NEED TO CATCH up? The Journal brings you a round-up of today’s news.

IRELAND

Stars of the TV show Bachelors Walk - Simon Delaney, Keith McErlean, Don Wycherley - are back together again in Yasmina Reza’s multiple award winning play ‘ART. Leon Farrell / Rollingnews Leon Farrell / Rollingnews / Rollingnews

• Garda investigating the 20-year mystery of the disappearance of Deirdre Jacob began a forensic search at a site earlier today in Kildare.
• Dublin City Council chief executive Owen Keegan was criticised for comments made to a students’ union over purpose-built student accommodation.
• There are 400 patients with Covid-19 in hospital as of this morning – the highest number of hospitalisations since 8 March.
• Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney said the UK continually dismiss new proposals over the Northern Ireland Protocol put forward by the European Union.
• Nationalist parties have called on the DUP to drop their boycott of north-south meetings after a High Court judge ruled the action unlawful.
• Minister for Transport and the National Transport Authority committed to a return of the Nitelink bus service in Dublin “as soon as possible” but an exact date is yet to be confirmed.
• Three men appeared in court in relation to an alleged criminal damage incident at Clontarf train station yesterday.
• An appeal has been launched for information on an Irish man who is missing from Berlin, Germany.
  
• The number of people who are receiving the Pandemic Unemployment Payment fell under 100,000 for the first time.
• A woman who was groomed for sex when she was a teenager by a family friend – and who later waived her right to anonymity during legal proceedings – said she hopes other victims of similar crimes will come forward after her attacker’s sentence was increased on appeal.

INTERNATIONAL

Israeli archaeologists have unearthed a massive ancient winemaking complex dating back some 1,500 years. The town of Yavne was a wine-making powerhouse during the Byzantine period. Tsafrir Abayov / AP/PA Tsafrir Abayov / AP/PA / AP/PA

#JAB IN THE DARK: A UK minister refused to confirm whether Russian spies “stole” the British-made Covid-19 vaccine to create its own jab. There are allegations that the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine’s design was used to create Russia’s Sputnik V jab.

#BIODIVERSITY: A key UN summit tasked with protecting biodiversity opened in China and online today, as countries meet to protect ecosystems and prevent mass extinction weeks before the COP26 climate conference.

#HEALTH THREAT: The burning of fossil fuels “is killing us”, the World Health Organisation warned in a report calling for ambitious climate action.

PARTING SHOT

NASA Astronaut Shane Kimbrough shared this image of Dublin from the International Space Station.

One of my favorite cities – Dublin, Ireland! Look forward to seeing all of my friends there next year. Slàinte! #dublin #trinity #ireland #nasa #iss pic.twitter.com/dbN1E2wmwj

— Shane Kimbrough (@astro_kimbrough) October 11, 2021