BBC news 2008-12-16 加文本

BBC 2008-12-16


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BBC News with Nick Kelly.

The United States President-elect Barack Obama has named Steven Chu, the winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1977, as environment secretary when the new administration takes over on January the 20th. Mr. Chu told a news conference that the environmental challenges facing the world should not be underestimated, but they were not insurmountable.

"What the world does in the coming decade will have enormous consequences that will last for centuries. It’s imperative that we begin without further delay. President-elect Obama has set the tone and pace for moving our country forward with optimism and calm determination. I hope to emulate his example. With these virtues, the United States and the world can and will prevail over our economic, energy and climate change challenges.”

The United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says he deplores the fact that the government of Zimbabwe does not welcome mediation efforts by the UN in its dispute with the opposition. Mr. Ban spoke during a briefing of the Security Council. Laura Trevelyan reports from the UN.

Not only Zimbabwe deadlocked politically and in the gripe of hyperinflation, now a deadly outbreak of cholera is adding to the country's woes. Britain requested this meeting. Behind close doors, the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon spoke of the deteriorating situation on the disintegration of the state with the UN called upon to pay Zimbabwe and civil servants. Yet the world body's ability to help resolve the crisis was limited, said Mr. Ban, neither Zimbabwe’s government, nor Thabo Mbeki, the former South African president who is trying to mediate between Robert Mugabe and the opposition, wanted a political role for the UN.

The list of investors hit by America's latest financial scandal ,an alleged 50-billion-dollar fraud by the US trader Bernard Madoff ,is growing. Potential losses are reported by several high-profile US investors and institutions. Spanish, British and Japanese banks say they could have considerable sums at stake. Prosecutors say Mr. Madoff was in essence running a pyramid scheme. Our business correspondent Nils Blythe reports.

Bernard Madoff told the FBI last week that his whole fund management business was a lie, based on taking money from new investors to pay off old ones. He estimated a loss of 50 billion dollars. Many people fear that other investment frauds may emerge as falling markets and fragile confidence expose underlying deceit. The old adage is that it's the only when the tide goes out that you see who is being swimming naked, and the economic tide is running out fast.

Thousands of demonstrators in Iraq have demanded the release of the Iraqi journalist Muntazer al-Zaidi, who threw both of his shoes at President Bush during a news conference on Sunday. In Sadr City, protestors described him as a hero.

World News from the BBC.

The United States Supreme Court has ruled that tobacco companies can be sued for the way they promote cigarettes, described as light or low-tar. The court said smokers could use consumer protection laws on deceptive advertising against the manufacturers, which promoted light cigarettes as less harmful than full-strength cigarettes. The case is brought by three long-time smokers against the Altria Group and its subsidiary, Philip Morris. They argued that the tobacco manufacturers had known for a long time that those who smoked light cigarettes tend to compensate for the lower levels of nicotine by inhaling more deeply and frequently.

The government of Niger says that the United Nation's envoy, Robert Fowler, has gone missing in the southwest of the country. A government minister said that Mr. Fowler had disappeared 40 kilometers from the capital, Niamey. A day earlier, a UN spokesperson in New York said three people working for the UN Development Programme in Niger were unaccounted for.

Ecuador says it has formally defaulted on a foreign debt payment three days after it warned it intended to do so. President Rafael Correa has described international lenders as monsters and said the debt payments are immoral. Daniel / reports.(Www.hxen.net)

The government in Ecuador had warned for some time that it wouldn’t pay nearly 40% of its 10-billion-dollar foreign debt but now it's official. The deadline for interests to be paid on global bonds has passed with the Finance Minister Elsa Viteri  stating we now declare ourselves in technical default. A special report commissioned by the Ecuadorian government earlier this year criticized the way the country's debt was restructured eight years ago.

And one of the biggest-ever celebrity divorce settlements, the American pop star Madonna has agreed to give her former husband, the British film director Guy Ritchie, 60 to 70 million dollars. The spokesperson for the singer said the figure included the value of the couple’s country house in western England.