BBC news 2009-10-09 加文本

BBC 2009-10-09


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BBC News with Ally Macue.

The man likely tipped to become the next British Prime Minister, David Cameron, has set up the aims and believes which he hopes will propel his party to power. In a speech to the last Conservative Party conference before next year’s general election, Mr. Cameron declared that he was ready. Naomi Grimley reports from the conference venue in Manchester.

David Cameron acknowledged these were testing times. He said the government’s massive budget deficit would mean painful measures were needed, such as cutbacks in public spending. While the war in Afghanistan, he argued, urgently required more British troops. He told his audience the Conservatives were ready to take on this kind of challenges after years of opposition. But he said he wouldn’t promise things he couldn't possibly deliver.

The French Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand has rejected opposition calls for his resignation over a book in which he wrote about paying boys for sex. Alasdair Sandford reports from Paris.

It was angry and far from apologetic Frederic Mitterrand who appeared on the French news. The culture minister said he absolutely condemned sex tourism and paedophilia which he said he never practised. He said he
committed what he described as an error against human dignity but denied having committed a crime. He said he'd not offer to resign. He described his book not as an autobiography but as a story about a life that resembled his own. When it was published in 2005, there was little comments other than literally praise.

The Czech President Vaclav Klaus has produced a further obstacle to the ratification of the Lisbon treaty, the document aimed at streamlining EU decision-making and which must be approved by all 27 member states. Mr. Klaus said he wanted to make an addition to the treaty before signing it into law. From Brussels, here is Dominic Hughes.

President Klaus, an ardent euro-sceptic, has been holding out on signing the Lisbon treaty for months. The country’s Constitutional Court is currently considering a case that argues the treaty breaches Czech law. But now President Klaus has asked for an additional piece of test known as a footnote to be added to the treaty itself. Details are very sketchy but the Swedish Presidency of the EU says it relates to the chart of fundamental rights. It’s a request that has thrown the EU’s leaders.

Officials in India say at least 17 policemen have been killed in a gun battle with Maoist insurgents in the state of Maharashtra. they said the fighting started after a group of Maoists attacked a police station. It's not clear whether the rebels have suffered any casualties. The Maoists say they are fighting for the rights of the poor.

President Hamad Karzai’s main opponent in Afghanistan’s recent election Abdullah Abdullah has said he expects there is to be a run-off election after the complaints commission has investigated allegations of fraud. In a BBC interview, he said over a million fraudulent votes were cast and that a majority of them had been for Mr. Karzai.

World News from the BBC.

Syria and Saudi Arabia have called for a national unity government to be formed in Lebanon after nearly four months of political stalemate. The announcement was made after King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad held a summit in Damascus aimed at reconciling their two countries. Each has supported rival sides in Lebanon, the Saudi’s backing the pro-western coalition and the Syrians the Hezbollah-led opposition.

Egypt’s leading Islamic cleric has barred female students from wearing a full-face veil at Al-Azhar university, the prestigious centre of learning for Sunni Muslims. Sheikh Mohammad Tantawi said the girls would be banned from wearing the full veil or niqab in all female classes and all female dormitories. Magdi Abdelhadi reports.

Sheikh Tantawi has made good on his pledge  a few days ago to ban the controversial cover. However, the official decision appears to be a watered-down version of his tirade against the full-face veil as a custom that had nothing to do with Islam. His remarks provoked some angry reactions with Islamist members of parliament calling for his resignation. Although the vast majority of Muslim women in Egypt wear the hijab which covers the hair only, an increasing number of them have adopted the niqab, widely seen as a sign of a puritanical even militant form of Islam.

The son of the American philanthropist Brooke Astor has been found guilty of plundering her fortune of almost 200 million dollars. Anthony Marshall, who is 85, faces a mandatory prison sentence of at least a year. During the trial, Mr Marshall’s defence lawyer said Brooke Astor had been lucid before she left him millions of dollars. The millionaires had Alzheimer’s disease when she died two years ago, aged 105.

The Nobel Prize for Literature for 2009 has been awarded to the Armenian-born German writer Herta Mueller. She’s known for her depiction of her life among the German-speaking minority of Armenia under the former communist ruler Nicolae Ceausescu.

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