BBC news 2010-05-02 加文本

2010-05-02 BBC

BBC News with Marian Marshall

The giant oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is growing fast with satellite images showing that it's more than tripled in size in the last few days. The oil is spewing out of a BP operated platform which sank after a huge explosion nine days ago. Andy Gallacher is in the worst hit state Louisiana.

The oil slick is still expanding and constantly changing direction. It's now hovering off the coastline of Louisiana, dangerously close to some of America's most important ecosystems. The first birds soaked in crude oil are being treated at local wildlife sanctuaries and the weather here is hampering efforts to contain the slick. When President Obama arrives on the Gulf Coast tomorrow, he'll see one of America's biggest oil spills in decades. Four states here have now declared a state of emergency as each waits nervously to see where the slick will go.

The crisis is also beginning to affect energy production in the Gulf of Mexico. Two gas platforms have stopped pumping and one of them has been evacuated.

There have been two explosions during mid-day prayers at a packed mosque in the Somali capital Mogadishu. Reports say as many as 30 people may have been killed. From Mogadishu, Mohammed Olad Hassan reports.

The blasts went off within minutes of each other while people were sitting inside the Abdala Shideye Mosque, waiting for noon prayers. Eyewitnesses I spoke to on the front half described the scene as very horrific. The blood was everywhere, they told me, and human flesh cut into pieces, scattered everywhere in the mosque. No group has so far claimed responsibility of today's bombing, and all sides, the government, the rebel groups condemned the act as un-Islamic.

Pope Benedict says he set in motion a series of thorough reforms of a powerful conservative religious order whose founder sexually abused children for decades. The Vatican described the actions of the Mexican cleric, Marcial Maciel, as immoral and criminal and said his order, the Legionaries of Christ, would have to be purified. Here is our Vatican correspondent David Willey.

Pope Benedict has acted with unusual speed to deal with one of the Roman Catholic Church's most serious sexual abuse scandals of recent years. The Vatican put out a strong statement accusing the priest Father Marcial Maciel, who died two years ago, of grave and objectively immoral even criminal behavior. The Pope has refused a solution that many critics have demanded that the Legion of Christ which has 850 priests and 2,500 seminarians in over 20 countries should be disbanded.

The Bolivian President Evo Morales has nationalized four electricity companies. A senior police officer said they are taking control of the firms' offices after Mr Morales issued a presidential decree. Two of the firms are part owned by British and French companies; the other two are Bolivian.

World News from the BBC

Protests are underway in the United States against a controversial anti-immigration law introduced in Arizona. One of the biggest rallies is expected to take place in Los Angeles where the march was kicked off by the singer Gloria Estefan, standing side by side with the(一个地方是不是应该只有1个archbishop? ) local archbishop Roger Mahony. The protesters say the law could lead to Hispanics being targeted and inflame racial tensions. It requires local police to question anyone they suspect of being in the US illegally. The governor of Arizona says the law strengthens border controls and will help keep violence between rival Mexican drug cartels out of the state.

A former general in southern Sudan George Athor has told the BBC that hundreds of soldiers have joined him after deserting from military barracks in the south. Mr Athor ran as an independent candidate in last month's elections and lost. He's accused the dominant party in southern Sudan, the SPLM, of rigging the results against him. More from James Copnall in Khartoum.

Mr Athor said 400 men deserted from the military barracks at Doleib Hill following armed clashes on Friday morning in which at least eight people died. He also said soldiers were joining him from elsewhere in southern Sudan and that the southern army has sent a battalion to find him. He's denied responsibility for the attack on the barracks, but acknowledged he's taking command of the deserters. It wasn't immediately possible to get a reaction from the southern army. A rebellion will be disastrous for southern Sudan which has already been weakened by inter-ethnic conflicts and the two-decade-long civil war that ended in 2005.

Foreign ministers from the Arab League meeting in the Egyptian capital Cairo have endorsed the resumption of indirect talks between Israel and the Palestinians. On Friday, the American Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced she expected the talks to resume next week. An earlier attempt by the United States to restart indirect talks failed last month after Israel announced the building of new Jewish homes in occupied East Jerusalem.

BBC News.