21/10/2013 BBC World News

Hello. This is BBC World News. Fears of a mega blaze near Sydney, as

bushfires burning New South Wales. The flames could spread across

hundreds of kilometres. Outrage in France as the latest leak

from Edward Snowden alleges the American National Security Agency

recorded millions of French telephone calls.

The infamous massacre of polls by Soviet secret police during World

War Two. The European Court says it isn't competent to rule whether the

Russian investigation was adequate. And six authors take on the

challenge of updating Jane Austen's classics into modern works.

A state of emergency is in place in southeastern Australia, as bushfires

sweep across New South Wales. Firefighters fear the fires could

merge into one huge blaze, spanning hundreds of kilometres. Steve

Warrington is the Acting Chief Fire Officer of Victoria. He has been

telling us what his estate has been doing to help. The sheer size of it

that people have got to come to grips with - one of it -- one of the

fires has a 300 kilometres front. It isn't like a house fire or a factory

fire that is stationary and doesn't go anywhere. This is literally in

the lap of the gods and can go anywhere. It is dynamic, quite

intensive, and the logistics if you have upwards of 4000 people on the

ground, you have got to feed them, fuelled, and make sure they are safe

and their safety is not compromised. It is a huge logistical effort just

to get the trucks there. Then you have got to get the workforce and

the management teams to make sure we are managing the fires as

effectively as possible, and make sure we limit the amount of life

lost and the amount of houses lost. In 2009, we lost 2000 homes, and

already over 200 homes have been lost in New South Wales. It is a

mighty effort just to slow the fires down. Steve Warrington and there, a

chief fire officer. Hundreds of families have already lost their

homes in these fires. Firefighters and weather forecasters saying there

must be a risk of worse to come. The aerial pictures show the extent of

the devastation. Helicopters have been dumping water on the fires for

many days now, but with high temperatures and strong winds

expected later in the week, there are now those warnings that we are

hearing that some of those fires will merge into a mega fire. The

fires cover a huge area of New South Wales. They have reached the

outskirts of Sydney already, Australia's biggest city. The area

around the Blue Mountains is the worst affected. So far, only one

person is thought to have died, but the destruction the fire has caused

will affect thousands of people for many years. Our correspondent has

been telling what the situation is like in the Blue Mountains. I have

just been for a drive up the street. Katoomba is the main town in the

Blue Mountains, and it is totally empty of people. The restaurants are

empty, there is hardly anybody out and about. It is as if people are at

home packing or have already decided to leave. It is difficult to work

out how many people live there from where we are. Is this a common area

for wildfire risk? Is so, why are people building how was there?

Katoomba is not an area traditionally associated with major

fire problems. Far from it. It is usually other communities within the

Blue Mountains that are more remote. In the Blue Mountains, we have many,

many millions of trees. The Blue Mountains is a city within a

National Park, so it is a very beautiful place to live and bring up

children. This is a very rare occurrence we are seeing here in the

Blue Mountains right now. The scale and the speed of the fire this week

took everybody by surprise, when we lost around 200 homes. That was very

unexpected. What about your own home and family? What precautions have

you taken? We are very worried. We are packed and ready to go at this

end. We have been trying to fireproof the house, getting things

like leaves and twigs out of the gutters around the roof area around

the house. We have been cutting back trees and shrubs overhanging the

house itself, and given the notice we have had, we have made sure any

thing that has special value to us is packed and taken elsewhere.

Obviously, we are ready to go at a moment's notice if the police or the

fire service say we are to evacuate. Do you have confidence that

firefighters are going to get this under control? You can't have

confidence. The scale of the fire on two fronts up here in the mountains

means that everyone is totally stretched to the limit. Also, the

concern amongst locals here is whether there is enough aerial

appliance to -- aerial appliances to drop water on fire this big. The

weather conditions are predicted to change, such as the wind direction.

If we end up having a fire on the third front, then that is a real

concern for people living in Katoomba. That is when people here

will start to look to move somewhere safer.

Thank you. More revelations from the documents leaked by the former

American intelligence analyst, Edward Snowden. The French

newspaper, Le Monde, alleges that the US National Security Agency

secretly recorded thousands of phone calls in France. The Interior

Minister described these allegations as shocking. I asked whether this

really came as a surprise to the French government. The French do

know this sort of thing goes on. They have a similar system

themselves. Le Monde ran a report last year saying that the foreign

intelligence service in France was recording millions of phone calls,

e-mails and text messages, to try and pinpoint terrorist cells. As the

Interior Minister said today, what is really needed is some sort of

control over this new expanding technology. No doubt the indignant

is we are seeing in France today is for public consumption, because this

programme had recorded some 70 million French phone calls, text

messages and e-mails. We have just had some comment from Laurel

fabulous, who said he had summoned the French Minister -- the American

minister for an explanation. TRANSLATION: We had been alerted to

this in June, and we reacted strongly. But it seems we have to go

further. This was an attack on privacy and is totally

unacceptable. We need to be assured very quickly that this is no longer

practised. Embarrassing for the US, because

this is not the first time this has happened. Le Monde reported last

year that they had introduced an operation into the work of the

Elysee Palace. The US ambassador was indignant and said it was not the US

responsible, but it had the power to find files and even to turn on the

microphones of the Elysee Palace you to is. This coincides with a report

in a weekly German magazine that also hacked into the e-mails of the

former Mexican President Felipe Calderon, not only looking into his

personal account, but also accounts of state security. The US will have

to respond today, and we await that response.

The European Court of Human Rights says it is unable to rule on whether

Russia carried out an adequate investigation into a massacre which

claimed the lives of more than 21,000 Polish prisoners during World

War Two. The court says it cannot rule on the case because Russia only

signed up to the European Convention on Human Rights on 1998, eight years

after the investigation began. Our correspondent has been following the

story. This is very confusing to most of us. How can the courts say

it cannot rule? First of all, they do not have enough documents. The

Russians have not released many. Just six documents have been

released since 1990. The term of confidentiality of the document is

30 years, but the documents are still not released. As many times as

Polish families have requested the release of documents connected to be

as massacre, they haven't been released. The Russian prosecutor 's

office has closed the investigation on the premise that the victims are

deceased, so there is nothing to investigate any more. We are hearing

from our correspondent in Warsaw that this is to do with dates, but

this is very politically sensitive. Yes, extremely. It is the most

controversial issue in relations between Poland and Russia, because

Polish authorities have insisted that the investigation goes on and

the documents are released. The Russians are finding all sorts of

excuses not to do that. The tragedy in 2010, in April, was that dozens

of top Polish officials were killed in a plane that crashed in -- that

crashed in Russia when they were on their way to a memorial service.

They added to it. The Russians investigated the crash very, very

well, but relations are still soured by this massacre issue, because it

has not been put to rest. There is no final decision made. The Russians

admitted that the Soviet authorities are to blame for the controversy.

Who gave the direct order? Was it Joseph Stalin? Was it the head of

the Russian secret police at the time? Joseph Stalin's grandson

insisted that his father had nothing to do with it, but you have to see

the documents, and the documents are not released. Does it end here? Do

the nuances of this go beyond Russia and Poland, or is it confined to

them? It will also affect the political atmosphere in Russia as

well, because the archives and the loss of documents regarding the

Soviet and Russian past, the near past and the far past, people want

to know what happened. Thank you. Some breaking news from Russia,

there has been an explosion on a bus in the southern Russian city of

Volgograd, and four people have been killed. That has been reported by

Interfax. An explosion on a bus in Volvo grad, with four people being

killed. -- in Volgograd. We will update you on that and the number of

injuries as soon as we can. Germany is a step closer to forming

a coalition government after the Social Democratic Party agreed a

series of economic concessions with Chancellor Angela Merkel. Talks

between the parties are due to start on Wednesday. The Christian

Democrats won the elections but fell short of a majority.

The Pakistani prime minister has held talks in Washington with the US

Secretary of State, John Kerry. He will then meet President Obama on

Wednesday. Among the issues being discussed is the contention issue of

American drone strikes on Pakistani soil.

The north-east of China, as you can see, has been hit by a huge rise in

air pollution caused by a combination of weather conditions

and an increase in the burning of coal in homes. The resulting smoke

caused visibility to be reduced to very few metres. You can hardly see

a thing there. Still to come, match-making with

government support. India seeks to revive the rapidly diminishing Parsi

community. In the Egyptian capital, gunmen have

opened fire on a wedding party, killing three people, including an

eight-year-old girl. Egypt's Coptic Christians community has been

targeted by Islamist militants. Masked gunmen fired indiscriminately

as people left the church on Sunday night. They had been at a wedding.

Eyewitnesses say a motorbike and a car approached the crowd outside the

Coptic Church in Cairo. The gunmen opened fire. Amongst the dead, and

eight-year-old girl, according to the Interior Ministry.

TRANSLATION: In the church we had a very loud sound, as if something was

collapsing. Within seconds, one of our friends arrived and said there

was gunfire in front of the church. We came running out, and I found a

woman seated in a chair covered in blood with lots of bullet wins. Many

other people had fallen around her, including a child. The Coptic

Orthodox Church is one of Christianity's oldest. In Egypt,

Christians make up at least 10% of the population. It is estimated that

the Coptic Christians population could be anywhere between six

million and 11 million people. According to some reports, there

have been more than 50 attacks on Christian churches since the start

of the military crackdown. The head of the Coptic Church appeared on

television when it was announced that President Morsi had been

removed. Since then, he has received death threats and several Christians

have been killed. TRANSLATION: What is happening is

targeting all of Egypt, not only the Christians. This is enough. People

are getting sick and tired of this. Egypt has been in turmoil since the

ousting of Mohammed Morsi. His supporters continue to demonstrate

in Cairo for his reinstatement. Less than 20 kilometres from the Coptic

Church, more violence in the city. Supporters clashed with police at a

university, a stronghold of the Muslim Brotherhood. Since the

military crackdown, hundreds have died and thousands have been

arrested. Now, the government has its way. Protests like this could

soon be outlawed, with demonstrators facing heavy fines and even jail.

Our main headlines... Fears that three large bushfires in New South

Wales could combine into one large blaze have been raised.

India is full of diverse religions and communities, but the Parsis, who

boast the highest literacy rate in the country, as well as some

well-known business families, have been dwindling.

These two are excited and relieved. They are on course for having their

first baby, for which they have been receiving fertility treatment for

more than a year. The couple now wants to have more than one child.

We want to kids, definitely. I understand finance and everything is

an issue, but still, I think to kids in a family is a kids -- two kids is

a must. The Parsis originally came from Persia more than 2000 years

ago. They have produced some of India's best-known business leaders

and entertainers, but the population is dwindling rapidly. Less than

70,000 remain, and nearly a third are over the age of 60. Here, a

group of Parsi men and women over the age of 35 have assembled to meet

prospective life partners. Nearly a third are unmarried, and many marry

outside the community, which has also contributed to the decline in

the population. Events like these are organised, where unmarried men

and women gets to meet each other. But so far, they have failed to

reverse the trend. The basic reason for this declining population is low

fertility. This is not biological infertility, it is infertility which

is caused due to late marriages and late con ceiling of children. The

government is to provide financial support to married couples for

fertility treatment. The community leaders have welcomed the

initiative, but the real success would be if this programme

translates into more Parsi children, which would mean a much brighter

future for one of India's most influential communities. I just want

to let you know a little bit more about our breaking news this hour.

There has been an explosion on a bus in the southern Russian city of

Volvo grad. -- Volgograd. It will raise fears that this could be an

attack linked to the internal politics of Russia. We will update

you as soon as we can. A key witness in the case of a British family

murdered in the French Alps last year has spoken publicly for the

first time. The anonymous French forestry worker has told the BBC's

Panorama programme that he saw a dark grey

Panorama programme that he saw a numberplate heading towards the

crime scene shortly before the attack. Three members of the family

from Surrey are murdered in their car while on holiday, and a French

cyclist is killed by what is thought to be an experienced hit man. Over a

year later, only the brother, Zaid Al-Hilli, has ever been arrested. He

remains on bail and denies arranging the killings. He has never been

charged. Now, Panorama has tracked down a witness who has never spoken

publicly before and does not want to be identified. A forestry worker, he

seems he saw a British, grey BMW 4x4 shortly before the attack. And he

saw a man dressed in black on a motorbike, thought to be the gunman.

He says two of his colleagues also saw the bike ten minutes later.

TRANSLATION: They passed the motorbike further up and they had

words with him, because motor vehicles are not allowed. So, they

asked him to drive down. They saw his face. He had a bit of a beard.

It suggests the motorcyclist may have had an accomplice in the BMW,

carrying out surveillance. In a row Mike has revisited the murder scene

with a British cyclist who also saw the motorbike leaving just moments

before he came across the people who had been killed. I was thinking, is

there a hunter, or a sniper type of character, hiding in the trees, may

be shooting from a cover position or something like that? I was thinking

to myself, I wonder if this is going to be painful when I get shot.

French police admit they have got no evidence on who the hit man or his

accomplices were, but say they will solve the mysteries of

That is due to the representation of women in Egypt. Whilst 38% of

Egyptian women attend university, they make up just 2% of the

parliament. Let's compare that to be United States, where almost 50% more

women than men attend university. With more ready access to education,

you might expect a high level of participation in government, but up

against other Western countries, this just is not the case. Only 17%

of the US Government are women. Women in the United States face

another barrier in their career progression - was mandated paid

maternity leave has become standard across the developed world, the US

lags behind, as employers have no legal obligation to pay staff on

maternity leave. With comparatively falling fertility rates raising

economic concerns, America will have to ask, can we afford not to pay our

mothers? It is questions like this and many others that we will be

addressing in our 100 Women series, here on BBC World News.

You can of course keep up to date on Twitter if you want to follow what

is happening with our 100 Women series. This is one inspiring woman,

for sure, with a bit of a challenge, because if you take a classic

English novel by one of the world's best loved authors and try to

broaden its appeal, well, what are you going to get? The Jane Austen

project has seen six well-known writers publishing their own version

of a classic Jane Austen novel, but is meddling with a classic really a

good idea? Tim Muffett has been finding out.

She completed just six novels, but almost 200 years since her death,

Jane Austen's classics still captivate. It is a truth universally

acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be

in want of a wife... EMac but can you update a classic and should you

even try to Mike this is Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen's Gothic parody.

There is nothing I would not do... And this is crime writer Val

McDermid, who is rewriting it in a modern-day setting. I hope it will

reawaken interest in the originals. People will be fascinated by how it

translates to the present day. Human nature remains the same, I am sure

there will be a lot of snipping is from purists, but I hope to confound

them. Her Northanger Abbey will be published next spring. Meanwhile,

Emma is to be reworked by Alexander McCall Smith. Pride And Prejudice

will be rewritten by American author Curtis Sittenfield. Joanna

Trollope's Sense And Sensibility is the first to be completed. The

writers of Persuasion and Mansfield Park have not yet been revealed.

Film and television adaptations are one thing, but rewriting Jane

Austen? Well, that is something else. Joanna Trollope has placed

Sense And Sensibility firmly in the 21st century. Social media features

heavily in the story, so what did this south London Reading group make

of it? I think it is brave, actually, to update what is a

classic and put it in a modern-day setting. It is not my favourite kind

of literature. I do not think I enjoyed it as much as the original,

but I thought it was quite cleverly done.

In the next hour or so, we are hoping to take you to Greece, where

a Roma couple are in court on charges of abducting a four-year-old

blonde girl who was found with them during a raid on a camp in Greece.

Our correspondent is there. I am back tomorrow.