BBC在线收听下载:联合国称要遏制埃博拉需取得进展

BBC news 2014-10-01

BBC News with Jerry Smit.

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Iraqi Kurdish forces are reported to have recaptured a strategic border crossing with Syria from Islamic State militants. They launched a successful attack on the town of Rubbia. Jim Rio reports from Nabil in northern Iraq.

The Kurdish offensive began at dawn with Peshmerga special forces advancing towards Rubbia on several fronts. Resistance from the militants was stiff. It included at least five suicide car bombs which took the lives of a number of elite Kurdish fighters. By nightfall Kurdish officials said Rubbia was firmly in their hands, although IS militants continued to hold out in just one building. Rubbia is an important strategic position to hold. It controls the main border crossing on the highway between Mosul in northern Iraq and Aleppo in northern Syria.

British warplanes have launched their first airstrikes on IS targets in Iraq on Tuesday.

Car bombs and mortar attacks have hit several districts in the Iraqi capital Baghdad, killing at least 25 people in many Shiah areas. It's not yet known who carried out the attacks, but they come amid reports that IS fighters have got as close as 10 kilometers to Bagdad in recent days before being held back by Iraqi forces and tribal fighters backed by US airstrikes.

The new government of Afghanistan has approved long-delayed security deals allowing US and NATO forces to remain in the country beyond the end of the year when combat operations will end. The Taliban condemned the agreements. Debby Loin reports from Kabul.

President Karzai's refusal to sign new security deals with the US and NATO soured his relations with the countries that bankroll his government in his closing months in office. His successor Ashraf Ghani said there should be no further delay. And he stood alongside his partner in the National Unity government Abdulla Abdulla and their deputies, as their new National Security Advisor Hanif Atmar signed the deals on only their second day in office.

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The new head of the United Nations' Ebola response team has said that in order to combat the decease successfully, there needs to be significant progress within the next 60 days. Anthony Banbury said 70% of infected people need to be receiving treatment and 70% of burials need to have taken place safely within that period. More than three thousand people have died from the disease in West Africa.

Oil prices have fallen sharply. Bench Crude Oil, one of the main international benchmarks tumbled to its lowest level for more than two years. Here's our economies correspondent Andrew Walker.

The price of oil is being undermined by the strength of the dollar, which in turn reflects the fact that US economy is stronger than Europe's or Japan's. Because oil is priced in dollars a rise in US currency often pushes the price down. There is also ample supply of oil and demand has been affected by a slowing Chinese economy. Back in June the oil prices surged due to concerns that Islamic State might severely disrupt Iraq's key southern oil fields. It didn't happen and since then the prices have drifted down by almost 20 dollars a barrel.

The Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has indicated that his country may be ready to endorse a World Trade Organization agreement on facilitating trade that India has been blocking since July. Mr. Modi wants the agreement to include exemptions that allow India to stockpile and subsidize food for the poor. His comments follow a meeting with President Barrack Obama at the Oval Office in Washington.

After years of delays Panama has inaugurated a museum designed by the world-renowned architect Frank Gehry, his first in Latin America. The Biomuseo has been built where the Panama Canal meets the Pacific Ocean, and bears Gehry's trademark metallic curves and canopies. The museum's eight galleries celebrate the history of the Central America Isthmus, as one of the world's richest deco systems.

BBC News.