The Week in Pictures: January 26 – January 31, 2016

With so many big news stories breaking last week perhaps we should spend a few minutes looking again at the most important from the last seven days

Swiss investigations into the state-owned 1MDB Fund in Malaysia has found numerous irregularities with some unexplained transfers to the private Swiss bank accounts of former Malaysian public officials as well as to some in the United Arab Emirates. Michael Lauber, Swiss Attorney General, is quoted as saying there were “Serious indications that funds have been misappropriated from Malaysian state companies.” In total the fund is said to be missing some $4bn and investigations continue.

Following the executive action taken by President Obama to place new tighter restrictions on the purchase of firearms in the US, a country that already has 88.8 guns for every 100 citizens, 270 million total, some three weeks ago the social media giants Facebook and Instagram have taken action to prevent private gun sales on their platforms. Whilst official gun dealing businesses can continue to use their services the numerous private gun sales that are facilitated on the sites are now banned.

In the US research into the treatment of Cancer at the Massachusetts General Hospital conducted by Dr. Torunn Yock has revealed that the once controversial therapy using Proton Beam technology that is used to treat some children shows a rate of effectiveness in line with that displayed by use of traditional Photon (X-ray) treatments only with the benefit of not having quite as much of a toxic effect on the heart and lungs of the patients. This research shows Proton beam therapy is now a real alternative.

In sport Angelique Kerber won the Australian Open beating Serena Williams 6-4 3-6 6-4 in Melbourne and becoming the first German to win a major singles title on the Tennis calendar since Steffi Graf last century. Her victory moves her up to No.2 in the world rankings, but can she take the top spot from Serena? You’ll have to read our daily news pages to find out, but in the meantime lets revisit some of the big news stories that we covered from around the world over the course of the last seven days.

1. Cam Newton & co. are the favourites to win the NFL final against the Denver Broncos after the Conference Finals.

Cam can do it! (Photo: Flickr.com)

2. Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer set up a semi-final against each other at the 2016 Australian Open.

They met again… (Photo: zimbio)

3. The world’s current No. 1 tennis player thrashed the former No. 1 in their semi-final at the Australian Open.

But first… (Photo: Elsa/Getty Images)

4. Bet365 Casino has launched the biggest Slots Giveaway promotion for February with a £1,000,000 prize pool.

Greatest promo on slots ever! (Photos: Bet365)

Meanwhile Greek football teams AEL Larissa and Acharnaikos staged a protest after the whistle had been blown in their match last week, with all the players, coaching staff and substitutes retaining their positions, not playing the ball and sitting down. An announcement made to the crowd said the 2 minutes silence would be “in memory of the hundreds of children who continue to lose their lives everyday in the Aegian” referring to the many deaths amongst immigrants attempting to reach the EU.