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Severe weather warnings are in place across much of Britain, with more heavy snow and freezing temperatures expected over the weekend.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Comedian Al Murray talks to Matthew Stadlen about the origins of his Pub Landlord character, his interest in science, the role of stereotypes in comedy and what gets him through a long tour.
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The wintry weather is again forcing sporting fixtures across Britain for this weekend to be called off.
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Sudan has denied allegations that Mr Bashir stole public funds Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has been accused of siphoning as much as $9bn of his country’s funds and placing it in foreign accounts, according to leaked US diplomatic cables.
Diplomats quoted the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) as saying that much of the money may be stashed in London banks.
The allegations released by the Wikileaks website have been published by the Guardian newspaper.
Sudan has denied the claims.
The cables quoted ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo as telling US officials that some of the funds may be held by the part-nationalised Lloyds Banking Group. He reportedly said it was time to go public with the scale of Mr Bashir’s theft.
“Ocampo suggested if Bashir’s stash of money were disclosed (he put the figure at $9bn), it would change Sudanese public opinion from him being a ‘crusader’ to that of a thief,” one report by a senior US official said.
“Ocampo reported Lloyds bank in London may be holding or knowledgeable of the whereabouts of the money,” the cable said.
Lloyds has responded by saying it has no evidence of holding funds in Mr Bashir’s name.
“We have absolutely no evidence to suggest there is any connection between Lloyds Banking Group and Mr Bashir. The group’s policy is to abide by the legal and regulatory obligations in all jurisdictions in which we operate,” the bank said.
Correspondents say that if Mr Ocampo’s claim about Bashir’s fortune is correct, the Sudanese funds being held in London banks amount to one tenth of the country’s annual GDP.
Mr Ocampo is said to have discussed evidence of the stash with the Americans just days after issuing an arrest warrant for Mr Bashir in March 2009 – the first issued by the court against a serving head of state.
Mr Bashir was indicted last year for seven counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Darfur region, with a further three counts of genocide added in July.
A spokesperson for the Sudanese government dismissed the claim, describing it as further evidence of the ICC’s political agenda in discrediting the Sudanese government.
“To claim that the president can control the treasury and take money to put into his own accounts is ludicrous – it is a laughable claim by the ICC prosecutor,” Khalid al-Mubarak, government spokesperson at the Sudanese embassy in London, told the Guardian.
“Ocampo is a maverick, and this is just part of his political agenda. He has failed miserably in all his cases and has refused to investigate Iraq or Gaza – he needs success and he has targeted Bashir to increase his own importance.”
“Attempts to smear not only Bashir but Sudan as a whole are well known, and are clearly linked with anti-Arab sentiments and Islamophobia,” Mr Mubarak said.
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A lonely coyote, crouched on a slab of ice has been rescued from the icy waters of Lake Michigan in the US.
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Richard Kemp said the behaviour of the two ministers was a “disgrace” Communities Secretary Eric Pickles and Housing Minister Grant Shapps have been accused of behaving “like Laurel and Hardy” by a senior Liberal Democrat.
Richard Kemp, leader of the Lib Dems in local government, wrote to Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg saying he felt they had not faced up to the effect of cuts.
Mr Kemp is a councillor in Liverpool, a city which will see an 8.9% reduction in spending power next year.
Mr Shapps said savings made had saved some front-line jobs in Liverpool.
In his letter, Mr Kemp urged Mr Clegg to “rein in” Mr Pickles because his “behaviour is a disgrace”.
And he accused the two ministers of failing to acknowledge the effect government cuts will have on jobs and services.
Mr Kemp said the men “continually put forward the idea that all the savings at this massively high level can be made by increased efficiency, cuts in a small number of salaries, raiding reserves that are not needed”.
“In fact almost every day we get from them a new gimmick,” he wrote.
“Their behaviour is a disgrace. Either they really do not know how serious the situation is that they have created… or they are deliberately trying to distract attention from the problems that they have created.”
However, Mr Shapps said Liverpool has already cut 48 posts saving more than £4m.
In a statement the housing minister said: “I don’t think even Richard Kemp could deny this move will protect plenty of front line staff.”
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The BBC’s Newsnight sent Steve Smith to investigate what councils ought to be spending on Christmas trees.
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US scientists are developing techniques to monitor woodpeckers and other bird populations from space.
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Christmas lights like these in Bogota were taken to the heart of the rebel-controlled jungle The Colombian army says it has installed a giant Christmas tree in Farc rebel territory, to encourage guerrilla fighters to demobilize.
Special forces infiltrated the remote Macarena mountain range to dress a 25m (82ft) high tree with 2,000 lights.
Movement sensors will make the tree light up when guerrillas approach.
The army says it will put up trees in nine other rebel-held zones to spread the message that Christmas is a good time to abandon armed struggle.
The Colombian government says more than 2,000 guerrillas demobilized this year under a scheme that gives them amnesty and help to return to civilian life.
“Operation Christmas,” as it was code named, was carried out by elite troops using Blackhawk helicopters.
The Christmas tree was installed near a rebel supply route in the region where the Farc military leader, Mono Jojoy, was killed in a large-scale military assault in September.
As well as lights, it was decorated with slogans saying “Demobilize, at Christmas everything is possible” and “If Christmas can come to the jungle, you can come home”.
The leftist Farc rebel group has suffered severe setbacks in recent years, with several of its top commanders killed.
Thousands of guerrillas have been captured or killed or have deserted rebel ranks.
But it still has thousands of fighters and remains a powerful force in some rural areas.
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The Trussell Trust charity and its staff and volunteers arrange collections of food for distribution locally Job centres around Britain are to give food vouchers to people experiencing severe financial hardship.
The vouchers, which can be redeemed at foodbanks run by the Trussell Trust charity, will be handed out by staff at Jobcentre Plus (JCP) branches.
One voucher can be exchanged for three days’ worth of food.
The scheme will be piloted in Salisbury and Gloucester from 4 January, before expanding across England, Wales and Scotland in April.
It will run in Jobcentre Plus branches that have a foodbank in the surrounding area.
The Trussell Trust already has 78 foodbanks around the country and anticipates that there will be 86 foodbanks by April 2011.
The move comes after lengthy negotiations between the trust and the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). The charity sent a report to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Iain Duncan Smith, in the summer.
A person experiencing severe financial hardship, caused by issues such as benefit delays or being ineligible for a JCP crisis loan, will be given a voucher that can be exchanged at a trust foodbank for three days’ worth of food.
An individual can be given three vouchers in a row during one particular period of hardship, and can be helped three times in a year, meaning a total of nine vouchers a year can be given out per person.
Chris Mould, director of the trust, said: “Although it has taken two years of campaigning to get to this point, we are delighted that ministers are listening to feedback from the front line of the voluntary sector.
“Their decision means people on the breadline will now get the help they need more easily and that’s of course what matters to us in the foodbank network.
“This is about sensible working between a public service and the voluntary sector.”
About 41,000 people were fed by 44 foodbanks across the UK last year The Trussell Trust is a Christian charity and its staff and volunteers arrange collections of food.
They ask supermarket shoppers in each foodbank area to donate an extra item from a predefined shopping list – then distribute the goods by means of vouchers.
The vouchers are distributed by “statutory professionals” such as doctors, health workers, social workers, the Citizens’ Advice Bureau and probation officers among others.
Some 41,000 people were fed by 44 foodbanks last year, and the trust estimates that 35-40% of them had problems with benefits.
When the first foodbanks were set up in 2000 in Salisbury, employees of the local JCP were initially one of the main distributors of foodbank vouchers.
When the charity’s foodbank franchise scheme rolled out around the country in 2004, other JCPs also began to adopt the process.
However, in December 2008 the then-Labour government issued a directive stopping JCPs from referring clients in crisis to a foodbank.
When the charity challenged the government over this decision, it initially responded that, among other reasons, all those entitled to benefits received them on the day if they were in crisis and that delay was not an issue.
“If you have a family to feed and no money then waiting even a couple of days is too long”
Chris Mould Trussell Trust director
But the trust says it is “simply not true that all those entitled to benefits receive them on the day”.
On behalf of the trust, MP Andrew Selous asked a series of parliamentary questions in 2009 and 2010 about benefit delay.
The eventual response given in January 2010 stated that 37,046 people waited 17 days or more for their jobseeker’s allowance, of which 20,068 waited 22 days or more.
Mr Mould said: “We wanted to work with the job centres again because tens of thousands of people across the country are not getting paid their benefits on time.
“Unless the DWP has a target of reaching 100% of people, there will be thousands of people who will be left in trouble through benefit delay, or for not being eligible for a crisis loan, for whatever reason.
“If you have a family to feed and no money then waiting even a couple of days is too long.”
A spokeswoman for the DWP said: “We recognise the merit of having additional targeted support in place such as foodbanks which play an important role in local communities.
“Jobcentre Plus is already in discussion with the Trussell Trust and have agreed to work together in the new year.”
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A four-year-old girl has been found dead in east London.
The child’s body was discovered at an address in Clapton at about 1530 GMT on Thursday, after police were told there had been a stabbing.
A woman has been sectioned under the Mental Health Act after being arrested on suspicion of murdering the girl, who was pronounced dead at the scene.
A post-mortem examination is due to be held in Poplar on Saturday. Police said next of kin had been informed.
The Scotland Yard unit which deals with child abuse is leading the murder inquiry.
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England need 391 to take an improbable 2-1 series lead in the Ashes after Mike Hussey hits 116 and Chris Tremlett takes 5-87.
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Gordon Brown fears the UK will see more youth unemployment than in the recession of the 1980s Gordon Brown has accused the coalition government of making “immoral” cuts to education that would leave the UK with a major youth unemployment problem.
Writing in the Daily Mirror, the former Labour prime minister said removing state help for less well-off pupils to stay in education after 16 was an act of “economic vandalism”.
He called for more apprenticeships to avert a “decade of youth unemployment”.
Official figures suggest 2.5 million people are unemployed in the UK.
The information, released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) earlier this week, revealed the number of people out of work increased by 35,000 in the three months to October.
It is the first time that the jobless measure has risen for six months.
The rise is thought to be driven by public sector job losses and pushed the unemployment rate up to 7.9%.
Mr Brown said the UK should follow the lead of Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Australia in boosting apprenticeship places to train young people to help the UK exploit fast-growing Asian consumer markets.
“We need to invest in British genius, in the innovations, the science, the technology that will build the best future”
Gordon Brown
The former Labour leader, who has written a book about the global economic crisis, predicted that youth unemployment would rise to more than 20% – with one in three out of work in the worst-hit areas.
He wrote: “We are still paying the price for the lost generation of wasted lives of the 1980s. Now we have a new social time bomb in the making.”
Mr Brown suggested saving the Future Jobs Programme from being scrapped would keep 50,000 young people “off the streets” and rather than reducing funding for universities – made up by rises in tuition fees – the government should ensure they “do a better job”.
He argued that by “cutting education”, ministers were “writing off half a generation of young people”, which he described as “immoral and an economic waste”.
“We need to invest in British genius, in the innovations, the science, the technology that will build the best future – and help small businesses to employ skilled young people.
“That’s the way to avoid another lost generation of wasted young lives.”
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Mr Chavez said he needed the new powers to help victims of the recent floods Venezuela’s parliament has granted President Hugo Chavez special powers to deal with the aftermath of devastating floods.
Mr Chavez will be able to pass laws by decree, without needing the support of congress, for 18 months.
His critics say the move will turn the country into a near-dictatorship.
They accuse him of taking advantage of the floods to strengthen his grip on power before a new congress is sworn in in January.
This is the fourth time Mr Chavez has been given such authority since he came to office almost 12 years ago.
He had asked to able to rule by decree for a year to address the emergency caused by floods and landslides that have killed around 40 people and left 140,000 homeless.
But the National Assembly extended the period to 18 months.
The head of the Assembly, Cilia Flores, said lawmakers were responding to the demands of flood victims.
“So that they can have their streets, their highways, public services, electricity, everything to live in dignity, we are going to hear their proposals and concerns,” she said.
Mr Chavez says he has already drawn up “a battery” of 20 new laws which he will pass by decree.
They include measures to raise value-added tax to fund reconstruction and build thousands of homes for flood victims.
The outgoing parliament is dominated by Mr Chavez’s supporters Opposition groups say the timing of the “Enabling Law,” as it is known, is deeply cynical.
The current parliament, which is dominated by the president’s supporters, is in the last few weeks of its session.
A new congress will begin sitting in January with many more opposition members following elections last September, which would have made it more difficult for Mr Chavez to pass laws.
The opposition fear Mr Chavez will use the powers to move Venezuela closer to a left-wing dictatorship.
Newly elected opposition congressman Julio Borges said the enabling law had one single aim: “to give more power to the government and take power away from the people”.
But the opposition would keep fighting to make sure the “Cuban project” would fail, he said.
Mr Chavez has dismissed these concerns, while making it clear that he is determined to deepen his “socialist revolution”.
“We are building a new democracy here that can’t be turned back,” he said on Thursday.
His new powers extend beyond relief and reconstruction to cover areas including infrastructure, banking and finance, rural and urban land use, telecommunications, defence and security.
The 18 month period means the opposition will be largely excluded from policy-making until the middle of 2012, months just months before Venezuela’s next presidential election.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
A motorist who was injured in a crash has died after the ambulance taking him to hospital left the road in poor weather conditions and hit a bush.
A police officer was driving as paramedics treated the man who was seriously injured when his car hit a highways vehicle in East Sussex.
As the officer was taking them to hospital the vehicle left the road and hit a bush on Standard Hill, Ninfield.
Two helicopters went to the scene of the second crash but the man had died.
The first accident happened just before 1430 GMT when the man, who was driving a mini, was in collision with the highways vehicle on the A271 Boreham Street, near Herstmonceux.
A police officer then drove the ambulance as two paramedics tried to treat the men who had suffered life-threatening injuries.
Twenty minutes later the vehicle crashed into a bush in poor weather. An ambulance crew member was later treated in hospital for minor injuries.
The Sussex Police helicopter and the Kent Air Ambulance attended the scene of the second accident but the man, from Horam, was pronounced dead.
A police spokesman said it was normal practice for police officers to take the wheel of an ambulance in a medical emergency.
Detective Chief Inspector Mike Ashcroft, of Sussex Police, said: “This is a complex series of interlinked events, which happened during adverse weather conditions.
“A detailed investigation involving forensic collision investigators is continuing against a backdrop of worsening weather.”
Sussex Police subsequently contacted the Independent Police Complaints Commission who are expected to decide on Monday whether to investigate.
A 36-year-old man who was driving the highways vehicle was arrested on suspicion of dangerous driving and remains in custody.
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