BBC News:烏克蘭下令武裝部隊進入戰(zhàn)備狀態(tài)
Ukraine's interim President Olexander Turchynov says the country's armed forces have beenput on full combat alert. The announcement made in a national televised address followedthe decision by the Upper House of the Russian Parliament authorizing President Putin todeploy Russian troops to Ukraine if he felt it necessary. Earlier, Ukraine's Prime Minister ArseniyYatsenyuk said his government was convinced Moscow would not engage in militaryintervention as that would mean war and the end of relations between the two countries.David Stern reports from Kiev.
Mr. Turchynov and Mr. Yatsenyuk made their statements after a three-hour long meeting ofUkraine's Security and Defence heads. Mr. Yatsenyuk also said he was convinced Russia wouldnot launch an invasion, given the repercussions. A Kremlin spokesman said Mr. Putin haddecided whether to send troops into Ukraine.
In the Ukrainian Republic of Crimea, the newly installed Prime Minister Sergiy Aksyonov hasbrought forward a referendum on the Peninsula status to March 30th. On Thursday, theregion's parliament called for a vote towards the end of May. Mark Lowen reports from Yalta inCrimea.
Crimea is lurching ever-closer towards conflict. The crisis here intensifying daily. After armedgroups occupied airports and communications buildings, the Ukrainian defense ministeraccused Moscow of sending 6,000 troops and 30 armed vehicles to back up its Black Seafleets. The new pro-Russian prime minister of Crimea brought forward a referendum onindependence to the end of this month saying all military and security services here are nowunder his control. The heightened tension is not only being felt here, there have been largepro-Russia demonstrations in the eastern Ukrainian cities of Donetsk and Kharkiv, as crowdstried unsuccessfully to occupy the administration buildings.
Meanwhile, the United Nations Security Council is holding another urgent meeting to discuss thecrisis in Ukraine. The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has called for an immediaterestoration of calm and direct dialogue between all concerned. His comments were echoed bythe European Union's Foreign Policy chief Catharine Ashton who described Moscow's decisionon Russian armed force as an unwarranted escalation of tensions.
In China, a group of men armed with knives has killed at least 27 people at a train station in thesouthwestern city of Kunming. The official news agency Xinhua says more than 100 people wereinjured. Witnesses, writing on Chinese social media, said the attackers, many wearing blackrushed at waiting passengers, slashing and stabbing those too slow to run away. Picturesposted on the Internet showed bodies in pools of blood. The authorities called it apremeditated terrorist attack, although they are not saying who carried it out. Local media saidseveral of the attackers were shot by police.
World News from the BBC
Thousands of people have marched in the Swiss capital Bern in protest last month'sreferendum which approved immigration quotes for European Union citizens. AlthoughSwitzerland is not a member of the EU, it had singed up to the free movement of people aspart of a series of agreements aimed at protecting its access to Europe's single market.
A senior United Nations official has broken ranks with UN and publicly called for compensationfor the victims of a cholera epidemic in Haiti which killed thousands of people since it beganfour years ago. The UN's top Human Right officer in Haiti has called for those responsible to bepunished as Mark Doyle reports.
Over 8,000 people have died from cholera in Haiti since 2010. It has been shown beyondreasonable doubt that the United Nations soldiers spread the disease by dumping infectedsewage near a river. The UN has claimed diplomatic immunity . But now a senior UN HumanRights lawyer Gustavo Gallon has publicly broken ranks, saying silence is the worst response.Mr. Gallon said in a new UN report that those responsible should be punished and the victimscompensated.
Reports from the northeast of Nigeria say a jet has bombed a village in Borno state. Oneeyewitness told the BBC that about 20 civilians were killed and 25 others were wounded in theair strike which took place on Friday night close to the border with Cameroon. It's not knownwho carried out the attack, but the Nigerian military has previously bombed villages that itbelieves sheltering members of Boko Haram, an Islamist insurgent group.
A court in the southwestern Nigerian state of Osun handed out lengthy prison sentences totwo men convicted of stealing the state governor's phone and using it to defraud people in hiscontact list. The men had used governor Rauf Aregbesola's phone to impersonate him andpersuade his acquaintances to make payments.
BBC News
