from Eton go to Oxford and Cambridge than boys eligible for free school meals".

But shadow Cabinet Office minister Jon Ashworth said it was a "reflection of the Conservative Party" under Mr Cameron.

"It's up to David Cameron who he puts into top jobs, and the fact is that the Prime Minister has chosen to surround himself with people just like himself," he said.

"He's leading a Government that's completely out of touch.

"That's why his decisions have helped a privileged few rather than hard-working families, with tax cuts for people earning over £150,000 while wages are down an average £1,600 a year."

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Tony Benn: Veteran Labour Politician Dies

Tony Benn: 'Controversial, But Courteous'

Updated: 1:18pm UK, Friday 14 March 2014

By Jon Craig, Chief Political Correspondent

Harold Wilson famously said of Tony Benn: "He immatures with age."

And it's true that as he grew older Benn changed from a charismatic and dynamic minister in the mainstream of government to a divisive left-winger who split the Labour Party, before becoming the national treasure of his declining years.

He was controversial, but always courteous. I first met him in the late 1970s, when he came to speak at Southampton University Students Union while still a Cabinet minister.

He paid his own train fare and came alone, without the army of spin doctors that accompany Cabinet and Shadow Cabinet members today.

Throughout his long career, he would record interviews with journalists, for many years on an old-fashioned cassette recorder. He was quirky, but never tetchy.

Teetotal and famous for drinking tea from large mugs. And before smoking was banned he would smoke his pipe at party meetings and conferences.

In the early 60s, in terms of Labour Party presentation Benn was the Peter Mandelson of his day, a "moderniser" pioneering the party's use of television as a means of communicating with voters as Wilson swept the Tories out of office in 1964.

He leaves some historic legacies. As Postmaster General in the Wilson government he oversaw the opening of London's Post Office Tower and drove pirate radio stations off the air. Then, as Minister for Technology, he was in charge of the development of Concorde.

In those days, he was known as Antony Wedgewood Benn, until he declared in 1973 – when he was moving sharply left with Labour in Opposition – that he wanted to be known in future as Tony Benn.

For years, however, the Daily Mail continued to call him by his old name.

Of course, despite his claims to be a great hero of the working class, Benn was in fact as upper crust as they come and earlier, in 1960, had to fight a battle in Parliament to disown his hereditary peerage, Viscount Stansgate, so he could remain an MP.

In 1975, when Wilson was back in Downing Street and held a referendum on whether Britain should stay in the Common Market, Benn shared platforms with Right-wing Tory MPs opposed to Britain's membership.

But it was after Labour's crushing defeat by Margaret Thatcher in 1979 that he became the leader of Labour's hardline left wing in a civil war that led to the breakaway SDP formed by major Labour figures Roy Jenkins, Shirley Williams and David Owen.

In 1980 he stood against Denis Healey for the deputy leadership of the Labour Party, in one of the most bitter and divisive elections in the party's history. He lost by a whisker, but the party split deepened and within a year the SDP was on the march.

At Labour's low point, the crushing election defeat of 1983, Benn lost his seat in Bristol.

"Labour gain!" chanted Right-wing Labour MPs, appalled by Benn's destructiveness over the previous few years.

But he bounced back in a by-election in Chesterfield, selected on a snowy Sunday night – I was there! - and from the moment he returned to the Commons until he retired he was almost inseparable from his left-wing Derbyshire neighbour, "the Beast of Bolsover", Dennis Skinner.

In the 1984-85 miners' strike, Benn and Skinner were Arthur Scargill's strongest allies and loudest cheerleaders in Parliament, while Labour leader Neil Kinnock had a nightmare year because of Scargill's refusal to hold a ballot.

In 1999, he proudly introduced his son Hilary into the Commons after Hilary won a by-election in Leeds Central, campaigning on the slogan "a Benn, not a Bennite". And in 2001, the Benn dynasty in the Commons assured, he stood down claiming he was "leaving Parliament to spend more time on politics".

In his latter years, he became a leading opponent of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, becoming president of the Stop the War movement. And in his 80s he becamse more popular than at any time during his career, touring Britain with his one-man show and his diaries became best sellers.

At Westminster, he will be remembered as one of the best speakers in the House of Commons, highly respected by Conservative MPs who shared his anti-EU views.

But for many Labour MPs, he will be remembered as an aristocrat with a romantic view of the working class whose judgement was often flawed.

Many older Labour MPs will never forgive him for what they regarded as his destructive splitting of the party which came close to destroying it in the 1980s.

Those Labour MPs, critical too of his opposition to Tony Blair and the war in Iraq, would also agree with Harold Wilson's famous phrase about Tony Benn.

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Annual Energy Bills 'To Rocket By 2020'

By Poppy Trowbridge, Consumer Affairs Correspondent

Annual household energy bills could rise by more than £600 within seven years so power companies can keep the lights on.

Sky News has learned the watchdog has written to the Treasury ahead of next week's budget to warn of rising costs.

In a new forecast, consumer champion Which? has predicted energy companies will need to spend £118bn on new infrastructure between now and 2020.

This would include building new power stations, replacing grids and building wind farms as part of a drive to sustain Britain's power supply and cut down on carbon emissions.

Which? believes this cost will inevitably be passed on to consumers, and that households and businesses will foot the bill.

This would mean that the average bill would exceed £2,000 a year even if wholesale costs of gas and electricity remain stable - an annual rise of £640 per household.

Richard Lloyd, executive director of Which?, said: "I don't think consumers know that this is heading their way and that decision has already been made by the Government.

"This is a massive chunk potentially on everyone's bills. This means one thing: that household bills are set to rise, and to rise for many people very steeply for the foreseeable future."

Which? is campaigning for a full market investigation to find out if consumers are paying a fair price for energy.

Sky News also learned that at least one of the 'big six' energy firms is not guaranteeing to make the necessary investment should it not prove profitable for the company.

Energy companies rely on investors - who require a return on their investment - to finance certain projects.

Angela Knight, of Energy UK, the body representing the industry, said: "A lot of this is all about the policy that the Government and previous Government signed up to.

"Right now there is significant concern about the price of a bill and that is before much of this investment comes through.

"At the same time, a lot of our stuff is old and you do have to refresh and replenish."

One move Chancellor George Osborne may deploy to tackle the costs being passed through to consumer energy bills could be freezing the Carbon Floor Price in next week's budget.

The tax policy means polluting industries must pay a minimum amount of money for the right to pollute.

If Mr Osborne were freeze or abolish the Carbon Floor Price, the knock-on effect would prevent around £8 being added to bills each year, according to one energy company source.

In December 2013, HM Treasury released estimates of planned national infrastructure investments relating to 2013-2020 and beyond.

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Tony Benn Obituary: A Conviction Politician

Tony Benn was one of the most charismatic, iconoclastic and - to many colleagues - infuriating figures of his generation.

Born into a world of privilege, and married to a wealthy American, he entered Westminster as a centre right politician.

But over time he veered to the hard left, renouncing not just his peerage but also the orthodoxy of mainstream power politics.

He had many critics but he stuck to his guns and in later years the pipe-smoking vegetarian acquired cult status, especially among young people.

He was born Anthony Neil Wedgewood Benn on April 3, 1925, at 40 Millbank, Westminster.

The son and grandson of MPs, Benn's links to the Labour movement ran deep.

His next-door neighbours were Sidney and Beatrice Webb, who wrote Clause IV of the Labour Party Constitution which was adopted by the party in 1918 and set out its aims and values.

Tony Benn at his home after announcing he would step down as MP

His father, Viscount Stansgate, was a Liberal MP who defected to Labour and was then elevated to the Lords.

Tony Benn was educated at Westminster School and Balliol College, Oxford, interrupting his studies to serve in the RAF in the later stages of World War II.

In 1950 at the age of 25 he was elected the member for Bristol South-East and went on to serve as an MP for 47 years, a Labour party record.

After his father's death in 1960, he fought a long, hard and ultimately victorious battle to relinquish his peerage and remain in the Commons.

He was a cabinet minister in the 60s and 70s under Harold Wilson and James Callaghan, serving as technology minister, postmaster general, and industry and energy secretaries.

His ability was never in doubt but his unwillingness to compromise his ideals often put him at odds with his colleagues.

Wilson once commented waspishly that Benn had "immatured with age". His reply: "I haven't yet decided what I want to do ... when I grow up".

Michael Foot with Benn in their seats at the House of Commons in 1980

He supported unilateral nuclear disarmament and favoured closer ties between western and eastern Europe.

It was hardly surprising then that he was vilified by the right and once denounced as "The Most Dangerous Man in Britain".

But he also backed the abolition of capital punishment, the ordination of women priests and the televising of Parliament, showing himself way ahead of his time.

His main aim was to achieve peace in the world - he campaigned against both wars in the Gulf, insisting they were about profit, oil and control of the region.

The death of his wife Caroline, an educationalist and writer, in 2000, was a huge blow. They had four children and 10 grandchildren.

Benn retired from the Commons in May 2001 to, as he put it, "devote more time to politics".

Benn and his daughter Melissa at a polling station in 1975

He was an assiduous diarist, recording everything in his notebooks every night since 1940, seven volumes of which have been published.

He also wrote several books and tracts, including a powerful polemic against nuclear energy.

At different times he was described - with some justification perhaps - as self-righteous, a crackpot and manic.

But Benn was a compelling performer and when he spoke, people always listened.

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Helicopter Crash: N Ireland's Richest Man Dies

Northern Irish peer and businessman Lord Ballyedmond was one of the four men killed in a helicopter crash in Norfolk.

The helicopter - an AgustaWestland AW139 - crashed in a wood in Gillingham, near the suffolk town of Beccles.

It happened close to Gillingham Hall - one of the homes owned by Lord Ballyedmond, the richest man in Northern Ireland with an estimated wealth of £500m.

The three other people in the helicopter have been named as pilot and co-pilot Carl Dickerson and Lee Hoyle and the other passenger was Declan Small, who was employed by Norbrook Laboratories.

Pilot Carl Dickerson

Sky's Emma Birchley, who was at the scene, said it was unclear whether fog, which had affected the area earlier on Thursday, was a factor in the crash, which happened at around 7.30pm.

"The fog is certainly going to form part of the investigation. It was very foggy last night and it remains foggy now, which has made conditions for the emergency services very tricky," she said.

An AgustaWestland spokesman said it was investigating the case, amid reports that Lord Ballyedmond was taking legal action against the firm in relation to possible safety defects with the helicopter.

Inspector Louis Provart said emergency services were alerted after people living near the crash reported hearing a loud bang.

Co-pilot Lee Hoyle

Roland Bronk, owner of The Swan House restaurant in nearby Beccles, said it was "very foggy" in the area at the time of the crash.

Taxi driver Mark Murray, 22, from Beccles, said: "There is a large stately home nearby and you often see helicopters coming and going from there.

"When they have a game shoot the guests often all arrive in separate helicopters. We don't know if that is linked, but that's the only helicopter activity we see in this area."

The helicopter owned by Lord Ballyedmond

The site is 45 miles from Cley Next The Sea, where four US airmen were killed in January when their Pave Hawk military helicopter came down in a marsh.

As well as being in the in pharmaceutical and chemical manufacturing businesses, Lord Ballyedmond also ran an air travel business - Haughey Air - which owned a helicopter charter company.

In 1996, three pilots were killed in a crash while en route from Belfast to his estate in County Down.

Sky's Ireland Correspondent David Blevins said: "The 70-year-old owned Ballyedmond Castle in Rostrevor, County Down, Corby Castle in Cumbria, and 9, Belgrave Square in London, a six-storey townhouse purchased in 2006 for about £12m.

Early morning fog was still making recovery difficult

"In the early '90s, he sat in the Irish Senate (Dublin's upper house) before being made a life peer in the Lords in 2004. Lord Ballyedmond initially sat as an Ulster Unionist before switching to the Conservative Party."

Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness MLA said he was "shocked and sad to hear that Dr Eddie Haughey and three other people have lost their lives in a helicopter crash. My sympathy is with their families."

NI Enterprise, Trade and Investment Minister, Arlene Foster MLA said: "Lord Ballyedmond was one of NI's most successful entrepreneurs, known for his leadership, integrity and global vision."

Emergency services at the site. Pic: Ryan Leddington

Sinn Fein's Conor Murphy, MP for Newry and Armagh, told David Blevins he was "very, very saddened" by the fatal crash.

He said: "It's a huge tragedy for all of the families involved and it's something that, I think, will shock the workforce here (at Norbrook Laboratories) particularly the very substantial workforce that Eddie Haughey had in the Newry area.

"He certainly was a very strong-willed character. He established from nothing a very successful business."

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Max Clifford: Model Claims He Exposed Himself

By Tom Parmenter, Sky News Correspondent

A former model has accused Max Clifford of twice exposing himself to her in his office.

The woman, who was 19 at the time, says she had gone to the meeting in 1979 or 1980 to discuss a role in an upcoming film.

She told Southwark Crown Court how she showed him a portfolio of modelling pictures and then said: "He undid his flies and took it out and held it and talked about it."

The woman, who cannot be named, then stood out of the witness box and demonstrated to the jury how she says Mr Clifford had done it.

She told the court she was embarrassed and said Mr Clifford then went on to make more lewd comments.

She said: "I didn't stand up for myself, I was a very silly girl.

"When I was young I had no confidence, no voice, you have no idea how people could treat me and get away with it at the time."

Clifford is standing trial on 11 counts of indecent assault between 1966 and 1984 on seven girls and women. Friday was the sixth day of evidence.

The former model went on to claim that she received phone calls from a man who said he was an Italian film director who made more lewd comments about Mr Clifford's penis.

She said: "I just heard his voice through the accent. I said: 'It's you isn't it Max?'"

The prosecution case is that Max Clifford repeatedly made bogus phone calls to young women.

Richard Horwell QC, defending, challenged the witness about her account and said the indecent exposure had never happened.

The woman insisted that it had and said: "I saw it, I'm not lying, I'm not lying."

Mr Clifford denies all the charges he faces and is due to give evidence later in the trial, which continues.

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