12/02/2016 World News Today

broadcasting in the UK and around the world.

I'm Tim Willcox. The headlines:

World powers agree to push for a temporary halt to the fighting

in Syria to relieve besieged towns, but President Assad says

Pope meets Patriarch - the heads of the Roman Catholic

and the Russian Orthodox churches are to hold their first talks

Also coming up, Britain's Independent newspaper

is to disappear from newsstands next month

And a Japanese MP behind a national debate about paternity leave

resigns, after having an affair while his wife was pregnant.

Russian warplanes have been in action over Syria again today,

just hours after major powers agreed on a pause in fighting.

Officially the so-called cessation of hostilities is due to begin

in a week's time, but the UN says aid deliveries

to some besieged areas inside Syria could begin

The agreement reached in Germany came shortly after

President Bashar al Assad said he intends to fight on

until he's brought the whole country back under his control.

Our Chief International Correspondent Lyse Doucet reports.

Syria's biggest, once beautiful city, now broken.

This month tens of thousands are fleeing Russia's bombing there.

Moscow says it is striking so-called Islamic State.

The West says it is aiding the Syrian military

Now, the world's most powerful diplomats emerged to say they had

We have agreed to implement a nationwide cessation

of hostilities to begin in a target of one week's time.

That's ambitious but everybody is determined to move as rapidly

Russia's Sergey Lavrov signalled an intention to move

But the doubts became clearer, most of all about Russia's intentions.

It is possible that the Russians had limited military objectives and have

largely achieved them and are now ready to see a scaling down

of military activity, but we won't know that until we see

Today Syria's rebel leaders are raising objections.

So did President Assad who spoke before the deal was done.

We have fully believed in negotiations and political actions

since the beginning of the crisis. If we negotiate,

it does not mean we will Two tracks are inevitable in Syria,

first through negotiation and second The two tracks are

separate from each other. This war is also a major

humanitarian crisis. The Munich deal means that

government and rebel forces must let aid enter areas where

people are starving. Imagine we have several convoys

for several days and repeated it Do you think this

is a turning point? Strong words have emerged here

in Munich, but great scepticism too. The next week will make it clear

whether this was a major breakthrough that can help ease

the suffering of Syrian civilians or whether it is another major

setback that will make Well, as that agreement

was being reached in Munich - today US Defence Secretary

Ash Carter was participating After the discussions he said

he expected Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates

to provide special operations forces to help Syrian opposition fighters

battling so called Islamic State. Secretary Carter sat down

exclusively with What is your reaction to what has

happened in Geneva? This agreement in principle for a cessation of

hostilities. John Kerry has done great work to try and ease the

suffering, the terrible suffering of the Syrian people, and ultimately to

put a political end to the civil War in Syria. I want to make clear,

there is no cessation of hostilities in the war against Isil. All the

countries here are agreed to step up their efforts to accelerate their

efforts, we want to get Isil defeated. Especially and initially

in Iraq and Syria. As soon as possible. You have 50 countries, all

of them saying that they would do more, just like the United States,

President Obama has pledged to more. Do you trust the Russians? This is

an agreement with them, the same who have been main moderate rebels when

they say they are bombing extremists. They have killed

civilians, they are strengthening Assad's and? They were way off

track, they have been from the beginning. But we will see, weather

they implement the agreement he signed up with. We will just see.

That is what they said they would do. We will see if they do it. More

broadly in sera, they said they were going to come in and fight Isil,

they did not. Instead they joined the civil War. They fuelled the

Civil War. That was a negative contribution. Let's hope they can

contribute in a positive, humanitarian way. You can understand

people being sceptical, because the Russians have not said they will

stop bombing. It does not go into effect for a week, and we will have

to see whether the Russians actually abide by it or not. But Secretary

Kerry got them to make that commitment, they need to meet that

but we will have to see, as in all things with Russians. You have been

trying to get that coalition to do more. What concrete have you

achieved in Brussels? Two things. They all agree unanimously to the

coalition, military campaign and that the United States devised that

calls out the objectives specifically. Taking Raqqa and Mosul

from Isis. And protecting our homeland, all those aspects, and we

went through all the capabilities that were going to be needed and

what each country could do to increase its contribution. We are

looking to help and enable the Iraqi Army, it is day that took back

Ramadi from Isil with our help. With the help of our excellent UK

partners and other coalition partners. Your intelligence chief

says it will not be until 2017 before you start even contemplating

going for Mosul, is that correct? Our timeline is as soon as we can

possibly do it. The Iraqi Prime Minister himself has said he would

like to get this done this year. We are going to do everything we can to

help him do that. As soon as possible. We need to defeat Isil as

quickly as possible, both in Iraq and Syria, and in other places.

The Pope and the Russian Orthodox Patriarch are meeting in Cuba -

significant because it's the first ever encounter between the heads

of the two churches since they split in the 11th century,

The Vatican has been pushing for such a meeting ever since

the collapse of the Soviet Union, but Moscow had always resisted.

The meeting is being seen as a major step towards warmer relations.

Our correspondent, Will Grant, is in Havana.

Both men now on the ground, a very symbolic burying the hatchet? That's

right. As you mentioned in your introduction, since the 11th

century, we thought the relations were frosty between Cuba and the

United States! It is nothing in comparison to the amount of time

that has passed between the Eastern and Western religions of the

Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic faith. But this is an

important moment for them to be coming together, and Bob Francis,

when he got off the plane and we saw some brief moments of him with the

Patriarch, already mentioned the word brotherhood and I think that is

the driving force of what they are trying to do. They no longer see

this as a time for the Christian faith to be divided, but they should

be coming together, this should be a moment of unity and cooperation, as

so many Christians around the world feel persecuted. Very different men,

very different styles. The church is very different as well. Roman

Catholic priests are celibate, the Russian Orthodox ones are allowed to

marry, for one example. What in concrete terms will this mean on the

ground, and where does it feed into some conflicts like Syria and others

around the world, in terms of that unity of the Christian faith? Well,

that is a good question, and there is a lot of suggestions that the

Russian Orthodox Church is staying very close to President Putin's

foreign policy and that is a key tenet of it, staying close to the

Putin Administration means it has been safe over the past few decades,

as opposed to when it suffered in the wake of the fall of the Berlin

Wall. So I would not want to suggest exactly what this would mean on the

ground in terms of Syria or that kind of conflict. It may be that it

takes so long for this kind of moment of unity to have any real

effect on the ground, but perhaps it just has bolstered people, it makes

the faithful feel they are part of a broader church, and no longer a

church that is at war with itself, or at least divided. I think at this

stage, these big symbolic moments are something about that, but

showing unity in the eyes of the world, and it is down to the

individual priests and parishes and religions to kind of apply it in

their daily life. We'll grant, and you very much.

Now a look at some of the day's other news.

Thousands of farmers from across Greece have

taken their protest against austerity measures

Fires have broken out among the crowds and there've been

The workers are angry at government plans to increase their taxes.

A five-storey building has collapsed in the centre of Istanbul.

Local news organisations say the building came down

near Istiklal Avenue, a busy pedestrianised street.

The Istanbul Governor has told reporters that noises

from the building alerted people that it was about to collapse,

the area was evacuated and it appears that no-one

European scientists have decided to give up trying to contact

the Philae space robot, which became the first craft

to touch down on a comet more than a year ago.

Philae operated for just 60 hours after an awkward landing.

Contact was briefly re-established with the lander last July

but mission control has now given up hope of any further communication

as the comet heads towards a much colder part of its orbit.

Stay with us on BBC World News, still to come:

A free man taking his first steps into a new South Africa.

Iran's spiritual leader has said he has passed a death sentence on

Salman Rushdie, the British author of a book which many Muslims say is

blasphemous. The people of Haiti have flocked to church to give

thanks for the hosting of the former President. Because of his

considerable value, Shergar was kept in a special secure box. Shergar was

driven away in a horse box that these brought with them. There are

steps down from the plane a figure in mourning. Head of the

Commonwealth, defender of the faith. You are watching BBC World News

today. The headlines. World powers agree to

press for a cessation of hostilities in Syria, President Assad says he

will fight on. And the heads of the Roman Catholic

and Russian Orthodox churches are holding an historic meeting in

Havana, almost 1000 years after a schism divided eastern and Western

Christianity. One of the UK's major newspapers,

the Independent, will be the first The paper was set up

in 1986 and is now owned Falling advertising revenues have

caused much upheaval in the newspaper industry

but Mr Lebedev says there is a growing appetite

for online journalism. The Independent will publish

its final print edition next month. David Uberti from the Columbia

Journalism Review has written Is this the start of a trend, do you

think, over here? There are a lot of online papers in the US. Certainly,

we have seen her trend, especially in our metropolitan newspapers, at

least cutting back on the print delivery service. The theory is that

they reduce overhead costs. Design, printing, delivery, and trying to

target days of the week that maximise the print run. They have

not been any US newspapers that have gone fully digital. The Washington

Post has invested in digital properties and the New York Times

has double that -- doubled down on its subscription. So they are

hybrids. But for the Independent to go fully online, what are the key

facts that they need to concentrate on? Presumably it is keeping that

individual flavour of the newspaper, and funding, the other big issue.

Certainly. Going digital is no panacea. I applaud the Independent

for taking such a radical step. They are probing the unknown whereas

other newspapers have not ventured as far forward. The quest for scale

really requires both focusing on a global audience but also maintaining

your brand and not watering down your journalism. One of the

difficulties with this strategy is that advertising rates in the

digital market are increasingly low, so they might look in the future

towards a digital subscription model to supplant that advertising

revenue. If you want to maintain that campaigning quality of

something like this, presumably if you had funding from subscribers or

crowdfunding or something like that, would it be difficult to maintain

that objectivity? People would be paying for something they wanted to

see and hear. It would be certainly difficult, and to this point we have

not find a long-term answer. The New York Times is the golden standard in

terms of creating a digital subscriber base that gives itself a

lot of revenue. Having said that, it is the best in class. The

Independent will really have to work on making its journalism strong,

having said that, there has not been a newspaper in the US besides the

New York Times that has really made that step. Doesn't mean so the

reporters have to be much more multi-skilled? Having to shoot their

own material as well as writing it. Certainly. We are entering an age

where reporters have to do so many different things, they have to wear

many hats. It is about tweeting, producing the page, the main thing

with digital journalism is it has to be much faster. The market is

different for this sort of journalism. So the Independent has

to shift in that direction. With most of these papers making the

transition, we tend to see very wealthy owners investing

significantly in their digital operations. So I would assume in

this transition to a digital army operation, the owner of the

Independent would invest in its digital side as well and try to

create its own new brand identity in its digital only operation. Thank

you very much indeed. The last hard copy of the Independent next month.

Lizzie Greenwood Hughes has all the sport now.

Fifa's former General Secretary, Jerome Valcke, has been banned

A Fifa ethics committee says it is for a number of offences,

including his part in a World Cup ticket scandal.

But his legal team have accused the committee of not

being a credible, independent or objective

decision-making body, and claim he did nothing wrong.

Earlier I spoke to our Sports News Correspondent Richard Conway,

who explained the ban was originally recommended to be for eight years.

Well, Fifa's Fx adjudicator has increased the ban, the investigators

called for a number of years for lower than 12 but he has given them

12 years. Looking at the litany of offences that Mr Valcke has been

found guilty of, you can see why. Using the private jet that Fifa

sometimes hired for sightseeing is one of the things he has been found

guilty of. Using that to transport himself and his relatives. In

addition, questions over World Cup tickets, also the question of TV and

media rights for the next two Welker best-mac. The Fx adjudicator Fifa

says they tended to be sold for less than the market rate. The worst

thing in the eyes of the investigators was not just the crime

itself but an attended cover-up of what he had done. Several computer

files were said to have been deleted or attempted to have been deleted.

So, Mr Valcke was sacked last month by Fifa and has been banned from all

football activity for 12 years. I think it is the last time we will

see him involved in world football governance.

The President of the International Olympic Committee says he's

confident the Zika virus will not disrupt this summer's Games in Rio.

Thomas Bach says the IOC are taking the issue seriously but

health authorities don't expect the virus to pose a threat.

All the experts agree that given the temperatures, then in the Brazilian

wintertime, when the Games are taking place in August, these will

lead to a very different situation. So, we have confidence, full

confidence in all the many actions being undertaken by the Brazilian

and international authorities and health organisations, and we are

also very confident that then the athletes and spectators will enjoy a

safe conditions in Rio de Janeiro. Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has

defended the Premier League's pricing structure and says his club

doesn't have a "massive problem". Ticketing costs is a hot topic

in English football and there have been protests at the Emirates

Stadium in the past over pricing. But Wenger is clearly

a fan of the free market. How do you decide what is the right

level of ticket prices, first of all? It is by your attendance. Then

you have been compared many times to foreign clubs. I don't think we are

on the same level ground, for example Bayern Munich. We paid ?220

million for our ground. It is true we get much more television income

but it is down to the audience for the success and the pressure on the

market, we pay the players at a higher price and our expenses would

come up straight the wages. Mark Cavendish has won

cycling's Tour of Qatar, but just missed out on victory

in the 5th and final stage. The sprinter started the day wearing

the leader's gold jersey and put himself in contention to win

the concluding stage. But he was just pipped to the line

by Alexander Kristoff Second place though was good enough

for him to secure Let's take a look at

some other stories now. The Deputy President of Kenya,

William Ruto, has won his appeal against the admissibility of key

evidence in his trial on charges of crimes against

humanity in The Hague. Mr Ruto and a Kenyan journalist

are accused of inciting mass killings in the weeks

after a general election The broadcasting authorities

in Pakistan have condemned a television news channel, ARY,

for airing hate speech directed at the Nobel Peace prize

winner, Malala Yousufzai. The regulator said declaring someone

an enemy of Islam was not the job of TV presenters and could

endanger someone's life. A young Japanese MP who made

headlines last year for his insisting on taking paternity leave,

has quit parliament after confessing to an affair with a bikini model

while his wife was pregnant. Kensuke Miyazaki made

waves inside the ruling Liberal Democratic Party

when he announced he would be the first Japanese MP ever

to take paternity leave. But this week a Japanese magazine

revealed the scandal. From Tokyo,

Rupert Wingfield Hayes reports. Bowing deeply and repeatedly,

Kensuke Miyazaki went before the cameras today to

confess his infidelity. Young, handsome, successful

and apparently a devoted husband, Kensuke Miyazaki had become

the poster boy for those who want Japanese men to do more to help

raise their children. Mr Miyazaki and his wife are both

Members of Parliament for the ruling

Liberal Democratic Party. In December he made headlines

when he announced he would become the first Japanese sitting MP ever

to take paternity leave. In Japan, only 2.3% of new fathers

take paternity leave. The government wants to raise it

to 13% by 2020. I thought that by declaring I wanted

to take paternity leave Instead, Mr Miyazaki is out

of a job and in disgrace. Earlier this week a Japanese scandal

magazine published a story alleging that while his wife was preparing

to give birth in Tokyo, Mr Miyazaki was in his apartment

in Q2 with another woman. There is now concerned from former

supporters that his scandal will be used by those who oppose Japanese

men taking time off to be Japan has one of the most generous

paternity leave systems Men can, in theory, take

up to a year off work, but many bosses still refuse

or threatened meal workers with dismissal or

demotion if they do. Right now, only 2.3%

of Japanese men take President Bashar al-Assad says he

intends to fight on until he has brought the whole country back under

his control. He said defeating the forces opposing him could take a

long time. He also said he would continue fighting what he called

terrorism during any peace process negotiations.

The UN says it up is to be at the start delivering aid to some

besieged areas in Syria within the next 24 hours.

From me, Tim Willcox, and the rest of the team, goodbye.

Good evening. Before we have a look at the weather in the UK, we will

head elsewhere for other weather stories around the world. North

America, some really cold air dumbing down from Canada over the

Great Lakes into the north-east of the US. We disease in colder weather

in northern Florida, threatening some overnight frost, which is not

good use for the growers. Contrast that with the 26 Celsius in Los

Angeles, very warm for the time of year. Even 17 in Denver. Significant

wind-chill for the likes of New England. Then high pressure moves in

on Sunday. But by then, they could develop another error of snow South

of the Great Lakes. Elsewhere, around the Caribbean, and ongoing

drought in Haiti. A few showers around on Sunday but the slow-moving

band of rain stretches from eastern part of Cuba, through Jamaica into

Honduras and Nicaragua. A weather front that could give two or three

inches of rain in the space of a few hours. In Australia, not much sign

of rain, it has all been about the heat in Western Australia. In Perth,

not as hot as it has been but temperatures will rise early next

week and with strong winds, the threat of some further wildfires. A

lot of sunshine across Australia and New Zealand but looking close to new

Caledonia and Fiji, we have two cyclones. The big one is Winston, a

category format. Tatiana has strengthened to a category two. They

are over open water. Unlikely to get as far South as New Zealand. Across

southern parts of Africa, this is as far South as the rain gets at this

of year. Seasonal rains very active. Threatening some flash flooding.

There could be a few welcome showers for the farmers across South Africa.

Likely to turn wetter and more windy later this weekend across northern

parts of Morocco and Algeria. The jet stream now across Europe, is

much further South. That picks up areas of low pressure, which in turn

bring areas of Cloud, rain and in some cases snow. We will find some

more snow over the Alps, most of which has been in the Western Alps.

Really strong winds, and some heavy rain could bring some travel

disruption. For the North East of Europe, the wind is from the South,

very mild air all the way into the Baltic states. Here at home, we have

cold air that will be with us for a while over the course of Monday, a

bitter northerly wind, significant wind-chill, but how long will this

last? Stayed tuned because there is more coming up.