NEED TO CATCH up? TheJournal.ie brings you a round-up of today’s news…

Seán Fitzpatrick leaving court today. Pic: Leon Farrell/Photocall Ireland.

IRELAND

• Two students from GMIT died in a fire at an Irish college residence in Leuven, Belgium.
• It later emerged that no safety checks had been completed on the house they died in.
• Seán Fitzpatrick and two other Anglo Irish top executives pleaded not guilty in court to unlawfully providing assistance to people to prop up the bank’s share price.
• Minister Pat Rabbitte said that he won’t be interfering in how RTÉ deals with the Saturday Night Show controversy.
• Gardaí found €43k worth of cocaine in a van they searched at a checkpoint.
• A Northern Ireland couple accused of sexual slavery can be named, a court said.
• A viable bomb was defused in Monaghan by the Defence Forces.
• The IMO accused the Government of ‘spin over substance’ after a meeting on free GP care for the under sixes.
• Bord Gáis announced a 2.2 per cent electricity increase, bringing a price freeze to an end.
• A storm warning now covers all of Ireland, with a threat of flooding.
• Midwives at Portlaoise hospital wrote to Brian Cowen and Mary Harney over ‘fears that a mother or baby would die’.

WORLD

Amanda Knox. Pic: Good Morning America.

#SYRIA Almost 2,200 people have died since the Syria peace talks began.

#ITALY Amanda Knox will fight her conviction – and will never go willingly to Italy.

#IRISH SEA The higher radiation levels reported at Sellafield were just ‘background radon’.

#UKRAINE A Ukrainian activist was tortured and crucified, he said on national television today.

INNOVATION

• We’ve all heard about Tinder, but what about a dating app where you judge people on their personality, not their looks? Meet Twine Canvas. (Yes, that’s its real name). [TechCrunch]
• Here are the first 10 users of Facebook. [TheGuardian]

PARTING SHOT

Pic: AP Photo/Yves Logghe

This? Oh, only a cat brothel. The image was projected onto a hotel near the red light district in Brussels as part of a campaign to pressure the Belgian government to pass a law forcing cat sterilisation. The aim is to help curb the overpopulation of cats and the euthanisation of thousands of unwanted kittens. [Can't see the image? Click here]