BBC news 2007-05-24 加文本

BBC 2007-05-24


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BBC World News with Sue Montgomery.


The Lebanese Defense Minister Elias Murr has told Islamist gunmen entrenched in a Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon to surrender or face further military action. Mr. Murr’s warning was dismissed by Islamist commanders as Palestinian leaders in northern Lebanon met to discuss the crisis. Our correspondent John Lion is outside the camp.

There had been talks involving the mainstream leaders of the Palestinians here, clearly they would love at least to keep their people out of trouble, they don’t have any sympathy for the militants. But whether they can really resolve this, these militants are real diehards. They are determined to fight to the end and it seems very hard to find a way in which they’d give up their weapons or indeed surrender themselves.

The Red Cross says that up to 15,000 Palestinians, about half the total number living in the Nahr El-Bared camp, have taken advantage of an unofficial ceasefire to leave.

There’s been an Israeli air attack on the shops of two money changers in the Gaza Strip. The Israelis said the stores were being used to channel money from Iran, Syria and Lebanon to Hamas militants in Gaza. At least two people were injured in the raid which also targeted at a car. Earlier the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas who is visiting Gaza held talks with the main Palestinian parties. Ali Makbul reports from Ramallah.

President Abbas is trying to find a way to bring the violence in Gaza to an end. In his meeting with the five main parties, he discussed ways of making the current inter-factional truce hold. But he also discussed proposals for a ceasefire with Israel to cover both the Gaza Strip and West Bank. But even as the meeting was taking place, militants from some of the very groups around the table were firing more rockets into Israel.

The United States says it will press for a further set of sanctions to be imposed on Iran over its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment. A report by the UN nuclear agency said Iran had ignored the latest UN deadline for freezing enrichment and had instead expanded the process.

Leading British aid agencies including Oxfam and World Vision of joint forces to launch an emergency appeal for victims of the fighting in Darfur. Apart from Darfur itself and parts of Sudan, many refugees from the fighting in Chad and Central African Republic are also facing hardship and deprivation. Here’s our Africa editor David Bamford.

4.5 million people are caught up in the war zone around Darfur that now affects three countries. The British aid agencies are issuing this joint appeal to enable them to provide urgent assistance. The money raised will help people displaced by the conflict with shelter, clean water and sanitation, as well as emergency food and medical care.

The United States Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson says two days of high level economic talks with China have shown tangible results with agreements on financial services, civil aviation, energy and the environment.

World News from the BBC.

Pope Benedict has acknowledged that European Christians committed injustices and inflicted suffering during the colonization of the Americas 500 years ago. The pope’s comments are seen as a response to the widespread criticism of recent remarks during a recent trip to Brazil in which he said Latin American indigenous groups had been silently longing to become Christians before colonial rule. Indigenous leaders backed by the Venezuelan President Hugo Chaves had demanded an apology. The pope said his visit to Latin America was above all a pilgrimage for the faith which he said has shaped worldwide cultures.
“While we don’t overlook the various injustices and sufferings which accompanied colonization, the Gospel has expressed and continues to express the identity of the people in this region and provides inspiration to address the challenges of our globalized era.

A former secretary of the soft drinks giant Coca Cola has been jailed for eight years in the United States after being found guilty of conspiring to steal trade secrets. Joya Williams had planned to sell the stolen material to Coca Cola’s rival Pepsi for at least $1.5 million. But after receiving a letter offering the information to the highest bidder, officials at Pepsi called Coca Cola to warn them.

The president of Serbia Boris Tadić says the conviction of twelve people for the shooting dead of the reformist Prime Minister Zoran Djindjicin in March, 2003 is a decisive moment for the judicial system in the country. After a trial lasting more than three years, the court in Belgrade sentenced the ringleader of the assassination plot and the man who pulled the trigger to maximum forty-year prison terms.

The Italian club AC Milan have won the European Cup for the seventh time in their history. They beat the English side Liverpool by two goals to one.

BBC World News.