BBC news 2012-09-08 加文本

BBC news 2012-09-08

BBC news with Fiona MacDonald.

The United States government is going to blacklist the Pakistan-based  Haqqani group, designating it a terrorist organization. The group has been accused of involvement in militant attacks in Afghanistan. Jill McGivering reports.

The US has long described the Haqqani group as a major threat. Based in Pakistan's tribal regions with links to Al Qaeda, it's blamed for growing violence in east Afghanistan and high-profile attacks in Kabul. The US has been putting pressure on Pakistan for a long time to curb it and the US goverment came under political pressure from congress to add the Haqqanis to the terrorist blacklist. But it was a tough decision. The designation may weaken the group financially. US companies and individuals will be banned from contact and the group's US assets will be frozen.

President Obama and his Republican rival Mitt Romney have traded accusations over the US economy after the publication of the latest data on unemployment. 96,000 jobs were created in August, a figure worse than expected. Back in the campaign trail ahead of the election in November, Mr Romney described the jobless rate as unimaginable, saying the president was taking America in the wrong direction. Jonny Diomand reports.

These are disappointing figures confirming a dispiriting trend. The US economy is simply not picking up steam. Indeed what recovery that is appears to be losing momentum. With revisions to June and July's figures, the monthly average of the job creation is now lower this year than it was last. The headline figure looks good. The fall in the unemployment reached to 8.1%. But that's only happened because people had given up searching for work.

Parliament in Burma has passed a new law which could pave the way for large-scale foreign investment in the country for the first time. The bill was approved on the final day of the Parliament Session after months of debate. A BBC correspondent says this aggrieves great fears that the amendments added to protect indigenous Burmese interests might deter many foreign companies from setting up in Burma. But the two most controversial causes were finally removed.

The Canadian government has announced it's closing its embassy in Iran and expelling all remaining Iranian diplomats from Canada. Lee Carter reports from Toronto.

Canada's foreign affairs minister John Baird has given Iranian diplomats in Canada five days to leave whilst ordering the Canadian embassy in Tehran to close immediately. In a statement he blamed the Iranian regime for sponsorship of terrorism, for supporting the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, its refusal to adhere to UN resolutions over its nuclear program and threatening Israel. He also acknowledged that he is nervous about the continued safety of Canadian diplomats in Tehran following attacks on the British embassy there last November.

World news from the BBC.

Libyan officials say three people have been killed in clashes between residents of a town near Benghazi and Islamist extremists trying to demolish a shrine belonging to the mythical Sufi branch of Islam. The Interior Ministry said locals fought off armed Islamists known as  Salafist who were trying to destroy Sufi Mausoleum. It's the latest in a series of attacks on Sufi shrines. They regard Sufi religious practices as heresy.

The prime minister of Portugal Pedro Passos Coelho has announced new austerity measures for next year to try to cut the country's debt. The country recently received a bailout of 78b euros. Alison Roberts reports from Lisbon.

Next year, employees will pay seven percentage points more of their salary to the state as their social security contribution rises to 18%. The change is largely to offset revenue losses after the constutional court ruled against deep cuts in public sector workers' traditional holiday and Christmas bonuses. But the prime minister said it would also enable the government to reduce the employers' social security rates with the aim of lowering record unemployment. Critics of the government are likely to see the changes as effectively a massive tax hike for workers.

Rescue teams in China are struggling to reach outlying villagers following earthquakes in the southwest of the country that killed more than 60 people. The state news agency said that some roads have been blocked by landslides in a mountainous region along the borders of Yunnan and Guizhou provinces. Reports said that some 20,000 buildings collapsed or were damaged.

The government in Chile has cancelled an army directive instructing recruiters not to admit homosexuals, Jehovah's witnesses and other minorities into the armed forces. The defence minister said that the directive contradicted government and army policy against discrimination and should be disregarded immediately. It had been approved by a senior general.

BBC news.