Two hefty asteroids passed close to Earth last Wednesday. At least five are more set to swing near by January's end, but none are dinosaur-killers, scientists who track them said. One of Wednesday's close-approaching asteroids measured between .6 and 1.8 miles in diameter, a big enough space rock to cause catastrophe if it collided with Earth. But asteroid 7341 1991 VK got no closer than 7 million miles, nearly 24 times the distance from the Earth to the Moon.

Environmental groups have welcomed the EU’s failure to secure a fisheries agreement with Senegal. WWF calls this a ‘positive sign’ that developing countries are becoming more prudent in weighing short-term economic gains against protecting their natural resources. WWF argue that while the EU aims to alleviate poverty in the
developing world its own heavily subsidised fleets have pushed small-scale local fisher folk to the side and damaged fragile ecosystems.

Youths from the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front (ZANU PF) party have destroyed hundreds of copies of the independent "The Daily News" in the town of Masvingo during a demonstration against alleged misinformation by the paper.

A few years ago, two paleontologists discovered in Madagascar a tiny jaw fragment that could upend the current theory of when and where the ancestors of marsupial and placental mammals arose. Senior online editor Kate Wong later traveled with the researchers as they looked for additional fossils. This week, she describes her experiences in the field and shares photos of the strange animals that inhabit the island today.