• Body discovered after fire in flat • Transsexual was at heart of carabinieri blackmail case Italian police are investigating the murder of a Brazilian transsexual caught up in a drugs and prostitution scandal that forced the resignation of one of Italy's top politicians last month. The soot-encrusted ...

Errors in car scrappage data mean scheme will be extended beyond February The government has exaggerated the success of its car scrappage scheme after double counting thousands of orders, the Guardian has learnt. Officials at Lord Mandelson's business department have begun a "data cleansing exercise" ...

With rain forecast for much of the country this weekend, we recommend 10 indoor attractions across the UK 1. City of Caves, Nottingham Deep under Nottingham city runs a fascinating network of Anglo-Saxon sandstone caves. Visitors can explore the tunnels and see how they were variously used over the ...

Labiaplasties can be risky, yet the number carried out on the NHS rose by 70% last year Before she had even turned 10, Anna had started worrying that there was something physically wrong with her. "I would look at other girls in the shower, and think, 'They don't have what I have,'" she says, and wearing ...

From the piercings to the possessions, Andrew Spooner takes in this colourful event

Mother says family faces jail in Tehran for possessing extracts from Satanic Verses and criticising regime Lawyers for a nine-year-old boy set to be removed from the UK tomorrow are urgently trying to stop his deportation. The Iranian boy, known for legal reasons as Child M, has been locked up in Yarl's ...

It's no joke! City council starts laughing clubs in colleges and jails to put smile back on citizens' faces and boost health Amid simmering political tensions, a fierce post-election crackdown and a depressed economy, reasons to be cheerful are hardly in abundant supply in Iran. Now Tehran city council ...

The director of Shaun of the Dead, Edgar Wright, is not happy with the Times. Not happy at all. Wright, the long-time collaborator of Simon Pegg who also directed Hot Fuzz and Channel 4's Spaced, wrote a tribute on his blog earlier this week to the late actor Edward Woodward. The Times then reprinted ...

Delroy Grant appears before Greenwich magistrates and is remanded in custody to appear at crown court next week A man accused of a series of sex attacks on elderly women was remanded in custody today to appear in court again this month. Delroy Grant, 52, of Brockley, south-east London, appeared at Greenwich ...

Figures boost government hopes of return to economic growth in final three months of the year Spending in Britain's high streets rose modestly last month giving a boost to government hopes of a return to economic growth in the last three months of the year. Data from the Office for National Statistics ...