Iceland's government is to call on British Petroleum to help block the Eyjafjallajökull volcano.

Following BP's resounding success in stemming the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico, Iceland is hoping the company will act to stem the flow of volcanic ash.

BP is already drawing up plans for a giant metal collander which it will drop over the spewing crater.

If that fails, the petrol giant aims to stuff the fissure with cricket balls, socks and celebrity autobiographies.

In a parallel effort, the European Free Trade Authority appears to be taking a different tack, threatening Iceland with legal action for 'failure to implement the single European sky.'

Killing bears while they're sitting ducks is like shooting fish in a barrel.

Hunters in Russia, according to MEP Fiona Hall, "use dogs to dig and rouse bears from hibernation in their den and then kill them."

The cubs are then left to die or sold to zoos and circuses, she says, in a memo asking for the European Commission's position.

Environment commissioner Janez Potočnik replied this week that the commission was "aware of the practice to hunt brown bear in the den during hibernation."

And his verdict?

"This practice as such does not seem be in line with a sustainable use of this species.”

Does not 'seem' to be a sustainable 'use' of the bear?

That's one way of putting it, Janez...