2010-04-12 BBC
BBC News.This is Mike Cooper.
Many thousands of people have lined the streets of the Polish capital Warsaw to witness the return from Russia of the body of the President Lech Kaczynski following Saturday's air crash. On arrival in Warsaw the coffin draped in the red-and-white Polish flag was carried from the plane by a group of army officers and born along a red carpet past waiting dignitaries. In all, 96 people died in the crash. Brian Hanrahan reports from Warsaw.
Right across Warsaw, there are small banks of candles and photographs - makeshift memorials to the 95 people who died along with the president. Read down the list of the dead, and you will soon see why this disaster has touched so many people personally. It's not just the politicians in the military who died by the dozen, but a whole range of public figures - representatives of the barrister, the Olympic Committee, cultural figures and academics. This was a delegation that represented the nation.
After the first day of voting in Sudan's elections, correspondents say a picture of confusion and disarray is beginning to emerge. The party of the former southern rebels, the SPLM has asked for a four-day extension to the scheduled three days of polling because of reported irregularities. Martin Plaut is in Khartoum.
While the process generally went well in the capital Khartoum, in the rest of the country the very opposite was frequently the case. In several states, from the Red Sea in the north to the far south of the country, voters had little chance of exercising their democratic rights. This country has seen little peace since independence in 1956. To hold an election as complex as this one in a country as underdeveloped as Sudan was always going to be a tall order. The authorities will have to strain every nerve if these problems are to be resolved in the time that remains.
The American Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Defense Secretary Robert Gates have sought to repair US relations with the Afghan leader Hamid Karzai. He's accused Washington of trying to dominate Afghanistan and weaken his government. Mr Gates described the US military and the Afghan authorities as having a good working relationship.
"I think that the Afghans are very concerned about their sovereignty, and they are very concerned that it be clear who is the president of Afghanistan and that he be treated with respect because he is the representative of the people of Afghanistan and their sovereignty. And I think we frankly have to be sensitive in our own comments about President Karzai in terms of being mindful that he is the embodiment of sovereignty for Afghanistan also in the way we treat him."
European Union finance ministers have given final approval to a 40-billion-dollar rescue package for Greece if Athens decides it needs it. Details of the package made up of loans at a favorable interest rate were finalized in a video conference call by ministers from countries that use the euro. The plan is designed to reassure financial markets and prevent Greece from going bankrupt.
World News from the BBC
Iran has said that it will make a formal complaint to the United Nations over changes of United States nuclear policy announced by President Obama last week. Iran says the US move amounts to an implied threat to use nuclear force against it. The US said it wouldn't use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear powers which comply with international treaties, singling out Iran and North Korea as two states in violation of such agreements.
The head of Kyrgyzstan's self-declared interim government has said she cannot guarantee the safety of the fugitive President Kurmanbek Bakiyev against people seeking revenge for those killed during his overthrow. Roza Otunbayeva said her government could not restrain those who wanted, as she put it, to rush to Mr Bakiyev's hideout with rifles. Mr Bakiyev is hiding in the south of the country.
Exit polls following Hungary's parliamentary elections suggest that voters have rejected the governing Socialists who have been in power during the severe economic crisis in the country. The exit polls point to a convincing victory for the conservative opposition party, Fidesz, which may become the first party to govern without a coalition since democracy was restored in 1990. From Budapest, here is Nick Thorpe.
Voting was extended in several places beyond the deadline as long queues formed. Separate exit polls forecast the return to power of Fidesz, the Christian Democratic Party which last held office eight years ago. They are expected to win between 54 and 57% of the vote. The Socialists are a distant second with around 20% and the far-right Jobbik close behind them with between 15 and 17% according to the exit polls.
Nine people have been killed in the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa when masked gunmen with automatic weapons opened fire in one of the city's poorest neighborhoods. The city's police chief said the shooting took place on Saturday night and involved drug gangs fighting over access to lucrative cocaine trafficking routes to the United States.
BBC News.