The Chinese have spotted another buying opportunity: Europe. After snapping up large tracts of Africa to extract oil and minerals, Chinese businesses are taking advantage of cash-strapped eurozone nations to gain a foothold. Read the full story

The Catholic child sex abuse scandal is casting a shadow over Easter Sunday services, as church leaders address the issue in their sermons. Read the full story

A Pennsylvania woman known to authorities as “JihadJane” has been charged in federal court with using the Internet to recruit jihadist fighters to carry out murders and violent attacks overseas. Read the full story

The Pope has told Irish bishops that paedophilia is a heinous crime and that they must address past problems of abuse with determination and resolve. Read the full story

The European single currency is facing an ‘inevitable break-up’ a leading French bank claimed yesterday. Strategists at Paris-based Société Générale said that any bailout of the stricken Greek economy would only provide ‘sticking plasters’ to cover the deep- seated flaws in the eurozone bloc. Read the full story

THE wife of beleaguered developer Bernard McNamara bought a luxurious apartment in New York for $2.58m (€1.8m) in 2008, just as the global financial crisis was taking hold, the Sunday Independent has learned. Read the full story

GARDAI are hunting bogus charity workers who falsely collected money for the victims of Haiti‘s earthquake. A group of women claiming to be from the Red Cross collected money in pubs in Limerick on Friday night. Read the full story

An investigation into the background to the financial crisis now seems inevitable, but we need to watch the civil servants and government ministers like hawks because they are experts at ensuring that an inquiry’s terms of reference protect their own actions from proper scrutiny. Read the full story