BBC news 2009-07-07 加文本

BBC 2009-07-07


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BBC News, I'm Michael Poles

In a major sign of improving relations, President Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev have reached an outline agreement on reducing nuclear weapons at talks in Moscow. Each side will cut its arsenal to below 1,700. Richard Galpin reports.

A total of eight different agreements were signed at the ceremony in a lavish gilded hall inside the Kremlin. The most important is the commitment to replace the so-called START-Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty which expires in December. The plan is to agree a new deal which could cut the number of deployed nuclear warheads to around 1,500 each. President Medvedev also agreed to allow the United States to ship weapons and ammunition across Russian territory on route to Afghanistan. Moscow also agreed to American requests to allow the transit of weapons and ammunition across Russian territory for US military operations in Afghanistan.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Liberia has recommended that President Ellan Johnson- Sirleaf be banned from holding public office for 30 years because of her alleged role in one of the country civil wars. She had already told the commission she had given money to the rebel leader Chiles Taylor, but for humanitarian purposes. John James reports.

She is included on a list of around 50 names of those alleged to have supported rebel movements during and before the Liberian civil war. The conflict killed an estimated quarter of a million people in vicious and at times sadistic fighting, left thousands raped and with permanent disabilities.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has spent the last three years collecting more than 20,000 statements from all levels of Liberian society. In this final report which went nearly 400 pages, the commission recommends eight former warlords be persecuted by a special war crimes tribunal including former President Chillas Tayllor. Mrs. Johnson- Sirleaf’s spokesmen told the BBC she could not comment as she was still reading the report.

Thousands of Egyptians have attended the funeral in Alexandra of a woman from the city who was stabbed to death in a German court last week. The woman, Malaelshabini, had been in court testify against her attacker a German man described as holding xenophobic views whom she accused of calling her a terrorist. Bob Triwillian reports.

Thousands of mourners marched behind the coffin of Malaelshabini, a young mother who’d recently become pregnant again before her brutal killing in a German courtroom. Some chanted slogans denouncing Germany and this widespread horror in Egypt of how this attack was allowed to happen. There’s being comparatively little coverage of the case in Germany, re-enforcing perceptions that Europeans are prejudiced against Muslims. Egyptian commentator said that if the attacker had been a Muslim and the victim had been a westerner or a Jew, the reaction in Germany would have been very different.

World news from the BBC

Chinese state media say at least 156 people are now known to have died in violent protests in the mainly Muslim western region of Xinjiang. Hundreds of ethnic Uyghurs have been detained following unrest in the state capital Urumqi. State media say police have dispersed a crowd of more than 200 protesters in the second city Kashkar. Reports say many protesters have been arrested in the Netherlands after they attacked the Chinese embassy apparently in response to the violence in Xinjiang.

A judge in Los Angles has ruled that the mother of the late Michael Jackson should be replaced as the temporary administrator of his estate. The judge said the estate should be administrated by Mr. Jackson's lawyer and a music executive in accordance with the singer's will. The will says the estate valued at more than 500 million dollars would be left to a trust benefiting the singer's three children, his mother Katherine Jackson and charities. Eleven thousand people are expected to attend the memorial service for the singer.

The Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo has been presented to thousands of his fans gathered at the stadium of Maria Madrid of Spain days after being signed for world record 130 million dollars. The current world player of the year who spent six years at Manchester United of England had earlier passed a medical test of the Spanish club. Steve Kinstan reports from Mardrid.

Eighty thousand fans packed the Bernabeu Stadium to greet the world's most expensive footballer. Wearing Madrid’s all white kit for the first time he saluted the crowd and promised victories and trophies. Then during a lap of honor, Ronaldo was forced to run away from a small number of supporters who made it on to the pitch and were wrestled away by security guards. Later in a news conference, the player thanked Manchester United’s fans and said he hoped they understood his decision to leave. Ronaldo called Maria Madrid his new home and the wait of expectation here is in mix.

Steve Kingstan ending that report from Madrid and this bulletin of BBC News