Hello, I’m David Austin with the BBC news.
WikiLeaks is publishing what it said is a document showing that the US National Security Agency spied on the French President Francois Hollande and his two immediate
predecessors Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac. French media reported that the communication intercepts took place between 2006 and 2012. John Sopel reports from
Washington.
"In the document entitled 'Espionage Elysees', WikiLeaks claimed that the US National Security Agency has been intercepting the communications of the last three French
Presidents. There is no source for this other than the claims made by WikiLeaks themselves. But they are being reported widely in the French media. And given previous
disclosures from the whistleblower Eward Snowden, the claim seemed plausible. The French Embassy here in Washington is refusing to say anything, and the State
Department issued a one-line statement, 'We do not comment on the veracity of content of leaked documents.’ "
The Hungarian government is temporarily suspending a key European Union asylum agreement. It compels the country to take back asylum-seekers who entered Hungary, but
subsequently travelled on to other EU member states. The government says more than 60,000 illegal immigrants have entered the country this year. From Budapest, Nick
Thorpe reports.
"The boat is full, Hungary government spokesman J K told reporters in Vienna, announcing the Hungarian government's dramatic move. The decision to suspend the central
EU asylum rule, known as 'the Dublin Procedure', dovetails with the announcement last week in Budapest that the government will build a defence along its southern
border with Serbia. By temporarily suspending the right of other EU countries to return migrants to Hungary, it is effectively sealing its other borders as well."
Eurotunnel train services carrying passenger vehicles and freights between Britain and France have resumed after being suspended when striking French port workers
swarmed onto rail tracks and set fire to tires. Migrants took advantage of the chaos to jump onto lorries in the hope of getting to Britain. Eurotunnel said they would
be running services through the night to clear the backlog.
Health officials in Sierra Leone say two new cases of Ebola have been confirmed in the capital Freetown. It was thought the city was free of the disease as no cases
have been recorded for several weeks. This report from our Africa editor Mary Harper.
"A spokesman for the National Ebola Response Center said there were fears of furthering infections as the new Ebola cases occurred in the densely populated slum. He
said there was great concern because all quarantine facilities in Freetown have been closed due to the lack of new cases. The north of Sierra Leone continues to be
affected by Ebola, as the neighboring Guinea." Our Africa editor Mary Harper reporting.
World News from the BBC.
Lawmakers in South Carolina have voted to debate for removing a confederate flag from the ground of the state capital of Columbia. It's a response to the killing of
nine African-Americans in Charleston last week. Pictures of the white suspect brandishing the flag have emerged on line. But the state senator for South Carolina Tom
Davis said the flag wasn’t just a symbol for racist groups.
"There are many people in South Carolina, many very good people in South Carolina, for whom that confederate flag is a symbol of inheriting ancestry. And they're not
racists. But it is also true that there are hate groups that they have taken the battle flag as an emblem of their hatred." Tom Davis.
More than three million Iraqis have been forced from their homes since the rise of Islamic State in 2014. The International organization for Migration says the
majority have been displaced from Anbar to the west of Baghdad, where IS has been fighting to take over the whole province. Meanwhile the Islamic State group has
accepted a pledge of allegiance by militants in the caucasus which include Chechnya and Tajikistan. It's the first time in IS has formally welcome Jihadists from the
region in Soviet Organization. The main Jihadist groups in Chechnya has been critical of the IS in the past.
Young female suicide bomber was reported to have killed at least ten people in the Northeast Nigeria. Witnesses in the town of G said another 20 people were injured.
One man said the bomber could not have been more than 12 years old.
Don Featherstone, the creator of the plastic pink flamingo, which had adorned countless American lawns for five decades, has died in Massachusetts. He was 79. His
birds first went on sale in the late 1950s, becoming a craze in the 60s before eventually turning into an icon of kitsch. His wife, Nancy, said the couple kept nearly
60 of pink flamingoes on their lawn, saying it reminded them of how their bread was buttered.