BBC news 2009-08-30 加文本

BBC 2009-08-30


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BBC News with Ally Micue.

President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan has increased his lead over his main rival in the presidential election. After results from a third of polling stations, President Karzai has 46% of the vote, comfortably ahead of his main opponent Abdullah Abdullah who has 31%. Mr. Abdullah has made further allegations about the poll. Speaking to the World Service he said he would not accept a compromised outcome.

"My concern is about massive fraud, state-crafted, state-engineered fraud which is taking place throughout the country. Today we were having meetings with representatives of five provinces. In eyewitness accounts of the elections, it's just dreadful."

Meanwhile, the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has suggested on a visit to Helmand Province that more soldiers could be sent to Afghanistan to help train Afghan troops. In his fourth trip to the country in a year, he promised there’d be new vehicles with stronger armor in order to protect British soldiers from roadside bombs.

A funeral Mass has taken place in the United States for Senator Edward Kennedy, the Democratic Party veteran and last representative of an American political dynasty. He died of brain cancer on Tuesday at the age of 77. At the service in Boston, President Obama delivered the eulogy.

"We can still hear his voice bellowing through the Senate chamber, face reddened, fist pounding at the podium, a veritable force of nature in support of health care or worker's rights or civil rights. And yet, while his causes became deeply personal, his disagreements never did. And that's how Ted Kennedy became the greatest legislator of our time."

The service was attended by much of America's political elite including three former Presidents. Senator Kennedy's body is now being taken to Arlington National Cemetery in Washington.

Two American policewomen in California have described how they became suspicious about Philip Garrido who is accused of kidnapping Jaycee Duguard as an 11-year-old and holding her captive for 18 years. The two officers said that something about the two young girls who were with Garrido had alarmed them. Rajesh Mirchandani reports.

Lisa Campbell and Ally Jacobs met with Philip Garrido on Tuesday when he asked to hold a religious meeting on the grounds of the University of California at Berkerly where they both work. Garrido brought two young girls with him and campus police officer Jacobs says the girls told them they did not go to school, but were given lessons at home. Another younger one sounded robotic and rehearsed when she explained a bruise around her eye as a birth defect. The officers ran a background check on Garrido and discovered he was a convicted sex-offender. They reported their concerns to his parole officer which eventually led to his arrest and the release of Jaycee Duguard.

World News from the BBC.

Reports from Iran say the prosecutor who organized the trials of about a hundred opposition figures after protests against June's election result has been replaced. Said Motazavi, a Teheran prosecutor general, was removed from his post by the recently appointed judiciary chief. Commentators say Mr. Motazavi gained a reputation as a hardliner during his six years in the post.

Chinese state media are reporting fresh clashes between the Burmese security forces and armed ethnic rebels in an area close to the border with China. In recent weeks, thousands of people have fled into the Chinese Province of Yunnan to escape the conflict. Beijing, one of Burma's main allies has said the Burmese’s government should bring the conflict to an end. Our correspondent Chris Hogg is one of the few journalists to have reached the remote border town of Nanshan and sent this report.

Most of the refugees have found some sorts of cover. In a back street we find a group sheltering in a bare room on thin mattresses. There are old women, their daughters, small children, too. One man who’s in his twenties says they have been driven over the border by the fighting on the other side. He's seen Burmese troop engaging the Kokang army. None of the others have seen the fighting, but they have heard about it. That had prompted them to flee.

At least five people have been killed and more than 275 others serious injured in a train crash near Cameroon's capital Yaounde. Officials have confirmed that a passenger train had been derailed north of the city. Rescuers are still searching in the wreckage for survivors.

Police in Florida have arrested about 75 suspected criminals after sending letters to their last known addresses offering money from a funds set up to help businesses survive the credit crunch. The fugitives telephoned the hotline and made appointments to receive checks in Fort Lauderdale. When the suspects arrived, they were detained. The charges against them range from grand theft to attempted murder.

BBC News.