Fossils of ape-like creatures dating back to 5.7 million years had already been found at the site. The most recent fossils belong to some of the oldest anatomically modern humans, who lived there about 80,000 years ago.”Here, in a single Ethiopian valley, we have nearly a mile-thick stack of superimposed sediments and 12 horizons [layers] yielding hominid fossils,” Professor White said. We now know where Australopithecus came from before 4 million years ago,” Professor White said.Scientists found the latest fossils, which belong to at least eight individuals, in an area of Afar called the Middle Awash, which lies about 140 miles north-east of the capital, Addis Ababa. “This new discovery closes the gap between the fully blown Australopithecines and earlier forms we call Ardipithecus. Scientists have unearthed a set of fossils in the Ethiopian Afar region that they believe is a “missing link” between a primitive ape-like creature that lived more than 4.4 million years ago and a later ape-man who became our own ancestor.
The discovery means that the region now boasts the discovery of the fossilised remains of eight distinct species that represent different stages in the evolutionary transition from ape to anatomically modern man.The latest fossil find belongs to a species called Australopithecus anamensis, which lived about 4.2 million years ago, between the earlier Ardipithecus ramidus and the later Australopithecus afarensis.Professor Tim White of the University of California, Berkeley, said that the discovery filled a million-year gap in the human fossil record between our ape-man ancestors – the australopithecines – who lived 3.5 million years ago and the even more primitive Ardipithecus. A barren piece of desert in the heart of Ethiopia has proved once more why it deserves to be called the “cradle of mankind”.

“It’s also the first place we visited after we won the Olympics in 1984.”Several famous Antipodeans (Shane Warne is widely tipped) will now model a sequin jump-suit, but they’ll be hard-pushed to rival David Seaman.He jollified the British version of the show by dropping partner Pam O’Connor on her teeth.pandora independent.co.uk. “There was interest from places like Italy, Russia and Germany, but we chose Australia because they speak English,” said Torvill, at the first night of Mack & Mabel. For Torvill and Dean are about to film an Aussie version of Dancing on Ice.They accepted the job for pragmatic reasons. But Hewitt isn’t bothered: she’s going to be brandishing “a themed prop.”A Labour spokesman tells me that, assuming they don’t decide to call the whole thing off, this will consist of a giant sponge cake.* After bar staff, Australia’s biggest cultural export to these shores has been inexplicably popular TV shows.Sometimes we get our own back, though.

“As far as we know, Joss has never said sorry,” says a source close to the project.* Patricia “don’t panic” Hewitt isn’t going to let the NHS crisis detract from routine point-scoring.Every Labour MP has been invited to join the Health Secretary at a special photo-shoot in Westminster on Tuesday.The invitation says they’ll be celebrating the 50th anniversary of “Nye Bevan giving the NHS Bill its second reading on the floor of the House of Commons.”For critics, this sort of grandstanding couldn’t have come at a worse time. I imagine she and Bruce Willis together were a joy to behold.”That final quote caused an almighty stink. Awful, actually, but I needed the money.”She’s all right; not very bright or talented. “The movie will happen, but as there’s no script yet, it won’t be any time soon.”* Oh, to be a fly on the tin wall of Demi Moore’s Winnebago when she meets the co-stars of her new film, Flawless.It was announced this week that Moore Sir Michael Caine and Joss Ackland will be filming the flick in the UK and Luxembourg later this year.Sir Michael will no doubt be politeness personified, but Moore’s relations with Ackland may prove tricky.Last time they worked together, in 2000, Ackland told the Radio Times that his co-star possessed all the intelligence of two short planks.”Then there was Passion of Mind last year with Demi Moore,” he said “Terrible script. But for the moment I don’t think it’s happening.”The problem, I gather, is that Coogan’s script, involving an al Qa’ida siege, had to be canned for reasons of taste, following the 7/7 attack.”Steve’s been preoccupied with a new comedy for BBC2,” says his production company, Baby Cow.

Before Christmas, the Culture Select Committee gave him something of a dressing down when he was required to give evidence defending his decision to publish a memoir in the first place.* It was always going to be a stretch, but Alan Partridge has been forced to shelve his ambitions to conquer Hollywood.A year after Steve Coogan revealed that he and Patrick Marber were writing Alan Partridge: the Movie, the project has stalled.The actress Amelia Bullmore, who plays Partridge’s Ukrainian girlfriend Sonja, tells me: “I’m not sure it’s going ahead now.”There was a lot of talk about it last year, but then the London bombings happened and it got put to one side,” said Bullmore, at the launch of her new TV show, Suburban Shootout.”I’m sure Steve will write an Alan Partridge film eventually. “This will be the first time his views are examined outside the context of this rather notorious memoir.”Although the committee has the power to compel people to give evidence, I understand that Meyer will appear of his own accord It’ll be his second such appearance in recent months. An outraged John Prescott accorded him the sobriquet “red-socked fop”.
Now Sir Christopher is returning to poke the hornets’ nest that is the Blair regime’s conduct over the war in Iraq. He’s agreed to appear before the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, which is conducting a investigation into “foreign policy aspects” of the “war on terror”.The hour-long interview, scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, will mark the first time that Sir Christopher has been cross-examined by MPs over the Iraq war.They expect fireworks, since his book DC Confidential was highly critical of Blair’s failure to blunt George Bush’s enthusiasm for conflict.”It’s a long and ongoing inquiry,” says a spokesman for the committee. Six months ago, our former Ambassador to Washington published memoirs detailing bitchery in the international court of Tony Blair.

* When Sir Christopher Meyer sticks his impeccably-groomed head above the parapet, important people get hurt. At my second trial, I passed back to our goalkeeper but it was too short, forcing him to scramble from his line just as one of the opposing forwards tried to intercept the ball The goalkeeper broke a thumb in the collision.. I didn’t play for the South-East England schoolboys or England under-15s, where the clubs’ scouts would be watching I was nowhere near that. I wasn’t the best player in my school team, even.When I was 15-and-a-half, around the school-leaving age, a friend of my father’s wrote letters about me to Arsenal and West Ham.