13 January - BBC News

 Mexico updates four years of drug war deaths to 34,612

President Felipe Calderon acknowledged that 2010, which saw 15,273 deaths, had been "a year of extreme violence". Half of the murders were in three northern states. The figures include the killings of gang members, police and troops, as well as innocent bystanders. 

Other states had been virtually untouched by the violence, with Yucatan and Tlaxcala registering fewer than 10 crime-related murders in 2010. 

"There's evidence that this phenomenon is due to conflicts between different criminal groups passing more and more from drug trafficking to activities such as extortion, people trafficking and piracy"

• 30,913 execution-style killings
• 3,153 killed in rival gang clashes
• 546 killed in clashes with the security forces

 President Calderon launched his offensive against the drug gangs after taking office in December 2006

Juarez killings activist Chavez murdered in Mexico

A Mexican activist who led protests against the unsolved killings of hundreds of women in Ciudad Juarez has herself been murdered.  Ms Chavez tried to draw attention to the killing of mainly poor women in the border town in the 1990s. 

The Chihuahua State Attorney General's Office said she was killed by three teenagers high on drugs, who cut off her hand to make it look like the murder was connected to organised crime.

 Brazil flood and mudslide deaths rise as search goes on

In the mountain towns of Nova Friburgo, Teresopolis and Petropolis, the reported death tolls are at least 168, 152 and 36 respectively. Officials in Brazil's civil defence department have warned there could be hundreds more bodies yet to be recovered in Teresopolis alone.

More than 800 rescue workers are conducting searches in the area. 

Civil defence officials in Teresopolis said that the city was soaked with 144mm of rain in 24 hours - more than the usual amount for the whole of January.
Power and telephone lines are down in the three towns, and there is no drinking water. Major roads have been cut by floods and landslides.
One resident described the situation just outside Petropolis as a "sea of mud".
"I've lived here 25 years and never seen anything like it," Manoel Candido da Rocha Sobrinho told Folha website.
"I live in a higher spot but when I look down I just see a sea of mud. Most people saved themselves by scrambling up trees or fleeing to higher ground."
Earlier this week, torrential rains in neighbouring Sao Paulo state left 13 people dead and brought traffic chaos to Brazil's biggest city.

• The towns, which lie in a region called the Serrana, are popular holiday destinations for city dwellers keen to enjoy fresh mountain air and verdant surroundings
• They also attract mountain climbers from around the country and elsewhere
• In the 19th Century they were a popular summer destination for emperors and aristocrats. Petropolis was named after Emperor Pedro II, and is known as the Imperial City of Brazil
• The area also has historical links with German and Swiss settlers
• Tourism has replaced agriculture as the region's principal economic activity
• The towns' populations have quadrupled over the last 30 years, according to the local governor

 

Battle to reach thousands of Sri Lanka flood victims

More than 325,000 people had been displaced by flooding. At least 23 people have died and more than a million are affected.

Image via WikipediaThe priority since the rains abated on Thursday has been to deliver emergency food and medical supplies.
In the centre and east, farmland has been flooded and rice fields destroyed.
Thousands of people who fled the flooding are now living in camps on higher ground. in some cases those camps in turn have been flooded; late on Wednesday reports said 25 out of 200 had been inundated in the coastal area of Batticaloa.Image via Wikipedia
More than one million people have been affected by the floods. they have either been forced from their homes or have seen their property flooded.
"Access to clean water is becoming a major problem and we and other agencies are distributing purification tablets."
The UN says that crocodiles and snakes are a threat to anyone wading through the flood waters.
Mr Fletcher said that the floods were especially bad news for people in the east, who in recent years have also endured a civil war and a tsunami.
The floods have left some stretches of railway line under nearly a metre of water.
Officials in Ampara to the south of Batticaloa say the rainfall there since Saturday has been the highest ever recorded in such a short time.
A number of big reservoirs have burst their banks, destroying paddy fields in a major rice-growing area.

• People in the central districts of Matale and Badulla are being evacuated because of the laImage via Wikipediandslide threat
• Vegetable prices have risen sharply because there is no means of transportation to the wholesale markets
• The temperature in Colombo dropped to 18.8C on Wednesday - the lowest recorded for 61 years, the Met Department said
• India's government says it will dispatch relief material to help those hit by the floods, with the first consignment due to arrive on Friday

Sri Lanka's government has made an emergency appeal for ordinary people's help in sending dry rations, mattresses and bottled water.
The floods bring a risk of disease, including the mosquito-borne dengue fever, which even in normal times is a severe problem in the country.

Aerial view of Brisbane's flood

The Australian city of Brisbane has woken to widespread flooding, although the peak level is a metre lower than feared.
The Brisbane River peaked at 4.46m (14.6ft) just before 0530 (1930GMT Wednesday), compared with 5.4m (17.7ft) in the 1974 floods.

Haiti earthquake: One year on

230,000 people died in the earthquake - one of the world's worst-ever disasters.

Today approximately one million people are living in tent camps - 380,000 of them children who are vulnerable to disease and exploitation. A year since the quake, this is the last place we want to see children and families.  

For many of the families living in these conditions it is their only option. They literally have nowhere else to go. They own nothing, not even the land where their homes once stood, since most people lived in rented accommodation before the earthquake.
For others, the camps offer at least some basic access to water and sanitation as well as potentially life-saving care through cholera treatment units. The truth is that until there are better places for people to go many of them will stay in the camps.

Haiti earthquake: One year on

Confusion over property ownership, the unforgiving geography of Port-au-Prince and its tightly-packed housing are all major challenges, explains Michael Wyrick - one of those contracted by the government to help with debris clearance and building demolition.

As vice president of business development for the Haiti Recovery Group, he says one of the biggest obstacles for his team has been obtaining permission from the Ministry of Public Works to enter damaged properties - particularly those of commercial use - as much of the ownership documentation, if it existed, was lost in the quake.
"It becomes ambiguous," Mr Wyrick explains. "Where are these property lines?"
But even when ownership is confirmed, the geography of Port-au-Prince, with its narrow streets and hilly terrain, can make many areas difficult to get to with machinery, he says.
Downtown, street vendors populate roadsides preventing large vehicles maneouvering freely and traders can be reluctant to leave their pitch - even temporarily - to let vehicles through.
'Unique complexity' And in the capital's neighbourhoods there are other obstacles.
"There are tents blocking streets and in some areas you just have footpaths between buildings, making it difficult to access with heavy machinery," Mr Wyrick says, explaining that in some locations his teams have had to resort to clearing debris by hand.
Another factor making demolition tricky in such neighbourhoods, he adds, is the fact that many buildings categorised as yellow and red - properties that are partially or badly damaged - are located very close to those that have been deemed safe - colour coded green.
Such daily practical difficulties mean the reconstruction work in and around Port-au-Prince will continue to be slow and time-consuming - something the Red Cross's Mr Fortier is keen to remind people.
"I have been in this kind of work for 30 years all over the world, and I have not yet experienced anything of this complexity and magnitude."

Russia extends wheat export ban

Russia is one of world's biggest wheat exporters, and millions of people around the globe rely on it for staple products like bread.
But Russia has decided to extend its export ban, in force since last August, as it tries to come to terms with the impact of last summer's heatwave on its harvest.

Hard times as price rises bite around the world

Due to the economic downturn, most people - even those with much better jobs - have not really seen an increase in salaries.  India's food inflation rose for the fifth straight week last week to 18.32% - the highest in more than a year.

Sharp rise in the price of onions a few weeks ago.

A staple for Indian families, used in almost all savoury dishes, its cost has risen dramatically over the past month.
A kilogram which usually costs 20 rupees went up to 85 rupees ($1.87; £1.20). At present, it is 50 to 60 rupees a kilo.
Some residents in north Mumbai have even boycotted using onions in their daily meals.
In response, the government stepped in with measures like a ban on exports and the slashing of import duties.
It also tried importing cheaper onions from Pakistan. However, its neighbour recalled the onion trucks meant for the Indian market from the Wagah border due to its own domestic shortages.
Farmers here say the unseasonal downpour in November has not only ruined the stocks, but has also damaged saplings for the sowing season.
So while rising prices should mean that producers are benefitting, they claim the damaged crop has resulted in much bigger losses than last year.
"Only 10% of the expected produce has actually come to market," says Vijay Heda, who has been an onion trader for over 30 years. "Everyone has suffered."
Dharma Devre, a farmer who has over 20 acres, accepts that no-one can protect them from the vagaries of nature, but is worried about how the next few months will pan out.

"A farmer invests so much in seeds, saplings, fertilisers, labour costs and transport but has no control over prices," he says.

He also complains that both farmers and consumers are currently losing out.
"There is huge disparity between what a farmer gets and what a customer pays. One needs to address these issues."

Hindu holy man accused of blasts

An Indian court remands a Hindu holy man in custody after he allegedly confesses to a string of bomb attacks previously thought to be the work of Muslim militants.

Has Cambodia become a country for sale?

"There was a day when the hostile traders conspired with the corrupted authority," chants the Venerable Lun Sovath, using measured rhyming couplets in the Khmer language.
"Wake up all Khmers and unite," he continues. "Bring back our rice fields."
He has brought me to this scrap of scrubland, where 20 villagers now eke out a living picking mushrooms, to show me the ugly side of Cambodia's system of what he describes as "economic land concessions".
Behind a fence, we can see the ruins of a village and a brilliantly green expanse of fields.
The local people say they were forced off this land, without compensation, when a sugar plantation was established here by a Thai investor.
Cambodia is one of the region's poorest countries, and is still recovering from the devastating civil war that followed the tyrannical rule of the Khmer Rouge regime in the 1970s.
Since 2005, around 15% of Cambodian land has been signed over to private companies, a third of them foreign, using leases under which they promise to develop the plots and provide jobs. One of the biggest growth areas is agriculture, because of rising world food prices and scarce global supplies.
But reports of unfair and sometimes violent "land grabs" have overshadowed the process.
"They lit the houses first, and then they shot to scare people so they would run from the houses," recounts Ho Mai, who says she lost her house.
She says the residents were literally forced out a year ago by military units acting on behalf of the plantation owner.
The Thai investors who have acquired the lease on this sugar plantation did not return my calls.
The land titling programme was initially funded by the World Bank, and other foreign donors. But they and the government have been criticised for being slow and ineffective.
I met a government official who explained to me anonymously how some investors get around the system.

Matt Rendall, a key adviser on the investor-friendly land law, denies it encourages land grabs

"Normally you don't need to even go via the ministry," He explained. "You can talk to the local officials, and you can just pay them to protect your land."
He told me the deals can be worth tens of thousands of dollars in bribes and payments for officials like him, whose normal earnings are the equivalent of US$200 a month.
He explained how in some cases, the officials use police or military units to make sure villagers leave the land.
"Sometimes we need to use force because we cannot talk to people who don't understand the law and are trying to take advantage," he says.
"We have to ask them to leave," he adds. "By law or by force."

Manchester City Council to cut 2,000 staff posts

Manchester City Council said it was among the five worst-hit authorities in England and, in reality, faced a 25% cut over the next two years.The Local Government Association has predicted the spending cuts will lead to the loss of 140,000 council jobs in England and Wales over the next year.

Alan Manning, of TUC North West, said the country needed policies which got people into work, closed the "loopholes on tax evasion", and brought in "proper taxation of banks and financial institutions", rather than "savage cuts" which hit the poor and vulnerable.

Ministers confirm end of default retirement age

It means employers will no longer be allowed to dismiss staff just because they have reached the age of 65.
The Department for Business said that as well as benefiting individuals, "the freedom to work for longer will provide a boost to the UK economy".
Employers had called for the changes to be delayed for a year to allow greater legal clarity over the plans.
The Employment Relations Minister Edward Davey told the BBC it would still be possible for employers to force people to retire if they were no longer up to the job.
"I think this [change] is really beneficial and should not be the problem some people suggest," he told the BBC.
"As of now, you are still able under the Employment Rights Act 1996 to fairly dismiss someone if you go though the proper processes - and one of the reasons you can dismiss someone fairly includes capability."

John Cridland, Director-General Designate of the CBI, said the government's new guidance was inadequate and did not deal with how firms could retire staff if they were no longer capable of doing their jobs properly.

"There is not enough clarity for employers on how to deal with difficult questions on performance," he said.
"Less than three months is not enough time for businesses to put in place new procedures.
"The outcome will be more unpleasant and costly legal action," he added.

 Lebanon seeks new government after collapse

The government was toppled by Hezbollah and its allies.

The crisis was sparked by a dispute over the UN tribunal investigating ex-Prime Minister Rafik Hariri's murder.
President Michel Suleiman has started consultations over the choice of a new premier, with Mr Hariri due to return to Beirut from a visit to France.

 Lebanon's political parties are now trying to form a new governing coalition, after the resignation on Wednesday of 11 ministers from Hezbollah and its allies, which brought down the Hariri-led administration.

Tuesday, Lebanese officials said that efforts by the Syrian and Saudi Arabian governments to reach a political compromise had failed. The opposition claimed that a potential deal was blocked by the US.

Hezbollah has rejected any suggestion of involvement in the assassination. Its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, has called the tribunal an "Israeli project" and warned of dire consequences if it indicts his followers.

Ukraine viewpoint: Novelist Andrey Kurkov

Ukraine's new year celebrations were cautious. In his televised speech to the nation, President Yanukovych announced that "the worst is behind us" but "there is still a lot of work to be done".

Precisely what work, he did not say, but the coming months will certainly be busy for the country's state prosecutors who have been told to draw up a list of illegal activities carried out by the government of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.
A number of high-ranking officials have already been arrested, including a former interior minister who is also leader of the Narodnaya Samooborona (People's Self-Defence) party, while Ms Tymoshenko - the so-called Orange Princess - is called in for questioning seemingly every other day.
One of these interrogations lasted 11 hours, after which a spokesperson for the state prosecutor explained that Ms Tymoshenko had not wanted to leave.

The government insists that these legal actions are in no way a vendetta against the opposition, but such statements are for Western ears. Ordinary Ukrainians have their own opinion.

Yulia Tymoshenko is Mr Yanukovych's chief political opponent.
Unless her party is destroyed now, and unless she is prevented from standing at the next presidential elections, she will become Ukraine's next president.
This is the worst fear of those close to Mr Yanukovych, who represent only the eastern part of the country - the Donbass region.
As soon as Mr Yanukovych became president he vowed to uncover corrupt practices in Ms Tymoshenko's government and, to this end, spent taxpayers' money hiring an American accountancy firm to investigate the financial practices of her cabinet of ministers.
The Americans worked for several months and left in silence. There have been no announcements about the results of their investigation which indicates that they found nothing. The blitzkrieg against Yulia Tymoshenko has failed.
Now we are into a slow and boring war, the motivation for which resembles corporate revenge.

US economy growing 'moderately'

It was a major downturn in the US housing market that sparked the global financial crisis in 2007, as it revealed substantial bad US mortgage debt.

Amazon to create 950 jobs at Scottish centres

Posts would be located at Inverclyde and Fife.  

JFK library to put all its records online

The presidential library commemorating the life of US President John F Kennedy is digitising every scrap of paper, video, audio and artefact it possesses.

The project is the largest undertaken by one of the 13 presidential library.
Materials already digitised include secret phone conversations about the Cuban missile crisis.
There are also recordings of meetings discussing Vietnam, civil rights and the space race, school report cards and letters from JFK to his mother.