BBC News with Nick Kelly
The electoral commission in Zimbabwe has declared that president Robert Mugabe has won a seventh term in office. Mr. Mugabe who is 89 years old won 61% of the vote. His main rival Morgan Tsvangirai won nearly 34%. Mr. Tsvangirai says he will go to court to contest the results. Andrew Harding reports.
The official results show president Mugabe won 61% of the vote. It’s a crushing victory that he and his supporters say is a vindication of their aggressive campaign to take back control of Zimbabwe’s economy and land. Mr. Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party has also won more than 2/3 of the seats in parliament. But the man who is now lost three elections in a row said the country was in mourning and in crisis. Morgan Tsvangirai said he would demand a forensic order of the entire process to reveal how the election was stolen. But although regional observers have expressed grave concerns about the election they seem in no mood to question the outcome.
The American Secretary of State John Kerry said the United States did not believe the results announced today represented a credible expression of the will of the Zimbabwean people. The British foreign secretary William Hague said the British government had concerns over reports of large numbers of voters being turned away from polling stations and the high number of extra ballot papers that were printed.
A month after the Egyptian military deposed the elected president Mohamed Morsi, senior American and European Union diplomats are holding talks in Cairo with leaders of the interim government and the Muslim Brotherhood opposition. Yolande Knell reports
Exactly one month after Egypt’s first democratically elected Islamist president was removed from office, international mediation efforts are increasing to try to mend the damaging deep political division in the country. Just hours after meeting members of Mr. Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood and its political party, the US deputy Secretary of State William Burns sat down for talks with the Egyptian foreign minister Nabil Fahmy. They were joined by the European Union’s envoy Bernardino Leon. Few official details have been given but the hope is clearly to prevent further violence and bloodshed.
Hassan Rouhani has been formally endorsed as Iran’s new president at a ceremony in Teheran. He would take the oath of office in the Iranian parliament on Sunday. In an address broadcast live on state television, Mr. Rouhani pledged his government would work to improve the economy and engage with the world.
“I have assured you this responsibility would support those people who want change, who want a better life away from corruption, poverty and discrimination, people who want more respected dignity and hope in a secure future. These are legitimate demands even though it will not be possible to realize them all straight away.”
World News from the BBC
Thousands of Tunisians have gathered at a Central Square in the capital Tunis to express their support for the governing Islamist movement Ennahda. Members of the opposition intend to hold a protest the same time. Ahmed Maher is at the government rally in Kasbah Square.
The mood here is festive. Firework’s been set off lighting the dark sky of Tunis. For many of the protesters here this rally is an attempt to recapture the political momentum amid amounting calls of the government to resign. Such calls for many of them are an assault of democratic legitimacy.
Government and opposition supporters in Venezuela are holding two separate marches in protest against corruption in the capital Caracas. President Nicolas Maduro who joined a crowd at the centre plaza of Venezuela said he would fight corruption regardless of who might fall. The leader of the opposition Henrique Capriles told thousands of demonstrators in the other part of the city the government rally was a march of the corrupt protesting against corruption.
And Russia has banned the American rock group Bloodhound Gang from performing at a music festival after a band member shoved the Russian flag into his underpants on stage. Daniel Sandford has the details.
The scandal began on Wednesday when the group was performing in the Ukrainian seaside resort of Odessa. A Russian flag was on the stage and the bassist, Evil Jared Hasselhoff put it into the front of his underpants and then pulled it out of the back. The group’s next stop on their tour was at a festival in Russia but the culture minister Vladimir Medinsky used twitter to say these idiots will not perform in Kuban. The bassist later apologized. Evil Jared Hasselhoff explained that it’s a tradition in the band that anything thrown from the stage into the audience passes through his underpants.