BBC news 2011-12-28 加文本

BBC news 2011-12-28

BBC News with David Austin

Thousands of Israelis have been taking part in a rally to condemn the behaviour of ultra-Orthodox Jews who want to enforce segregation between men and women. The Israeli President Shimon Peres said a minority in Israel was acting outrageously. Jon Donnison was at the rally in Beit Shemesh.

By early evening, thousands of demonstrators had gathered in Beit Shemesh. There was anger at the growing influence of Israel's conservative ultra-Orthodox Jews and, in particular, their treatment of women. Local girls, some as young as eight, have been harassed supposedly for dressing immodestly. At tonight's rally, there was something of a party atmosphere, but many Israelis believe the country's character is at stake. The Israeli government - so often critical of religious extremism in Islamic countries - has ordered a crackdown on intolerance at home.

The President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, says he will allow the Taliban to open a liaison office in Qatar to try to help the peace process. However, Mr Karzai's office said there should be restrictions preventing any foreign intervention in peace talks. From Kabul, here's Caroline Wyatt.

This is the first time that President Karzai has personally backed in public the idea of an office for the Taliban in the Gulf state of Qatar. It was a move he ruled out only a few weeks ago, infuriated that the US and Germany had been conducting negotiations over the location without consulting him. Early this month, Afghanistan withdrew its ambassador to Qatar in a signal of Kabul's displeasure. However, a statement from the presidential palace tonight said that if the Americans wanted to locate the office there, the Afghan government would agree in order to help the peace process.

Tens of thousands of protesters in Syria have thronged the streets of Homs as Arab League observers visited the city to monitor a peace agreement. Opposition activists have accused the Syrian government of hiding tanks outside Homs to avoid detection by the Arab League mission. Jim Muir reports.

It was baptism by fire for the Arab observers. After a meeting with the governor of Homs, they went to the city's Baba Amr district, which had been heavily pounded by security forces' tanks and artillery in recent days. There, the observers found themselves confronted by angry residents eager to show the damage and pools of blood. Even as they were talking, gunfire could be heard. The team is staying on in Homs, though its leader is returning to Damascus for meetings. Although he said it had been a good day and that both sides had responded, it's been a pretty mixed result, must have brought home to the observers how complex and deadly the situation is.

Jim Muir

Human rights activists in Egypt have welcomed a court order to stop the military from making female prisoners undergo virginity tests. The case was brought by a woman who said the army forced her to undergo a virginity test after she was arrested during a protest in Tahrir Square in March.

World News from the BBC

The lower house of the Indian parliament has passed a bill to create an anti-corruption ombudsman. The Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told MPs his government was determined to combat the problem. The vote came as the popular activist Anna Hazare began a fast in Mumbai to demand much tougher legislation against official corruption.

Nigeria's top Muslim spiritual leader has sought to calm tensions after a series of deadly attacks on Christmas Day. The Sultan of Sokoto said he wanted to assure all Nigerians that there was no conflict between Muslims and Christians. He was speaking after a meeting with the country's President Goodluck Jonathan. The Islamist sect Boko Haram said it carried out the bombings, which killed around 40 people, most of them in a Roman Catholic church.

An official estimate in Portugal suggests that more than 1% of the population may have emigrated this year. In a newspaper interview, a Portuguese minister said up to 120,000 people had left the country over the past 12 months. From Lisbon, here's Alison Roberts.

Estimating emigration is notoriously hard in a European Union with free movement and with tens of thousands of Portuguese having the right to citizenship in countries such as Angola. But a host of recent indicators point to an exodus on a scale last seen in the early 1970s when Portugal was still at dictatorship. The latest wave of emigration includes many qualified workers, such as engineers. Even the prime minister has suggested that teachers who fail to get placed in schools here could try their luck abroad. His comments triggered a storm of protest.

Alison Roberts

With Kim Jong-il's funeral due to begin in the next few hours, North Korean media has been reporting supernatural events following the late leader's death. The communist party newspaper said owls had been weeping each day while Radio Pyongyang said an unidentified white bird was seen brushing off snow from his statue.

That's the BBC News.