BBC news 2011-03-19 加文本

BBC news 2011-03-19

BBC News with David Austin

President Obama has set out specific conditions that Libya must fulfil if it's to avoid Western military intervention in its fight against anti-government forces. He said they included an immediate halt to all attacks.

"A ceasefire must be implemented immediately. That means all attacks against civilians must stop. Gaddafi must stop his troops from advancing on Benghazi, pull them back from Ajdabiya, Misurata and Zawiya. Humanitarian assistance must be allowed to reach the people of Libya. Let me be clear, these terms are not negotiable."

Britain has said it's moving warplanes to bases in the Mediterranean to prepare for action over Libya. In Libya itself, the government declared an immediate ceasefire, but reports say forces loyal to Colonel Gaddafi continued to attack Misurata and Ajdabiya well after the truce was announced. Misurata is the last rebel-held city in the west of the country. A hospital doctor there said 25 people had been killed.

The President of Yemen, Ali Abdullah Saleh, has imposed a state of emergency after at least 39 anti-government protesters were killed in the capital Sanaa. Reports say snipers started firing at the crowds after Friday prayers. A British-Yemeni film-maker, Sarah Ishak, described the scene in the capital.

"I think everybody in Sanaa was really anticipating something really awful happening today. Still, after Friday prayers, snipers on buildings surrounding this square launched an attack on the protesters. The government is denying any involvement in this, but nobody really believes it."

Reports from Syria say at least three people have been killed and scores injured in clashes between anti-government protesters and security personnel in the city of Deraa. State media blamed the violence on what it called "infiltrators". Owen Bennett-Jones reports.

The video footage posted on various websites shows large crowds said to be in Deraa chanting slogans against corruption, and reports from the city say the authorities responded with water cannon and then live fire that killed at least three people and wounded many more. The official news agency in Syria said infiltrators in Deraa had provoked chaos and set cars and shops on fire there by obliging the security forces to intervene. There are also reports of protests elsewhere in the country, and security officials broke up a demonstration after Friday prayers in the main mosque in Damascus.

The Japanese government has acknowledged that it could have reacted more quickly to last week's earthquake and tsunami. It said contingency plans had failed to anticipate the scale of the disaster. Meanwhile, the International Atomic Energy Agency said the situation at the nuclear plant was still serious, but had not worsened significantly in the past 24 hours.

World News from the BBC

The United States has signed a nuclear accord with Chile despite growing misgivings in the country about the safety of nuclear power. The Chilean government said the deal focused on training nuclear engineers rather than building a reactor. Chile suffered a devastating earthquake last year, and environmental groups have questioned the decision to invest more in nuclear energy.

The former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide has returned home after seven years in exile in South Africa. Mr Aristide was greeted by cheering supporters as he stepped off a plane in the capital Port-au-Prince. Although he has said he won't re-enter politics, Mr Aristide's return is already causing waves in Haiti, as Andy Gallacher reports.

I'm here outside the home of Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the house he hasn't seen for seven years, but tens of thousands of people have followed him here from the airport. They are, as I'm looking, storming over the walls of the house and over the gate, despite the fact there's razor wire all over the place. There is a carnival atmosphere here. People are dancing in the streets, wearing his face on their T-shirt[s], waving flags with his face on and saying "Our father has returned home."

The Roman Catholic Church has welcomed a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that the display of crucifixes in state schools is acceptable. The Vatican described the ruling as "historic", saying the crosses were an expression of the cultural and religious identity of traditionally Christian countries. A woman in Italy had complained that crucifixes at a local school violated secular principles and were discriminatory.

A computer expert from Bangladesh has been jailed for 30 years in Britain for conspiring to blow up an airliner. Rajib Karim, who worked for British Airways, was found guilty last month of making preparations for terrorist attacks. A court was told he used his job to supply confidential information about British Airways to a militant linked to al-Qaeda. The judge described Karim as a "committed jihadist".

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