Brave men, they suffered the cruellest of deaths, so undeserving for the good they were doing.

BBC: Afghan shooting: Soldiers were 'unlawfully killed'

Some were told they were orphans, the cruellest of fictions, since often their parents were still alive.

BBC: Oranges and Sunshine

"After all the changes to defence in the past year this would be the cruellest cut of all, " he said.

BBC: Wounded soldiers' 'jobs at risk'

This cannot make for a very happy place, and the city's "resilient spirit" has now become the cruellest Indian cliche.

BBC: Why does Mumbai bleed again and again?

That must seem the cruellest thing of all to Enron.

ECONOMIST: Energy trading

The episode is the start of a chaotic 20 years of mania interspersed with debilitating depression, ostracism, poor decision-making, hospitalisation, joblessness, homelessness and, cruellest of all, having her three children taken into care.

ECONOMIST: A story of riding and redemption