Britain, United Kingdom | featured news

Proposed cuts in state-sponsored pension plans spur hundreds of thousands of teachers, police, immigration workers and others to picket for a day. The walkout could be a sign of further industrial action this summer over deep cuts in British public spending.

HSBC said that it is to cut around 700 jobs from its retail-banking operations in the U.K., ahead of major regulatory reforms that are set to affect the domestic industry's advisory business.

Personal details about Tony Blair that appear online were apparently not hacked from the former British prime minister's computer systems, but from the email account of a former staffer.

A North Somerset primary school teacher filmed himself sexually abusing young girls in his classroom, a court hears.

Uh oh, Skype's experiencing its second big outage in the space of just a couple of weeks, as we're hearing reports from the UK, Netherlands, and yes, even Bulgaria, claiming the online communications service is down. Our own Skype clients are currently unable to move past the "Connecting..." status note, both on Mac OS X and Windows 7.

The United States has not seen a balanced budget since 2001. Although private banks in the U.S. hold the majority of the country’s debt, over 52% according to MSNBC, the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve Board estimate that foreign governments hold 4.4 trillion of the country’s $14 trillion debt in Treasury securities.

Lionel Messi broke a 1-1 tie with his 53rd goal as Barcelona topped Manchester United 3-1 Saturday in the Champions League final at Wembley Stadium in London.

A 16-year-old British schoolboy became the youngest person ever to climb the highest mountains on all seven continents when he ascended Mount Everest, the tallest of them, on Thursday, his organizers said.

Queen Elizabeth II welcomed President Obama to Buckingham Palace on Tuesday, marking the start of a state visit with the British monarch.

The last of Britain's military forces have withdrawn from Iraq after more than eight years of fighting militants and training security forces.