Tony Blair Jeered by UCL Students Before Speech
THE GUARDIAN: The former prime minister is greeted with chants of "war criminal" as he arrives at the London university

Tony Blair was jeered by anti-war protesters as he arrived to deliver a speech at University College London (UCL) this morning.

Students and campaigners from the Stop the War Coalition used the occasion to reiterate their demand that the former primer minister be tried for war crimes and criticised the university for hosting the event.

Blair was speaking at the launch of the Institute for Security and Resilience Studies (ISRS) – a research institute which is independent from UCL – alongside former defence secretary John Reid and education secretary Michael Gove.

But students say the event-organisers behaved in an underhand manner by failing to advertise the speech, which was open only to guests who paid £700 for tickets. » | Ashley Cowburn | Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Muhammad Cartoon Row Leads to Resignation
BBC: The president of a London university atheist society has resigned over a row about an image of the Prophet Muhammad.

The society at University College London (UCL) published an image on its Facebook page showing "Jesus and Mo" having a drink at a bar.

The atheist group was asked by the UCL union to remove it, but refused and started a petition defending its freedom of expression.

A student Muslim group began a counter-petition asking for its removal.

UCL's Atheist, Secularist and Humanist society said its president Robbie Yellon was stepping down to be replaced by former vice president Michael Thor.

"Robbie stepped aside because he signed up as president to organise events and run a student society," said Michael Paynter, secretary for the National Federation of Atheist, Humanist and Secular Student Societies.

"He did not appreciate the stress he would be under when dealing with a controversy like this, so he wanted to make way for someone else." » | Catrin Nye and Athar Ahmad, BBC Asian Network | Thursday, January 19, 2012

Details of British Muslim Students Could Be Given to CIA
THE TELEGRAPH: Personal details of almost 1,000 British Muslim students could be placed on US terror watch lists because of the police investigation into the Detroit bomb.

Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab while on a school trip to London. Photograph: The Telegraph
Names, email and home addresses of members of the Islamic Society at the University College London (UCL) were handed over to detectives investigating the alleged attack on an aircraft by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab as it landed in Detroit on Christmas Day.

Abdulmutallab studied engineering at university in 2005/08, and was president of the UCL Islamic Society in 2006/07.

Names and email addresses of all members of the UCL Islamic Society and Royal Free and UCL Medical Islamic Society between September 2005 and June 2009 were handed over to police by the university's student union, according to a report in The Independent.

Police were then given telephone numbers and home addresses by the UCL Registry.

The newspaper said the information had been given to the CIA, and that the homes of more than 50 of the students have been visited by police officers, but nobody has been arrested.

Some of the students on the list were not at UCL at the same time as Abdulmutallab and many had never met him.

The newspaper said Mojeed Adams-Mogaji, the current president of the UCL Islamic Society, was told by police the personal details would be kept for seven years and would be shared with other intelligence agencies “if requested”. >>> Alastair Jamieson | Thursday, April 01, 2010

Human Evolution Grinds to a Halt
YAHOO! (UK & IRELAND): Human evolution is grinding to a halt, according to a leading genetics expert.

The gloomy message from Professor Steve Jones is: this is as good as it gets.

Prof Jones, from the Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment at University College London, believes the mechanisms of evolution are winding down in the human race.

At least in the developed world, humans are now as close to utopia as they are ever likely to be, he argues. Speaking at a UCL Lunch Hour Lecture in London, Prof Jones said there were three components to evolution - natural selection, mutation and random change.

He said: "In ancient times half our children would have died by the age of twenty. Now, in the Western world, 98% of them are surviving to the age of 21. Our life expectancy is now so good that eliminating all accidents and infectious diseases would only raise it by a further two years. Natural selection no longer has death as a handy tool."

Mutation rate was also slowing down, he said. Although chemicals and radioactive pollution could cause genetic changes, one of the most important mutation triggers was advanced age in men. "Perhaps surprisingly, the age of reproduction has gone down - the mean age of male reproduction means that most conceive no children after the age of 35," said Prof Jones. "Fewer older fathers means that if anything, mutation is going down."

Random alterations to the human genetic blueprint were also less likely in a world that had become an ethnic melting pot, according to Prof Jones. Human Evolution Coming to a Halt >>> Press Association | October 7, 2008

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