BBC news 2009-02-04 加文本

BBC News with Marian Marshall.

President Barack Obama’s nominee as the new US Secretary of Health, Tom Daschle, has withdrawn from the post because of problems with his taxes. On Friday, it was disclosed that he had failed to pay more than 100,000 dollars of tax. President Obama said he was accepting Mr. Daschle’s withdrawal with sadness and regret. The White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Mr. Daschle didn’t want to distract from President Obama’s agenda for the country.

We are at a critical juncture in our nation’s history and a crossroads economically, and the president has a robust agenda to deal with many of those problems. As Senator Daschle said in the statement that we released, and told the president on the phone, that he did not want to be a distraction to that agenda.

Earlier, another Obama nominee, Nancy Killefer, withdrew her candidacy also because of tax irregularities.

The President of Kyrgyzstan, Kurmanbek Bakiyev, has announced that his government has decided to close an American airbase on its territory. Mr. Bakiyev made the announcement in Moscow after Russia promised Kyrgyzstan more than two billion dollars in loans. Richard Galpin reports.

The closure of the base would be a big blow for continuing American and NATO military operations in Afghanistan. It’s the Americans’ only base in central Asia, and its closure will come at a critical moment, just as the new administration in Washington plans a sharp increase in the number of US troops on the ground in Afghanistan. For Russia on the other hand, it’s a significant diplomatic victory as it seeks to reassert its influence in all the former states of the Soviet Union and beyond.

Sri Lanka’s key international donors, the United States, Japan, Norway and the European Union have called on the Tamil Tiger rebels to consider laying down their arms to avoid more civilian casualties. The donors said the Tigers should renounce violence and return to politics to find a solution to the conflict. Earlier, the International Committee of the Red Cross in Sri Lanka said a hospital in rebel-held territory had been hit by shells for a fifth time. A government spokesman Lakshman Hulugalle told the BBC that security forces weren't responsible for the incident.

I have to say on behalf of the government that it’s totally now, there was no attack to the hospital. And we are not, we are very disciplined, we are not at any time, we don’t attack any hospitals as we are not targeting the civilians.

There has been no comment from the rebel Tamil Tigers.

A city mayor in Madagascar who's been trying to oust the president has been sacked by the government. Andry Rajoelina, who is mayor of the capital Antananarivo, says he will contest the dismissal. The constitutional court has refused to consider his petition to impeach President Marc Ravalomanana. The mayor began his campaign to wrest control from the president last week after anti-government protests turned into riots in which dozens of people were killed.

World News from the BBC.

The Iraqi authorities say they have arrested a senior female militant allegedly behind the recruitment of a number of women suicide bombers. Militant groups in Iraq have increasingly used women to carry out suicide attacks. Jim Muir in Baghdad has more.

An Iraqi security spokesman said the woman, named as Samira Jassim, was detained last month. In a poor quality video recording shown to journalists, she confessed to having recruited as many as 80 women from different parts of the country, and prepared them as suicide bombers. At least 28 of them subsequently carried out attacks in Baghdad and Diyala province with Samira Jassim directing them towards their targets. American military officials meanwhile said that in the three days preceding last Saturday’s provincial elections, a number of suspected would-be suicide bombers were arrested.

The left-wing Colombian rebel group FARC has released a former provincial governor held hostage for more than seven years. The politician Alan Jara was handed over to a humanitarian commission headed by the International Red Cross. He is one of six hostages that the FARC announced in December it was preparing to release. Four were freed on Sunday. A politician who has been involved in hostage negotiations with the FARC, Senator Piedad Cordoba, said Mr. Jara’s release gave her hope for peace in the country.

It is a message of total optimism and enthusiasm. What the world must know is that this is a starting point for a work on the peace process in Colombia, and a negotiated exit policy to the conflict. The war in this country will definitely come to an end.(www.hXen.com)

At least 11 countries from three continents have expressed an initial interest in staging the 2018 and 2022 football World Cups. In a break with tradition, FIFA will select the hosts for both tournaments at the same time. One of the early favourites is England who last staged the tournament in 1966.
 
BBC News.