Canberra
Australia's industry and science minister has approved funds to set up a centre for advanced cell engineering at Monash University in Melbourne even though state and federal governments are still seeking a joint position on stem-cell research. Current laws ban harvesting human embryos and require them to be brought from overseas.
Buenos Aires
More than 90 per cent of academics at Argentina's universities struck last week over cuts imposed as a result of the economic crisis. The rector of the Universidad Nacional de R!o Cuarto in C"rdoba is taking legal action against the government over threatened 13 per cent reductions in teaching staff salaries.
Asmara
Two students from the University of Asmara have died in Eritrean government detention. They were being held with about 2,000 others in temperatures of up to 49C. The students were protesting over the arrest of student union president, Semere Kesete, after he criticised the government at a graduation ceremony.
Qinghuangdao
An engineering professor at the University of Qinghuangdao, China, has been charged with murdering her ex-husband. Jiang Shenliang allegedly recruited four students to beat him up and then forced him to drink disinfectant. She is alleged to have acted after her ex-husband insisted on returning to their home after she had thrown him out.
Bujumbura
United Nations agencies have recruited students and teachers from the medical school at the University of Burundi to help with a polio vaccination programme.
Moscow
About one-third of Russian university students had to pay tuition fees last year. The total number of students in higher education rose by 16.4 per cent, and enrolment in technical colleges by almost 10 per cent.
Krasnoyarsk
A Russian scientist from the Krasnoyarsk Thermophysics Centre, who was arrested last February on suspicion of spying for China, is being sued by Krasnoyarsk State Technical University for "illegally cashing" 446,000 roubles (£10,600).