BBC在线收听下载:美英官员批评脸书的加密计划

BBC News with Chris Barrow.

A BBC investigation in Iraq has found evidence of the sexual exploitation of children and young women by some Shia Muslim clerics. It involves a practice known as pleasure marriage in which men are allows to take a wife for a short period. This is sometimes permitted in Shia Islam, but is outlawed in Iraq. Nawal Al-Maghafi reports. Pleasure marriage is a controversial religious practice used by Shia Muslims for a temporary marriage with a woman with paid money. But it's illegal under Iraqi civil law. A BBC News Arabic team conducted a ten-month investigation into the practice filming Shia clerics undercover. They approached 10 clerics at the Kadhimiya shrine in Baghdad, one of the most important sites in Shia islam. Eight of them said they would carry out pleasure marriages. The team also found some clerics were willing to perform such ceremonies for underage girls, with some of them as young as nine.

Iraq's prime minister has warned that there's no magic solution to tackling the country's problems following a third day of anti-government unrest. Adil Abdul-Mahdi says the demonstrators were right to demand an end to corruption, but added that it would take time. He promised to try to pass a new law to grant poor Iraqis a basic income.

Democrats overseeing the impeachment investigation into President Trump have expressed grave concern about his latest actions. The chairs of three Congressional committees have written a letter accusing Mr. Trump of mounting a misinformation campaign. Chris Buckler reports. In an open letter, senior Democrats in the House Foreign Affairs, Intelligence and Oversight Committees accuse president Trump of being unethical and unpatriotic in encouraging Ukraine to investigate his political rival Joe Biden. They've also published text that they received as part of their impeachment inquiries, in which the leading US diplomat in Ukraine Bill Taylor says that he thinks it would be crazy to withhold security assistance to try to ensure help with a political campaign. However, the American ambassador to Europe replies that the president had stated that there was to be no quid pro quos.

Senior officials in the US, Britain and Australia have criticized Facebook's plans to encrypt its messaging services, saying it could have security implications. They've called for the Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg to halt the encryption plan. Gordon Corera explains. This would mean only the sender and recipient are able to read a message. Privacy advocates say this increases everyone's security. But it would mean that even if law enforcement agencies served a legal demand on Facebook to provide access to the content of a message, the company wouldn't be able to assist. The letter warns this would severely erode the ability of tech companies to respond to illegal content and activity, such as child sexual exploitation and terrorism, putting citizens and societies at risk. Gordon Corera.

World news from the BBC.