BBC News with Jim Lee
The United States has demanded that the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah withdraw its fighters from Syria immediately. A state department spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, said their presence was unacceptable and dangerous.
"We condemn in the strongest terms Hassan Nasrallah’s recent declarations confirming Hezbollah militants’ active role in the fighting in Qusair and other parts of Syria. This is an unacceptable and extremely dangerous escalation. We demand that Hezbollah withdraw its fighters from Syria immediately.”
The Syrian rebels’ military chief, Gen Salim Idriss, has accused Hezbollah of invading Syria with Iranian backing. He appealed to Western powers for help, saying the rebels didn’t have sufficient weapons to withstand the attack by Hezbollah and Syrian government forces on Qusair.
"The situation of Qusair is very, very complex. It is very dangerous and these fighters of Hezbollah are very well organised and very well armed, and they are supported by the air force of the regime. And the air force of the regime is using vacuum bombs and very powerful bombs, and the regime is using the long-distance artillery and the missiles, the Scud missiles, against al-Qusair.”
Syrian state media says the government has now captured an air base near Qusair tightening the siege of the town.
Security officials and medical staff in Iraq say at least 27 people have been killed in two bomb attacks in different areas of the capital Baghdad. One of the blasts hit a wedding party in a mixed Sunni-Shiite neighbourhood, killing many guests. The other took place in the Sunni neighbourhood of Gazalia. The explosions are the latest in a wave of violence in Iraq linked to political and sectarian tension.
A Taliban source in Pakistan has told the BBC that one of the movement’s most senior leaders, Wali ur-Rehman, has been killed in a US drone strike. Pakistani security officials say the deputy Taliban leader Wali ur-Rehman was one of at least six suspected militants killed in a double missile strike on a house in North Waziristan. There’s been no confirmation from the leadership of the Pakistan Taliban. From Islamabad, Orla Guerin reports.
The killing of Wali ur-Rehman, if confirmed, will be a significant blow to the Pakistan Taliban and a considerable victory for Washington. A White House spokesman said if the deputy leader had been killed, it would deprive the Pakistan Taliban of their chief military strategist. He said Wali ur-Rehman had been involved in horrific attacks on Pakistani soldiers and civilians and in targeting Nato and US forces in Afghanistan. Washington wanted him for murder, in connection with a suicide bombing at a US base in eastern Afghanistan in 2009. That claimed the lives of seven CIA agents.
World News from the BBC
A gay rights activist and his partner have become the first same-sex couple in France to be legally married the day after a new law came into force. Vincent Autin and Bruno Boileau exchanged vows in a civil ceremony at the town hall in the city of Montpellier. Hugh Schofield was watching when the presiding official declared the couple married.
"It is a great honour for me to tell you that in the eyes of the law you are united in marriage.” That was the moment when Vincent Autin and Bruno Boileau became spouse and spouse and it was a very important symbolic moment watched by a big big crowd. They had to open up a special salon and it wasn’t the normal marriage room in the town hall. It was a big kind of reception area, all catered out. There were 80 or 100 police officers mobilised around the town hall. The risk was a crowd of people shouting abuse and generally being provocative, but they were kept away.
The US stock exchange Nasdaq has agreed to pay a record $10m in settlement after mistakes were made during Facebook’s floatation last year. Computer glitches delayed the launch, but Nasdaq decided to go ahead with trading in Facebook shares despite the problems. The Securities and Exchange Commission said a series of ill-fitted decisions disrupted one of the largest floatations in history and violated fundamental rules. More than 30,000 Facebook orders were stuck in the system for hours with investors unable to buy or sell shares.
A tropical storm of Mexico’s Pacific coast has strengthened to become a hurricane as it approaches southern areas. The US National Hurricane Centre predicts Hurricane Barbara will make landfall in the next few hours near the port of Salina Cruz, home to Mexico’s biggest oil refinery. Thousands of people in southern Chiapas state are being moved as the hurricane approaches. The hurricane has maximum sustained winds of 120km/h.