BBC news 2009-02-20 加文本

BBC 2009-02-20


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BBC News with Fiona McDonald.

United Nations officials say that Palestinian Hamas movement which controls the Gaza Strip delivered a letter to the American Senator John Kerry while he was visiting the territory. The head of the UN relief agency in Gaza said the letter was addressed to President Obama. Mr. Kerry and two members of Congress who accompanied him were the most senior US officials to visit Gaza since Hamas seized control there almost two years ago. One of the congressmen, Brian Baird, said they did not seek any contact with Hamas.

"We were focusing on the humanitarian crisis, witnessing that first-hand and sharing our experiences, and also frankly conveying to the Palestinian people and the international community that members of Congress are deeply concerned about what has been happening and are committed to trying to provide relief in the short run and solutions in the long run."

The Texan financier, Allen Stanford, who is alleged to have committed massive fraud, has been located in the United States. He's been served with civil legal papers by the financial authorities. From Washington, Richard Lister reports.

The FBI says its agents met Allen Stanford in Richmond, Virginia, and gave him the documents relating to the civil case against him. The FBI spokesman Richard Kolko says the agency was acting at the request of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which earlier this week, accused Mr. Stanford of defrauding investors of more than eight billion dollars, using his bank in Antigua. The SEC says he lured investors with certificates of deposit, guaranteeing artificially high interest rates for investors based on a fraudulent investment strategy.

The United Nations nuclear agency says it has found additional particles of uranium in samples taken from the site of an alleged nuclear facility in Syria. It was bombed by Israel in September, 2007. Syria denied the site was a nuclear reactor and alleged the traces of uranium found there came from Israeli missiles. But the UN agency said the probability of the uranium coming from missiles was low.

Switzerland's biggest bank, UBS, has said it will not supply the American authorities with the details of over 50,000 US citizens believed to have bank accounts in Switzerland. UBS earlier agreed to pay the US government 780 million dollars after admitting some of its staff helped these clients to set up secret accounts. From Bern, Imogen Foulkes.

Like many governments battling the current financial crisis, Washington doesn't want a penny of possible tax revenue to escape. It believes billions may be sitting in Swiss banks. UBS says it won't hand over the information. Tax fraud may be a reason to lift banking secrecy under Swiss law, failing to declare a taxable income is not, but the pressure on Switzerland to relax its fiercely protected banking secrecy is now enormous.

You are listening to the World News from the BBC.

The organization that monitors media freedom in Europe says Russia's failure to solve the murders of journalists such as Anna Politkovskaya, amounts to a human rights crisis. The comment by a spokesman for the OSCE follows the acquittal of three men accused of involvement in the murder of the investigative reporter, who is a critic of the Kremlin. The spokesman said those on trial were not the masterminds or even the actual killers. Ms. Politkovskaya was murdered outside her Moscow apartment in 2006. 

The United States and Canada are to work together to develop clean energy to help combat climate change. President Obama and the Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said this would involve investing in new technology, including in carbon capture and storage. They also highlighted the need to improve their countries' electricity grids to help supply homes with clean energy. President Obama said the measures were critically important.

"How we produce and use energy is fundamental to our economic recovery, but also our security in our planet, and we know that we can't afford to tackle these issues in isolation. And that's why we're updating our collaboration on energy to meet the needs of the 21st century."

The Argentine government has given a Roman Catholic bishop who denied the full extent of the Holocaust ten days to leave the country or face expulsion. It said that Bishop Richard Williamson had repeatedly breached the terms of the visa that allowed him to live and work in the country.

The Czech President Vaclav Klaus has compared the European Union to a Soviet style dictatorship in a speech to the European Parliament in Brussels. Mr. Klaus branded the EU and its institutions undemocratic and elitist. He said anyone who, as he put it, dare to think differently about greater European integration face being labeled an enemy. His speech was cheered by some parliamentarians, but about 40 others walked out. The Czech Republic currently holds the EU's rotating presidency.

Glossary:

first-hand: If you experience something first-hand, you experience it yourself.

serve with: When the police or other officials serve someone with a legal order or serve an order on them, they give or send the legal order to them. [LEGAL]

amount to: If you say that one thing amounts to something else, you consider the first thing to be the same as the the second thing.

acquittal: Acquittal is a formal declaration in a court of law that someone who has been accused of a crime is innocent. (www.hxen.net)

breach: If you breach an agreement, a law, or a promise, you break it.  =violate

brand: to describe someone or something as a very bad type of person or thing, often unfairly.

elitist: Elitist systems, practices, or ideas favour the most powerful, rich, or talented people with a group, place, or society.