SCOTLAND - China has signalled its opposition to Scottish independence, with the country's premier saying that he wants to see a “united, United Kingdom”. In yet another boost for the No campaign ahead of September’s Scottish independence referendum Li Keqiang, the Chinese premier, said that he wants a “strong” United Kingdom. His comments follow an intervention by Barack Obama, who earlier this month said that the UK is better off remaining together. His comments will come as a further blow to Alex Salmond, the Scottish First Minister, who has courted the Chinese in recent years. Nationalists attempted to dismiss the remarks, with a Yes Scotland spokesman saying that "unlike people in China" the Scottish people will have a "free and democratic vote" on September 18.

JORDAN - Members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIS, were trained in 2012 by US instructors working at a secret base in Jordan, according to informed Jordanian officials. The officials said dozens of ISIS members were trained at the time as part of covert aid to the insurgents targeting the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. The officials said the training was not meant to be used for any future campaign in Iraq. The Jordanian officials said all ISIS members who received US training to fight in Syria were first vetted for any links to extremist groups like al-Qaida. In February 2012, WND was first to report the US, Turkey and Jordan were running a training base for the Syrian rebels in the Jordanian town of Safawi in the country’s northern desert region. That report has since been corroborated by numerous other media accounts.

USA - Half of the small town of Pilger was destroyed after two twisters tore through it, decimating buildings including the school and fire station. Victims were taken to three regional hospitals, where a child, whose gender has not been released, later died of their injuries. Stanton County Commissioner Jerry Weatherholt said: "More than half of the town is gone - absolutely gone. The co-op is gone, the grain bins are gone, and it looks like almost every house in town has some damage. It's a complete mess." The first tornado struck the town yesterday afternoon, flattening power lines and trapping people inside a destroyed farmhouse. It was followed shortly afterwards by a second twister, which tore down the high street, injuring several people.

JAPAN - Remember how Japan decided to build that crazy ice wall to contain the Fukushima nuclear plant's radioactive water leaks? Well, its construction is behind schedule — because its engineers can't achieve temperatures low enough to freeze the ice. The ice wall was to be constructed by driving vertical pipes, spaced about a meter apart, between 20 and 40 meters into the ground. Then, coolant was to be pumped through them, effectively creating a barrier of permafrost around the affected buildings, keeping the contaminated water in and groundwater out. But now, the Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) has admitted that an initial, smaller inner ice wall — a proof-of-concept, if you like — is proving difficult to construct.

UK - One expert has voiced his concerns that new rules, which took effect on June 1, could mean that diseased animals could now go undetected when they are slaughtered. In the past, carcasses were cut open for inspection but under the new European regulations supported by Britain's Food Standards Agency (FSA), they will have to rely on visual checks alone. Ron Spellman, director-general of the European Working Community for Food Inspectors and Consumer Protection (EWFC), which represents meat inspectors across the EU, told the BBC: "Last year we know that there were at least 37,000 pigs' heads with abscesses or tuberculosis lesions in lymph nodes in the head. They won't be cut now." Meat from pigs' heads is recovered by specialised parts of boning plants and goes into pies, sausages and other processed foods.

USA - We are starting to see that there are very serious consequences for filling up our oceans with massive amounts of plastic that never biodegrades. In fact, this is one of the greatest environmental disasters of all time and yet you rarely hear it talked about. Virtually every molecule of plastic ever created still exists somewhere, and we all use things made out of plastic every single day. But have you ever stopped to think about what happens to all of that plastic? Well, the truth is that a lot of it ends up in our oceans. In fact, humanity produces approximately 200 billion pounds of plastic every year, and about 10 percent of that total ends up in our oceans. In other words, we are slowly but steadily filling up our oceans with our garbage.

VATICAN - Pope Francis has criticized Europe for a declining birthrate, a high percentage of unemployed people and discarding the elderly. He called Europe “tired,” saying it risks becoming a “throw-away culture.” Pope Francis: UN should encourage ‘legitimate’ redistribution of wealth. “Europe is tired. We have to help rejuvenate it, to find its roots. It’s true: it has disowned its roots. But we need to help it find them,” Francis said during his visit to the Community of Sant'Egidio in Rome’s Santa Maria in Trastevere Basilica. The community’s volunteers provide various forms of help to homeless, immigrants, elderly, disabled, and young people.

VATICAN - The centuries-old divide between the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church is a 'scandal', Pope Francis said as he met the Archbishop of Canterbury in Rome. The leader of 1.2 billion Catholics worldwide said a goal of full unity between the two churches 'may seem distant' but it remained an aim that should direct their 'every step'. He said progress towards full unity would not be the result of human actions alone, but would be a 'free gift of God'.

VATICAN - Pope Francis on Monday denounced those getting rich through speculation in financial markets, calling on them to use their investments for the good of humanity. "It is increasingly intolerable that financial markets are shaping the destiny of peoples rather than serving their needs, or that the few derive immense wealth from financial speculation while the many are deeply burdened by the consequences," he said.

DENMARK - Denmark's Parliament has approved a new law that forces the country's churches to conduct formal gay marriages rather than just short blessing ceremonies. Under the new law, priests maintain the right to refuse to officiate the ceremony but the local bishop must arrange a replacement for their church. Denmark has offered civil unions to gay couples since 1989 and legalized gay marriage in 2012. The first church-conducted gay marriages could take place as early as this weekend.

IRAQ - Sunni militants have seized the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar, officials and residents say. Militants led by ISIS - the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant - captured key cities including Mosul and Tikrit last week, but some towns were retaken. UN human rights chief Navi Pillay said the "apparently systematic series of executions [of non-combatants] almost certainly amounted to war crimes". The US earlier announced it might use drone strikes to halt the ISIS advance. "They're not the whole answer, but they may well be one of the options that are important," said US Secretary of State John Kerry.

EUROPE - The appointment of an arch-federalist as the European Commission president risks creating a ‘dramatic’ backlash that will hasten Britain’s exit from the EU, one of the country’s most senior diplomats has warned. A leaked document said Ivan Rogers, the UK’s permanent representative to the EU, believes the ‘die is cast’ in favour of Jean-Claude Juncker, the former prime minister of Luxembourg.

IRAQ - The Islamist militants taking over large parts of Iraq have social media skills that have seen them run progaganda rings around their internationally backed but less sophisticated opponents. Social media is proving a highly effective weapon in the armory of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (Isis), striking fear far beyond the immediate battleground of northern Iraq. In the five days since Isis took the world by surprise with the sudden overthrow of the Iraq army in Mosul, the former al-Qaeda affiliate has posted a series of bloodthirsty messages and videos on social media including Twitter and YouTube. Such is the trepidation with which the posts are received that the Iraqi government has sought to block the Internet, to prevent the spread of Isis’s electronic terror.

USA - A California wildfire that has already destroyed three structures and blackened some three square miles of forest land near Sequoia National Park was threatening 1,000 more homes on Monday, officials said. More than 1,100 firefighters were battling the so-called Shirley Fire, which erupted on Friday evening on the park's outskirts northeast of Bakersfield and prompted the evacuation of several foothill communities. The flames jumped containment lines on Saturday, fueled by high winds and dry brush, according to the US Forest Service, despite the efforts of water-dropping helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. California’s fire season has been particularly severe this year, with one of the worst droughts in the state's history playing a substantial role in the size and number of wildfires across the state.

RUSSIA - Russia cut off gas to Ukraine on Monday in a dispute over unpaid bills that could disrupt supplies to the rest of Europe and set back hopes for peace between the former Soviet neighbours. After the weekend loss of 49 troops when pro-Russian rebels shot down a military transport plane, Ukraine's new president ordered his forces to retake full control of their border with Russia - saying this could then pave the way for negotiations. Calling time on weeks of wrangling in talks over natural gas supplies, Russia said Kiev had missed a Monday morning deadline to repay $1.95 billion owed for previous purchases and announced Ukraine would now only get gas it has paid for in advance. All that sent Russian financial markets lower on Monday and helped oil and gas prices climb in Europe that were already firm on fears of supply disruption due to violence in Iraq.