BBC news 2009-07-17 加文本

 BBC 2009-07-17


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BBC News with Mike Cooper.

There was confusion at United States military court in Guantanamo Bay at a hearing in which five men accused of plotting the September 11th attacks were due to appear. All five including the alleged mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed initially refused to attend the hearing. As Jonathan Beale reports.

The hearing was meant to focus on whether two of the detainees Ramzi Bin al- Shibh and Mustafa al-Hawsawi are mentally competent to represent themselves in court. Mr. Bin al-Shibh's lawyer told the court that he suffered from a delusional disorder. But when she went into details about how he being deprived of sleep, the audio feed from the court was cut. In a sign of a contempt with which they viewed these proceedings, one of the detainees threw a paper plane at his co-accused when the court once again went into recess.

Columbia has extradited to the United States an alleged rebel leader accused of being the jailer of political hostages, among them the former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt. The man, Gerardo Aguilar Ramirez also known as Cesar, was arrested last year. From Bogota, here is Jeremy Mcdermott.

Cesar is now the unwilling guest of the US justice system, and is likely to spend the next 20 years in an American cell. Cesar has also been forsaken by his former FARC comrades who condemned him as a traitor, after he was hoodwinked by an army intelligence operation masquerading as a humanitarian mission. Undercover soldiers persuaded him to hand over 15 hostages in his care, among them, Ingrid Betancourt. Not only did he surrender his hostages but he was persuaded to accompany the mission, climbing aboard a helicopter where he was quickly overpowered and placed under arrest.

The United States Space Agency NASA has begun a series of events to mark the 40th anniversary of the lift-off of Apollo 11, the 1969 mission that put the first humans on the moon. Andy Gallagher reports from one of the events in Florida.

This has been a day of reflection and celebration. Forty years ago, the Apollo 11 rocket blasted off from the launch pad here in Cape Canaveral and human history changed forever. A handful of Apollo astronauts have been taking questions from an eager audience here, and memories of those glory days have been recalled. But this is also a day that many are asking about the future. NASA's shuttle fleet will be retired next year. And there is talk of putting another man on the moon in the next few years. But for many, it's nothing compared to that day in July, 1969 when two men walked on the lunar surface.

The British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has again been forced to defend the government's provision of helicopters and troops in the current campaign in Afghanistan, where there's been a recent surge in the number of British troops killed. Most of the casualties were caused by roadside bombs, leading to demands that troops would be safer if more helicopters were available. But Mr. Brown has insisted that sufficient helicopters were being deployed there.

I'm Mike Cooper in London. This is the World News from the BBC.

The Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh says there can be no formal peace talks with Pakistan until those who carried out the attacks in Mumbai last year are brought to justice. He was speaking after meeting the Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani on the sidelines of a summit in Egypt. Christian Fraser is there.

The Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been pressing the Pakistanis to get tougher on terrorism. Today his Pakistani counterpart Yusuf Raza Gilani reported progress they've made on the Mumbai investigations. Five suspects are due to go on trial this week. And he said Pakistan had also handed over a dossier of further evidence which Prime Minister Singh is now reviewing. In a joint statement, both prime ministers said action on terrorism would no longer be linked to the peace process. But later, in a closed-doors briefing, the Indian Prime Minister ruled out any resumption of the talks until all the suspects in the Mumbai case had been hunted down.

Several former Central and East European leaders have published an open letter to President Obama, urging him to reaffirm that the United States remains fully engaged in Europe in the face of what they term "a resurgent Russia". The signatories who include Lech Walesa, and Aleksander Kwasniewski of Poland, and the former Czech leader Vaclav Havel say many nations were deeply disturbed to see NATO stand by as Russia violated the territorial integrity of Georgia last year.

President Obama has designated $1.8 billion for emergency use to tackle the swine flue pandemic. The funds will be used to buy vaccine ingredients and help get vaccines approved by the US Food and Drug Administration. Earlier the World Health Organization announced that the pandemic had spread internationally with uNPRecedented speed.

A 17-year-old American has become the youngest ever person to sail around the world alone. The teenager Zac Sunderland spent 13 months battling storms, equipment breakdown and the running with suspected pirates.

BBC News.