BBC news 2008-02-22 加文本

BBC 2008-02-22


Download Audio

BBC News with Jonathan Weekley.

Several thousand protesters in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, angered with western support for Kosovo's declaration of independence, have attacked a number of embassies. In the worst incident, protesters broke into the US embassy and briefly set part of it alight. The attacks followed a mass rally in the city. Nick Hawton is in Belgrade.

The main square outside the Serbian parliament has now been emptied, but across the road, across a park, there are riot police deployed outside the presidency building. Gangs of youth, gangs of protesters have been brawling around this area and also outside some of the embassies and the central of Belgrade. A little earlier, about 1,000 protesters attacked the United States embassy. Some of the protesters got inside and set fire to some of the rooms inside there. At the time, there / appeared to be no police protecting the embassy.

And we just heard that a charred body has been found inside the American embassy. It hasn't been identified.

The two major moderate political parties in Pakistan have agreed to work towards forming a government. The Pakistan People's Party, which was led by Benazir Bhutto until her assassination, and the former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's party, the Pakistan Muslim League, made a strong showing in January elections held last Monday. Alan Johnston reports.

The ex-Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, said that they'd agreed on a common agenda. More specifically, Mr. Sharif said that being an agreement in principal to reverse President Pervez Musharraf's decision last year to dismiss Pakistan's most senior judge. For his part, the PPP leader and the late Benazir Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari, said that the two parties still had a lot to discuss, but that they would stick together to try to strengthen Pakistan.

The British Foreign Secretary David Miliband has apologized to parliament after admitting that American flights carrying terrorism suspects did land on British territory despite previous government denounce this had never happened. Mr. Miliband said US officials have recently disclosed that two such flights refuelled at Diego Garcia in 2002. John Bellinger, the Legal Advisor to the US Secretary of State, said there have been administrative oversights.

"This was an error that was made in good faith. The Foreign Secretary said this morning that he accepted that the assurances that were provided that no flights had come through Diego Garcia. Those assurances were made in good faith, as a result of a more comprehensive record search conducted recently by our CIA. They determined that information was wrong."

The American Senator, Barack Obama, has won the Democratic Party's primary among Democrats living outside the United States, his 11 straight win over Hillary Clinton. The Democrats Abroad Primary and its Global Convention in April are worth 11 delegate votes at the party's convention to elect a presidential candidate.

You are listening to the World News from the BBC.

The front-runner in the Republican race for the US presidency, Senator John McCain, has denied newspaper reports, suggesting that he had a romantic relationship with a lobbyist. The New York Times alleged he had a close relationship with the lobbyist during his run for the presidency in 2000. The newspaper reported that unnamed aids to Mr. McCain had been concerned about the relationship he had with the lobbyist as he had written letters to a federal commission that would have benefited her clients.

The President of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, has said rich countries must bear more the cost of protecting the Amazon and tackling global warming. The Brazilian president was addressing representatives from the G8 Group of richest economies and five major developing nations. From Brazil, here is Tim Hirsch.

President Lula is proposing an international Amazon fund in which he is hoping to raise a billion dollars from industrialized countries. He also used the speech to attack protectionist policies in Europe and the United States that penalized the import of Brazilian ethanol made from sugar-cane. He said there was no truth in claims that bio-fuels threatened either the supply of food or the Amazon forest.

As the European Union's anti-fraud agency investigates allegations of fraudulent expenses claims by Members of the European Parliament, a former Italian MEP has admitted unauthorized use of EU money. Lucio Manisco, who represented the former Italian Communist Party in parliament until 2004, said that he and fellow Italian Communist MEPs had hired assistants who were in reality working for the party.

And Sudan has rejected accusations that its military operation near the border with Chad has led thousands of civilians trapped. The Sudanese Minister for Humanitarian Affairs said the army had been performing its duty of controlling the border and protecting civilians in the Junbo Moon area.

BBC News.