BBC News with David Austin
Congolese refugees have become returning home to the strategic border town of Bunagana after government troops backed by United Nations forces drove out rebels from the M23 group. Residents cheered as government troops entered the town, the last remaining stronghold of the rebels who appealed to have fled to the hills. Here is Gabriel Gatehouse.
It’s a remarkable turnaround in this year and a half long rebellion. In November United Nations troops had stood by powerless as rebel fighters briefly captured the regional capital Goma. The UN had pledged to protect the city and blamed the defeat on what they said was military backing from Rwanda. But for the UN force 18,000 strong it was embarrassing demonstration of their ineffectiveness. But injection of fresh peacekeepers earlier this year with a stronger mandate to actively take the fight to the rebels appears to have turned the tide.
The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court Fatou Bensouda says she does not object delaying the trial of the Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta until February. Lawyers from Mr. Kenyatta have asked the ICC to postpone his trial for crimes against humanity saying that he’s needed at home to deal with the aftermath of last month militant attack on a Nairobi shopping center. The hearing is due to begin next month.
The United States has promised that it’ll not spy on the United Nation. The pledge follows a report that the US national security agency had cracked UN encryption codes last year into setting confidential communications. Nick Bryant reports.
The United Nations first contact to the United States after reports appeal in the German magazine Der Spiegel in August claiming that the national security agency has been eavesdropping on its secret communications. Reaching back to the days of the Cold War, the UN headquarters in New York has long being the target of American surveillance partly to identify possible foreign spies who may be posing as diplomats. But President Obama recently ordered the NSA to curtail its electronic surveillance on the organization itself as part of a wider review of its spy activities.
The president elected of Georgia has told the BBC he will work to improve relations with Russia despite the legacy of his country’s disastrous war with its neighbor five years ago. Diplomatic relations between the two states have been none existence ever since. Bidzina Ivanishvili who was elected Georgia president last weekend said that he was ready to draw up a roadmap towards reconciliation with Russia.
“We want to stabilize our relationship with Russia to decrease the tension that we have since 2008 and even before. We want to enhance our bilateral relationship with them but furthermore we want to stabilize Georgia’s new Atlantic environment.”
However analysts say his plan to sign a trade agreement with the European Union next month is unlikely to help relations.
World News from the BBC
The Pakistani government has said that civilians made up only 3% of the total number of people killed in US drone strikes in the country since 2008. The figure provided by the defense ministry is much lower than estimates by independent organizations. According to the officials, in over 300 drone strikes more than 2,000 militants were killed but only 67 civilians.
A court in London where two former editors of a British tabloid newspaper are facing charges related to phone hacking has been told that three journalists on the News of the World have pleaded guilty to similar charges. Rebekah Brooks and Andy Coulson deny charges of conspiring to access voice mail messages illegally. Ruben Brent reports.
The prosecutions said it will be a long and slow trial but in his opening statements, Andrew Edis QC told the jury there was phone hacking during both periods referring to when Rebekah Brooks and then Andy Coulson was editor that the now defunct News of the World. Andy Coulson also approved payments for illegally obtained royal phone directories as the court heard. The jury was also informed that three former News of the World journalist and the convicted private investigator Glenn Mulcaire have already pleaded guilty to hacking related charges.
Wine levels are facing the threat of a global shortage of the drink according to new research. Last year production dropped to its lowest level in 40 years according to analysts leaving demand outstripping supply by some 300 million cases. Global production has been declining since 2004 while consumption has risen.
A five-meter high bronze statue commemorating the French footballer Zinedine Zidane’s infamous head butt in the 2006 World Cup final has been removed from a prominent position in the Qatari capital. It’d only been on displaying in Doha for a few weeks but it had prompted accusations of idolatry from conservative Muslims.