6th of August, 6.30 BBC Radio 4 News

Farming leaders have rejected claims that the industry is profiting from the foot and mouth outbreak. Compensation demands of more than a million pounds made by 37 farmers are to be investigated by two public spending watchdogs. But the president of the National Farmers Union, Ben Gill, said he was not surprised by the amounts of money requested to replace breeding stock.

The main political parties in Northern Ireland have been asked to give their verdicts today on plans to rescue the peace process. The British and Irish governments set the deadline last week when they issued the latest proposals to salvage the Good Friday agreement. But the Ulster Unionists and Sinn Fein have already indicated that they will need more time to respond to the package.

Police say that they have now completed their painstaking forensic examination of the scene of last Thursday’s car-bomb explosion at Ealing in West London. Local people are waiting to find out if they can return to their homes and businesses, which have been cordoned off.

Government officials in the former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia are due to meet ethnic Albanian leaders again today to put the finishing touches to a peace deal. Talks have been going on for the past week in the resort of Lake Okrit(?) to try to end six months of fighting. Yesterday the two sides reached agreement on the composition of the country’s police force, which had been a major sticking point.

A doctor has been ordered to attend a disciplinary hearing of the general medical council after offering alternatives to the controversial measles, mumps and rubella vaccine. Worcester Health Authority has complained that Dr Peter Mansfield is putting children’s lives at risk by offering a single measles jab at his clinic.

Police in Glasgow are appealing for witnesses after a Turkish asylum seeker was stabbed to death in the Sighthill area of the city. The attack happened in the early hours of yesterday morning. The police say it appears to have been completely unprovoked and could have been racially motivated. The man who died was 22. He was returning from a meal in the city centre.