Target the French troops led by Timbuktu

January 27, 2013, last updated at 07: 55 GMT Mark Doyle of the BBC visit the ruins of the House of the Mayor to Konna after fighting in the city

In Mali, the French-led forces advance on the key city in the North of Timbuktu, as they continue their offensive against Islamist rebels.

Saturday Malian and French forces captured Gao, another important in the North of the city.

The advance comes as African Union leaders are meeting to discuss sending more troops in Mali.

Islamists seized the North of the country last year, but have been lost ground as the French forces launched an operation earlier this month.

End of day Saturday, first French Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said Malian and French troops "near Timbuktu" would happen soon.

During the night they secured Gao - northern Mali most populous city-special forces captured the airport and a strategic bridge in the South.

Most militants appear to have fled in the lairs of the desert and hunting for them can be more difficult once all cities are safe, said the BBC Thomas Fessy in the capital, Bamako.

Troops from Niger and Chad are to assist the Malian forces in to secure the city.

Continue reading the main story Timbuktu was a centre of Islamic education from the 13th to the 17th Centuries700, 000 manuscripts survive in public and private libraries, collectionsBooks religion, law, literature and scienceAdded world heritage site by UNESCO in 1988 for its three mosques and 16 cemeteries and mausoleumsThey have played a major role in the spread of Islam in West Africa; the oldest date of mausoleums of 1329Islamists destroyed after his arrival on the cityUS refuelling of the leaders of the African Union organize a Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, that members to deploy troops to help the French-led operation there.

The African States are committed to almost 5,700 troops to support French and Malian forces in their campaign.

Only a small part of the African force has deployed so far.

A number of West African countries Saturday raised the total number of troops committed to 5,700. Separately, Chad said it is sending 2,000 soldiers.

Meanwhile, the United States said it would provide air-to-air refuelling for the French war planes.

It had also discussed the plans for the United States to transport troops in countries such as Chad and Togo Mali, said the Pentagon.

Islamists seized a large area in the North of Mali, last year and have attempted to impose strict Sharia, or Islamic law.

Some 3,700 French soldiers committed in the Serval operation, 2 500 of them on Malian soil.

France intervened militarily as the Islamists advanced further to the South. He said that the capital, Bamako, was under threat.

As French and Malian troops was Gao, spoke of Malian officials of the scenes of joy, but also looting.

"Maybe at some point that the enemy in front of us was underestimated," part of Tieman group Chung Malian Minister of Foreign Affairs said ahead of the Summit in Addis Ababa.

"But everyone has seen that this terrorist group intends to spread its criminal purposes across Mali and possibly other countries targeted.

The African Union has recommended civil observers monitor the situation of human rights in areas that came under the control of the Government of Mali.

Human rights groups have accused the Malian army of committing serious abuses.

Somali women seek a brighter future in Mogadishu

With Somalia's UN-backed government consolidating its hold over the capital, Mogadishu, and other areas from al-Qaeda-linked militants, many women are returning to help rebuild the country, reports the BBC's Kate Forbes.

"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this Air Africa flight to Mogadishu," the Kenyan stewardess booms over the plane tannoy.

Absolutely no-one pays any attention, with passengers preferring to root through the overhead lockers or stand talking in the aisles.

The plane is full of familiar accents: British, Canadian and American. Open your eyes and you see it is packed with Somalis, mainly women, going to a "home" they barely know.

'High-flying executives'

Ayan Yussuf, 18, is one of a group of women sitting together dressed alike in black floor-length abayas (cloaks) and hijabs (headscarves).

"Well, when in Rome, do as the Romans," she says.

She admits it is not what she wears in Canada, where she lives.

She is coming to Somalia on holiday - her first visit to the country.

"I want to see what it's like. One day, we might move back," Ms Yussuf says.

Is she scared?

"Yes, definitely! I've got no idea what it's going to be like."

On first sight, not much has changed in Mogadishu since I was here in early 2012. It looks like a country in conflict, and security is still the first priority.

The airport is in a heavily fortified base that is home to the joint African Union (AU) and UN force known as Amisom.

Holidaymakers have been flocking to the beach in Mogadishu

Outside, pick-up trucks full of soldiers, armoured vehicles and teams of civilian guards wait to pass in and out. Across the road, a cafe sits behind an eight-foot wall of sandbags and barbed wire.

But the rest of Mogadishu is ablaze with bustle and renovation.

After a period of stability, Somalis are coming back by the plane-load.

"You can hardly get a seat," one man tell us at Nairobi airport, on his way to Mogadishu.

'Double life'

Among them are many women, who want to play their part in rebuilding a country that has been at war for more than 20 years.

Continue reading the main story

You are used to going anywhere and doing what you want back home in the States, but here you can't just jump in the car and go down to the store ”

End Quote Maluka Abulkadir Working in the PM's office Walking into an office not far from the airport, I spot some perfectly manicured nails tapping away at an expensive laptop.

Next to that lie a designer handbag and some serious-looking files.

Safia Yassin Farah is 34 and her desk is that of a high-flying executive anywhere in the world, except that the view from her office is of high walls, wire and armed guards.

She left the US to take up a post working with young people in Mogadishu, helping them obtain an education and skills.

"I'm here to stay. I've quit my job," Ms Farah says, sounding thrilled and scared at the same time.

"I grew up in the US and got my degree at the University of New Hampshire. I had a job, a house, I had everything."

She says she was motivated to return after hearing about the plight of Somali children caught up in violence, including being recruited by the al-Qaeda affiliate, al-Shabab, which has lost control of Mogadishu and other towns to Amisom and government forces but still controls many rural areas of southern and central Somalia.

"I could see this huge need for education for young people. They need chances, like kids have in the West," Ms Farah adds.

"I just looked around and said to myself: 'I have to do more than this'. I realised I had to go back."

After a month in Mogadishu, top of the list of what she misses is the Starbucks coffee chain.

Ms Farah also worries about some things, like the lack of health care and security but adds: "It's much better than people think."

Attitudes towards women are different from the West, however, as I hear from Maryan Hassan, a 26-year-old law student who was born in the UK.

"Men are traditionally the breadwinners [in Somalia] and the woman's place is in the home," she says.

However, Ms Hassan points out that many of the Somali women returning would have led a "double life" in the West, occupying traditional roles at home while being treated more equally in the workplace.

'Open prison'

"Somalia has changed a lot, though," she adds.

"Twenty years of war meant that women have had to support families as many men died or couldn't work."

Maryan Hassan hopes she and other expats can inspire young Somalis

One thing that every woman mentions is the security situation. Mogadishu is still dangerous. And because of this, there is a lack of independence.

It is one of the hardest things about moving back, explains Maluka Abulkadir.

A young woman, she gave up a top job in the US with finance company Merrill Lynch to return to Mogadishu.

"The hardest thing is the social life. You are used to going anywhere and doing what you want back home in the States, but here you can't just jump in the car and go down to the store. It's not safe enough," Ms Abdulkadir says.

She smiles in agreement when I tell her that a British-Somali had greeted me that afternoon by asking: "How are you enjoying Mogadishu? We call it the open prison!"

Ms Abdulkadir cannot drive anywhere without armed guards, in part because she works in the prime minister's office.

"We're rebuilding Somalia. For me, it's worth it," she says.

For some women, just being in Somalia can make a difference.

"I tell girls about my own experiences - like getting a degree and how hard I've worked. Sometimes it's the first time they've really thought about whether they could go to university," says Ms Hassan.

"For example, a cousin of mine didn't really know what she was capable of, or I guess entitled to, but inspired by me, she's gone and found herself a scholarship and is doing computer science. So imagine that replicated across the country. It's got to be a good thing."

But to live in Somalia is not so easy for everyone.

On Mogadishu's beach, Samira, 40, paddles in the clear turquoise water.

She watches over some children swimming in the distance, but they are her sister's.

"My kids were born in London and they won't even come here on holiday," she says.

"They've just got no interest. If I want to move back, I'll have to wait until they've grown up."

For now, then, she must stay in London with her family.

"People ask me why I want to go back. They say I'm crazy. I tell them: 'I have to. It's my country.'"

Queensland braces for flooding

January 27, 2013, last updated at 05: 50 GMT Nick Bryant BBC: "they say now in Bundaberg, they will worsen the floods they had two years ago"

The Australian State of Queensland is on alert for flooding following cyclone tropical Oswald.

Hundreds of people were evacuated in the rain continues to fall on Sunday, with the towns of Bundaberg and Gladstone is the possibility of severe flooding.

The bad weather is expected to move towards the capital of the State, Brisbane and the State of New South Wales.

Two years ago, floods in Queensland, caused the death of 35 people.

On Sunday, Australian media reported that authorities had pulled the body of an old man of water at Burnett Heads northeast of Bundaberg.

Two other people were reported missing, including a man who disappeared after trying to cross a Creek at Gympie, North of Brisbane.

Six tornadoes have already hit the Bundaberg region, ripping off roofs and injuring 17 people.

BBC-Nick Bryant of Sydney River in Bundaberg is already beyond flood levels were recorded in 2010, reports and meteorologists are concerned that it could reach one meter, reaching levels not seen in the 1970s.

The Commission expects some 300 homes and businesses to be flooded.

At Gladstone in the North, 400 properties have already been evacuated.

Sandbags are also distributed in the State capital, Brisbane, where the berries regions are particularly vulnerable to the tsunami.

Severe weather warnings are in place of Central Queensland to southern New South Wales border.

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Researcher Charles Taylor tried

25 January 2013, last update at 19: 05 GMT Prince Taylor was an investigator of the Court sitting to A defence defence former investigator Charles Taylor with the special Tribunal for Sierra Leone was found guilty of violating the witnesses in the trial of the former President of Liberia Charles Taylor imprisoned.

Prince Taylor was found guilty of five counts of contempt of court, the Court said.

He is accused of trying to convince the prosecution witnesses to recant their testimony by a former Sierra Leone rebel, Eric Koi Senessie.

Charles Taylor is currently on appeal against his conviction in the Hague.

He was sentenced to 50 years in prison in May last for crimes of war by providing weapons and support to the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels in neighbouring Sierra Leone during the bloody 1991-2002 civil war.

Defense lawyers called the verdict a "miscarriage of Justice" and that the statement of conviction quashed.

"Odious crimes".

Prince Taylor was found guilty of four courts to try to persuade the former witnesses to recant their testimony through Senessie, a member of the RUF.

Continue reading the main story

• 1989: Launches rebellion in Liberia

• 1991: RUF rebellion starts in Sierra Leone

• 1997: Elected President after a 1995 peace agreement

• 1999: The Liberia Lurd rebels launch an insurrection to oust Taylor

• June 2003: stop the warrant issued. two months later, he comes down and goes into exile in Nigeria

• March 2006: arrested after an escape failed, bid and sent in Sierra Leone

• June 2007: trial opens - organized in the Hague for security reasons

• April 2012: recognized guilty of aiding and abetting the Commission of war crimes

• May 2012: sentenced to 50 years in prison

• June 2012: his lawyers say he will appeal against his conviction

It has also been recognized guilty of "educate and persuade otherwise Senessie to give false information to the independent counsel appointed by the Registrar.

Mr. Senessie was found guilty by the special court in June to eight counts of interference with the same witnesses and sentenced to two years in prison the following month.

He testified against Prince Taylor during his trial.

Prince Taylor was acquitted of four counts of attempting to bribe witnesses to change their testimony. He should be sentenced by the special court at a later date.

Charles Taylor became the first former head of State to be convicted of war crimes by an international court since the Nuremberg trials after the second world war.

He was found guilty of 11 counts of war crimes for atrocities including rape and the murder and described by one of the judges as "some of the most heinous crimes in human history."

In exchange for the so-called conflict diamonds, Taylor provided arms and logistical and moral support to the RUF, prolong the conflict and the suffering of the people of Sierra Leone, said.

Taylor started the civil war of Liberia as a warlord in 1989 and was elected President in 1997. He ruled for six years before being forced into exile in the South of Nigeria. He was arrested in 2006, while trying to flee Nigeria.

The family feuds sparked by booming Indian land values

The price of land in India has risen hugely in value over the last 20 to 30 years The dramatic rise in the value of land in India has resulted in a growing number of families of Indian origin returning from the UK to cash in on their inheritances. But many discover that the land is either sold, occupied or disputed - resulting in bitter feuds and lengthy legal battles, reports Poonam Taneja of the BBC's Asian Network.

At his home in the English city of Wolverhampton, Iqbal Singh pores over a thick pile of court papers, the result of 16 years of legal wrangling in the Indian courts.

He has inherited a legal battle to reclaim his parents' farmland in the rural Indian state of Punjab.

Mr Singh's father was a first-generation immigrant to the UK from India. Like other Punjabi men who arrived during the 1960s, he worked long hours as a manual labourer to overcome the financial hardship he initially experienced with his family.

Continue reading the main story

It's a huge problem because many Punjabis in the UK stand to inherit ancestral land”

End Quote Harjap Singh Bhangal London-based lawyer "We were quite poor, we didn't even have a television," Mr Singh remembers.

His father spent every spare penny buying land in the country of his birth. He dreamed of returning there one day.

'Fraudulently sold'

Twenty acres of farmland was purchased in Punjab at a cost of £30,000 ($47,000). The land, in one of India's prime agricultural areas, is now estimated to be worth more than 10 times that.

A relative was placed in charge of farming the land. However, during a visit to India the family made a shocking discovery.

"My dad went to the land, only to find someone else claiming to be the owners," Mr Singh said.

He alleges that the land was fraudulently sold by his grandfather - who had fallen out with the family.

In 1996, the family started legal proceedings to reclaim the land from the new owners, who insist the farm was bought in good faith.

Since then, there have been numerous hearings in the courts, but with no resolution.

'We receive 15-25 calls a day in the UK'

It is a complex tale of lies, deception and betrayal - but it is far from an isolated case.

London-based lawyer Harjap Singh Bhangal works in Southall, known as "Little Punjab" due to the large number of Indian immigrants who have settled there.

He says that a growing number of Britons are embroiled in legal disputes over ancestral land with their relatives in India.

"It's a huge problem because many Punjabis in the UK stand to inherit ancestral land."

He says that relatives are doubly reluctant to hand over property because in many cases they funded migrants to leave home and seek a new life in the UK.

'Profiteering'

I made the journey to Punjab to investigate this issue.

Reaching legal settlements in Indian land disputes can be costly and cumbersome

In the last decade, rapid urbanisation has meant the state has benefited from a real estate boom.

In the bustling city of Jalandhar, I met property dealer Jag Chima, who has offices in both the UK and India.

He shows me around a small plot of land on the edge of the city. Neighbouring plots have already been sold to developers, and shops and apartments have been built.

Two acres of land in this area now has a market value of £1m ($1.58m) - an increase in value that has provoked a corresponding increase in the number of land disputes within families.

"If it was worth £10,000, you wouldn't be too fussed about trying to claim it back if it was too much hassle. But when you find out it's worth £1m, that changes the rules of the game," Mr Chima says.

Judicial battle

Indians involved in land disputes with their British relatives accuse them of returning only to cash in on India's real estate boom.

Criminal gangs have also entered the market in the battle for land

One farmer showed me around his disputed farm which has been in the family for generations.

"This is my daily bread; it's my livelihood," he tells me.

"A farmer's life is a hard one, waking early to tend the land and feed the animals, sow the crops and reap the harvest.

"Costs are rising and maintaining the land is expensive."

The last thing this farmer needs is a protracted legal battle.

Reaching a settlement in the Indian courts can take up to 25 or 30 years and can cost thousands of pounds.

It is not unusual for both sides to accuse the other of using violent threats and intimidation.

Continue reading the main story

I made a promise to my dad on his deathbed - to get the land back - and I don't break my promises”

End Quote Iqbal Singh UK-based Indian land owner Between 2,000 and 2,500 such cases are lodged with the Punjab police each year, the majority being diverted to the civil courts.

But there is also a sinister element emerging - organised gangs taking advantage of disputes over land to make a fast profit by buying it at a cheaper price at the expense of both sides.

The Punjab police say they are aware of the gangs.

"We have come across a number of cases where organised gangs - comprising property dealers and maybe a few government revenue officials or police department personnel - may be involved," says Inspector General Gurpreet Deo, who is responsible for NRI (Non-Resident Indian) affairs in Punjab.

"They operate hand in glove with each other... we realise there are gangs which operate in this manner."

At a conference earlier this month the issue of land disputes was discussed by the Punjab government. It has now set up a special website where complaints can be logged and is considering setting up fast track courts to expedite cases.

But these reforms offer little hope to Iqbal Singh - lawyers say it may take another decade before his land dispute reaches the high court. Despite this he is determined to reclaim the family land his father worked so hard for.

"I made a promise to my dad on his deathbed - to get the land back - and I don't break my promises," he says.

Whose Land Is It Anyway is on BBC Radio's Asian Network at 1700 GMT on Monday 28 January

The city of Mexico explosion kills 25

February 1, 2013 Last updated at 06:39 GMT that will Grant to the BBC said the explosion happened "at the worst possible time"

The number of people killed by an explosion in Mexico City at the headquarters of the national oil company, Pemex, has risen to 25, the Minister of the Interior said.

At least 100 people were injured and an unknown number trapped in the rubble at the base of the 54-story tower. The search for survivors continues.

The cause of the explosion is under investigation, said Pemex.

Last September, 30 people died in an explosion at a Pemex gas refinery in the North of the Mexico.

Anxious parents

Thursday's explosion in the lower floors of the building which happened as shifts were changing in the afternoon, making this particularly cluttered area.

Television footage showed debris from the explosion spread in the street before the building and ambulances of the Red Cross on the scene, attending to the wounded.

The building of Pemex's 54 floors is 214 m (702 ft) in height

Hundreds of rescuers, aided by dogs looking 30 people supposed to be trapped inside the building.

Police have cordoned off the streets around the building, which is located in a shopping area of the city of Mexico.

PEMEX said its operations will continue to operate normally - and commercial and financial obligations will continue to respect - despite the explosion.

Director general sound, Emilio Lozoya Austin, cut short a business trip to Asia and went to the Mexico, a Pemex statement said.

Members of the family of employees are gathered before the building looking for information about their relatives, local media report. It said that some have tried to reach employees on their mobile phones, but have had no response.

"The place shook, we lost power and all of a sudden there's debris everywhere. Colleagues helped us out of the building, "an eyewitness said Cristian dagger.

"We were talking and all of a sudden we heard an explosion with white smoke and glass falling from the Windows," another witness said.

"People began to flee the dust covered building. Many pieces were flying. »

Continue reading the main story Will Grant BBC News, Mexico City

Pemex's construction in the North of Mexico City is surrounded by a large number of police and paramedics. Sniffer dogs are used to search for people trapped under the rubble.

Mexico City is used to earthquakes, and emergency services seem well prepared for this type of disaster.

The skyscraper has withstood the explosion also, with most of the damage limited to the ground floor and first floor. But night has now in the Mexican capital, which complicates the search.

Some members of the families of the missing workers gathered outside the Pemex, construction of the news of their loved ones, while others are are made directly to hospitals.

Authorities and teams of paramedics release information at regular intervals, but the exact cause of the explosion can still take a long time to be confirmed. This is now by far the worst explosion in Mexico for nearly 30 years.

Images of the explosion posted on Twitter showed large clouds of smoke rise up of the building. Television images showed people transported by helicopter from the scene.

The President Enrique Peña Nieto and Mayor of Mexico City Miguel Angel Mancera led on the site of the explosion.

Mr. Peña said Pemex rescue and security teams working alongside the authorities in the city to help the wounded.

"I am deeply sorry for the death of our colleagues at Pemex. My condolences to their families, "Mr. Peña said on Twitter.

"For the moment, the priority is to help the wounded and protect the physical security of the people who work there."

The President said that he has ordered an investigation into the causes of the explosion.

Earlier on Thursday, Pemex had reported problems with the electricity in the building, in a message on Twitter.

Later, he confirmed that an explosion had taken place "in building B2 from the administrative centre".

Plaster fell from the ceiling of the basement and the situation was "delicate", a local emergency services spokesman, quoted by the news agency Reuters said.

PEMEX has experienced a number of fatal accidents in recent years.

Deadly explosion of last September in a refinery of gas near the northern city of Reynosa appears to have been caused by a buildup of gas.

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Starbucks rejects tax row claims

  Starbucks has faced public criticism over its level of corporation tax payments Starbucks has dismissed reports it held urgent talks with government officials over fears it was being singled out for criticism of corporate tax avoidance.

Starbucks confirmed that it had had a meeting at Downing Street on Friday, but said this was "long-scheduled".

Last week Prime Minister David Cameron said tax avoiders "need to wake up and smell the coffee", perceived as a thinly-veiled swipe at the company.

Tory party Chairman Grant Shapps said no-one was being singled out.

However, he repeated that companies had to pay "their fair share" of tax.

Starbucks, along with Amazon, Google and others, faced a public backlash last year over the disclosure of the amount of corporation tax they pay.

Starbucks had paid £8.6m in corporation tax in its 14 years of trading in the UK, and nothing in the last three years, despite UK sales of nearly £400m in 2011.

In December the coffee chain agreed voluntarily to pay extra tax over the next two years, amid reports it was facing a boycott by some customers.

Continue reading the main story

"I don't think we would ever single out a single company, but I do think companies in this country need to pay their way”

End Quote Grant Shapps Chairman, Conservative Party 'Politicisation' Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday, Mr Cameron said that corporations must "pay their fair share" of taxes, and he pledged to use Britain's G8 chairmanship to counter tax avoidance.

However, Starbucks felt his remark about "smell the coffee" was a "cheap shot" at the company and considered suspending millions of pounds worth of investment in the UK, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

Kris Engskov, UK managing director for Starbucks, met officials on Friday amid concerns about the "politicisation" of the tax issue.

But on Sunday, Starbucks said that Friday's meeting was scheduled long before Mr Cameron's Davos speech.

"We do not discuss the details of our government meetings but can say that we do not recognise how it has been reported," the company said.

Mr Shapps said no company was being targeted for criticism, but he repeated that they must pay their fair share of tax.

"I don't think we would ever single out a single company, but I do think companies in this country need to pay their way," he told Sky News' Murnaghan programme.

"I think they need to do what's right as far as that is concerned and I think most people watching this would agree, companies should pay their fair share of taxation.

"That applies to that company and anyone else you care to mention. It certainly applies to millions of smaller businesses in this country.

"People who work very hard, build up their companies from scratch... are paying their fair share of taxes all the way through. The same rules have to apply to everyone."

Last month the coalition government announced a campaign against "tax dodgers" and "cowboy advisers" to claw back £2bn a year, after MPs alleged that multinationals were involved in "immoral" avoidance of tax.

Starbucks said in its statement: "Starbucks agrees with the prime minister that all businesses should pay their fair share.

"In the UK, we employ 9,000 people, contribute £300m a year to the economy and are forgoing tax deductions that will make the Exchequer at least £20m better off."

Sapphires sweeps Australian awards

Feel-good drama The Sapphires dominated the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts Awards (AACTA), picking up 11 gongs at the ceremony in Sydney.

The musical comedy about an Aboriginal girl group entertaining the troops in Vietnam was named best film.

Chris O'Dowd, who plays the group's manager, won best actor, with Deborah Mailman named best actress and Jessica Mauboy named best supporting actress.

Psychological thriller Wish You Were Here was also among the winners.

The film, starring Joel Edgerton, was named best original screenplay, with Antony Starr picking up best supporting actor.

The ceremony at Sydney's Star Casino was hosted by Russell Crowe, with Australian stars Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Geoffrey Rush also attending.

But the night belonged to The Sapphires, with Wayne Blair collecting the best director award. The film also won best adapted screenplay and picked up five technical awards.

When asked backstage if he anticipated the film's awards success, Blair replied: "Not in my wildest dreams.

"It just came out of the blue. Out of the 12 nominations I thought we might win you know, one or two, that'd be lovely, that'd be vindication of something, But winning a few more is good, very positive."

Mauboy, who received her prize from Kidman, said: "Oh my goodness, accepting the award from Nicole Kidman, it's unexplainable."

Shell profits hit by weak prices

Annual profits at Royal Dutch Shell have fallen to $27bn (£17bn), from $28.6bn in 2011.

Profits for the last three months of the year rose to $7.3bn, against $6.5bn, but Shell was hit by generally weaker oil and gas prices during 2012.

Peter Voser, chief executive of Europe's biggest oil company, said 2012 was a year of "headwinds".

But he added that Shell was "delivering a strategy that others can't easily repeat".

The fourth-quarter profit figure was boosted by a turnaround at Shell's refining arm. This reported a profit of $1.2bn compared with a loss of $278m in the same period a year earlier.

However, profits at Shell's upstream business - which covers exploration and production - fell to $4.4bn from $5.1bn.

Capital constraints

The Anglo-Dutch company pledged to push ahead with plans to deliver more oil and gas, despite an uncertain outlook for some parts of the world economy.

Shell raised output during the year, with the company selling more gas than oil for the first time. The company is investing more in liquefied natural gas projects in Asia and increased production at its huge Pearl gas-to-liquids plant in Qatar.

The firm is planning to increase its output to four million barrels of oil and gas equivalent by 2017-18, up from current levels of about 3.3 million.

Mr Voser was also upbeat about future prospects, saying: "We are more constrained by limits on capital [funding] than by limits on opportunities."

However, shares in Shell fell more than 1% after the release of the results, with the profit figures coming in lower than analysts' expectations.

Richard Hunter, head of equities at Hargreaves Lansdown Stockbrokers, said there were some "positives" in the statement.

"Refining margins improved in the last quarter, the company's increased investment is part of a long-term strategy and the accompanying management comments were upbeat on future prospects.

"However, the overall profit number was shy of expectations, costs are on an upward trend within the industry and the weakness of the gas price has impacted on Shell."

Sunnis rally at Fallujah funerals

  les funérailles à Falloujah samedi a rapidement tourné à des protestations contre le gouvernement chiite des milliers de personnes en deuil se sont réunis dans la ville irakienne de Falloujah samedi aux funérailles de manifestants sunnites tués par les troupes de l'armée de terre un jour plus tôt.

Les processions funéraires ont été suivies d'un regain protestations contre le gouvernement chiite de l'Irak.

Le vendredi, cinq personnes ont été abattues morts et des dizaines de que plus ont été blessés lorsque l'armée a ouvert le feu sur une manifestation de protestation.

Les sunnites irakiens, qui détenaient le pouvoir sous Saddam Hussein, accusent le gouvernement d'une discrimination à leur encontre.

Reporters à Falloujah ont indiqué avoir vu des portraits de l'ancien dirigeant irakien détenu par des personnes en deuil, et au moins un cercueil était drapé dans le drapeau irakien flotte avant l'invasion américaine en 2003.

L'armée avait retiré de la ville pour les obsèques, craignant davantage de violence.

Mais lors d'une attaque de venger, des hommes armés ont tué deux soldats et enlèvement trois fois à la périphérie de la ville.

Craintes sectaires

Les dirigeants sunnites dans la province d'Anbar, où se trouve Falloujah, avaient auparavant déclaré à la BBC qu'ils attaqueraient les positions de l'armée dans la province si le gouvernement n'a pas pu traduire les soldats responsables de la fusillade de manifestant "en justice".

Nouri Maliki a conduit le gouvernement irakien depuis 2005

Manifestants réclament lois antiterroristes et autres mesures destinées à être supprimées, disant qu'ils ciblent disproportionnée des sunnites.

Les récentes flambées de violence ont suscité l'inquiétude de son retour à la guerre sectaire qui a caractérisé la période suivant l'invasion américaine de l'Irak.

Manifestations contre le gouvernement, qui est dirigée par le ministre chiite Nouri Maliki, ont eu lieu pendant les cinq dernières semaines, mais les tirs de vendredi a marqué la première confrontation avec l'armée.

Le ministère de la défense a promis une enquête sur la fusillade, mais M. Maliki a déclaré que soldats avaient été attaqués tout d'abord et a averti que les groupes terroristes ont essayé d'exploiter les tensions sectaires.

Pendant ce temps, dans la capitale, Bagdad, Kurdes, sunnites et chiites partis politiques ont voté pour approuver la législation limitant les termes que les premier ministres peut servir - une mesure visant à M. Maliki qui est en fonction depuis 2005.

Les partisans du premier ministre a rejeté la manoeuvre comme inconstitutionnelle, cependant.

Samsung gains tablet market share

Apple and Samsung are also involved in various legal battles over claims of patent infringement Samsung doubled its share of the tablet PC market in the last three months of 2012, research firm IDC has said.

Samsung, which makes the Galaxy range of tablets, sold 7.9 million units, up from 2.2 million a year ago, taking its market share to 15.1%.

Market-leader and iPad-maker Apple saw its share slide to 43.6% from 51.7%, despite also seeing a jump in sales.

The two have been competing to get a greater share of the tablet PC market, seen as key to their overall growth.

Global shipments of tablet PCs surged 75% in the final quarter of 2012 to a record 52.5 million units.

"We expected a very strong fourth quarter, and the market didn't disappoint," said Tom Mainelli, research director of tablets at IDC.

"New product launches from the category's top vendors, as well as new entrant Microsoft, led to a surge in consumer interest and very robust shipments totals during the holiday season."

The numbers are in sharp contrast with the traditional personal computer market, which saw shipments decline during the quarter for the first time in more than five years.

Growing competition The tablet PC market is expected to grow further in the coming years.

A number of firms have launched tablets in an attempt to cash in on the booming sector.

Among the latest entrants has been Microsoft, which launched its Surface tablets, powered by the Windows 8 system, late last year.

However, IDC said that the response to the firm's tablets was "muted at best". Microsoft shipped nearly 900,000 unit in the three months to end of December.

IDC said that higher prices of its products had hurt Microsoft's sales.

However, it added that the firm was likely be a key player in the sector in the long term.

"There is no question that Microsoft is in this tablet race to compete for the long haul," said Ryan Reith, program manager of Mobile Device Trackers at IDC.

The curious US cult of Jane Austen

The film Austenland explores the world of Janeites Two centuries after her most famous work, Jane Austen inspires huge devotion in the US. What makes this most English of writers so appealing to Americans?

She wrote it herself in 1813: "How much sooner one tires of any thing than of a book."

Jane Austen's own work is a case in point. It may be 200 years since her most celebrated novel, Pride and Prejudice, was published, but in the US she is the subject of more wildly devotional fan-worship than ever.

With their conventions, Regency costumes and self-written "sequels" to their heroine's novels, Austen's most dedicated adherents display a fervency easily rivalling that of the subcultures around Star Trek or Harry Potter.

Some Janeites, as they call themselves, write their own fiction imagining the marital exploits of Mr and Mrs Darcy. Others don elaborate period dress and throw Jane Austen-themed tea parties and balls.

Continue reading the main story

Retired teacher Joanne Lannie (second from left), 65, is regional co-ordinator of the South Carolina chapter of the Jane Austen Society of North America

Every year we celebrate Jane Austen's birthday with a formal high tea. We have English tea and sandwiches, and we have quizzes and games too.

Members can wear their best Regency dresses. I had a Regency-style gown made with a 2ft ostrich feather.

It's all about celebrating a great author. It's like Star Trek fans having a convention.

We have about 60 members in our chapter and we meet nine times a year. We hold talks and lectures about Jane Austen at Charleston Library.

I love her fabulous dialogue, her dry sense of humour and her wit. Her stories are universal.

Blogs and forums dedicated to Austen and Austen-style fan fiction abound across the internet. The Jane Austen Society of North America (Jasna) boasts 4,500 members and no fewer than 65 branches.

In October 2012, over 700 Janeites - many attired in bonnets and early 19th Century-style dresses - gathered in Brooklyn, New York for a Jasna event that incorporated three days of lectures, dance workshops, antique exhibitions, a banquet and a ball.

It's a curious phenomenon when one considers that Austen won little fame in her own lifetime, dying aged 41 in 1817 with only six novels to her name.

While she may be regarded as one of the greatest writers in English literature, it's difficult to imagine a similar level of fandom emerging around a novelist like, say, Charles Dickens.

For all that her stories can be by turns bleak and waspish, however, it's the romance of Austen's world that many Janeites say drew them in.

"There's a longing for the elegance of the time," says Myretta Robens, who manages one of the most popular US Austen fan sites, The Republic of Pemberley. "It's an escape."

Screen versions such as Andrew Davies's 1995 BBC adaptation Pride and Prejudice - famously featuring Colin Firth in wet breeches as Mr Darcy - and the 2005 film starring Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennet, contributed to an upswing of interest in all things Austen.

Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle did much to popularise Austen

But this alone does not explain why so many Janeites want to inhabit their favourite writer's world, whether by dressing up in the fashions of the era or writing their own Regency fiction.

"I think it's to do with the fact that we only have six novels and she died fairly young," says Laurel Ann Nattress, who runs the Austenprose blog and edited Jane Austen Made Me Do It, a collection of short stories inspired by the author.

Austen's heroines have all been regularly portrayed in screen adaptations

"People just love her characters and they don't want to give them up."

Robens, however, believes there is a more straightforward reason why readers feel compelled to compose their own versions.

"Quite frankly, I think a lot of people want more sex, particularly with Elizabeth and Darcy," she says.

A perusal of Austen fan sights reveals an abundance of stories with titles like Darcy Meets His Match and The Education of Miss Bennet.

It is not only online amateurs who have attempted to re-imagine these characters, however. Linda Berdoll's 2004 Pride and Prejudice "sequel", Mr Darcy Takes A Wife, was a bestseller.

Helen Fielding has stated her own Bridget Jones's Diary was loosely based on the original Austen plotline - hence the presence of a character named Darcy, played in the film version by Firth. The 1995 comedy Clueless was inspired by Austen's Emma.

Continue reading the main story Born 1775 in Steventon, HampshireFirst novel, Sense and Sensibility, appeared in 1811Followed by Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814) and Emma (1816)Died in Winchester in 1817Two further novels, Persuasion and Northanger Abbey, were published posthumously and a final novel was left incompleteNor is all ersatz Austen concerned with affairs of the heart. PD James's Death Comes to Pemberley involves the married Darcys in a murder mystery. Seth Grahame-Smith's Pride and Prejudice and Zombies re-casts the original novel in an alternate version of Regency England populated by hordes of undead.

The Janeite subculture was itself the subject of a popular comic novel, Shannon Hale's Austenland, a movie version of which premiered at the 2013 Sundance film festival.

Nonetheless, it might be seen as incongruous that Austen's fandom is so extensive in the US, a nation founded on the rejection of aristocracy and old world manners and traditions.

Indeed, when Pride and Prejudice was first published, the UK and US were at war. Nattress, who lives in Snohomish, Washington state, believes US Janeism is an expression of a persistent Anglophile streak in American society.

"I think that we look back to the motherland in many respects," she says.

"Look at the incredible impact Downton Abbey has had over here. It's a perfect example of how America is fascinated by British culture."

But while Austen's sharp prose, ironic wit and vivid characterisation are all key to her appeal, Robens believes that it is the romantic entanglements of her strong-willed heroines that draw so many to the books.

"It's women, in general, who fall in love with them," says Robens. "It's a truth universally acknowledged that women want to read about relationships."

It was not always the case that Austen's fanbase was seen in these terms, however.

Indeed, the term Janeite was initially coined by the male literary critic George Saintsbury. Rudyard Kipling's 1926 short story The Janeites describes a group of soldiers brought together by their passion for the works of Austen.

According to Claudia L Johnson, an Austen expert and professor of English literature at Princeton University, the author was widely regarded well into the 20th Century not as a romantic novelist but as a steely, tough-minded, sardonic social critic.

"Now, alas, Austen is typically seen (by my students and others) as chick lit and she is beloved for her love stories," laments Johnson, author of Jane Austen: Women, Politics, and the Novel. "I think this is a real loss."

Continue reading the main story

It is hard to open a newspaper or click on a news website in America at the moment without reading something about ITV's Downton Abbey.

American Downton fans organise Sunday night viewing parties, shell out on themed merchandise and chat endlessly about the latest plot twists on Twitter and Facebook.

Johnson draws a distinction between the extravagant, amateur Janeites and their more academic counterparts, whom she terms Austenites. They are not categorisations which meet with much approval among most fans.

Nonetheless, Johnson acknowledges that attempting to remake Austen in the reader's own image is a valid exercise.

"Janeites - at least in the US - regard their excesses with a curious mixture of irony and seriousness," she says.

"They know it's absurd to throw tea parties, but the fundamental drive here - to try to be somehow connected with the world and life of a beloved author - isn't absurd."

It's likely Austen would agree. In her early writing she pastiched the 18th Century's so-called novels of sensibility and parodied historical tomes.

As the author herself put it in Pride and Prejudice: "A person who can write a long letter, with ease, cannot write ill."

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Portuguese flee economic crisis

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
25 January 2013 Last updated at 22:35 GMT Many emigrants are heading for the oil-rich former Portuguese colony Angola More than 2% of Portugal's population have emigrated in the past two years, since the country entered the worst recession in decades, officials say.

Jose Cesario, the secretary of state for emigrant communities, said up to 240,000 people had left since 2011.

Most were young, highly-educated people fleeing to Switzerland or the oil-rich former Portuguese colony Angola.

He said more would probably have emigrated had job prospects in Europe not taken a turn for the worse.

Portugal was long known as a country of emigration, says the BBC's Alison Roberts in Lisbon, but during the 1990s the outflow reduced sharply and immigrants flooded in, as the economy boomed.

In the current unprecedented crisis that process has been reversed - this time with many highly educated youngsters leaving, adds our correspondent.

But while in the 1960s most emigrants went to France, today they are more likely to head for Switzerland - where Portuguese now constitute the largest foreign community - or Angola.

"There's a very large increase in Portuguese emigration to Angola. We admit that in 2012 between 25,000 and 30,000 Portuguese left for Angola," Mr Cesario said, adding that the figure was between 5,000 and 10,000 higher than in the previous year.

The numbers heading for Mozambique were also growing fast, he added, while many Portuguese were still striking out for countries closer to home such as Germany, the Netherlands and the UK.

Only Europe's economic slowdown and the high level of unemployment in other EU nations had kept overall emigration from being far higher, the secretary of state said on Friday.

Shooter dies trying to steal some bookmakers

January 26, 2013, last updated at 01: 54 GMT that Walter Louise BBC reports from the scene of the attempted robbery in Plymouth

A sniper hidden has died after having been pushed back and mastered by customers during an armed robbery at a bookmakers based in Plymouth, police said.

The man, in his fifties, in the branch of Ladbrokes in Crownhill road at 18: 45 GMT Friday with a mask gas and holding a gun.

Disarmament of the man and his customers held on the ground, according to police.

Police arrested the man, who was already unconscious upon arrival, but he died a short time later.

"Immediately addressed.

The man has been identified but close have not yet been informed, said Devon and Cornwall Police spokesman.

Spokesman said that when the man entered the shop, he was "immediately approached" by customers and "retained still wear gas mask".

When the police arrived, they attempted to resuscitate the man until the ambulance arrived but he was pronounced dead about 20 minutes later.

The police watchdog, the independent Commission's complaints policy (IPCC), has been informed.

Ch Insp Ian Drummond-Smith said: "it is a very serious incident. We cannot speculate on what took place here today.

"A full investigation has now begun, and while the IPCC conduct their investigations, it is not appropriate to comment further."

Ladbrokes declined to comment.

Spain cycling doping trial begins

January 28, 2013, last updated at 07: 32 GMT Dr. Eufemiano Fuentes is considered to be with her sister and three former coaches doctor A Spanish cyclist must go on trial accused of running one of the largest ever world sport doping rings.

Trial of Dr. Eufemiano Fuentes in Madrid is nearly seven years after the police raided its offices and seized some 200 bags of blood that were linked to a number of top cyclists.

Dozens of cyclists have been called to appear as witnesses in the trial.

Dr. Fuentes, his sister and three former coaches of cycling are charged breaking the law of public health.

They could be charged with crimes related to doping because the Spain had no law against doping at the time of their arrest.

Prosecutors must prove that the actions of the defendants risk the lives of athletes — something the defense should be denied.

The case comes days after the first seven times winner of the Tour de France that Lance Armstrong has finally admitted to the prohibited use drugs and blood doping during his cycling career.

They

Spanish police conducted a series of raids on offices, laboratories and the apartments in Madrid, Zaragoza and El Escorial in May 2006 as part of an investigation called operation Puerto.

They found about 200 bags of blood or plasma frozen with labels that were supposed to be silenced for the clients of Dr Fuentes - athletes who have been allegedly boasting a sophisticated doping program.

Dozens of cyclists have been allegedly involved in the scandal, including the former winner of the Tour de France Alberto Contador who should testify at the trial.

The World Anti-Doping Agency said that it said at the time of the raids, that the blood bags linked to athletes in several sports, including football and tennis.

But the Monday trial will focus only on cyclists who, according to the Chief Prosecutor in the case, are the only athletes who could be identified from the bags of blood seized.

The Spain's anti-doping Agency has said it has no evidence to support the contention that evidence gathered during the raids took place, Tom Burridge of the BBC reports from Madrid.

The trial is expected to last until mid-March and if convicted, the accused face up to two years ' imprisonment and a two-year professional ban.

Roll up for the inauguration

The US presidential inauguration is a unique political spectacle, says historian David Cannadine.

Whenever possible, I like to be in the United States to witness the patriotic festivities and political theatre that once again took place in Washington DC last Monday, for they are an extraordinary amalgam of national celebration and religious fervour, piety and partying, glitz and glory, showbiz and razzle-dazzle.

Nowhere else in the world is there anything quite like an American presidential inauguration, and the fact they've happened once every four years for more than two and a quarter centuries is also unique.

In their fundamentals, the pomp and the ceremonial are essentially unchanging, and all of them since Bill Clinton's second inaugural in 1997 have been available live on the internet, which means it's possible to follow this quintessentially American spectacle as it happens from virtually anywhere in the world.

Continue reading the main story A Point of View is on Fridays on Radio 4 at 20:50 GMT and repeated Sundays, 08:50 GMTDavid Cannadine is a British historian, author and professor of history at Princeton UniversityBut no two presidential inaugurations are ever completely alike, even if they involve the same president, and to catch the special mood and the immediate resonances, you ideally need to be somewhere in the US when and as they happen.

This time, a delayed flight from Britain meant I viewed President Obama's second inauguration on a small screen, high above the snow and clouds, somewhere in the mid-Atlantic.

Bad winter weather almost invariably leads to the cancellation of many flights to and from Britain, but while temperatures can often be sub-zero in Washington DC at this time of year, the cold and the snow have never been so severe that a presidential inauguration has yet been called off. On occasions, though, the programme has been modified to take account of the icy conditions, and the swearing-in has sometimes been held inside the Capitol building rather than outside - in 1909, when William Howard Taft took the oath of office, and again in 1985 when President Reagan was inaugurated for the second time.

Ronald Reagan is still the oldest American president to hold office, and he'd been lucky to have survived an assassination attempt early in his first term, so there was good reason to be concerned about his health on a colder than average Washington winter day.

Ronald Reagan's 1985 inauguration - one of only two ever held indoors

And there was one earlier unhappy episode, dating from 1841, which no one on Reagan's staff wanted to become a precedent. That year, President William Henry Harrison delivered an inaugural address of more than 8,000 words, which lasted almost two hours, and he refused to wear a coat or a hat.

As a result of such prolonged exposure to the bitter cold, Harrison promptly caught pneumonia, and died a month later, thereby achieving the double and ironic distinction of the longest inaugural address, and the shortest American presidency.

Fortunately, most inaugurals have been more concise, the briefest of them all being George Washington's second, which was only 135 words long. On Monday, Barack Obama spoke for 18 minutes, which is about average for recent addresses. He took the oath of office on two bibles which had been owned by two of his heroes, Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King.

Obama's speech was less euphoric and exultant than his first inaugural, and after four years of bruising battles with a gridlocked Congress, he had toned down his high-minded appeals to put an end to partisan bickering and the old style of politics, and for those belonging to both parties to come together in the national interest.

But it was a confident and eloquent performance from a president who, for the moment at least, seems not only to have been re-elected, but also to have recaptured the political initiative. There was still plenty for his supporters to cheer.

In general, second inaugural addresses tend to be very different in tone and substance from those delivered by incoming presidents four years earlier. A new administration means new people in Washington, new policies to get the country moving again, a new beginning and the hope of national revival.

Abraham Lincoln: "With malice towards none and with charity for all"

Such, at least, are the claims often made in first inaugurals, and sometimes at least, they turn out to be true.

In 1861, facing the prospect of civil war, Lincoln exhorted all Americans to be friends not enemies, and appealed (vainly as it turned out), to what he memorably called "the better angels of our nature".

In 1933, during the darkest days of the Great Depression, Franklin Roosevelt declared that "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself", and offered a "new deal" to the American people, promising a period of bold, vigorous and continuous experimentation, which he hoped would reduce unemployment and get American workers back into jobs.

Second inaugurals, by contrast, are often less upbeat and uplifting, since it's no longer possible for a president, having already been four years in office, to offer a new deal, or to proclaim, as Obama did in 2009, that "change is coming to America".

One alternative is to play it safe - to say, as both Reagan and Clinton did, that the national revival they promised had indeed begun during their first term, and that they would devote their second term to seeing it through.

But other presidents have been more rash. Richard Nixon announced that his administration would "answer to God, to history and to our conscience for the way in which we use these years", which was giving a serious hostage to fortune, for the impending Watergate scandal meant there would soon be plenty of answering to be done.

And George W Bush proclaimed that the US would work to expand "freedom in all the world", a laudable enterprise, no doubt, but one which, at least in Iraq and Afghanistan, has met with questionable success while costing a great deal in American lives and money.

Among second inaugural addresses, the greatest remains that delivered by Lincoln in 1865, which was made all the more poignant because he was assassinated soon after. By then, the Civil War was almost over, and Lincoln had preserved the union, emancipated the slaves and given the Gettysburg address, which included his great panegyric on democracy as "government of the people, by the people, for the people".

But now he had to try to pull the nation together, speaking "with malice towards none and with charity for all", "with high hope for the future", and expressing his resolve to "finish the work we are in". And so he pledged himself "to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, [and] to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace".

By comparison with the challenges that Lincoln faced in 1865, the problems confronting Obama may seem of secondary significance. The American people may be divided, but the president doesn't have to bring the American nation back from the very brink of disintegration and dissolution, as Lincoln did.

Yet the challenges Obama faces can scarcely be dismissed as trivial - a still-depressed economy, a spiralling national debt, millions of illegal immigrants, climate change, global warming and gun control, and the seemingly intractable problems in Afghanistan, the Middle East and now in north Africa too. Lincoln's concerns were primarily domestic and political, but Obama's are economic and global as well.

For one brief day, a presidential inauguration may be a celebration of freedom, democracy and of national unity, and in calling upon Americans to "seize the moment", Obama gave an assertive articulation of the liberal agenda he hopes to implement.

But the Republican opposition is already gathering force, and as he begins his second term, the president may soon be wondering where are to be found those "better angels of our nature" when you really need them?

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Russia curbs 'worst since USSR'

Russia has seen big anti-government protests following the 2011 parliamentary elections Russian President Vladimir Putin has unleashed the worst political crackdown in the country's post-Soviet era, a human rights group has said.

In a report, Human Rights Watch said Mr Putin had signed a raft of laws quashing freedoms after his return to the Kremlin for a third term in 2012.

Mr Putin's fear of mass street protests had been behind the moves, the report's authors said.

Moscow has so far made no direct comment on the document's findings.

Russian foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said an official statement would be issued soon.

But he added that Russia's "human rights situation is not the worst" and its critics were not "perfect" themselves, pointing to alleged human rights abuses in the US and the EU.

'Swift reversal'

The New York-based HRW issued its annual world report on Thursday, analysing key human rights issues in more than 90 countries - including Russia - in 2011-12.

Referring to the situation in Russia, the watchdog said in a statement: "The Kremlin in 2012 unleashed the worst political crackdown in Russia's post-Soviet history."

The report highlighted further curbs and fines for staging public demonstrations, a wider definition of treason and restrictions on internet content - measures seen by critics as attempts by the Kremlin to quash public dissent.

It also said that Mr Putin's return to power last May "oversaw the swift reversal of former President Dmitry Medvedev's few, timid advances on political freedoms".

Russia has seen big anti-government protests in Moscow and other major cities following the December 2011 parliamentary elections, which saw the pro-government United Russia's party retain power - although with a much reduced majority.

The opposition described the elections as fraudulent - a claim denied by the Kremlin.

A number of opposition leaders are now facing jail on charges that the opposition says are politically motivated.

Sporting events shine spotlight on Qatar's human rights

Qatar has imported Western sports; some want it to import Western freedoms A Qatari poet is due to appear at the Court of Appeal in Doha, to ask that his life sentence be commuted. His crime: to have written a poem which was deemed to have insulted the emir and the ruling family.

At the same time, Qatar is continuing with its preparations to show a very different side of itself: staging some major international sporting events - none bigger than the 2022 Fifa World Cup.

So how far should the right to hold such a tournament depend on a minimum standard of human rights at home?

'Imports'

It was on 24 August 2010 that Mohammed al-Ajami, also known as Mohammed Ibn al-Dheeb, visited an apartment in Cairo.

He was a third-year Arab literature student at Cairo University. In the company of seven other people, Mr Ajami recited his latest poem, a paean to the Tunisian Revolution.

"We are all Tunisia," Mr Ajami declared. "We are standing up against the repressive elite." He did not mention his home country, Qatar, by name. Rather, he directed his ire at all governments in the region.

He ended by asking: "These rulers import all that the West has to offer.

"So why then don't they import law and freedom?"

The poem was recorded by one of the seven people in the apartment and uploaded onto the internet.

In November 2011, some time after his return to Qatar, Mr Ajami was arrested.

He was later tried and, just over a year later, sentenced to life in prison on charges of "inciting to overthrow the ruling system" and "insulting the emir".

The right time?

"He's only said a poem!" says his lawyer in Qatar, Najeeb al-Nuaimi, his voice rising in exasperation. Mr Ajami did not even recite it in public, but just "to his colleagues and friends inside an apartment", he adds.

Mr Nuaimi argues that the poem was not directed specifically at the emir or the crown prince, but that offence was looked for by the authorities.

The charge of insulting the emir carries a five-year prison sentence in Qatar

"They brought some people from the ministry of culture, and told them to make an interpretation of this poem. Maybe the ministry of religion here can interpret the people when they have a dream?"

No-one at the Qatari ministry of justice was available for comment on the Ajami case.

But it was no lesser dignitary than Her Highness Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser al-Missned, one of the emir's wives, who in 2010 raised a rather pertinent question at the very start of her official presentation of Qatar's bid to stage the 2022 World Cup.

Looking directly at her audience in Zurich - the men right at the top of Fifa - she began her speech: "When? When do you think is the right time for the World Cup to come to the Middle East?"

The answer, from the bigwigs of Fifa, was "now". Qatar would be indeed given the right to stage the World Cup.

The emirate had convinced the powers of world football that it could build the stadiums and the transport network, provide the preferential tax regime and handle the global media rights necessary for a World Cup.

'No transparency'

But should the prize of a big sports tournament also hang on adherence to basic democratic values? Within Qatar, a tiny minority are willing to take the risk, and voice concerns.

One of them is the academic, Ali al-Kuwari. His pamphlet, Qataris for Reform, questions, among other things, whether the oil-rich emirate is wasting its finite wealth on ephemeral "transformational" projects, rather than long-term investment.

Critics say Qatar is wasting money on ephemeral "transformational" projects

"There is no transparency regarding the public accounts," he says. "It's non-existent.

"One of our fundamental demands is to provide us with transparency on the national budget - on the losses and gains of domestic and foreign investments."

It has been widely assumed that most Qataris are delighted at the prospect of hosting the World Cup and other major sports tournaments.

But even here, Mr Kuwari raises an eyebrow.

"I can't say for sure if the people welcome it, because nobody asks the Qataris their opinion about this matter. Decision are are taken out of the blue and we have to accept them," he says.

"Another example I can mention here is the construction of military bases in Qatar; overnight these bases were set up here, and the people had no say one way or another about the matter.

"The same thing applies to the education system. There's no debate, no discussion."

Contradiction

Clearly, upholding political or civil rights was not a deal-breaker for awarding the Olympics to Beijing in 2008, or Moscow in 1980.

But Mr Nuaimi, the lawyer for the imprisoned poet, and himself a former minister of justice in Qatar, argues that there should be some linkage.

"It matters," he says. "We are making reform around the Arab world. Why don't we do it ourselves? We have to reform our society, our legal system, our political system. Then we can stand for any events around the world."

Qatar is currently preparing itself to bid for the biggest bauble of the lot, the Olympics in 2024.

A few years ago, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned the Olympic Movement that human rights abuses directly contradict Olympic ideals.

For those who run sport, the question remains: how heavy should that contradiction weigh?

Silver haul donated to Ashmolean

The haul of nearly 500 items, described as the most important gift to a British museum for over a century, was donated by the late collector Michael Wellby.

The collection includes a rare lapis lazuli bowl, made by Dutch goldsmith Paulus van Vianen, valued at £3m.

A selection of the objects will go on temporary display from next month.

They will be housed in the museum's West Meets East gallery before the entire collection is showcased in a permanent gallery.

Professor Tim Wilson, keeper of the department of western art, said: "The Ashmolean is extremely grateful to Michael and his family.

Oxford's Ashmolean Museum has received a donation of silver treasures from Michael Wellby

"This is the most important accession of objects of this sort to any UK museum since the bequest of objects from Waddesdon Manor by Ferdinand Rothschild to the British Museum in 1898."

Much of the collection was assembled in the 1940s from German sources, and Professor Wilson conceded some of the pieces may later transpire to have been looted by the Nazis.

He told the BBC's Arts and Culture Correspondent, David Sillito: "Michael was never terribly forthcoming about where things have come from so there's quite a lot of research about that to be done.

"It is perfectly true that these are the kinds of objects which Jewish collectors had in quantity. It is not impossible that one or two of these objects may, as research goes on, prove to have come from collections which were the subject of spoliation during the Nazi period.

"The British Government has a very honourable system of dealing with claims from affected families. The museum is fully signed up to that."

Wellby, who died last year, was a renowned Mayfair dealer, specialising in German silver of the 16th and 17th Centuries. He sold many of the pieces he acquired through the family business but held on to some of the more exceptional items for his personal collection.

One of the most significant pieces is a silver gilt ewer, or pitcher, made in Portugal around 1510-15, which is enamelled with the Royal Arms of Portugal.

Other pieces incorporate ivory, agate, shell, and rock crystal.

Wellby's personal jewellery collection was auctioned off at Sotheby's last month, raising more than £2.8m.

US incomes jump ahead of tax rise

Despite the big jump in incomes, the growth in consumer spending slowed during the month US personal incomes jumped 2.6% in December, the biggest monthly increase since 2004, as high earners sought to beat a New Year tax rise.

The month was marked by accelerated bonus and dividend payments, the US Commerce Department said.

Income tax cuts dating back to George W Bush's presidency were due to expire in the New Year as part of the "fiscal cliff" of tax rises and spending cuts.

Despite the boost to incomes, consumer spending rose only 0.2% in the month.

"Personal income in November and December was boosted by accelerated and special dividend payments to persons and by accelerated bonus payments and other irregular pay in private wages and salaries in anticipation of changes in individual income tax rates," the Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Analysis said.

In the event, the tax rises went ahead only for individuals earning more than $400,000 (£250,000), as part of a last-minute deal negotiated between Republicans and Democrats in Congress to avert the fiscal cliff, with the top tax rate rising from 35% to just under 40%.

Capital gains tax also rose on 1 January.

Special factors

The 2.6% increase in incomes in December came on top of an unusually high 1% rise the month before.

Other factors also exaggerated the income increases in the two months, including lump-sum benefit payments handed out in December, and the loss of income for many in the New York area during October because of disruption from Storm Sandy.

Excluding all of these special factors, incomes rose 0.6% in November and just 0.4% in December - in line with the trend increase during the rest of the year.

Most of the windfall income was not spent, with the US personal savings rate increasing from 4.1% of income in November to 6.5% in December.

Indeed, the seasonally-adjusted growth in spending slowed noticeably in the run-up to Christmas, from 0.6% in November to 0.2% in December.

"Consumers finally realised about the tax increase so they pulled back a bit on their spending during the holiday season," said Sam Bullard, senior economist at Wells Fargo.

Consumer spending is expected to remain weak in the New Year, owing to the impact of a rise in payroll taxes, also agreed as part of the fiscal cliff deal.

Personal incomes are also likely to experience a drag in January and over the coming months, reflecting the fact that most of the increase recorded in December was merely income that had been brought forwards.

Verdicts fans cause disturbances in Egypt

January 26, 2013, last updated at 17: 49 GMT Aleem even: "this was always going to be a case where it was going to be violence"

At least 30 dead in Port Said, officials say, in clashes triggered by the sentencing to death of 21 local people during the riots of football in Egypt.

Supporters of the defendants tried to storm the prison that held and attacked police stations.

The 21 were sentenced during the riots that killed 74 people after a football game at the Port Said Stadium in February.

Violence Saturday following a day of unrest on the second anniversary of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak.

National defence of Egypt Board, led by Chairman Mohammed Morsi, has condemned the violence and calls for dialogue, saying that he would consider declaring a curfew in the areas affected if necessary.

Thousands of people took the streets Friday to express their opposition to the Islamist president, accusing him of betraying the revolution.

Continue reading the main story 74 people killed in Port Said stadium on 2 February 2012Clashes has broken out between rival fans of clubs al-Masry and flooded field offensive Ahly players and fans as game endedMost died of a concussion, cuts and suffocationThe more dead people historyAt at least seven for the Egyptian football al-AhlyFans was killed and more than 450 injured in unrest across Egypt.

The 21 defendants sentenced to death Saturday have been fans of the club al-Masry Port Said. When the verdicts were announced by a judge at the Court of Cairo, relatives of the victims applauded.

However, the decision has been supporters of the defendants to go on a rampage in Port Said. Two policemen were shot dead outside the prison of the city and strengthening of the security of the State has reportedly set on fire.

At least 28 people were killed and about 300 were wounded in further clashes, said officials.

Two football players were among those killed in clashes Saturday, reported State News Agency Mena. They are goalkeeper former al-Masry al-Fahlah of Tahir and Muhammad al-Dadhawi, a player to a club lower Port Said.

The violence has continued despite the deployment of units of the army in the streets of the city.

Meanwhile, in Cairo, clashes also erupted between police and protesters near the Ministry of the Interior of the Egypt. Police fired tear gas in an attempt to prevent them from reaching the building.

Stones and Fireworks

Last year football riots led to the suspension of the League.

Continue reading the main story Yolande knell BBC News

Cairo and Port Said have seen dramatic clashes in the past 24 hours, but for different reasons.

Ultras, die-hard fans of al-Ahly, the most successful club of the Egypt, invaded the streets of the capital to show satisfaction after 21 people were sentenced to death for their role in the violence of football last February.

They waved the Red of their club flag as they clashed with police near Tahrir square, where crowds had gathered earlier to mark the second anniversary of the uprising of January 25.

Ultras played a key role in the protests that brought down president Mubarak. Many think that the Loyalists Mubarak hatched a plot to target them to the game outside of al-Ahly to the team of al-Masry Port Said and criticize the police for failing to act.

In Port Said, the violence broke out, to the Criminal Court, when members of the family of the condemned men rushed forward to try to release them, killing two police officers. Ultras al-Masry also the carnage. They argue that these verdicts were political.

They began minutes after the match, al-Masry fans invaded the field, throwing stones and Fireworks to visit supporters of al Ahly Cairo club.

A section of supporters of al-Ahly, known as "ultras", played a key role in the protests against the former president Mubarak.

Some accused supporters of the overthrown head of inciting violence in Port Said. They also accused the police of doing little to prevent the violence.

Seventy-three people, including nine police officers, were found during the fighting stage. Neither is al-Ahly fans.

The judge said that he would announce verdicts for the remaining defendants on March 9.

Economic "collapse".

Friday saw a large anti-Government rally in Tahrir square in Cairo, with supporters of the opposition of the clashes with the police.

There were also disturbances in 12 of the country's 27 provinces. At least six of the deaths occurred in Suez.

In Ismailia, demonstrators set fire to the headquarters of freedom and Justice, the domestic political Muslim Brotherhood. Siege of the city governorate was later also supported assault.

The liberal opposition accuses Mr. Morsi to be autocratic and led by a new constitution that does not adequately protect the freedom of expression or religion.

The Government is also responsible for the worsening of the economic crisis.

One of the protesters in the Cairo's Tahrir square Momen Asour said he had come to demand an end to the rule of president Morsi.

"We have not seen anything, nor freedom, or social justice or a solution to unemployment or any investment," he said. "On the contrary, the economy has collapsed."

President Morsi and his allies have rejected the request, saying that they have a democratic mandate after the recent elections. The constitution, drawn up by a body dominated by the Islamists, was approved by a referendum last month.

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Washington rally for gun control

Thousands of people rallied in Washington DC, calling for stricter gun controls as they walked from the Capitol to the Washington Monument.

The crowd included people of Newtown, Connecticut, where a school shooting last month has reignited a debate on the safety and security of firearms.

They made banners with the names of the victims of the violence of arms firearms and daubed messages like "Gun Control Now".

Speakers ask them to exert political pressure to support the reform of the control of weapons.

"Fewer children dead" continue reading the main story while some 46 per cent of households and 29% of people stated that they possessed a firearm in 1990, two decades later it had fallen to 32% and 21%.DC has most gun homicides; Connecticut less than averageFor more statistics, as well as the difference between a pistol and a semi-automatic rifle, visit the BBC in the statistics: firearms in the United StatesSecretary of education Arne Duncan said a student died of gun every two weeks, while he was CEO of Chicago public schools.

But he denied that gun control would limit a weapon to fire the rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.

"It's about the responsibility of the firearms. It is about the safety of firearms. It's less dead Americans, less dead children, fewer children are living in fear, he said.

Speaking alongside lawyers and Hollywood actors such as Kathleen Turner, the speakers call supported by president Barack Obama style ban on military assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines, as well as the background checks wider on firearms buyers.

Mr. Obama has also proposed giving school districts funds to hire uniformed police officers to keep schools.

Warcraft film director is named

Newsbeat reporter Duncan Jones with Jake Gyllenhaal, who starred in 2011's Source Code Source Code director Duncan Jones is to make a film based on the World of Warcraft video games by Blizzard Entertainment.

With more than 10 million subscribers globally, World of Warcraft is the world's biggest MMORPG, or massively multiplayer online role-playing game.

The film's total budget is believed to be in excess of $100 million (£63 million).

The director's first film, Moon, cost $5 million (£3.1m) in 2009.

Continue reading the main story

So the gauntlet was thrown down ages ago. Can you make a proper movie of a video game. I've always said its possible. Got to do it now

Duncan Jones

He followed it with Source Code, in 2011, starring Jake Gyllenhaal which had an estimated budget of $32 million (£20m).

The British/American science fiction techno/thriller then went on to gross more than $147 million (£92m) worldwide.

A statement on the Warcraft Facebook page said: "We are pleased to announce that Duncan Jones, director of critically-acclaimed films Source Code and Moon, has signed to direct the upcoming live-action film based on the Warcraft universe."

The director, who was born in Bromley, south London, also confirmed his involvement on Twitter.

"So the gauntlet was thrown down ages ago," he said. "Can you make a proper movie of a video game?

"I've always said it's possible. Got to do it now."

Warcraft has a script by Blood Diamond writer Charles Leavitt, but plot details are being kept secret.

The film will begin shooting this year for a release some time in 2015.

Duncan Jones is the son of 1960s pop star David Bowie.

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The story of life in a prison city

  Throughout the bitter days of the Warsaw Ghetto, a clandestine group of researchers compiled a vast archive detailing every aspect of life in this prison city built and then obliterated by the Nazis. Led by a historian, Emanuel Ringelblum, the group then buried the archive for for future generations.

On the hot night of 3 August 1942, 19-year-old David Graber signed his name on a piece of paper and put it inside a metal box at 68 Nowolipki Street, in the heart of the Warsaw Ghetto.

"I would love to see the moment in which the great treasure will be dug up and scream the truth at the world," he wrote. "May the treasure fall into good hands, may it last into better times, may it alarm and alert the world to what happened… in the 20th Century… May history be our witness."

David knew that he might have only hours, or minutes. German soldiers had arrived in the next street. Two weeks before, they had begun to drive the half-million Jewish men, women and children living in the ghetto into trains taking them to the new death camp at Treblinka.

On 2 August, 6,276 people had been taken. On 3 August, another 6,458 were seized.

With David was another teenager, Nahum Grzywacz, and a teacher, Israel Lichtensztajn. The three were part of a colossal, secret attempt to record every detail of ghetto life in an archive - David's "great treasure". The codename for this project was Oyneg Shabbes (Joy of the Sabbath).

The Oyneg Shabbes collaborators had amassed tens of thousands of documents by August 1942. Some were written, in the form of diaries, essays and commissioned surveys, poetry and precise reportage in Yiddish, Polish and other European languages.

Others were gathered. Hundreds of paintings, sketches, maps, tram tickets, recipes and even photographs secretly developed in the ghetto were carefully wrapped in paper and stored.

Unearthed from the archive Continue reading the main story The researchers filled 10 of the metal boxes, bound them with cord and hid them inside the brick foundations of 68 Nowolipki, an old school building.

"I only wish to be remembered," reads Lichtenstzajn's last note on behalf of himself and his wife, a well-known artist. "I wish my wife to be remembered, Gele Seksztajn. I wish my little daughter to be remembered. Margalit is 20 months old today."

The man behind the Oyneg Shabbes was a historian and social activist, Emanuel Ringelblum.

Ringelblum with wife Yehudit and son Yuri before the war, then a teacher

He was living with his wife and young son in Warsaw when the armies of Germany advanced through Europe and into Poland - the heartland of European Jewry.

Continue reading the main story

One of the documents unearthed was The Telephone, a poem by Wladyslaw Szlengel (1924-1943):

With heart all shattered and ailing/ With thoughts to the 'other side flown,/ I sat there, while light was failing,/ by the telephone.

And thought: yes, I will ring someone,/ someone on that 'other side',/ when it's my turn to be minding/ the phone tonight.

I suddenly think: God Almighty -/ I know no one - have nothing to say -/ I in the year Thirty-Nine/ went a quite different way.

From What I Read to the Dead: Poems From The Depths of Hell by Wladyslaw Szlengel translated by Marcel Weyland

Polish Jewish families in their tens of thousands were driven into walled prison cities known as ghettos, or fled to Warsaw thinking they'd be safe in a modern capital in which every third person was Jewish. They were not.

"The Saturday the ghetto was introduced was terrible," wrote Ringelblum in November 1940. "People in the street didn't know it was going to be a closed ghetto, so it came like a thunderbolt."

Ringelblum began by recording each day of of his appalling times himself. But gradually he invited more and more trusted contacts to join in. Some wrote in Polish, but most in Yiddish.

To Ringelblum, the revival and maintenance of Yiddish was of paramount importance, in a population filled with intense debate about its identity and under pressure as never before. Each document provides a precise and personal insight into life in a community that still hoped and planned for peace.

Snatched photographs show smugglers vaulting the three-metre wall with the sacks of food which helped the majority just avoid starvation.

A recipe for frozen potatoes, an article on rotten fish cooked with saccharine and synthetic honey speak of how far those scraps of food stretched.

Researchers logged the words to the cries of beggars, and advertisements for umpteen adult education classes from physics to paper flower making.

Continue reading the main story Holocaust Memorial Day (27 January) is a national event in the UK dedicated to the remembrance of Holocaust victimsTo mark it, poems written by children in the Terezin concentration camp have formed the inspiration for an art exhibition"I bambini della Shoah" or "Children of the Holocaust" explores the themes of childhood, freedom and, above all, hope (see link below)"Everyone wrote," recorded Ringelblum. "Journalists and writers of course but also teachers, public men, young people - even children. A tremendous amount was written... a photograph of life."

Commissioning, writing and collecting was structured tightly. Secretaries made copies in triplicate, in case the project was uncovered, even using the typewriters and carbon paper of the Judenrat, the Jewish council set up by the Germans. No single person knew the whereabouts of all the documents, in order to create a security firewall.

Each document reveals the sharp, bright detail of real life. We meet the poet, Wladislaw Szlengel, as he sits by his phone in the ghetto, looking through his window to the park on the other side. The phone still works - but he has no one to call in the other Warsaw beyond the wall, the one he called home before 1940.

The bitter jokes in the archive still work: "Hitler comes to the other world. Sees Jesus in Paradise. 'Hey, what's a Jew doing without an armband?' 'Let him be,' answers St Peter. 'He's the boss's son.'"

Other testimonies mark the many who died without trace.

"Terrible case of a three-year-old refugee child," Ringelblum writes of a family sent by train to the ghetto. "The guard threw the child into the snow. Its mother jumped off the wagon and tried to save the child. The guard threatened to shoot all the Jews in the wagon. The mother arrived in Warsaw and here went out of her mind."

The concert programmes and tickets preserved give a glimpse of names once famous in what had been a sophisticated European capital. There are performances by world-class musicians from the Warsaw Radio Orchestra and the Philharmonic.

Continue reading the main story

Janina Dawidowicz was a nine-year-old girl when World War II engulfed Poland. As Jews, she and her family were soon driven into the Warsaw Ghetto, but she later escaped and remains one of its few survivors.

Staff from the Electro-Syrena record company were also confined within the ghetto. The first record label in Poland, Electro-Syrena, had been bringing out popular dance music in Polish and Yiddish since 1904, a back-list of 14,000 titles. In the long summer of 1939, weeks before the German invasion, it produced a smokey foxtrot that would be its last record.

One of the label's greatest stars, the elegant Artur Gold, was so famous to his German captors that they made him perform at Treblinka, wearing a clown suit, before they killed him.

David Graber, Nahum Grzywacz, Israel Lichtensztajn, Gele Seksztajn, 20-month-old Margalit, Emanuel Ringelblum, Yehudit Ringelblum, Uri Ringelblum, the poet Wladislaw Szlengel, the orchestras, the staff of the Electro-Syrena label, Artur Gold - none of them survived the war.

Nor did Nowolipki Street. In 1943, after the ghetto uprising, German soldiers blasted the shabby streets still standing into rubble and ash.

But three members of the Oyneg Shabbes inner circle did come through.

In September 1946, after weeks of planning and calculation, they estimated where the hiding place must have been and dug beneath the rubble. The 10 boxes were still there, intact, and the papers legible, bar some water damage.

35,000 documents from the archive were unearthed in 1950

Then in 1950, labourers at one of the new post-war housing estates in what was now communist Warsaw stumbled upon two metal milk churns filled with documents.

Around 35,000 documents were recovered in total. All efforts to find the last cache - the biggest - have failed.

Most recently, archaeologists looked under the garden of the Chinese embassy on what was Nowolipki Street, but found nothing but the burnt scraps of a diary.

The rest of the archive may still be under Warsaw.

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