BBC news 2009-07-01 加文本

BBC 2009-07-01


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BBC News with Marian Marshall.

President Obama says U.S. troops have met their deadline to withdraw from all of Iraq’s towns and cities. He described the handover of control of the cities as an important milestone, but warned that difficult days lay ahead.

There are those who will test Iraq’s security forces and the resolve of the Iraqi people through more sectarian bombings and murder of innocent civilians. But I’m confident that those forces will fail. The future belongs to those who build, not those who destroy.

As Iraqis celebrated the US’ withdrawal, a car bomb in the northern city of Kirkuk killed at least 25 people.

Iraq has failed to agree terms with international oil companies for seven of the eight major contracts it offered for bidding. No bids were received for a project in Diyālā, one of Iraq’s most violent provinces and in all but one other case, the oil firms declined to accept the Iraqi government’s financial terms. The only contract agreed so far to develop Iraq’s largest oil field Rumaila, was won by a group including the British firm BP and China’s CNPC.

President Obama’s Democratic Party has secured the last remaining seat in the US Senate, seven months after voting took place. The Republican candidate, Norman Coleman, conceded after the Supreme Court in the State of Minnesota declared his Democratic rival, Al Franken, the winner. He is a former comedian and left-wing commentator. Kevin Connolly reports from Washington.

This is almost certainly the end of the legal road, although in theory Mr. Coleman could attempt to refer the matter to the federal courts, but this is not merely a story about a tight local election or about the elevation of a well-known television entertainer to the American Senate. Mr. Franken’s election will give Barack Obama’s Democratic Party 60 votes in the upper chamber on Capitol Hill, enough to veto any delaying tactics by the rival Republican Party. The Democrats can’t rely on all 6o senators in every vote, but reaching that magic number underlines the party’s dominance in Washington.

The deposed president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya says he will be accompanied by two South American presidents on his return home this Thursday. He says Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner of Argentina and Ecuador’s Rafael Correa will go with him. The Honduran government which forced Mr. Zelaya into exile on Sunday says he will be arrested if he returns. Meanwhile, supporters of the country’s new government have demonstrated in the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa, from where Stephen Gibbs reports.

Outside the cathedral in the center of the capital, thousands of people have gathered, they are carrying the blue and white flag of Honduras and shouting liberty. These are the people that are glad to see President Zelaya gone. They say he was legally forced from office without a shot being fired. They do now accuse Mr. Zelaya of attempting to manipulate world opinion and they say he won’t be welcome back.

World news from the BBC.

Russian gamblers have placed their final bets before a law banning most casinos and gambling halls came into effect at midnight local time. The only places where gambling will be officially allowed are in four remote special zones, but no casino company has been prepared to move to them. And there are fears that gambling will be driven underground. Richard Galpin reports from Moscow.

The government wants to push gambling out of the cities and towns, to try to cut the growing number of addicts. But casino owners say that at the stroke of midnight, more than a third of a million people have been added to the already swelling ranks of the country’s unemployed. They also say the government will now lose two billion dollars in taxes from the fast-growing and highly profitable gambling industry.

China has delayed the introduction of compulsory software to restrict internet access. In what correspondents describe as a rare climb-down, manufacturers will no longer be obliged to equip every computer sold in China with the controversial technology known as Green Dam. The government has said the measure was simply meant to block pornographic and violent content. But it would also have allowed the authorities to stop people accessing politically sensitive websites.

More details have been emerging about the only survivor of the Yemeni-operated Airbus 310 which crashed off the Comoros Islands on Tuesday. The plane with 153 people on board crashed into the Indian Ocean, just north of the main island of Grand Comore. One of the rescuers said the survivor, a 14-year-old girl, had been spotted swimming among dead bodies, more than two hours after the plane disappeared from radar screens.

One of the most influential choreographers of modern dance, Pina Bausch, has died, she was 69. Pina Bausch began her career in the United States, but returned in the early 60s to her native Germany, where she became the Director of the Wuppertal Dance Theater.

BBC News

handover n. 移交 act of relinquishing property or authority etc.
Minnesota n. 明尼苏达州（美国州名） .
delaying tactic 拖延战术(就是所谓的filibuster)
depose vt. 罢免 force to leave(an office).
Ecuador n. 厄瓜多尔（南美洲国家）
pornographic a. 色情的，淫秽的 designed to arouse lust.
Yemeni n./a. 也门人（的）
choreographer n. 舞蹈指导 someone who creates new dances.