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BBC news 2012-02-14

BBC News with David Austin

The United Nations human rights chief Navi Pillay has accused the Security Council of emboldening the Syrian government to launch what she described as an "all-out assault" to crush the opposition. Ms Pillay told the UN General Assembly that the longer the international community delayed action, the longer Syria's civilian population would suffer. Here's our diplomatic correspondent Bridget Kendall.

Navi Pillay's denunciation of the Syrian authorities was ferocious. Across Syria, she said, the pattern of attacks on civilians suggested approval at the highest levels.

"Credible information shows patterns of systematic and widespread use of torture by security forces. Extensive reports of sexual violence, in particular rape primarily against men and boys, are particularly disturbing."

In response, the Syrian ambassador to the UN, who backed by Iran and North Korea had tried to block her report, bluntly accused her of bias.

Israeli embassy vehicles have been targeted in two almost simultaneous bomb incidents in India and Georgia. A car exploded in Delhi, injuring the wife of an Israeli diplomat and their driver. In the Georgian capital Tbilisi, a bomb was planted on an Israeli car but failed to detonate. More from our security correspondent Gordon Corera.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wasted no time in pointing the finger at those he said were behind today's attacks. Iran, whom he described as the world's leading exporter of terror, and its proxy, the militant group Hezbollah, were responsible, he said. No evidence was produced, but both do have reason to try to strike Israel now. Iran has described the accusation that it was involved as sheer lies, saying it's part of a propaganda campaign.

President Obama has unveiled a US federal budget that's expected to form a basis for his economic platform in November's presidential election. Addressing supporters in Virginia, Mr Obama outlined his proposals for spending cuts combined with tax increases for the wealthy and the reining in of corporate tax avoidance.

"We've got a choice. We can settle for a country where a few people do really, really well, and everybody else struggles to get by. Or we can restore an economy where everybody gets a fair shot, everybody does their fair share, everybody plays by the same set of rules from Washington to Wall Street to Main Street."

Mr Obama's Republican opponents attack the plans as doing too little to restrain growth in the government's costly health benefits programme.

The United States says it'll hold direct talks with North Korea later this month about Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme. The talks in Beijing will be the first direct contact between officials since the death in December of North Korea's former leader Kim Jong-il.

This is the World News from the BBC.

Two businessmen have been convicted by an Italian court of negligence that led to more than 2,000 asbestos-related deaths. The court found that they'd failed to prevent asbestos fibres from their factories in northern Italy from spreading across the region. Stephan Schidheiny and Jean-Louis de Cartier, who's a Belgian baron, were both sentenced in their absence to 16 years in prison. Damages amounting to tens of millions of dollars were also awarded against the pair.

The Zambian football team have been given a hero's welcome on their return home after winning the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time. Cheering crowds greeted the players as they arrived at Lusaka airport. The BBC's Mutuna Chanda was there.

They came to a rapturous welcome, a very thunderous welcome. If you came into the country for the first time, you'll think that maybe it was Jesus Christ who was disembarking from that plane. They arrived to a hero's welcome. There were(was口误) well over 1,000 people at the Kenneth Kaunda International Airport.

Thousands more fans, many of them wearing the national colours of green, orange, red and black, lined the route from the airport to a sports arena in the capital where speeches and a concert have been taking place. Zambia beat Ivory Coast in a penalty shoot-out in the Gabonese capital Libreville. A plane crash there 20 years ago killed almost the entire Zambian squad.

The diary of a British soldier from the final years of the First World War written on toilet paper and other scraps is finally being decoded. Edward Siegrist, who was in his 20s, made a daily record of his time in France and Belgium between 1917 and early 1919 using a now-defunct form of shorthand. The diary lay in the attic of one of his children until the family found one of the few people still alive who could transcribe it. The journal gives a vivid record of dangers and discomforts of life behind the front-line.

And those are the latest stories from BBC News.