BBC 2008-04-08
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BBC news with Nick Kelly
The jury at the British inquest into the deaths of Diana, Princess of Wales, and her companion Dodi Fayed in a car crash in Paris in 1997, has said that they were killed unlawfully. It blamed gross negligence by the couple’s driver Henri Paul and paparazzi photographers pursuing them. French and British police inquired into the crash had concluded it was an accident. The coroner previously ruled there was no evidence to support allegations by Dodi’s father Mohamed Al Fayed that the deaths were the result of a conspiracy including members of the Royal Family and British intelligence. But a senior police officer, Paul Stevenson, said he hoped every one would accept the verdict. (www.hXen.com)
"This has been the most extraordinary process, uNPRecedented disclosure and intrusion, into what is normally matters of private grief. I think we now have to soberly reflect upon a clear verdict, and wish and hope that this now brings some sort of closure to this matter so that the people can go back to grieve in private and remember in private. "
Nine Moroccan militants convicted over the May 2003 Casablanca bombings escaped from a prison in the north of the country. Officials said they tunneled out of the jail in Kenitra just after morning prayers. James Copnall reports from Rabat.
The majority of the nine were serving life sentences for their part in the May 2003 suicide bombings in Casablanca in which 45 people died. A source close to Islamist prisoners told the BBC the nine men had left a message on the wall of their jail in Kenitra. It said they had suffered from injustice have escaping because they saw no other solution to their woes and stressed they received no outside help for their prison break. According to the Moroccan state press agency, the Moroccan authorities are making every effort to get the prisoners back.
President George Bush has sent his planned free trade agreement with Colombia to Congress under a procedure which demands a vote within 90 days. The Democratic majority opposes the deal, citing concerns about the threat of American workers affected by the lowering of trade barriers, as well as the continuing murders of trade union activists in Colombia. James Comarasamy reports from Washington.
The US and Colombian governments signed the bilateral trade deal 16 months ago, but efforts to get it ratified have run up against opposition from the Democratic majority on the Capitol Hill. President Bush described the deal as helpful to the US economy and to American workers and as an urgent matter for national security. By sending the agreement to Congress now, he has given legislators 90 days to accept or reject it. (www.hxen.net)
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United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has joined international calls for the urgent publication of the results from last month’s presidential election in Zimbabwe. Earlier the high court in Harare postponed a ruling on an opposition request that it order the immediate publication of the results.
The Kenyan Prime Minister designate, the opposition leader Raila Odinga has accused President Mwai Kibaki of breaking agreements on the planned power-sharing government. Mr. Odinga said he'd received a letter from Mr. Kibaki’s office, insisting that the full executive power would remain exclusively in the presidency. Mr. Odinga said he and his party had made many concessions, but had not been reciprocated by the president. Adam Mynott reports from Nairobi.
The two men spent six hours on Sunday trying to agree on a share out of cabinet positions in the coalition government. But they appeared to have emerged with very different impressions of what took place. President Kibaki made a public statement saying they were close to agreement and talks on Monday would have finalized matters. Minutes earlier, Raila Odinga said it was clear that President Kibaki and his followers will not prepare to do anything which would release their grip on power.
Thousands of Egyptian demonstrators have clashed with security forces in Mahalla el-Kobra north of Cairo. Many of the protestors chanted anti-government slogans and threw stones at riot police who responded with teargas. It came the day after the Egyptian security forces prevented factory workers there from staging a strike over low wages.
And police in Texas have removed another 200 children from a ranch occupied by a polygamist sect doubling the number taken away since Friday. A judge ordered every child to be taken away from the ranch near Eldorado after a 16-year-old girl there said she had been sexually and physically abused by her 50-year-old husband. The children have been joined voluntarily by more than 130 women. The sect broke away from the Mormon Church which renounced polygamy more than a century ago.
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