Dozens of the world’s top artificial intelligence experts have signed an open letter calling for researchers to take care to avoid potential “pitfalls” of the disruptive technology .

Those who have already signed the letter include Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk, the co-founders of DeepMind, Google's director of research Peter Norvig and Harvard professor of computer science David Parkes.

“There is now a broad consensus that AI research is progressing steadily, and that its impact on society is likely to increase,” says the letter, published by The Future of Life Institute.

“The potential benefits are huge, since everything that civilization has to offer is a product of human intelligence; we cannot predict what we might achieve when this intelligence is magnified by the tools AI may provide, but the eradication of disease and poverty are not unfathomable. Because of the great potential of AI, it is important to research how to reap its benefits while avoiding potential pitfalls.

Some of the research priorities set out in an accompanying paper describe the need to remain in control of any artificially intelligent machine – “systems must do what we want them to do” – while others relate to the ethics of autonomous weapons.

The paper suggests that it “may be desirable to retain some form of meaningful human control” over intelligent machines designed to kill.

It also warns that legislative efforts are needed before autonomous cars become a practical and ubiquitous technology: “If self-driving cars cut the roughly 40,000 annual US traffic fatalities in half, the car makers might get not 20,000 thank-you notes, but 20,000 lawsuits.”

Professor Stephen Hawking has previously said that the rise of artificial intelligence could see the human race become extinct.

He told the BBC: ''The primitive forms of artificial intelligence we already have have proved very useful. But I think the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race.''

Technology entrepreneur Elon Musk has also described the rise of AI in the past as ''our biggest existential threat''.

This article was written by Matthew Sparkes Deputy Head of Technology from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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Double agent working for US, identified only as Markus R, may have sold top-secret details of 3,500 German intelligence officers posted abroad, according to Bild newspaper

Thousands of German spies posted around the world could be at risk after it emerged that a double agent unmasked last summer stole a list of their real identities and may have sold it.

The double agent, who has been identified only as Markus R under strict German privacy laws, obtained a top secret list of the real names, aliases and locations of 3,500 German intelligence officers posted abroad, according to a report in Bild newspaper.

But German intelligence sources sought to downplay the incident, briefing that the list in question was out of date and contained far fewer than 3,500 names, the DPA news agency reported.

The arrest of Markus R last summer caused a major diplomatic rift between Germany and the US, after it emerged he had acted as a double agent for the CIA.

He had also approached Russian intelligence and offered to sell them secret information, and there are fears he may have passed the list of German spies' names to a hostile foreign agency.

An employee of the BND, Germany's equivalent of MI6, Markus R worked in the registry section of its overseas operations department, where he had access to top secret documents including the identities of operatives posted abroad.

The stolen list, which is said to date from 2011, is believed to contain the real identities and aliases of BND officers posted under cover as diplomats to various embassies around the world, and of those working secretly in countries where the German military has missions abroad, including Afghanistan.

It is not clear whether Markus R passed it to any foreign intelligence agencies. It was found on a hard drive seized during a search of his home after his arrest last summer, which has only recently been properly evaluated.

Markus R's unmasking was one of two spying scandals that badly shook US-German relations last summer, and saw Angela Merkel's government ask the CIA station chief in Berlin to leave the country.

Markus R has reportedly confessed to passing the CIA more than 200 secret documents over a period of two years, in return for payments of €25,000 (£16,500).

He appears to have been motivated by money rather than ideology, and it is the possibility that he may have sold German spies' real identities to a hostile foreign intelligence agency that will be of most concern now.

He was discovered after an email he sent the Russian Embassy in Berlin offering to sell secrets in exchange for cash was intercepted, and German investigators were stunned when he confessed he had been spying for the Americans.

They had even asked the CIA for help unmasking their own mole, convinced the man they were hunting was a Russian double agent, and had been surprised when there was no reply from the Americans.

The arrest came with US-German ties already strained by the revelation that the National Security Agency had spied on Mrs Merkel's phone calls, and it was followed days later by the questioning of a second possible double agent, an official in Germany's Defence Ministry who was suspected of at the time of passing secret information to the Americans.

Mrs Merkel's government ordered surveillance of American and British intelligence gathering on German soil for the first time since 1945, and asked the CIA station chief to leave the country, a rare step between allies.

US-German relations have improved since then, but it was reported earlier this week that prosecutors now believe the case of Markus R is more serious than previously thought.

Prosecutors now believe he was recruited by the CIA a year and a half earlier than he has admitted, in 2010, and was paid €75,000 for passing secrets over a period of four years, according to Spiegel magazine.

This article was written by Justin Huggler Berlin from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

SEE ALSO: Here's what makes Paris-style terrorist attacks so Scary

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The world entered a new epoch on July 16 1945 when humans detonated the first atomic bomb, scientists have concluded.

Human behaviour now has such an enormous impact on Earth that it has even altered the geology of the planet and tipped us into a new era, the Anthropocene.

Although humans have been leaving traces of their actions for thousands of years, it was not until the mid-19th century that they began to affect the entire globe, in what scientists have termed ‘the Great Acceleration.’

Since then the world has experienced a huge boom in population, environmental upheaval on land and in the oceans and global connectivity.

Scientists chose the start of the nuclear age for the birth of the new epoch because the fall-out from atomic bombs is detectable in the geological record, through radioactive isotopes.

“Like any geological boundary, it is not a perfect marker – levels of global radiation really rose in the early 1950s, as salvoes of bomb tests took place," said Dr Jan Zalasiewicz, of the University of Leicester’s Department of Geology and chair of the Anthropocene Working Group.

“But it may be the optimal way to resolve the multiple lines of evidence on human-driven planetary change. Time - and much more discussion - will tell.”

The term ‘Anthropocene’ was first coined by Nobel Prize winning chemist Paul Crutzen who in 2000 suggested that man’s impact on the world was so substantial that we were no longer in the Holocene – the era which began at the end of the last Ice Age around 11,700 years ago and saw unprecedented human expansion and the emrgency of towns and cities.

Since then many academics have embraced the concept, but there has been no agreement about when the epoch began.

The Anthropene Working Group was established to decide whether the epoch should be officially adopted by the International Commission on Stratigaphy, which will make the final decision next year.

But the latest report from the group suggests that a key turning point can be seen from around the 1950s. This was when humans did not just leave traces of their actions, but began to alter the whole Earth system.

On July 16, 1945, the first atomic bomb was detonated in the New Mexico desert 120 miles south of Santa Fe in the US. The blast produced a searing flash and a mushroom cloud that rose 40,000 feet into the air, images of which have burned themselves into the consciousness of the human race.

The bomb, created by scientists working on the Manhattan Project, generated the destructive power of 15,000 to 20,000 tons of TNT.

It also scattered radioactive particles from the poles to the equator, leaving an indelible signal in the surface strata of the Earth.

The history of the Earth is divided up according to the geological time scale made up of periods, epochs and ages.

The longest of these are periods, such as the Tertiary period, which spans from around 2.5 million years ago to 66 million years ago. Epochs are shorter, such as the Eocene, which ran from 56 million years ago to 34 million years ago. Shorter still are ages, such as the Messinian, which spanned the past 7 to 5 million years.

This year, the Anthropocene Working Group will put together more evidence on the Anthropocene, including discussion of possible alternative time boundaries.

Alternative suggestions for the start of the Anthropocene include the dawn of agriculture 12,000 years ago and the Industrial Revolution.

A research paper on the Anthropocene from the working group appears in the journal Quaternary International.

This article was written by Sarah Knapton Science Editor from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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Exclusive: How Islamic State fighters have been training new recruits close to Lebanon – and could launch cross-border attacks

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant fighters in Syria, massed close to the Lebanese border, are threatening to launch attacks across it, the Telegraph has witnessed.

The group has been training new recruits and defectors from smaller rebel factions in Qalamoun, a militarily strategically important province in the south-west of Syria that borders Lebanon .

Several of those smaller rebel groupings, some aligned with the more moderate "Free Syrian Army", have capitulated to the jihadists in recent months with many of their fighters joining Isil.

The growth of the group in the area means Sunni Isil fighters in Syria are now at the edge of the Lebanese heartland of its Shia arch enemy Hizbollah, whose men are fighting alongside the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

“The moderate rebel groups on the border have collapsed, and their men have joined Isil,” said Ahmed Flity, the deputy mayor of Arsal, a Lebanese border town that has effectively been cut off from the rest of the country by security forces, because of the threat from jihadists in the area.

The black flag bearing the Isil logo was clearly visible fluttering only a few hundred yards from the lone Lebanese army checkpoint marking the border between Arsal and Syria when the Telegraph visited last week.

This was once the principal route for smuggling money and satellite phones to Syrian activists opposed to Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, and later to moderate rebel fighters. This newspaper watched the jihadists move with confidence around the rocky mountainous terrain.

They bought weapons and refuelled their trucks with black-market oil sold by smugglers who have set up shop in this no-man's land, far from the reach of any country's laws.

Abbas Ibrahim, the head of Lebanon’s General Security office, has estimated that as many as “700” fighters from less extreme groups have “pledged allegiance” to Isil, swelling its ranks to over 1000 men.

While Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Isil’s leader is not yet interested in seeking to takeover Lebanon, a source close to the jihadist group said, the group is plotting to target a string of Lebanese towns and villages on the country’s border that form a base of support for Hizbollah.

The jihadists are now the dominant force in the mountains that form a no-man’s land, just miles from these villages, where - sleeping in Bedouin tents - the group is training its new recruits.

To reach these areas, Isil would have to first attack Lebanese army posts on the border - including a series of watchtowers partly funded by the British Government that were built in an initiative to shelter Lebanon from the Syrian war.

Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda’s wing in Syria, whilst very active in the area, has not condoned targeting the Lebanese military, preferring to keep its fight with Hizbollah, a non-state actor, separate from the Lebanese state.

The differences have opened a dispute between the two groups.

“Now there are two plans for attacking Hezbollah,” the Nusra source in Arsal said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he did not have the authorization of his emir - leader - to talk to the media.

“The first plan is to launch a full scale attack in Qalamoun in Syria. The second plan is to attack Hizbollah in its stronghold in Hermel and Bekaa inside Lebanon. Our emir, Sheikh Abu Malik disagrees with the second option."

A wholesale attack on the Lebanese villages and on Lebanese military checkpoints would upset a longstanding, informal non-aggression pact between Jabhat al-Nusra and the Lebanese military and officials in Arsal.

Many fighters in the Nusra Front are originally from the Qalamoun region. When the region was attacked in a joint military offensive by Hizbollah and the Syrian military last year, thousands of family members of the Nusra fighters fled across the border to Arsal.

Whilst checkpoints around the town have prevented the families from leaving the area and traveling deeper into Lebanon, Lebanese officials have, for the moment, tolerated their living as refugees in Arsal.

"Abu Malik fears that if Isil attacks Lebanese military posts, there will be a retaliation against our families here in Arsal," said the Nusra fighter.

A Lebanese military source confirmed the informal pact to the Telegraph.

The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, explained that, by the same token, the Lebanese army is not making incursions inside Arsal, for fear that arrests of Nusra members in the area would spark retaliatory attacks, as occurred last year.

Mr Flity said: "Nusra are not interested in attacking Lebanon. They say, don't attack us and we won't attack you."

Last August, when the Lebanese Army arrested Imad Ahmad Jomaa, an Islamist Syrian rebel commander, Nusra showed the limits of its patience. It joined Isil in retaliatory attacks against the army. Temporarily seizing control of Arsal, the groups kidnapped dozens of soldiers, 27 of whom are still being held by the groups.

In contrast to other parts of Syria where Isil and Nusra, though sharing a similar ideology, have become sworn rivals because of disputes between their leaders, on Lebanon’s border the two groups have, as was shown in August, remained cordial.

A reason for the working relationship between them is that Abu Malek al-Telli, Nusra’s leader in Qalamoun had a “personal relationship” with Isil emir Baghdadi even before the war, members of Nusra told the Telegraph.

After the attacks last year, through extensive negotiations, Nusra reinforced its informal ceasefire with the Lebanese military. It had, its fighters said, also succeeded in delaying Isil's attacks inside Lebanon.

But day by day, their power over Isil is weakening.

As Isil grows in numbers, Nusra is, by contrast, being crippled by a lack of funds from its backers.

Senior sources inside Nusra close to Lebanon, claimed that Qatar had been financing the group, but that it had stopped the operation last year because of a row with fellow Gulf states over the issue.

One local resident in Arsal who has dealing with both Isil and Nusra estimated that the former now has five times more followers than the latter.

The imbalance of power is causing increasing friction between the two factions.

In early December Isil's religious scholar Abu-Walid al-Maqdisi visited Qalamoun to persuade Abu Malek al-Telli, Nusra's commander, to vow allegiance to Isil.

"Abu Malik is a man of few words. He did not respond to the scholar's request: he just walked out of the meeting," the Nusra source recalled.

But despite Nusra's defiance, the group is increasingly incapable of defending its turf. Inside Arsal last week, fighters from Nusra were meeting arms dealers to sell their weapons.

"We are doing it because we need money to buy food for our families," one member told the Telegraph.

This article was written by Carol Malouf and Ruth Sherlock in Arsal from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

SEE ALSO: Israeli airstrike kills Hezbollah and Iranian commanders in Syria

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Radio waves in space could be evaporating black holes, alien communication or merging neutron stars.

A mysterious radio signal which may have come from a black hole, a neutron star or even an alien civilisation, has been picked up by astronomers.

Fast radio bursts, which last only milliseconds, are quick, bright flashes of radio waves from unknown sources in the universe, which emit as much energy as the Sun does in an entire day.

The first one was discovered in 2007 by sifting through old data, and only seven more have been spotted since then.

Now, for the first time, the mysterious phenomenon has been observed happening live.

Exactly what may be causing the signal is hotly debated by scientists. Possibilities range from evaporating black holes to alien communication and merging neutron stars.

"These events are one of the biggest mysteries in the universe," said Carnegie Observatories' acting director John Mulchaey.

"Until now, astronomers were not able to catch one of these events in the act."

Scientists had been looking for the bursts using twelve telescopes in Australia, California, the Canary Islands, Chile, Germany, Hawaii, and India.

Because the radio waves were "caught in the act" scientists were able to check for other wavelengths such as infrared light, or x-rays to try and work out their source. However they found nothing.

"The fact that we did not see light in other wavelengths eliminates a number of astronomical phenomena that are associated with violent events such as gamma-ray bursts from exploding stars and supernovae, which were otherwise candidates for the burst,” said Daniele Malesani.

But the way that the waves were polarised suggested that it had been near to an object with a large magnetic field.

"The theories are now that the radio wave burst might be linked to a very compact type of object — such as neutron stars or black holes and the bursts could be connected to collisions or "star quakes."

"Now we know more about what we should be looking for," says Daniele Malesani, of the University of Copenhagen.

Previous signals indicated that the bursts originated from outside of our Milky Way galaxy.

The team's data indicates that the burst originated up to 5.5 billion light-years away.

Emily Petroff, a PhD candidate from Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, Australia, added: "These bursts were generally discovered weeks or months or even more than a decade after they happened.

"We're the first to catch one in real time."

Their work is published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

This article was written by Sarah Knapton Science Editor from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

READ MORE: Europe Wants To Build A Human Colony On The Dark Side Of The Moon

SEE ALSO: These Are The 2 Big Hurdles To Setting Up A Mars Colony

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The Queen is now the world’s oldest monarch following the death of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.

Abdullah, who was 90, was two years older than the Queen, who will be 89 in April.

She is one of eight octogenarian monarchs in the world, with others including the King of Thailand and the Emperor of Japan.

Her 62 years on the throne still leave her some way short of being the world’s longest-reigning current monarch. That distinction goes to Thailand’s king, Bhumibol Adulyadej, who will celebrate 69 years on the throne in June. He was just 18 when he became king.

The longest-reigning monarch of all time was Sobhuza II of Swaziland, who was on the throne for 82 years from 1899 to 1982, though the Egyptian pharaoh Pepi II is said to have reigned for up to 94 years, having come to the throne at the age of six. Some historians, however, believe he reigned for 64 years.

If he reigned until he was 100, Pepi II may also have been the oldest monarch in history, though Abdul Momin, Sultan of Brunei until 1885, was either 99 or 100 when he died, the exact date of his birth being unknown.

The Queen is the second-longest reigning monarch in British history, behind her great-great grandmother Queen Victoria, whose record she is due to surpass in September this year.

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In the tape, made exactly one year before the former KGB officer was allegedly poisoned with a radioactive isotope, the dissident apparently claims the Russian president had links with a mobster who was most wanted by the FBI.

Mr Litvinenko says Putin had a “good relationship” with Ukrainian crime boss Semion Mogilevich, whom he accused of selling weapons to al-Qaeda.

In broken English, the spy, 43, also accuses a fellow former KGB agent of influencing Chechen rebels through Russia’s foreign and state security services, and having connections to an Arabian terrorist.

Mr Litvinenko, whose voice in the recording was verified by a close friend, goes on to claim that Russia had blackmailed him for working on a commission investigating Soviet links with Italian politicians.

He says that Russia was “afraid” of the commission’s work, sparking some sources to speculate that the spy’s murder may have been connected to the Italian probe.

Mr Litvinenko, whose voice in the recording was verified by a close friend, goes on to claim that Russia had blackmailed him for working on a commission investigating Soviet links with Italian politicians.

He says that Russia was “afraid” of the commission’s work, sparking some sources to speculate that the spy’s murder may have been connected to the Italian probe.

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American spies secretly intercepted communications between those involved in the murder of Alexander Litvinenko and provided the key evidence that he was killed in a Russian -backed “state execution,” The Telegraph can disclose.

The National Security Agency (NSA) obtained electronic communications between key individuals in London and Moscow from the time that the former spy was poisoned with radioactive material in central London. The evidence was passed to the British authorities.

A source familiar with the investigation confirmed the existence of American “intelligence material”. They said it would have been “inadmissible” in court, but that the British authorities were “confident that this was a state execution”.

The disclosure comes ahead of the start of the public inquiry into Litvinenko's deathin 2006, which will see hearings, many of which will be held in secret, carried out over a nine-week period in the High Court from Tuesday.

The existence of the American intelligence material offers the first proof that the Russian state was involved in the murder of the dissident and explains why senior British politicians have been so confident in publicly blaming the Kremlin for the murder.

It is revealed as part of a Telegraph investigation which also unearthed an audio recording appearing to capture Litvinenko giving a detailed account of his investigations into links between Vladimir Putin and one of the world’s most dangerous criminals.

The tape will reignite claims that Litvinenko could have been killed as a result of investigative work he carried out in a series of European countries after leaving Russia.

These claims are likely to be played out in the High Court as the Litvinenko Inquiry, chaired by Sir Robert Owen, a former high court judge, conducts its hearings.

Last year Sir Robert said that he had seen “prima facie” evidence that the Russia state was involved in the murder.

It is likely that the NSA intelligence formed part of the evidence that Sir Robert was given.

The disclosure of the material is likely to be put pressure on the British government’s relationship with the Kremlin and will renew calls for the UK to toughen its stance.

The start of the inquiry comes after years of campaigning by Marina Litvinenko, the widow of the former KGB spy, for an official verdict on his death.

Mrs Litvinenko has applied to the NSA to disclose telephone intercepts, and says that “all information” should be disclosed to Sir Robert.

Litvinenko was poisoned in November 2006 during a meeting at a Mayfair hotel. He died three weeks later. Tests revealed that he ingested a rare isotope, polonium 210, which is hard to detect.

British prosecutors want two men, Andrei Lugovoy and Dimitri Kovtun, both of whom are former KGB bodyguards, to face murder charges over the murder.

Mr Lugovoy, now a Russian MP, and Mr Kovton, have always maintained their innocence and Moscow have said that they cannot be extradited under Russian law.

An international warrant has been issued for their arrest if they ever leave Russia.

Last October Marina Litvinenko filed a Freedom of Information request to the NSA through an intermediary asking for “NSA intercepts of telephone communications of Mr Andrei Lugovoy and Mr Dimitry Kovtun from London, UK, in the period October 15 to November 1 2006.”

The application stated that the material was “to be used as evidence in the [public] inquiry hearings.”

Paul Blaskowski, a senior NSA official, responded in a letter that it could not comment on the “existence or non-existence” of the transcripts because such material had “to be kept secret in the interest of national defence or foreign relations.”

He said the spy agency was also empowered “to protect certain information concerning its activities” by withholding if from public disclosure.

Joel Brenner, who was Inspector General of NSA at the time of Litvinenko’s murder, said that the “co-operation between the UK and US government on signals intelligence is extremely close and probably without parallel”.

The public inquiry was ordered by Theresa May, the Home Secretary, last year.

It replaces an ongoing inquest and one of its key purposes will be to examine whether the Russian state was behind the killing.

The government had previously resisted calls for an inquiry, citing the need in part to “protect international relations.”

But Sir Robert, who had also acted as coroner at the inquest, said that he could not conduct a “fair and fearless” investigation because the government had refused to release certain information.

This is thought to be intelligence material relating to the involvement of Russia in the case and of Litvinenko’s work as an informant to MI6.

Sir Robert said last July that “sensitive” government evidence over the poisoning would now heard in closed sessions of the public inquiry.

The possible involvement of the Russian government in the murder would be of “central importance to my investigation”, he said.

According to information that came out during the inquest, Litvinenko had been working for MI6 for several years during his time in London.

As part of this, Litvinenko also began assisting the Spanish security services. It is understood that his work in Spain involved investigating organised crime networks.

Litvinenko’s work in Spain, as well as in Italy and Georgia, after leaving Russia and the KGB, has given rise to competing theories about who might have been behind his death.

The disclosure of the former spy’s verbal account of his investigations of Moscow’s links to criminal networks in Italy will raise fresh questions about the risk involved in his work in the country.

However, Alex Goldfarb, a close friend of Litvinenko who was involved in helping him gain political asylum in Britain, also said that his friend “did not see how dangerous and threatening the Spanish operating was”.

Mr Goldfarb said the individuals Litvinenko investigated in Spain had “good connections in the Kremlin” and the information he was gathering “could have tarnished Putin’s image and more importantly, could have harmed the business interests of his inner circle”.

Litvinenko himself accused Putin of being behind his murder shortly before he died.

“You may succeed in silencing one man but the howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life,” Litvinenko wrote in a statement read out by Mr Goldfarb after his death.

This article was written by Claire Newell in Washington DC, Lyndsey Telford in Rome and and Edward Malnick in London from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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Angry at being overlooked as a female DJ, Tatiana Alvarez spent a year posing as a man — and soon found herself fully booked.

Since time began, women have dressed as men to get ahead.

For some it has been a desire to see action on the front line and for others it has been to further their career at a time in which women were at even more of a disadvantage in the workplace than today.

Matt Muset, born Tatiana Alvarez

California-born Tatiana Alvarez had spent years trying to build a career as a DJ.

She found herself repeatedly being booked for gigs on the strength of her music, before being rejected by venue owners upon learning she was a woman.

Furious at the double standards in the industry, Alvarez decided to reinvent herself — as a male DJ named Matt Muset, aka Musikillz. Through email, she set up another alter ego — that of agent Maya Feder — and started touting Musikillz around to clubs in Los Angeles.

Alvarez (as Musikillz) was immediately successful. She will serve as music supervisor in the movie of her life, the rights to which were purchased by Warner Brothers last year.

Denis Smith, born Dorothy Lawrence

In 1914, Dorothy Lawrence was an ambitious cub reporter with aspirations of becoming a war correspondent. Living in Paris when war was declared, she contacted numerous British newspapers offering her services but was turned down by them all, on account of her being a woman.

The following year, and aged just 20, she flattened her figure using a corset, cut off her hair and used a razor blade on her face in the hope of giving herself razor burn. She learned how to move like a man and joined the ranks of the Royal Engineers under the name Denis Smith. She served for 10 days on the Western Front before her real identity was discovered.

Lawrence's thinking had been that by going 'undercover' as a Tommy she would secure the access the editors doubted she could get as a female journalist. In 1919, though heavily censored by the War Office, Lawrence published Sapper Dorothy Lawrence: The Only English Woman Soldier, an account of her experience in France.

James Barry, born Margaret Ann Bulkley

The story of Dr James Barry was only finally told in 2008. Barry was a pioneering surgeon for the British Army who died in 1865 after falling victim to dysentery. Shortly after his death, a maid tasked with preparing his body for burial claimed Barry was a woman.

Army officials, appalled they could have been so badly fooled (and presumably particularly outraged they had been duped by a woman), locked away his medical records. In 2008, letters were found confirming Barry had in fact been born Margaret Ann Buckley, niece of James Barry, a professor of painting at the Royal Academy.

Barry, living as a man, became the first biological woman to graduate with a medical degree, went on to have the highest recovery rate of patients treated during the Crimean War, and reportedly became the first surgeon in the then British Empire to successfully perform a caesarean section.

Christian Davies, born Christian ‘Kit’ Cavanagh

Christian ‘Kit’ Cavanagh (born 1667 in Dublin) had no desire to join the Army as a youngster, but disguised herself as a man to do so after her husband disappeared, apparently to Holland with the British Army.

After 13 years of searching, and having fought in battles, been wounded, captured, discharged and then having re-enlisted, she finally found Richard. Sadly, he was in a new relationship with another woman. Davies’ secret was revealed after she suffered a fractured skull in combat, and she was discharged once again.

She died in 1739 and was buried with full military honours. Her story was recently told in the BBC4 documentary Harlots, Housewives and Heroines: A 17th Century History for Girls.

Rena Kanokogi, born Rena Glickman

Rena ‘Rusty’ Kanokogi, who died in 2009, was a pioneering judo expert from New York.

In 1959, Kanokogi (then Glickman) entered the YMCA championships in Utica as a man.

Women were not explicitly barred from the competition but she nonetheless cut off her hair and taped down her chest ahead of the championships.

She won her bout but upon collecting her medal was asked if she was a woman. She confessed and was stripped of it.

In an interview with the New York Times the year she died, she said: "Had I said no, I don’t think women’s judo would have been in the Olympics. It instilled a feeling in me that no woman should have to go through this again.”

Judo became an Olympic sport for men in 1964. Kanokogi threatened the International Olympic Committee with legal action and the event was eventually introduced for women at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul — with Kanokogi as US team coach.

Murray Hall, born Mary Anderson

Murray Hall, born in Scotland around 1840, was a New York City politician, known for his slight appearance and for helping win votes for Tammany Hall, the political organisation that played a big role in New York politics between the 18th and 20th centuries.

His birth name was Mary Anderson — it is believed he arrived in America wearing his dead brother’s clothing after fleeing Govan. His secret stuck until after his death in 1901, meaning he would have been able to vote at a time women were unable. In the days after his death, the New York Times ran an article saying: "In a limited circle, she even had a reputation as a 'man about town', a bon vivant, and all-around 'good fellow.'"

George Eliot, Mary Ann Evans

Middlemarch author George Eliot was perhaps one of the first writers to use a male pen name in an effort to have her books taken seriously. Born Mary Ann Evans in 1819, she lived during a time at which women authors were published, but usually in the genre of romance. She was encouraged to write by the philosopher George Lewes, with whom she had a rather scandalous relationship (Lewes was married when they met), and her nom de plume was an homage to him.

The Bronte sisters

Much like George Eliot, the Bronte sisters passed themselves off as men by name only. In the early years of their career, Charlotte, Emily and Anne went by the names of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. Their first work under these names, simply entitled Poems, was published in 1846. The following year, Charlotte had Jane Eyre published under the name Currer Bell, while Emily continued as Ellis Bell for the publication of Wuthering Heights.

This article was written by Sian Ranscombe from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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There can be few greater humiliations for a revered tribal sheikh than to lead hundreds of men in a full-scale retreat across the desert.

But for Faisal al-Gaoud, the leader of a powerful Sunni clan in western Iraq, worse was to come. As he and his men sought refuge from the jihadists of Isil, news came in of the massacres.

"They rounded people up five at a time and killed them," he said. "In Heet city, they killed 50 people. They never gave us the bodies. They killed 40 in Hay al-Bakr — those bodies they returned. Mainly they were civilians, the police and soldiers had all left."

The resistance of Sheikh Faisal's Albu Nimr tribe to Isil in the Sunni heartlands west of Baghdad had lasted 10 months. Its failure and the murderous consequences have cast a shadow over America's hopes of building a coalition among Sunni tribal leaders like him to defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Tribal leaders have little formal status in Iraq's government structures, but in fighting Isil, whose base is in their heartlands in Iraq and eastern Syria, their private armies of loyal kinsmen can be a major asset.

While some tribal leaders have allied to Isil, Sheikh Faisal and several other pro-Western tribes have fought against the jihadists ever since they swept through western Iraq a year ago.

But despite support from both the Iraqi government and its international backers, the Albu Nimr's supplies of ammunition ran out and their people were forced into retreat.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph in Baghdad, Sheikh Faisal spoke for the first time about the disaster that then befell his people late last year.

At that time, his tribe's fiefdom around Heet, a walled city on the Euphrates river 100 miles west of Baghdad, was totally surrounded by Isil's forces. One night in early November, Sheikh Faisal took a phone call at 1am. "A fighter told me, 'The army have pulled back, the police have pulled back, the tribal fighters have pulled back'. The soldiers told me they had run out of ammunition."

Sheikh Faisal arrived at a gathering point in the centre of the 20-mile stretch of territory that the tribe still controlled. He soon realised he had no choice but to lead his men in retreat: otherwise they would face certain death.

Skirting Isil positions, he led a convoy of 400 jeeps through the enemy lines, on a circuitous route that took 11 hours to take them to safety.

Over the next few days, Isil fighters moved into their villages and houses and interrogated those left behind. Far from being safe as civilians, men who were found to have policemen, soldiers or other fighters as relations were taken away and shot.

One policeman, Mutar, said his wife and young children crossed the Euphrates with his brother, a taxi driver, and his family, to stay with relations.

At a checkpoint, the jihadists seemed to know who they were. His brother had two sons in the army, while as a policeman his family were also a target.

"They took my brother's younger sons, Hussein, who is 16, and Fadl and Attiya, who are twins and 13," he said. "They arrested them, interrogated them, and tortured them. Then they shot and killed them."

Over the next few days, the pattern was repeated, with up to 50 people being killed daily. The reports filtered back to the tribal leaders, who could do nothing.

"There were four brothers of a policeman in one house – they came and killed all four," Sheikh Faisal said. "Their father was old and couldn't do anything about it. They left him."

Sheikh Faisal is now based in the town of Barwana, north of Heet, trying to regather his forces. Meanwhile, the Iraqi army is also trying to re-group, with the help of a major US retraining programme.

Those who question the programme's chances of success point out that America had eight years from 2003-2011 to build an Iraqi army and a network of loyal tribal militias, but both collapsed within two and a half years of the coalition pull-out in 2011. Sheikh Faisal spoke on a trip to Baghdad to see ministers about being re-supplied with more US weapons.

But others think that the strategy of building up indigenous Sunni forces has to change. MPs, particularly for minority groups, say that relying on traditional tribal structures simply exacerbates Iraq's sectarian dividing lines, and plays into Isil's hands.

Sheikh Hameed al-Hayiss, a tribal leader from the city of Ramadi who also suffered the humiliation of defeat, said that fighters should be recruited straight into the army instead.

"If you want success, you shouldn't be relying on civilians," he said. "The idea that you can call on tribal sheikhs and give them 50 or 100 Kalashnikovs and say 'there you go' and think they will liberate the region – that's not going to work.

"They armed and trained us before, and look what happened."

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They're a staple even on cutting-edge smartphones, televisions, and Hi-Fis, but the jack plug was invented back in the 19th century to route phone calls. Imagine hundreds of them being rearranged with swift dexterity by switchboard operators.

Has any technical standard ever lasted as long?

Despite the jack plug's age, it will still come as a shock when it disappears into obsolescence. Especially to those people who have just bought an expensive pair of headphones.

The original design was a quarter inch in diameter, which is still used on electric guitars, but it shrank to 3.5mm for headphones. It is showing its age, though, and even the smaller sockets are now hindering the gradual de-thickening of mobile phones. Which is why they'll soon be replaced.

There are basically two main ecosystems for mobile phones today: Apple's iOS and Google's Android. Both of them are well on their way to ditching the 3.5mm socket altogether.

At its developer conference last year, during a talk on designing accessories for the iPad and iPhone, Apple announced it was working on headphones that connect via the Lightning port. That odd, proprietary socket that replaced the original 30-pin iPod connector now provides audio as well as power.

Philips was first to develop a pair: the Fidelio M2L. So, just when you thought Apple couldn't be any more of a walled garden, there now exist headphones that work only on its devices.

Perhaps it was a deliberate measure by Apple to not be the first to launch such a product through its recently acquired Beats brand, to avoid the same accusations of profiteering that cropped up when it dropped 30-pin connectors for Lightning. Certainly, much of Beats' $3 billion price tag could be recouped if every iPhone owner bought a new set of Lightning-equipped headphones.

The latest version of Google's Android operating system, known as Lollipop, also includes support for USB audio. This is effectively the same thing as Apple's new feature but with a universal USB plug rather than proprietary connector.

What do these features mean for audio? Unlike a traditional headphone wire, which carries the analog signals produced by a chip inside the phone, the new headphones will take digital audio and convert it to an analog signal only when it reaches the speakers next to the ear.

In theory, if you buy decent headphones, this will provide better quality: not only will that DAC (digital to analog converter) most likely be better quality, but there will be less degradation along the wire thanks to digital error correction.

It could also allow phones to be made even thinner, as the round headphone socket is increasingly the bulkiest component, in terms of width, in svelte handsets. Whether or not we really need thinner phones when customers are complaining that their handsets bend in their pockets is another matter, but it certainly makes for easy marketing.

Another benefit is that noise-canceling headphones could draw power from the phone over the wire, as Philips has already taken advantage of, eliminating the need to charge yet more batteries. There's also the ability to have a microphone on the same cable, and all sorts of buttons to control playback. You could even have apps running on the phone that tweak settings on the headphones, adjusting bass or treble.

So the advantages are clear and numerous, but there are also downsides: how do you charge your phone and listen to music at the same time when your charger and headphones use the same socket? Not a deal-breaker, but still an issue.

Most importantly, your current and potentially new and expensive headphones will become obsolete. You could use an adapter, but that's far from ideal and will cost you on top of your phone.

Thankfully, this isn't going to happen tomorrow. Although there's nothing to stop you splashing out on digital headphones now if you want to adopt early.

The iPhone, for instance, alternates between a partial refresh and a total redesign with each new model. We had the 6 and 6 Plus in September and will most likely get the refreshed "6S" this year, so it's easy to imagine the "iPhone 7" losing its 3.5mm socket in September 2016.

Apple didn't respond to a request for comment on this story, so we'll have to speculate.

You're probably more likely to retain a 3.5mm socket for longer if you use Android, as there's a wide range of manufacturers on the platform, so you can choose the one that retains the plug longest.

The really interesting thing will be to see when manufacturers ditch the Lightning and USB ports entirely.

Wireless charging can already handle topping-up our batteries, and Bluetooth can deal with audio and peripherals. Losing the ports will also make devices sleeker and easier to waterproof.

So while it looks certain that the 3.5mm socket will become an anachronism within a couple of generations of phone, the USB and Lightning port may not be too far behind, and the headphones that you bought to replace the ones that became obsolete will also become obsolete. Such is the way of technology.

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Jimmy hands $2 worth of dimes to the conductor and finds a seat at the back of the bus.

He settles himself in for what is going to be a long night - taking off his scuffed leather shoes and resting his head against a window opaque with condensation.

Jimmy, 47, has had the same routine for the last three years since losing his job as a chef at Microsoft.

He gets on the bus at midnight and rides the same 35-mile journey between San Jose and Palo Alto, California, until sunrise. He can spend up to $8 (£5) a night just trying to keep warm and off the streets - money he can ill afford.

The 22 bus is the only route that runs 24 hours in Silicon Valley and it has become something of an unofficial shelter for the homeless.

They call it Hotel 22.

This small pocket of The Golden State has become the most extreme example in the US of the growing schism between the haves and have nots.

Santa Clara - the county which encompasses Silicon Valley - has the highest percentage of homeless in America, according to the latest Department of Housing report.

Yet it also has the nation’s highest average household income and some of the most expensive homes in the country - all down to the high-tech economy on its doorstep.

Silicon Valley is enjoying the most sustained period of wealth creation in history, but the area is crippled by income disparity. Where once a robust middle-class thrived, there exists only the super-rich and the extreme poor.

The 22 bus drives past Jimmy’s old employer Microsoft, as well as the headquarters of Google, Facebook and Apple.

On our journey, we pass a “Google bus” going in the opposite direction towards San Francisco. Employees are ferried to and from work in their own private blacked-out coaches dubbed “Gbuses”, which have themselves come to be a symbol of the inequality.

“It’s a tale of two cities,” Jimmy says. “At least that’s the poetic way people describe what’s going on here.

“What these techies don’t realise though is that we’re no different to them - they’re just one misstep, one paycheck away from being us.”

Jimmy, who moved from Chicago to California in the early 1990s for work, is wearing a slightly mottled suit and tie, as he does most days, in the hope it will help him find a job. He sends off a dozen applications a day from the local library, but he rarely even hears back.

He keeps a length of rope wrapped round his ankle, hidden under his trouser leg, “just in case one day I decide I’ve had enough.”

According to the most recent census data, as many as 20,000 people will experience homelessness in the county this year.

Those who are not sleeping on the streets here are sleeping in what is known as The Jungle - the largest homeless encampment in the US. Hundreds of makeshift tents and treehouses go on for miles in a lawless sprawl.

Ray Bramson, the City of San Jose’s homelessness response manager, says: “There’s 5,000 sleeping rough on any given night - we just can’t deal with that.”

Over the last few years rent in the area has skyrocketed, in some cases up to 300% of the national average.

“When you think homeless, you think of someone on the streets with no money, no job,” he says. “That’s changed. Being employed no longer guarantees you can afford to rent here. People simply lack the sustainable wages they need to survive.”

The state’s minimum wage was recently increased from $8 to $10 an hour. “It’s a step in the right direction,” Mr Bramson says, “but unfortunately the self-sufficiency standard is around $15.”

Our bus jolts to a stop as the driver spots someone waiting in the dark at the side of the road. It is now 2am. He lays down the ramp for the woman, who has a large cart full of her worldly belongings.

She is not the only woman, Sandra Pena spends one night a week on Hotel 22.

A well-spoken, well-educated and strikingly beautiful woman of 52, she is not the average night passenger.

She spent nine years working as a technician for Arantech - which was at one time one of the bigger tech firms in Silicon Valley, until she was made redundant in 1989.

Shortly after, she decided to start up her own construction business, which enjoyed some success.

But at the height of the recession in 2009 she lost it all and had her home repossessed.

She started living out of her truck, doing odd job for neighbours, until she could no longer afford that either.

“I was hit by everything at once, and sometimes you just can’t pick yourself up from that,“ says Sandra, who is wearing pristine blue jeans and a button-down blouse. “Never, ever, would I have imagined myself in this situation.”

When there are no free beds at the local shelter, Sandra sleeps on the bus.

“I get the day pass for $6 - which if you buy at the right time can last you all through the night to the next morning,” she says. “I like it for the quiet …. and the alone time.

“The only downside is that you get woken up at the end of the line and are made to wait 15 minutes to get on the next one,” she says.

As a native of Santa Clara she has seen the area change beyond recognition.

It was once known for its orchids, earning it the nickname the Valley of Heart’s Delight. Until the 1960s, it was the largest fruit production region in the world and Del Monte was the biggest employer in town.

Then the tech companies started moving in, growing outward from Stanford University, which had begun nurturing start-ups with grants and academic support.

“Growing up here it was all ranches and orchids, I was a cowgirl. You had everything you could want, and great weather all year round. I don’t blame them all for coming here, but they offer the people who live here nothing,” says Sandra, who is currently completing a building course at an employment centre, which she hopes will lead to a job.

Chris Richardson, director of programme operations at the homeless organisation Downtown Streets, which has been helping Sandra, said: “Hotel 22 is an open secret in the homeless trade - for a couple of bucks people can get a relatively undisturbed night’s sleep.”

He says the problem has become so out of control there are twice as many homeless as there are available beds.

“You see camps of people sleeping rough just two miles from Sergey Brin’s (Google co-founder) house,” he says. “And the irony is, not even his engineers get paid enough to live here.

“We are trying to get tech billionaires involved in what we’re doing. They donate millions to good causes, but almost nothing to the local community they are helping destroy.

“It’s not necessarily their fault, but they are stakeholders in the homelessness problem and have the power and brains to change it.”

Eileen Richardson, Downtown Street’s founder, is a venture capitalist and former tech CEO herself, previously heading up the online music site Napster. She volunteered with the homeless on a sabbatical leave 10 years ago and was so shocked by what she saw she started up her own organisation to help.

At their weekly meeting, the team leader makes an announcement to the some-100 guests gathered - Google is hiring. The company is holding a jobs fair in a few weeks’ time and they are looking for chefs, cooks and cleaners.

Some groan, but most are keenly listening and a group stay behind after to sign up. In desperate times you cannot be too proud to “make a deal with the devil”, one guest says.

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The island of Giglio, its inhabitants, the Italian government and Costa Concordia cruise ship passengers are banding together to request hundreds of millions of euros in damages from Costa Cruises this week, as the trial of the 2012 cruise ship disaster nears its climax.

Prosecutors have requested a 26-year prison sentence for Captain Francesco Schettino, who abandoned the cruise ship after it hit a reef doing a sail-by of the Mediterranean island of Giglio. Thirty-two people died as the ship tilted into the sea and filled with water.

Mr Schettino is expected to be convicted, but the trial will also assign civil responsibility and on Wednesday lawyers representing 39 different civil parties made their demands for the first time.

Lawyers present in court said the requests include $226,637,000 million ( €200 million) from Giglio island, and $101,826,000 million (€90 million) from a group of disaster survivors who suffered everything from serious injury to the permanent loss of the “joy of vacation”, €1 million each for the Grosseto province of Grosseto and region of Tuscany and €200 million for various Italian government entities, including the environmental ministry.

Even the Moldavian dancer who dined with Mr Schettino, Domnica Cemortan, is asking for $226,280 (€200,000).

“Given that this is such an extraordinary case and trial, we expect it will be an extraordinary verdict,” said Michael Verhoven, a legal consultant for the US lawyer John Eaves, who represents passengers in the trial.

“The civil parties agree: Schettino should get the highest sentence, but Costa should pay a high amount for putting luxury and profit before safety. It has to be a lot, otherwise the insurance companies simply absorb the cost, raise prices and there is no impact.”

Lawyers representing Costa Cruises walked out of the courtroom after hearing the requests. No-one from Costa Cruises or its parent company Carnival is being held criminally liable, but this verdict, expected in mid-February, is likely to set the stage for the civil trial to follow.

“It is clear Schettino doesn’t have that kind of money,” Giglio island spokesman Cristiano Pellegrini said. “It is Costa Crociere who has civil responsibility.”

In closing arguments, Maria Chiara Zanconi, representing Giglio, argued for $226 million (€200 million) in damages, including €20 million to be awarded immediately. Of that, €10 million stems from material damages from emergency response, blockages and lost tourist revenue during the three-year salvage process, while the other €10 million was for damage to the reputation and identity of the island.

“Our analysis showed Giglio had been associated with the Concordia disaster 13,000 times in the Italian and international media, for a total of 40 billion views,” said Ms Zanconi. “We tried to calculate the cost of a campaign to offset that damage, but it was impossible. Costa Concordia is forever etched in Giglio’s history.”

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A new dinosaur which had an extraordinarily long neck has been discovered in China and named the ‘Dragon of Qijiang.’

Qijianglong (pronounced "CHI-jyang-lon") is about 15 metres in length and lived about 160 million years ago in the Late Jurassic.

The fossil site was found by construction workers in 2006, and the digging eventually hit a series of large neck vertebrae stretched out in the ground.

Incredibly, the head of the dinosaur was still attached.

"It is rare to find a head and neck of a long-necked dinosaur together because the head is so small and easily detached after the animal dies," said Univerity of Alberta doctoral student Tetsuto Miyashita.

The new species belongs to a group of dinosaurs called mamenchisaurids, known for their extremely long necks sometimes measuring up to half the length of their bodies.

Most sauropods, or long-necked dinosaurs, have necks only about one third the length of their bodies.

Unique among mamenchisaurids, Qijianglong had neck vertebrae that were filled with air, making their necks relatively lightweight despite their enormous size.

Interlocking joints between the vertebrae also indicate a surprisingly stiff neck that was much more mobile bending vertically than sideways, similar to a construction crane.

"Qijianglong is a cool animal. If you imagine a big animal that is half-neck, you can see that evolution can do quite extraordinary things," said Miyashita.

"Qijianglong shows that long-necked dinosaurs diversified in unique ways in Asia during Jurassic times--something very special was going on in that continent.

"Nowhere else we can find dinosaurs with longer necks than those in China. The new dinosaur tells us that these extreme species thrived in isolation from the rest of the world."

Mr Miyashita believes that mamenchisaurids evolved into many different forms when other long-necked dinosaurs went extinct in Asia.

It is possible that the dinosaurs were once isolated as a result of a large barrier such as a sea, and lost in competition with invading species when the land connection was restored later.

"It is still a mystery why mamenchisaurids did not migrate to other continents," he says.

The Qijianglong skeleton is now housed in a local museum in Qijiang.

"China is home to the ancient myths of dragons," says Miyashita, "I wonder if the ancient Chinese stumbled upon a skeleton of a long-necked dinosaur like Qijianglong and pictured that mythical creature."

The discovery was reported in the Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology.

This article was written by Sarah Knapton Science Editor from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

SEE ALSO: Paleontologists Have Found Evidence Of Dinosaur Pee

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German Chancellor Angela Merkel ruled out any cancellation of Greece's debt and said the country has already received substantial cuts from banks and creditors.

"There has already been voluntary debt forgiveness by private creditors, banks have already slashed billions from Greece's debt," Merkel said in an interview with the Hamburger Abendblatt newspaper.

"I do not envisage fresh debt cancellation," she said.

The new Greek government has already begun to roll back years of austerity measures demanded by the EU and the International Monetary Fund in return for a 240 billion euro ($269 billion) bailout granted to avoid a financial meltdown in 2010, and says it will negotiate to halve the debt.

At the start of 2012, Greece restructured its debt in a deal involving private creditors who took "haircuts" or wrote down parts of their holdings. This cut Greece's total debt burden by around 100 billion euros.

But the country is still lumbered with a debt pile of more than 315 billion euros, upwards of 175 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), a record for the European Union.

"Europe will continue to show its solidarity with Greece, as with other countries hard hit by the crisis if these countries carry out reforms and cost-saving measures," Merkel said.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras will visit Italy and France on Tuesday and Wednesday, but has no immediate plans to visit Germany, Europe's biggest economy and effective paymaster.

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The hacking attack on Sony Pictures played a crucial role in Princess Beatrice’s decision to leave her role as a paid intern at the company, it has emerged.

Friends said the princess and other employees were asked to take time off after the devastating hack — thought to have been carried out by North Korea in revenge for a Sony comedy which depicted the assassination of Kim Jong-un, the country’s leader.

However, the princess — who is sixth in line to the throne — decided to resign instead.

Her salary, address and other confidential information was among a vast amount of material stolen by hackers.

The cyber criminals, calling themselves Guardians of Peace, made public a range of highly damaging email exchanges between Sony bosses, as well as copies of unreleased movies and the script to the upcoming James Bond film, Spectre .

It is unclear whether the security implications of working for Sony had any bearing on Princess Beatrice’s resignation.

But the company’s failure to store securely private information about a member of the Royal Family is bound to have raised concerns at Buckingham Palace.

A friend of the princess told the Mail on Sunday: “Beatrice’s job was semi closed down by North Korea when her social security details were splashed all over the pages of American newspapers.”

The development may also have influenced Beatrice, 26, to view it as the right time to leave the internship at Sony’s British headquarters in Soho, central London, and attempt to secure a permanent role elsewhere.

The friend said Beatrice had been approached by headhunters and is now considering two job offers.

A Buckingham Palace spokeswoman refused to comment on the latest development.

“We have only confirmed that the princess is pursuing a career in business,” said the spokeswoman.

The hackers put every computer at Sony out of action and claimed to have stolen 100 terabytes of data.

They tried to force the company to cancel the release of The Interview, featuring the assassination of Kim Jong-un.

After an initial delay the film was received a theatrical and digital release, to mixed reviews.

This article was written by David Barrett Home Affairs Correspondent from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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Venezuela 's economy is set to shrink by 7pc in 2015, according to the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) latest figures from last month. The country, which used to be hailed as a 'socialist paradise', will see its economy crumble further as oil prices continue to slide.

To understand just how quickly the economy is deteriorating, the IMF predicted only last October that Venezuela's GDP would contract by 1pc. The world economy is set to grow by 3.5pc.

The country's inflation rate is no better, with official figures putting the number at 64pc. However, according to Robert Bottome, publisher of VenEconomy Weekly, it is 100pc and Russ Dallen of Caracas Capital Market says it is 120pc. To put that into context, Argentina's inflation rate in December was 10.9pc, Brazil's was 6.4pc and Mexico was 4.08pc.

One of the reasons for the rise in inflation was a large increase in money supply as Venezuela's central bank continued to print money to finance a budget deficit.

The IMF cannot see any improvement this year. Venezuela stopped publishing its GDP figures in 2013 but the problems are clear in the long queues for food and regular electricity blackouts.

Why is the Venezuelan economy doing so badly?

Oil exports account for 95pc of Venezuela's exports. But oil prices have fallen from $112.36 (£74.80) a barrel in June 2014 to $52.99 a barrel in January 2015.

At the higher price, Venezuela's daily output of two million barrels of crude oil, according to Opec, would have been worth $82 billion a year. Now it is worth $38.6 billion.

According to VenEconomy Weekly, it is "no wonder [the] cash is short" since the country spent $60.5 billion importing goods and services yet the state owned oil company, PDVSA, "received some $39 billion for its [oil] exports". In an attempt to bolster its oil revenues, Venezuela frantically tried to get Opec to cut oil production last November but failed.

The decision by Hugo Chavez, Venezuela's former leader, to impose controls on foreign exchange, with a fixed rate for buying dollars, has created a black market for American currency, which currently trades at 183 bolivars to the dollar.

Mr Dallen explains some of the reasons in the Financial Times :

[Venezuela's] limited domestic production of consumer goods has been destroyed by 15 years of expropriations, price controls and communism."

Oil revenues contracted in the last three years. Looking at VenEconomy data based on their estimates as well as the country's Central Bank, the share of GDP made up by oil shrank 3.3pc, compared to a 1.4pc fall in 2012.

And the future is not brighter. According to World Bank data, the current account balance as a share of GDP will continue to slide. There are fears of a default; as Mr Dallen points out, maturity and interest payments on the country's foreign debt of around $11bn are due this year.

SEE ALSO: Major US companies face billions in Venezuela currency losses

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One of the world’s largest activist hedge funds has made a bet worth nearly £100m on Britain’s solar power industry, The Sunday Telegraph can disclose.

Elliott Capital Advisors, the UK arm of the American hedge fund, has put money into half a dozen unnamed projects capable of generating about 85 megawatts – making it one of the largest privately-held solar power operators in the country.

Elliott has hedged its bets by taking out short positions in five other renewable energy funds listed on the London stock market. It made its biggest bet against a firm last week, spending an estimated £9m to short 2.21pc of The Renewables Infrastructure Group (TRIG).

The hedges amount to a £17m position against the publicly-traded renewable firms. Elliott is thought to have spent up to four times as much so far in building its own solar projects.

Elliott is shorting Bluefield Solar Income Fund, which has 12 projects in England and Wales; John Laing Environmental Assets, which invests in seven renewable projects; and Nextenergy Solar Fund, with three projects underway; and Foresight Solar Fund, which owns Wymeswold, until recently the country’s largest solar farm.

Almost £8bn was invested in renewable energy in 2013, according to figures cited by the Department for Energy and Climate Change. The Government has committed to meeting 15pc of the UK’s energy needs from green sources by 2020, and has introduced incentives such as renewable obligation certificates, a subsidy that generators sell to suppliers. However, this particular subsidy could be drawing to a close this year.

Elliott is best known in Britain for taking stakes in companies in order to push through sweeping changes. The fund lost a campaign to instal its own directors at National Express, and bought Game Group in 2012.

This article was written by Marion Dakers Financial services editor from The Daily Telegraph and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

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NOW WATCH: An Israeli Company Just Solved Solar Energy's Single Most Mystifying Problem

Russia will be the biggest loser from the current downturn in oil prices as the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) seizes back a bigger share of the world crude market, the world's top energy watchdog has said.

In its closely-watched medium-term market report the International Energy Agency (IEA) said that Russia's output of crude would contract by 560,000 barrels per day (bpd) through to 2020.

"Russia facing a perfect storm of collapsing prices, international sanctions and currency depreciation, will likely emerge as the industry's top loser," said the IEA.

The Paris-based agency also said that US shale oil output will continue to grow through to the end of 2020 despite a 50pc slide in the price of crude since June, which has threatened the profitability of fields in North America.

Oil prices, which have rallied over the last week, have been under pressure since the end of last year when the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec).

"There has never been a situation like we face today," said Maria van der Hoeven told an audience of oil industry executives on Tuesday at IP Week in London. "This time around it's not business as usual."

The IEA expects crude prices to average $55 per barrel throughout 2015 but warned the suppliers of oil will increasingly cut back on expansion projects.

"As producers take an axe to their spending, supply will grow far more slowly than previously projected, but global capacity is still forecast to expand by 5.2m bpd by 2020, and the toll on production will vary by country," said the IEA.

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Airlines, these days, release new uniforms to much pomp and ceremony. In a bid to outshine one another, airlines call in fashion designers to create new looks, with Vivienne Westwood behind Virgin’s striking new designs — which for women combine "hot red" skirts with frill-front blouses and oversize collars.

One of the more recent was unveiled by the French airline La Compagnie, which was one of the first to offer staff the option of culottes— the loose-fitting shorts that in 2014 made a fashion comeback.

Handy, you might think, for those who can't decide between wearing skirts and trousers. But actually, for cabin crew, that choice rarely exists.

In recent years there appears to have been a move away from giving female staff members the option to wear trousers.

British Airways employees, for example, are no longer able to wear trousers unless part of the long-haul only team, even though the airline introduced trousers for women in 2004.

A recent report in the Daily Mail said some of BA's employees have complained about this, with a union representing stewards poised to take action, but the airline told us it had not received any complaints.

Etihad's uniform too used to give staff the option of both trousers and skirts, but its new range also allows skirts only, a result, the airline said, of much consultation with crew.

"Don't you think it's a little sexist?" said Heather Poole, an American air flight attendant and the author of "Cruising Attitude: Tales of Crashpads, Crew Drama and Crazy Passengers."

Despite wearing a skirt while working, she told Telegraph Travel that at times they could be impractical. "Flight attendants are there for safety," she said. "Pantyhose are highly flammable. If I'm wearing a skirt, I'm also wearing hose — as I fight a fire."

Poole said she chose to wear a skirt however for aesthetic reasons.

"I almost always wear the skirt, but that's because I don't look good in our pants [trousers]. They're not flattering. But when I'm standing outside the Denver airport waiting for the hotel van to take us to the hotel and it's 7 degrees outside, I usually wish I had my pants on. Or when there's a blizzard in New York and I have to work, well, I think I'll wear the pants, regardless of those unflattering pleats."

Lee Cobaj, a Telegraph Travel writer who flew with Thomas Cook as a flight attendant for 18 years, was surprised to hear that airlines were backing away from women in trousers but said that she struggled to remember seeing any female crew members wearing them.

"The uniform is a big part of projecting an airline's image," she said. "The grooming standards that go along with that are extremely stringent too, a certain size of earring, say, and permitted ways to color and wear your hair. High heels still have to be worn outside of the aircraft and Virgin even have specific lipsticks — I can't think of any other industries that would get away with it."

Sky-high standards

• BA expects cabin crew to wear lipstick and blusher "as a minimum."

• The sarong part of Asian uniforms, including the "Singapore Girl" uniform, worn by Singapore Airlines cabin crew (see above), has been criticized for being impractical.

• Last year, Japan's Skymark Airlines dressed staff in skimpy miniskirts that some said left them open to harassment.

• Virgin's high heels gave employees blisters, according to some reports, and its new collars scratched necks.

British Airways' website makes it clear to prospective cabin crew that tattoos are allowed only if they can be covered up, something which is easier for men, being required to show less flesh. "Gentlemen may have tattoos on their legs as trousers can conceal them," it says.

Women, however, are not allowed tattoos even on their feet, as all female shoes "must be of the classic court style, which leaves the top and side of the foot exposed. The maximum permitted hosiery density is 15 denier and does not cover up tattoos."

The airlines contacted by Telegraph Travel had differing policies regarding trousers for women.

Most however, suggested that their strict uniform standards were an accepted part of the job, with the overwhelming majority of female cabin crew members apparently wanting to wear skirts. Even airlines that do allow trousers as an option said that few cabin crew, if any, take it up.

A uniform should be there to project authority and professionalism, so that passengers feel that they can rely on you in emergency, but not to attract sexual attention.

BA said the management team for its long and short-haul cabin crew had not received a request from female crew members to wear trousers in four years. "Our cabin crew are proud to wear one of the industry’s most iconic uniforms," it said.

Virgin Atlantic, however, does give females a trouser option — Dame Westwood herself was seen sporting a riotous pair at the Virgin uniform's launch party.

"Virgin Atlantic has an iconic look for its crew of which we are extremely proud," a spokesman said, "and the standard uniform includes a skirt. However the comfort of our people is very important to us and therefore trousers can be provided with requests reviewed on a case by case basis."

Emirates refused to comment on the issue, while Etihad Airways told Telegraph Travel its new, skirt-only female uniforms had been "enthusiastically well received by our crew and guests since we launched them in December.”

The female trouser option was dropped after criteria including safety, durability, functionality, and style for a workforce of more than 140 nationalities, were considered.

Etihad's crew were "deeply involved" in the creation of Ettore Bilotta's feminine designs, a spokesman said, and, while previously an option on a few specific flight sectors, "female cabin crew indicated a clear preference against trousers in the new design process."

Trousers are not an issue at EasyJet however. "EasyJet provides all of its female cabin crew with the option of wearing either a dress, skirt, or trousers when on duty," a spokesman said. "The safety and well being of our passengers and crew is EasyJet's highest priority, and we comply with all relevant regulations."

Ryanair however, perhaps unsurprisingly for an airline that published an annual calendar of staff in bikinis until just last year, makes its crew wear skirts.

A Ryanair spokesman said the airline's uniform options were under review, along with all other aspects of the budget airline's operation.

One reason for cabin crew wanting to look glamorous is the feeling that it is important for airline staff stand out, giving employees more authority in the eyes of passengers.

"It's important to convey a somewhat glamorous image — travel should be alluring — but are these airlines trying to say women can't look presentable — even fabulous — in trousers?" Lee Cobaj asked.

"A uniform should be there to project authority and professionalism, so that passengers feel that they can rely on you in emergency, but not to attract sexual attention. There are a lot of crew who like wearing skirts and feeling feminine — and that should be fine, too. But which attire one chooses to wear to work should most definitely be a choice for adults in 2015."

One which the airline industry, compared to other major industries, seems slow to recognize.

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