BBC 2007-04-15 加文本

BBC 2007-04-15



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BBC World News with Mary Small.

The United States has officially told North Korea that it must immediately honor its commitment to begin shutting down its main nuclear reactor. North Korea failed to meet Saturday's deadline for this process to start under an international deal by which Pyongyang would scrap its nuclear weapons program in return for an energy and aid package. China is urging the United States to show patience. James Renaults reports.

The chief US negotiator Christopher Hill has come here to Beijing to try to make progress. He's held talks with his Chinese counterparts. Mr. Hill has told reporters that he is prepared to show patience for a couple of more days. At the moment the future of the agreement appears to depend on the status of a bank transfer. North Korea insists that it won't shut down its nuclear reactor until it gets back 25 million dollars of funds frozen almost two years ago following US suspicions of money laundering. The United States says that the funds have been released so everyone is now waiting for North Korea to check its bank balance.

Votes have been counted in Nigeria a day after elections to choose state governors from representatives for state assemblies. The poll is seen as a preview to the conduct of the presidential and national assembly elections next week. There were some reports in some areas of delays in opening polling stations, violence, and other electoral irregularities. Ankeyn Ephigecca reports.

The delays were caused by a variety of factors. Some election officials turned up late. Polling stations ran out of ballot papers or did not have any delivered, and some voters could not find their names on voter registers, despite proof that they were registered to vote. The head of the European Union Observation Mission, Max van den Berg, said he had concerns about how the vote was carried out. the Chairman of Nigeria's Electoral Commission, Maurice Iwu, said that while there had been a few teething problems, the voting process had been, in his words, a very good first effort.

The people of Ecuador are voting today in a referendum on whether the country's political system should be radically changed. The president, Rafael Correa, wants voters to approve the creation of a People's Assembly that would by-pass Parliament and rewrite the constitution. From Quito, here is Daniel Shrinla.

Ecuador has lived through political chaos in much of the past ten years, and few expect things to get better any time soon. The left wing president Rafael Correa accuses the established politicians of corruption and is asking the people if they want to bypass parliament and form a People's Assembly. He said he will resign after just four months in office if they vote "no". Opposition politicians of much of that political establishment accused President Correa of acting illegally.

Anti-government protestors are planning to hold a big demonstration today in Russia's second city St. Petersburg a day after police broke up a similar rally in Moscow. Organizers say the protesters may try to march along the city's main avenue Nevsky Prospect.

World News from the BBC.

Delegates are, to, uh,gathering in a Forest Communities from across central Africa have been discussing how to safeguard their people's access to resources. The forum, the first of its kind, is meeting in the Italian Impfondo in the Republic of Congo. Indigenous Community leaders say their traditional land is increasingly been given to national parks. John Nelson from the UK-based group Forest People's Program says the creation of parks can deprive hunter-gatherer communities of their livelihood.

The impact on communities can be severe. Particular if there are forest hunting-gathering culture even relying on the forest breached everything. You don't accumulate capital. Everyday you are looking for food and you are moving seasonally to the forest,and so if you don't have access to that resource, you really, really have big problem.

The future of the president of the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz. comes under the spotlight today when the bank's governors meet in Washington. Mr. Wolfowitz has become embroiled in a scandal involving the promotion of his girlfriend yesterday hosting the annual meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund in Washington. Andrew Walker reports.

The formal business is likely to go ahead as planned with discussions on routine World Bank business, and the committee of 24 ministers will have the top advisor, they always have at these meetings, the president of the bank. Paul Wolfowitz is under a dark cloud after it emerged that he'd ordered a promotion for his girlfriend who was already a member of staff when he joined the bank two years ago. Mr. Wolfowitz says the bank's ethics committee recommended promotion and internal documents released in the last few days corroborate that. But the World Bank's board, which is considering the issue, says the terms of the promotion had not been approved.

The Thai authorities say at least 35 people are now known to have been killed when a flash floods swept through a series of waterfalls in the south of the country. Many people are missing and rescue teams are still searching the area.