An £18m fund is being earmarked to encourage international collaboration and cultural exchange, and generate more money by sending the best of English arts and culture overseas. 

Seomra ranga - "classroom", in Ireland's indigenous language - reads a cardboard sign tacked onto a door. A little further down the hall, a leabharlann is filled with books. It is a very Irish scene, but in a very unlikely place: East Belfast Mission on Newtownards Road. Across the street, a mural commemorates the Protestant paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force. Union Jack flags fly from lampposts in the shadow of the shipyards that built the Titanic.

Positioning itself at the crossroads between Africa and Asia, Mauritius is also looking north – especially to France and Britain, where it has strong historical ties. Africa's most developed country is striving to become the continent's leading higher education hub.

When I first drove down to live in Cornwall more than 20 years ago, I was met by a graffiti message on a railway bridge near Truro: "Go home, English!" I should have taken it personally. I should have politely turned around to head back across the Tamar.

After warning that Islamic extremism is the “most deadly” threat to charities in Britain, the UK’s Charity Commission on Wednesday detailed its proposed crackdown on groups of concern to it. In statements earlier this week, the Charity Commission’s chairman William Shawcross told the Sunday Times the regulator is taking action against charities sending money to various groups in Syria.

Former UK prime minister and crusader against the "Axis of Evil" Tony Blair delivered a speech Wednesday calling for Western powers to "take sides" in Middle East foreign policy and to move the issue of "religious extremism" to the top of their agenda.

This is succession planning. It's about laying down memories in Australia against the time the Queen dies. The first tour is the one that matters – the tour with the young couple and the baby, the gloss not worn off their marriage and possible princely misdemeanours of the child far in the future.

Sri Lankan authorities have decided to deport a British tourist for having an image of Buddha tattooed on her arm, officials have said. Police spokesman Ajith Rohana said on Wednesday that Naomi Coleman, 37, was detained at Colombo's airport after she arrived from India on Monday when authorities spotted the tattoo of Buddha seated on a lotus flower.