BBC News with Jerry Smit.
Classified documents leaked by the US whistleblower Edward Snowden suggested the United States has monitored the telephones of 35 world leaders. A memo published by the Guardian newspaper in Britain suggested the US National Security Agency began monitoring calls after being given more than 200 key phone numbers by an official from another American government department. Current and former officials in the US, including the former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, have also said that is routine for countries to spy on each other. Jonny Dymond in Washington has more.
This is not a surprise to people, said Madeleine Albright in Washington on Thursday, Countries spy on each other. And she said it wasn't just America listening to everyone else. Ms.Albright was US ambassador to the United Nations from 1993 to 1997. She said that the French ambassador there had made it clear to her that they had listened in to a phone conversation she had had with a third party. They had, she said, an intercept.
Earlier, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that spying among friends is not done. She was speaking as she arrived at a European summit after it emerged that the US intelligence agencies have been intercepting her mobile calls. Ms. Merkel said trust between the two allies now needed to be resorted.
Since we talked about the NSA, I've repeatedly told the American President that spying between friends is unacceptable. I'm doing this in the interest of German people. This is not just about me, but it's about all German citizens.
Twitter has said it expects to raise around $1.5bn in its stock market launch expected to take place in November. Just over 10% of the social media company will be sold. In an evaluation that will make the company worth more than $10bn.
The United States says it's concerned about the rise in piracy of the coast of West Africa after two American citizens were kidnapped from an oil supply ship. The C-Retriever owned by US Maritime Transport Company was attacked on Wednesday and its captain and chief engineer were kidnapped. Will Ross reports.
The International Maritime Bureau has recorded more than 40 attacks in the Gulf of Guinea this year with 132 crew taken hostage. The gangs usually target the oil vessel to steal a cargo and then set free the captives. This latest attack happened as an antipiracy training exercise was taking place off Nigeria’s coast involving British, Spanish, Dutch and Nigerian forces. It's not clear if any of those visiting navies are going to intervene.
The state news agency in Ethiopia says the government has temporarily banned its citizens from traveling abroad to look for work. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said countless Ethiopians have lost their lives or undergone untold traumas because of illegal human trafficking. It said it wanted to safeguard their well-being.
World News from the BBC.
Newly published research has shown that finding a cure for the millions of people around the world who have Aids is likely to be even more difficult than scientist had feared. A 3-year-study has found that the size of the dormant reservoir of HIV, the virus that can lead to Aids, is up to sixty times larger than previously thought. Experts say the finding explain why HIV usually makes a rapid comeback if an infected person stops taking antiretroviral drugs.
New genetic research suggested thousands of small segments of DNA determine how one person's face can look so different from another's. The study published in the Journal Science said the small amount of genetic material influence how the shape of a human face would alter as it developed and aged. One of the researchers, Doctor Axel Visel said their findings could help establish how facial birth defects arise.
Many of these switches probably also play a role in major malformations of the face. In some of these cases where you have patients with these malformations, we know what's going on because there are mutations in certain genes. But we suspect that there are also many cases where the underlying cause is a mutation in some of these switches.
The United Nations member states have made more than 200 recommendations it says are needed for China to improve its human rights record. Top of the list are calls for Beijing to guarantee freedom of expression, safeguard press freedom and ease its control over the Internet. China has stresses its advance in education and improved access to health care for its citizens.
A court in Sierra Leone has charged two editors at the Independent Observer newspaper with seditious libel after they published an article comparing the President Ernest Bai Koroma to a rat. Press freedom groups say the government of the West African country has recently made a number of attempts to intimidate the media.