BBC news 2011-06-14 加文本

BBC news 2011-06-14

BBC News with Sue Montgomery

International donors have promised $4.3bn for children's vaccination programmes in the developing world, which will target pneumonia and diarrhoea. The money pledged at a conference in London comes from governments and private donors, among them the computer billionaire Bill Gates. He said the consequences would be far-reaching.

"There are so many ways to look at the impact: children to get the vaccines, the children who won't be sick and will develop their full potential. I like to think of it in terms of equity that this is the first time that we can say that poor children will not be refused the vaccines that the children in the rich countries get because there's not enough money."

Some aid organisations say much of the money will go to big Western drug companies, who charge more for their vaccines than producers in developing countries, but one of the companies told the BBC it wasn't making a profit.

The exodus of refugees fleeing the violence and unrest in Syria has continued to build. Reports now say almost 7,000 people have crossed over into Turkey, with more arriving all the time. People crossing the border said the Syrian military had been arresting hundreds of people in a sweep of villages near the town of Jisr al-Shughour, regained by the military on Sunday after a revolt a week ago. Jim Muir reports from neighbouring Lebanon.

It's the villages and hills to the east and north of Jisr al-Shughour that now seem to be the focus of the army's efforts to re-impose the regime's control over the defiant area. The state media said the army was chasing what they called the "remnants of armed terrorist gangs" through the surrounding countryside. Activists said local men of military age were being rounded up, houses damaged and crops destroyed. Refugees making their way across the nearby border to Turkey spoke similarly of a scorched earth policy.

The US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has urged African leaders to promote democratic reforms, otherwise, she warned, they could face the kind of popular revolts taking place in the Arab world. Speaking to the African Union in Ethiopia, she encouraged African countries to abandon support for Colonel Gaddafi, despite his financial support, and to develop ties with Libya's rebels.

Meanwhile, Mrs Clinton has cut short her Africa trip because of a volcano that's erupted in Eritrea and is threatening to disrupt air travel. The German airline Lufthansa says it's already cancelled two flights. Here's Martin Plaut.

Residents woke to find their homes covered with a film of grey black ash, 1mm to 2mm thick. The source is the Dubbi volcano, which began erupting on Sunday night for the first time since 1861. The volcano is situated in the remote Southern Red Sea Region of Eritrea, a thinly populated area. But the French weather bureau is predicting that by Tuesday the cloud could spread as far as Egypt, Sudan and even Israel.

BBC News

Human rights organisations are warning of a humanitarian catastrophe in border areas between north and south Sudan in the run-up to independence for the south next month. Amnesty International says a campaign of ethnic cleansing seems to have started to destabilise the region. Khartoum says it will withdraw its troops from the disputed region of Abyei under certain conditions, but has denied targeting people on an ethnic basis.

The United States has released in its entirety a top secret report into the Vietnam War 40 years after parts of it were leaked to the New York Times. At the time, the revelations that the Kennedy and Johnson administrations had secretly escalated the conflict and lied to Congress about it increased opposition to the war. The man who leaked the documents, Daniel Ellsberg, says he already picked out the best bits.

Italian voters have dealt the country's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi a heavy political blow, rejecting a raft of key policies proposed by his government. They included a plan to revive nuclear energy in Italy. From Rome, Duncan Kennedy.

With around 90% of the votes now counted, Italians appear to have clearly rejected nuclear power - the role of the Fukushima accident in Japan a decisive factor. A number of other policies were also rejected, including the privatisation of water supplies and one which would have allowed ministers to skip court cases if they had government duties. All have the personal backing and prestige of Silvio Berlusconi attached to them, so their combined rejection is a serious political setback for the prime minister.

India and Sri Lanka have launched their first ferry service after a gap of 30 years. The vessel is carrying more than 1,000 people from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu to the Sri Lankan capital Colombo. Ferries were suspended during Sri Lanka's long-running battle against Tamil Tiger rebels, which ended two years ago.

BBC News