BBC news 2008-10-03 加文本

BBC News with Nick Kelly.

The first and only televised debate between the two American vice presidential candidates is due to take place shortly. The debate will pit the relatively unknown Republican Sarah Palin against the political veteran, the Democrat Joe Biden who’s served six terms in the US Senate. Kevin Connolly reports.

The vice presidential debates don't usually generate much excitement among American voters, but Campaign 2008 is proving very different. Sarah Palin is probably the most-talked-about candidate for the office in American history. The woman who's lack of experience in national politics is slowly turning from an asset into a liability for her party. If she performs unconvincingly in the debate as she has in some recent television interviews, she could seriously damage Republican chances of retaining the White House. Her Democratic rival Joe Biden is vastly more experienced, but his reputation for long-windedness could prevent him from capitalizing on any [of] Sarah Palin's slips.

The Head of the Metropolitan Police in London, Ian Blair, is resigning. His decision follows months of criticism of his leadership and handling of key investigations, such as the killing of a Brazilian man who was mistaken by police for a terrorist. Sir Ian, who is Britain's top police officer, said he was leaving because he no longer had the backing of the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson. Mr. Johnson said London's police force needed a new leader.  "There comes a time in any organization when it becomes clear that it would benefit from new leadership and new clarity of purpose. I believe that time is now."

Canadian researchers say they've discovered a huge Chinese surveillance system that records and senses messages sent through the Internet telephone service Skype. The researchers say security lapses/ enabled them to view more than 150,000 messages filtered by the system, many of which contained politically sensitive words such as Tibet or Taiwan.

Police in the United States have confirmed that the wreckage of a light plane found in a remote area of eastern California belonged to the millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett, who disappeared a year ago.  Rajesh Mirchandani reports.

He took off from a private ranch in the neighboring state of Nevada in September last year. He filed no flight plan. Despite searches over 50,000 square kilometers, no sign of him was found, and he was declared legally dead in February. The area where the wreckage has now been found, 85 kilometers from where he took off, was originally searched from the air, but with that altitude it might not have revealed a crash site. A ground search is now underway for the explorer's body.

More than 1,000 people in Mexico City have paid tribute to those who died when security forces opened fire on an unarmed students' demonstration 40 years ago. The incident took place weeks before the city hosted the 1968 Olympic Games and received widespread publicity. Many details remain unclear.

World News from the BBC.

Share prices in New York have ended the day more than 3% down, following bad news on the United States economy. The US government said unemployment benefit claims had risen to the highest level for seven years, and orders received by American factories had fallen. The figures were published as the US House of Representatives considers President Bush's multi-billion-dollar rescue plan for America's financial sector. From Washington, here's Rachel Harvey.

Getting this huge bill through the Senate provided some respite for the Bush administration and nervous markets. But the real test is to get it passed in a much more reluctant House. There is almost universal distaste of the prospect of using hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayers' money, that is voters' money, to rescue the financial system. Conservative Republicans are ideologically opposed to such government intervention. Some Democrats worry about what it will do to America's spiraling national debt.(Www.hXen.com)

The former commander of the Yugoslav national army, Momcilo Perisic, has gone on trial at The Hague on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Prosecutors say he was key player in the late Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic's plan to create a Greater Serbia by purging parts of Croatia and Bosnia of non-Serbs. Gen. Perisic has pleaded not guilty. He's accused of helping to channel weapons to Bosnian Serb forces and of allowing his troops to use cluster bombs against civilians during an attack on the Croatian capital Zagreb in 1995.

And the German fee collection agency, GEZ, has issued an apology, after sending television license payment reminders to the romantic poet, Friedrich Schiller, who died more than 200 years ago. The agency said the mistake was caused by the vast amount of data it holds. This wasn’t spotted earlier because Schiller is a common surname. The reminders were delivered to a school bearing Schiller's name and kept arriving although its headmaster pointed out that the addressee was no longer capable of enjoying television programs.

BBC News.