BBC news 2009-07-10 加文本

BBC 2009-07-10


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BBC News with Julie Candler.

President Barack Obama has hailed what he calls a “historic consensus” of the G8 summit between industrialized and emerging countries on climate change. He said both sides were now committed to working towards limiting global warming to a maximum of two degrees Celsius. From the summit, James Robbins reports.

President Obama said the major economies had taken some important strides forward. Both the industrialized world and the largest developing economies led by India and China, all had committed to work to limit global warming to two degrees Celsius. That’s hugely significant because it obliges all of them, not just the historic polluters, to restrict emissions. Mr. Obama called it a good start.

However, there have been widespread reservations about the agreement. The United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said the industrial countries had set their own cuts too far into the future. President Obama’s scientific adviser John Holdren said eight wasted years under the Bush administration had made it unlikely that the US could meet interim European targets of big cuts in gas emissions by 2020. And up to R.K. Pachauri, the chairman of the International Panel on Climate Change, the body which collates climate data for world’s governments, said the leaders had been vague about how the 80% reduction would be measured.

“It’s pretty ridiculous if you ask me, I mean I’m surprised that they didn’t see the fallacy that they were introducing in this pledge by not defining the baseline at least. How can you say you will achieve a cut of x amount, if you don’t even define, what the baseline is, what the benchmark is.”

The President of Costa Rica Oscar Arias has been holding talks with rival leaders of Honduras in an attempt to mediate an agreement following last month’s coup. He first met the deposed President Manuel Zelaya at his residence in the capital San Jose, and then held separate talks with the interim leader Roberto Micheletti. The Costa Rican Foreign Minister, Bruno Stagno Ugarte told the BBC that both sides in Honduran dispute wanted to end the uncertainties surrounding their country as quickly as possible.

“They both recognize that the situation that Honduras is currently living is one that is clearly unsustainable, where we have, uh, increasing violence, where we already have reported deaths, where we already have people who have been wounded. And obviously, this is creating great economic and social upheaval.”

Two bomb explosions at a market in the Iraqi capital Baghdad have killed nine people and injured 35 others, all of them civilians. Earlier, a double suicide bomb attack in the north of Iraq killed at least 34 people. Reports say the two blasts were minutes apart, with the second attack coming while people gathered at the scene of the first, and at least six people were killed in a bomb attack in the Shiite district of Sadr City. It’s the highest number of people killed in Iraq in one day.

BBC News.

A lawyer for the imprisoned leader of Nigeria’s most powerful militant group Henry Okah says he’s accepted a government offer of an amnesty made last month to militants operating in Niger Delta. Mr. Okah leads MEND, a group which has made regular attacks on foreign oil companies in the region. A senior member of the group told the BBC that its fighters would lay down their arms as soon as Mr. Okah was released. Caroline Duffield reports.

Henry Okah’s barrister is upbeat. He told the BBC that he’s met his client yesterday where he’s being held at the headquarters of Nigeria’s secret service. He described how a government offer of an amnesty was put to him and he accepted. Mr. Okah is understood to be in poor health and in need of emergency medical treatment outside Nigeria. But for now, MEND has dismissed the entire idea of an amnesty. But tonight, it said it did support any deal for Henry Okah because of the special circumstances of his failing health.

Coffins containing the remains of more than 500 Bosnian Muslims killed in the 1995 massacre Srebrenica have been transported to their final resting place. Grieving relatives of the newly identified victims watched a convoy of trucks carrying the remains to the memorial cemetery outside Srebrenica where they will be buried on Saturday.

American police have charged four people with the desecration of graves at a well-known cemetery in Chicago. Prosecutors allege the workers dug up bodies from more than 100 graves so they could sell the plots. Among other prominent Americans, the Burr Oak cemetery holds the graves of the blues singer Dinah Washington and the former world heavyweight boxing champion Ezzard Charles.

The Dutch government has handed back 69 ancient artifacts looted from Iraq. The items were surrendered by Dutch art dealers after Interpol disclosed their origin. Among the treasures is a terracotta relief more than 2000 years old.

BBC News.

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