BBC news 2007-07-01 加文本

BBC 2007-07-01


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BBC World News with John Jason.

The new British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has said that the national terror threat rating has been raised to its highest level of critical, meaning that officials expected an attack imminently. Ms. Smith said extra security measures have been implemented, in response to the last 48 hours which have seen a blazing car crashed into a Scottish airport and two car bombs defused in London. The Prime Minister Gordon Brown has made a televised statement, calling on all people in Britain to remain vigilant.
"The first duty of government is security and safety of all the British people, so it is right to raise the levels of security at airports and in crowded places in the light of the heightened threat."

Police in Scotland say there are links between the attack on Glasgow Airport and the discovery of two car bombs in London on Friday. The senior police commander in Glasgow Willie Rae said two men had been arrested after the airport attack. Mr. Rae said one was taken to hospital and was in a critical condition and had been found to be carrying a suspicious package.
"When he was being treated at the hospital,a suspect device was found at the hospital, and the consequence was that the hospital was partly evacuated until this device was removed and putted into a safe area."

A BBC correspondent says this may have been a suicide belt. The airport remains closed.

Israeli war planes have carried out two air strikes in the Gaze Strip, killing 6 people. Three militants were killed when Israeli aircraft fired on their vehicle. Palestinian medical officials say three more people died during a second strike in central Gaza. Aleem Maqbool reports from Ramallah.

"In the first attack late/ on Saturday afternoon, a missile from an Israeli aircraft blew up a car, traveling through the city of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza. All three people in the vehicle were killed. The militant group Islamic Jehad claimed the dead men as its members, saying one was a senior commander. Israeli forces say they were targeting a cell that planned to carry out suicide bombings. Later in the day, two missiles hit what witnesses described as a metal workshop, but Israel's army says was a weapon store. In the Maghazi refugee camp in the center of Gaza, three more were killed including a father and a son."

The Israeli attorney general has called the former President Moshe Katsav a serial sex offender. Mr. Katsav formally presented his resignation on Friday after agreeing to plea guilty to several sexual offences as part of a plea bargain that removes rape charges against him. The plea bargain has sparked widespread criticism in Israel and the comments come over 20.000 people rallied alongside women's groups and victims of sexual offences in Tel Aviv, demanding Mr. Katsav stand trial for two rapes.

World news from the BBC.

Police in Hong Kong have stopped pro-democracy protestors from meeting the Chinese president Hu Jintao, who is visiting the former British colony on the 10th anniversary of its return to China. Several dozen protestors scuffled with police as they tried to march to Mr. Hu's hotel. Earlier President Hu attended the ringing of Buddhist bell at midnight, and called for Hong Kong people to be patriotic and forget their differences.

The US-led military coalition in Afghanistan says that a number of civilians appeared to have been killed after US and NATO led forces launched air strikes in the southern province of Helmand. Afghan officials say at least 30 civilians including women and children were killed. Our correspondent Charles Haviland is in Kabul.

"What the coalition said is that they came under heavy insurgent fire along with the Afghan national army that they then identified several Taliban positions and returned fire and it was only after that they called in air strikes which were launched by the coalition and ISAF working together. Now they say that after this, the remains of people who appeared to be civilians were found in some positions that had been identified as the Taliban's firing positions in a trench. "

The President of Ivory Coast Laurent Gbagbo's condemned the attempted assassination of the Prime Minister Guillaume Soro. Mr. Soro who was a former rebel leader survived a rocket attack in the rebel stronghold of Bouake on Friday. Correspondents say there are strong suspicions that the attack was carried out by disaffected rebels opposed to the agreement, under which Mr. Soro and his supporters joined the Ivorian government.

A former French Prime Minister Michel Rocard has had an emergency brain surgery in the Indian city of Calcutta. Mr. Rocard had a blood clot removed and is said to be in a serious but stable condition. He served as Prime Minister under the late president Francois Mitterrand from 1988 to 1991 and he is currently a member of the European Parliament.