BBC在线收听下载:南非卡纳白金矿警察开枪射死矿工

BBC news 2012-09-02

BBC news with Mike Cooper.

A day after the death of one of Italy's most popular and controversial church figures Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, an interview has been published in which he strongly criticizes the Roman Catholic Church. The interview was with a fellow Jesuit priest. From Rome, David Willey.

Cardinal Martini said the church was 200 years behind the times and Catholics lacked confidence in it. "The church is tired", he said. "Our culture has grown old. Our church is big and empty.

And the church bureaucracy rises up. Our religious rites and the vestments we wear are pompous.” He urged the Catholic church to recognize its errors and embark on a radical path of change, beginning with the Pope and his bishops. He said unless the church adopts a more generous attitude towards divorced persons, it'll lose the allegiance of future generations.

The Jordanian government has sharply increased the amount of money it says it needs from the international community to cope with the influx of refugees from Syria. Jordan said it urgently needed 700m dollars. Dale Gavlak reports from Amman.

Earlier in the week, the information minister estimated that Jordan hosts more than 190,000 Syrian refugees, the largest number in the region. The UN Refugee Agency's representative to Jordan Andrew Harper says that as the violence deepens in neighbouring Syria, the numbers fleeing to Jordan are expected to increase and more international help from donors is desperately needed.

Islamist militants have seized control of the town of Douentza in Mali. The move extends the already sizable area controlled by the rebels in the north of the country. Steve Jackson reports.

Residents say a convoy of jeeps carrying bearded militants entered Douentza on Saturday morning. After a brief stand-off, witnesses say the militants disarmed a local self-defense militia and took over a hotel and checkpoints around the town. Douentza is strategically important to the militants as it brings them closer to government-held areas in central Mali. The country was until this year one of the most stable in West Africa, but in June the rebellion by ethnic Tuaregs, a military coup and a militant takeover of the north.

A prominent Egyptian television presenter has denied urging the murder of President Mohammed Morsi at the opening of his trial. Tawfiq Okasha said he merely criticized Mr Morsi who's from the Muslim Brotherhood. Mr Okasha has expressed fierce opposition to the Brotherhood. He denounced his trial as politically motivated accusing the Brotherhood of trying to silence dissent. His case has raised concern that the Islamist movement is trying to restrict media freedom.

The Syrian government says forces loyal to President Assad have repelled a large gale of attack by rebels on an airforce college near Aleppo. The Rasm al-Abboud air base is one of a number to have come under attack in recent days.

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The trial's begun of one of Saudi Arabia's most prominent human rights campaigners. Mohammad al-Qahtani faces a number of charges that includes setting up an illegal organization, turning international organizations against Saudi Arabia and breaking his allegiance to the king. Mr al-Qahtani is an economics professor who cofounded the Saudi human rights organization. He told the BBC he'd been trying to expose the Saudi authority is oppressive and said he had committed no crimes.

"This is a political trial. First of all, it's an illegal trial. It 's a maneuver by the regime to silence us regarding human rights abuses that we have been recording and documenting".

If found guilty, Mr Qahtani could face five years in jail.

Early results from the general election in Angola suggests the formerly Maxist-ruling party the MPLA has won three quarters of all votes, only slightly down on the previous ballot. If confirmed, the outcome means president Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who's been in power for more than three decades will get another term. Louise Redvers reports from Rwanda.

The MPLA's victory has never been in doubt. The question was how much it would win by. With half of the votes counted, it seems it is on course to securing a large majority in parliament. The election, only the second since the end of Angola's three decades of civil war in 2002 has been dogged by claims of regularities. UNITA, who has led the criticism accused the MPLA of trying to fix the vote has said it may not accept the final results.

The funerals have taken place for many of the 34 mine workers shot dead by a police at the Marikana platinum mine in South Africa. Government officials attend some of the funerals. Lawyers on Friday threatened legal action on behalf of 270 minors who have been charged with the murder of their colleagues even though they were killed by the police. Forty-four people including two policemen were killed in violent protests over pain.

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