BBC news 2011-06-18 加文本

BBC news 2011-06-18

BBC News with David Legge

There's been another day of widespread anti-government protests in Syria. Official media said a number of policemen had been shot and one had died. Unconfirmed reports from activists said at least 16 demonstrators were killed by the security forces in several locations. Much of the worst violence took place in the city of Homs, with film of it posted on a social media website.

Disturbances were reported from nearly all parts of Syria, including in the second biggest city Aleppo. Meanwhile, in the north of the country, the Syrian military has continued its operations. About 10,000 people who've fled their homes are camping on the Syrian side of the border with Turkey. Our correspondent Matthew Price reports from one of the Syrian camps.

There are(There's口误) a number of makeshift shelters here, and there's a rather large tent. These are all people who've moved here in the last few days, and they all say that they are frightened, frightened of their army, frightened of their president. In one tent, Saad Fatemi Khabchi, elderly and frail. "I came here because of the violence," she said, "because of the army." The tactic is to crush the rebellion, but for now at least the crackdown seems to be fanning its flames.

The heirs to Argentina's main media group have agreed to DNA tests to establish whether they really are the children of left-wing prisoners killed by the armed forces in the 1970s. Marcela and Felipe Noble Herrera, the adopted children of the owner of the Clarin group, are abiding by a court ruling that they give DNA samples to a national database. They'll then be compared with DNA from people who disappeared or were killed under military rule.

Financial markets appear to have settled a little after the German Chancellor Angela Merkel softened her position on moves to prop up the Greek economy. The German government wants private sector banks to shoulder more of the burden by giving Greece more time to make repayments on its huge debts. Andrew Walker reports.

The financial markets have been fretting about the next stages in the Greek government's debt drama. Chancellor Merkel's acceptance that any private sector contribution should be voluntary means there's slightly less danger of that drama turning to financial tragedy. She wants banks to allow Greece more time to repay. If they were in effect forced to, that would be seen in the markets as a default, which would mean widespread turbulence. Investors have welcomed her change of heart.

The International Monetary Fund says it's more worried about the state of the world's economy than it was two months ago. One IMF official said the United States and Europe were playing with fire by failing to take tough political decisions to tackle their debt problems. The report says economic growth is slowing and the risks are increasing.

World News from the BBC

Vietnam is beginning a joint operation with the United States to remove traces of the toxic defoliant Agent Orange. The initial focus is a former US military base, which is still contaminated with the chemical, which was used to destroy vegetation cover for communist forces during the Vietnam War. Vietnam and the US are improving relations amid shared concern about China's growing power.

Spain's National Court has set a record bail figure following the detention of Hussein Salem, a close associate of the former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Bail set in two separate hearings today reached over $38m. From Madrid, Sarah Rainsford.

When police in Madrid began investigating Hussein Salem, they discovered large sums of money transferred to Spanish bank accounts - funds they believe were acquired illegally in Egypt. Bank accounts containing well over $45m have been frozen, as has the sale or transfer of nine properties in Spain worth another $14m. In Egypt, Hussein Salem is accused of large-scale corruption in the sale of gas and of donating luxurious villas to Hosni Mubarak and his family in return for land.

Researchers in Britain who are trying to find a cure for Parkinson's disease are creating a bank of artificially-grown brain cells from patients suffering from the illness. Parkinson's disease is a degenerative disorder, which attacks parts of the brain that control movement. Scientists are using a new stem cell technique allowing them to turn skin from patients into small pieces of brain. The aim is to build up a brain bank, enabling researchers to study how Parkinson's develops and to test new drugs. Dr Richard Wade-Martins is leading the study.

"The brain is an inaccessible organ. You can't get bits of somebody's brain in life. So now for the first time we can grow in a dish the neurons that are very closely related. They're identical essentially to the neurons inside the brain of a patient that we couldn't get access to before."

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