UK - Four years ago, the Queen asked academics why no one had foreseen the “awful” financial crisis which has blighted the country ever since. On Thursday, during a tour of the Bank of England, she effectively answered her own question as she talked about “lax” City workers and a regulator that “didn’t have the teeth” to intervene. The Duke, meanwhile, was typically direct. “There’s not another one coming, is there?” he asked. Then, as he left Mr Kapadia and his group, he said: “Don’t do it again!”

USA - Members of the US Congress convened in Washington on Thursday to discuss the United States’ ongoing extrajudicial slayings of Americans and foreigners overseas using unmanned drones. On Capitol Hill, Representative Dennis Kucinich (Democrat for Ohio) led a House Judiciary Committee discussion that demanded more transparency from President Barack Obama over how his administration carries out the targeted killing of suspected terrorists using drone aircraft. Despite the growing number of kills, the White House has remained mostly quiet on its drone program, with the lions’ share of information only surfacing through intelligence leaks made to the media.

FRANCE - In the midst of the economic crisis, France's Socialists are denying reality. The minister of industrial renewal is calling for nationalization of some industries, while the president shies away from necessary structural reforms. Business leaders fear the clock has been turned back 30 years. The liberal economist Nicolas Baverez, who predicted "France's downfall" 10 years ago and has just written a book titled "Réveillez-Vous" ("Wake Up"), saw the wrangling over Florange as proof that the French left still hasn't accepted globalization, and acts as if the country were an economic and cultural preserve. "The idea of nationalization sends an ominous message to all investors," Baverez said.

USA - President Barack Obama and House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner held a "frank" face-to-face meeting on Thursday in an effort to break an impasse in talks to avert the "fiscal cliff" of steep tax increases and spending cuts. With an end-of-year deadline looming, the two leaders talked at the White House as frustration mounted over the recent lack of progress in negotiations that had become bogged down in a daily round of finger-pointing. Aides on both sides used similar language to describe the 50-minute meeting, calling it "frank" and repeating that lines of communication remained open.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND - Ever get the feeling that the entire global economy is one big experiment conducted by several former Keynesian economists from MIT with a bent for central planning, who sit down in conspiratorial dark rooms in tiny Swiss cities and bet it all on green until they double down so much nobody even pays attention to the game? No? You should. Jon Hilsenrath, of all people, explains why.

USA - According to the BIS’ latest Quarterly Review financial markets are starting to behave in some of the ways they behaved before the crash. In particular, investors seem to be chasing riskier and riskier assets, despite the fact that the economic prospects are hardly all that great.

USA - America’s largest bio-agriculture company and the biggest retailer in the country are joining forces, but a happy ending isn’t necessarily in sight. Walmart will soon be stocking their shelves with GMO corn made by Monsanto.

USA - President Obama wasn’t the only big winner on Tuesday: the Monsanto Co and the billion-dollar business behind genetically modified foods were victorious in California, where a measure that would've required the labeling of GMOs lost at the polls. Proposition 37, a state-wide initiative that aimed to increase consumer awareness about the food industry’s growing use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), was defeated by a margin of 53 to 47 percent, with nearly all of the polls accounted for Wednesday morning.

BRUSSELS, EUROPE - European finance ministers have reached a deal on rules for supervising eurozone banks ahead of an EU summit. Around 200 of the biggest banks will come under the direct oversight of the European Central Bank, which will act as chief supervisor of eurozone banks. The agreement - a key step towards banking union - will be put before European leaders later on Thursday.

USA - The Federal Reserve on Wednesday announced a new easing program to boost the US economy and said for the first time that it will keep interest rates near zero until unemployment falls below a newly established threshold of 6.5 percent.

VATICAN - ‘Christian Unity: illusion or promise? Ecumenical aspects of the Year of Faith’ That was the title of a lecture given at the Lateran University on Monday by Swiss theologian Cardinal Kurt Koch, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity.

VATICAN CITY - The Vatican's top astronomer has some assurances to offer: The world won't be ending in about two weeks, despite predictions to the contrary. The Reverend Jose Funes, director of the Vatican Observatory, wrote in Wednesday's Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano that "it's not even worth discussing" doomsday scenarios based on the Mayan calendar that are flooding the Internet ahead of the purported December 21 apocalypse.

UK - Today's Census figures show that 176,632 people in England and Wales identify themselves as Jedi Knights, making it the most popular faith in the "Other Religions" category on the Census and the seventh most popular faith overall.

USA - The Kansas City Star, in a yearlong investigation, found that the beef industry is increasingly relying on a mechanical process to tenderize meat, exposing Americans to higher risk of E. coli poisoning. The industry then resists labeling such products, leaving consumers in the dark. The result: Beef in America is plentiful and affordable, spun out in enormous quantities at high speeds, but it's a bonanza with hidden dangers. E. coli 0157:H7 is a potentially deadly bacterium that can cause bloody diarrhea, dehydration and, in severe cases, kidney failure. The very young, seniors and people with weak immune systems are most at risk.

BRUSSELS, EUROPE - The relationship between the US and Europe has historically been about diplomacy. But in these economically-straitened times, the focus on foreign policy has shifted. Indeed, negotiations on a bilateral trade accord are set to be at the heart of the relationship between the US and the EU in the second term of US President Barack Obama's administration. To be honest, it is surprising that the US is one of only a handful of World Trade Organisation (WTO) members not to have a free trade deal with the EU.