BBC News with Nick Kelly
The Pentagon has announced it’s sending an advanced ballistic missile defence system to the pacific island of Guam as a precaution against threats from North Korea. At the same time, the North said it in view what it called the US nuclear threat. It had ratified a possible diversified nuclear strike. That statement on Pyongyang’s official news agency came amid warnings from the U.S. Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel over North Korea’s behavior.
“I hope the North will ratchet this very dangerous rhetoric down. There is a pathway that is responsible for the North to get on a path to peace, working with their neighbours. There are many, many benefits to their people that could come. But they’ve got to be a responsible member of the world community.”
Lawmakers in the American state of Connecticut are debating a package of measures on gun control. They are expected to pass ushering in some of the toughest laws in the US. The measures include a wider ban on assault weapons and more background checks on gun-owners in Connecticut which suffered one of the worst school shootings in US history in December. President Obama is also continuing his push for more control of guns. He’ll be speaking at the Denver Police Academy in Colorado close to the scene of a mass shooting at a cinema last year. Congress is resisting tougher rules on firearm sales.
Fierce clashes between Afghan security forces and militants have killed more than 50 people, most of them civilians in the western province of Farah. More than 90 people were wounded. Here is Caroline Wyatt in Kabul.
The standoff began with a suicide bomb attack at about 9 o’clock this morning when militants set off a large army vehicle which was packed with explosives. And the Taliban has said to news agencies that this was an attempt to free Taliban prisoners who were going on trial in the courthouse. And the blast certainly damaged several government buildings including the governor’s office which is near the court compound as well, also, some banks, several shops and houses because the banks were packed with civilians at the time. A lot of people waiting to take their pay as the firefight broke out basically across a very crowded bazaar.
Princess Cristina of Spain has been ordered to appear in court later this month over accusations that her husband misused millions of Euros of public money. From Madrid, Tom Burridge reports.
Princess Cristina is the youngest daughter of Spain’s King Juan Carlos. She is married to Inaki Urdangarin who is accused along with his former business partner of misusing millions of Euros of public money. They had a company which organized sporting events and the allegation is that they used it to organize events for regional governments in Spain at hugely inflated prices. Her husband denies he’s done anything wrong and he’s still not been charged.
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The United States says it will offer a reward of up to five million dollars for information leading to the capture of the head of Lord’s Resistance Army Joseph Kony. He led a two-decade insurgency in Uganda and he is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes.
A judge in Brazil has ruled that four more people should face charges over a nightclub fire in the southern city of Santa Maria in January that killed 241 people. This brings the total number to be charged to eight. Two owners of the Kiss nightclub and two members of the band that was playing at the time of the fire will be prosecuted for manslaughter.
Scientists say they’ve come closer to finding the enigmatic invisible substance known as dark matter which is thought to make up a considerable part of the universe. The researchers say the data from a device on the international space station is consistent with the existence of dark matter but it may take some time to produce a conclusive finding. Here is our science editor David Shukman.
As long ago as the 1930s, scientists realized that what we see in the night sky is not the whole story, that the stars are not alone, that something must be filling the gaps in the galaxies. The reason is that the galaxies rotate faster than they should. To reach the speeds they do, the laws of physics require them to have more mass than we can see. So a strange, invisible material became known as dark matter and over the years scientists have tried a wide range of methods to find it.
And finally the novelist and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala has died at the age of 85. She is perhaps best-known for her 1975 novel Heat and Dust set largely in 1920s British-India which won the Booker Prize as well as her many novels and short stories. She wrote award-winning screenplays for Merchant/Ivory films including A Room with A View and Howard’s End. Originally born in Germany, she grew up in England after her family fled Nazism.