BBC news 2008-07-01 加文本

BBC News with Jonathan Weekley.

The Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga has added his voice to growing criticism in Africa of the re-election of the Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe. Mr. Odinga called on the African Union to suspend Mr. Mugabe until he allows a free and fair poll. Grant Ferrett reports.

Raila Odinga said the African Union was setting a dangerous precedent by allowing Robert Mugabe to attend its gathering of heads of state in Egypt. Speaking in Nairobi, he said Zimbabwe was in crisis. It had no government with the legitimacy to run the country. But at the summit itself, there was no direct public criticism of the Zimbabwean president from his fellow African leaders, many of whom themselves have questionable democratic credentials. There’s been continuing diplomatic pressure from Western governments. Italy has recalled its ambassador from Harare, and the United States is preparing a UN Security Council resolution for possible sanctions against Zimbabwe.

The Indian government has unveiled its plan for confronting the threat of climate change and says that it envisages a gradual shift to greater reliance on sustainable sources of energy. The Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the development of India’s capacity to tap solar power would be central to the strategy, but he made no commitments to cut his country’s carbon emissions.

Annual inflation has hit 4% in the 15 European countries which use the Euro. It’s the highest rate since the currency was established 9 years ago, reflecting higher world energy and food prices. Norman Smith reports.

The European Central Bank has an obligation to keep inflation at or just below 2%. Four percent is double the target rate, and almost as importantly, higher than most independent estimates, suggesting that high energy and food prices are having an even bigger impact than originally thought. It also means that although the Euro-zone economy is slowing down, the ECB will almost certainly raise interest rates to 4.25% later this week against the trend in other leading economies.

A court in Peru has heard the much anticipated testimony of a key witness in the trial of the former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori who is accused of human rights abuses. Mr. Fujimori’s intelligence chief Vladimiro Montesinos, who was alleged to organize death squads during the 1990s, told the court that Mr. Fujimori had nothing to do with two massacres that kills 25 people.

The Israeli Parliament has approved at a preliminary reading a bill which would require a national referendum or the support of 2/3 of MPs before any withdrawal from the Golan Heights could be undertaken. The draft bill still needs to be approved to the second and third reading before it can become law. Syria wants the return of the Golan Heights in return for peace. In May, Israel and Syria announced they resumed negotiations on a peace deal for the first time in 8 years.

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Military prosecutors from the United States have filed charges against the alleged mastermind of the attack on the American warship, the USS Cole. 17 sailors were killed in the bombing eight years ago. Abdul Rahim Al-Nasheri, a Saudi citizen is being held at the Guantanamo Bay detention center. He has alleged that he confessed under torture.

Four Iraqi men say they are suing American military contractors for allegedly torturing them at the Abu Ghraib prison near Bagdad. The men who were all released without charge have brought separate lawsuits in four American courts. Adam Brooks reports from Washington.

The four Iraqi men were held in Abu Ghraib prison in 2003 and 2004. They are allegedly… appalling treatment at the hands of the US military and civilian contractors. Wissam Al-Quraishi, for example, says he was electrocuted, beaten and even hung from a pole for seven days. He was later released without charge. Military personnel have already been tried on criminal charges and imprisoned for the abuses at Abu Ghraib, but no civilians have. This civil lawsuit accuses two big American companies of complicity in the abuses.

Crowds of Spanish football fans have [come] from central Madrid to welcome home their victorious team from the European Championships. Its spectacular celebration took place in Plaza Colon, the main square in the capital. Steve Kingston was watching.(Www.hxen.net)

Here the mood is just one of unrestrained joy. Thousands of fans lined the route as the bus came in from Barajas Airport in Madrid. And as I speak, an aerial salute to these players, jets flying overhead, blooms of red and yellow smoke, the national colors, greeting the players. Spain, victors in the European Championship, victors in a major football tournaments for the first time in 44 years.