:00:18. > :00:21.following the referendum, the Crimean parliament declares
:00:22. > :00:24.independence from Ukraine. Ministers meet to declare possible sanctions
:00:25. > :00:31.against Russia, saying the boat was illegal. Russia calls on the
:00:32. > :00:38.European Union to recognise Crimea's right to the side its own
:00:39. > :00:42.future. The Malaysia and varieties save the search for the missing
:00:43. > :00:47.plane has become a global operation. And why is the smallest planet in
:00:48. > :01:02.our solar system shrinking further? -- Malaysians authorities.
:01:03. > :01:08.The parliament in Crimea has declared independence from Ukraine
:01:09. > :01:12.following the referendum. The Prime Minister is travelling to Moscow to
:01:13. > :01:16.formally request it becomes part of Russia. The parliament has also
:01:17. > :01:25.announced that all Ukrainian property is to be nationalised. In
:01:26. > :01:30.response, Ukraine has approved a partial mobilisation of troops.
:01:31. > :01:34.Foreign ministers are meeting to decide what sanctions they could
:01:35. > :01:38.impose on Russia and Crimea, saying the vote was illegal. Russia insists
:01:39. > :01:44.the poll was in line with international law. The Russian
:01:45. > :01:48.Foreign Ministry has called on the European Union and the United States
:01:49. > :01:55.to recognise Crimea's right to decide its own future.
:01:56. > :02:02.Wild scenes in simpler poll last night as people who have longed to
:02:03. > :02:10.rejoin Russia took a huge step towards their dream. -- Simferopol.
:02:11. > :02:19.We will come back to Russia. We are happy. We are all happy. The people
:02:20. > :02:23.here in the centre of town have got what they wanted, but how it came
:02:24. > :02:29.about is going to have a lasting impact on international relations.
:02:30. > :02:35.The referendum produced an overwhelming vote in favour of
:02:36. > :02:38.leaving Ukraine and joining Russia. Although the Russian president,
:02:39. > :02:44.Vladimir Putin, insists it was consistent with international law,
:02:45. > :02:50.it remains hugely controversial. It was organised in less than a
:02:51. > :02:55.fortnight, while Russian troops were already in effective military
:02:56. > :02:57.control of Crimea, and it is not recognised by the fledgling
:02:58. > :03:02.Ukrainian government or the vast proportion of the International can
:03:03. > :03:08.unity. If Vladimir Putin moves to join Crimea on to Russia, it will
:03:09. > :03:14.trigger immediate sanctions. The fallout could escalate over the
:03:15. > :03:22.weeks ahead. With pro-Russian protesters in eastern cities in
:03:23. > :03:23.mainland Ukraine, relations between Russia and the West could be about
:03:24. > :03:39.to go from bad to disastrous. With me is the BBC's Ukrainian
:03:40. > :03:43.affairs analyst. Tell me about troop build-ups on both sides. We have
:03:44. > :03:50.been getting reports of more activity today. The latest we hear
:03:51. > :03:53.from the Ukrainian defence ministry, their calculation is 60,000 Russian
:03:54. > :03:59.troops on the border. It is not a huge increase. We are also hearing
:04:00. > :04:02.reports about troop movement, armour on the Ukrainian side towards the
:04:03. > :04:09.Russian border. The defence Minister announced partial mobilisation,
:04:10. > :04:21.20,000 more reservists, 20,000 on top of that to the National Guard.
:04:22. > :04:24.Politically, it looks different. The Russian foreign minister has come
:04:25. > :04:30.out with a proposal of how to resolve the crisis. There are
:04:31. > :04:33.several points about a contact group, about Ukraine being given the
:04:34. > :04:45.neutral status, not member of any military blocs, enshrined by the
:04:46. > :04:51.United nations security council. Quite an interesting thing, and it
:04:52. > :05:00.comes as a last minute thing. Is your sense that Russia wants to stop
:05:01. > :05:06.any further action? It is difficult to say, yesterday, the
:05:07. > :05:09.demonstrations in Donetsk were not very numerous but quite focal and
:05:10. > :05:18.tenacity. In other cities of Ukraine there was not really too much
:05:19. > :05:23.presence. -- four: Nastily -- vocal and nasty. On the other hand, there
:05:24. > :05:30.is a little bit more movement on the the half of the Ukrainian
:05:31. > :05:35.government. They are sending police to the protests. But there is a
:05:36. > :05:40.political offer to talk rather than brandish weapons. We are seeing
:05:41. > :05:44.threats from the European Union and the United States, but
:05:45. > :05:50.realistically, will we get any sanctions taken out by countries
:05:51. > :05:54.such as Germany? This is debatable, the policy of the European Union
:05:55. > :05:57.seems to be more coherent. Countries like Germany, Poland, the Baltic
:05:58. > :06:02.states are pushing for tough sanctions. We will see what those
:06:03. > :06:06.sanctions are. Will Russia be worried? I think so, but it is
:06:07. > :06:14.difficult to say how much worried it will be. Whether the sanctions touch
:06:15. > :06:19.the top edge along of ministers -- top group of ministers. Could be
:06:20. > :06:24.even more tough sanctions. Tomorrow we will from Vladimir Putin himself,
:06:25. > :06:28.he is addressing the National Assembly. This will be the first
:06:29. > :06:37.time we hear from him on his positions and how he will respond to
:06:38. > :06:43.the referendum. Thanks. 26 countries are now involved in a vast search
:06:44. > :06:47.over a wide area for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane which
:06:48. > :06:50.disappeared over a week ago. Authorities have revealed they think
:06:51. > :06:54.it was the co-pilot who said the last words to ground control before
:06:55. > :06:59.the plane disappeared. It is not clear if those words were uttered
:07:00. > :07:04.before or after one of the tracking devices was switched off. Of
:07:05. > :07:09.course, the wait continues for the desperate families, most of them in
:07:10. > :07:15.China. The BBC's correspondent is in Beijing. We have seen ongoing
:07:16. > :07:19.frustration from the Chinese, what is their reaction to the press
:07:20. > :07:24.conference we had earlier in Malaysia and the weekend's dramatic
:07:25. > :07:30.news about the communication system being deliberately turned off? What
:07:31. > :07:36.the Chinese authorities have called for is greater clarity from the
:07:37. > :07:44.Malaysians authorities. They have also asked for them to step up their
:07:45. > :07:48.search. Many of the families are in hotels in Beijing, close to the
:07:49. > :07:53.airport. There is a real sense of desperation, anger, and grief, as
:07:54. > :07:57.you can imagine, more than one week after this plane simply disappeared.
:07:58. > :08:06.Many of them just one cancers. They want to know what happened. -- want
:08:07. > :08:10.answers. While a majority were from China, the attention this story will
:08:11. > :08:16.get will remain incredibly high until we get some kind of
:08:17. > :08:20.resolution, for what has been a big mystery. We heard in the news
:08:21. > :08:30.conference that the investigation is going on, they will all be
:08:31. > :08:33.interested to see who is investigated, but also the Chinese
:08:34. > :08:38.government is involved in the search. That is right, the Chinese
:08:39. > :08:43.government has been involved in the search, and we have seen a widening
:08:44. > :08:49.of the search along to corridors, one jutting into Central Asia, the
:08:50. > :08:58.other jutting downwards through the Indian Ocean. China, until now, has
:08:59. > :09:05.been wasted, because the focus has been the South China Sea, and the
:09:06. > :09:08.authorities have asked them to call off the search in that part of the
:09:09. > :09:16.ocean with this new information I think that will deepen frustration
:09:17. > :09:21.in China that it took them so long to inform them of these updates.
:09:22. > :09:24.Others will say, this is an unprecedented situation, the
:09:25. > :09:27.Malaysia not authorities are under enormous pressure, the information
:09:28. > :09:33.is coming in but it is slowly coming in, and when they have informed
:09:34. > :09:35.other countries, they have done it on an up-to-date fashion, that is
:09:36. > :09:42.certainly what the Malaysians authorities are saying, but China
:09:43. > :09:47.just want a resolution, they want to know what happened. You said you had
:09:48. > :09:57.spoken to some of the relatives, what are they saying to you? They
:09:58. > :10:03.are getting press conferences or briefings from Malaysia Airlines,
:10:04. > :10:11.but it is becoming apparent they do not know any more than the media
:10:12. > :10:17.do. So people are following it through newspapers. There is a
:10:18. > :10:21.deep-set sense of despair, there is anger towards Malaysia Airlines, and
:10:22. > :10:31.one man I spoke to, his cousin was on board this plane, he had been
:10:32. > :10:35.returning from Singapore, had been a construction worker, and he says
:10:36. > :10:39.that Malaysia Airlines knows more than it is letting on. That belief
:10:40. > :10:51.is shared with many of the Chinese families waiting in Beijing. Thank
:10:52. > :10:56.you very much. With me in the studio is our security correspondent, Frank
:10:57. > :11:02.Gardner. A dramatic turn over the weekend, what are you hearing about
:11:03. > :11:08.that? How can they be sure this can indication system was deliberately
:11:09. > :11:11.turned off as opposed to failing? There has been two phases of this
:11:12. > :11:16.investigation and we are into the second one. The first phase, which
:11:17. > :11:19.lasted until Saturday morning, the investigators were keeping an open
:11:20. > :11:24.mind but largely basing their assumptions on some kind of
:11:25. > :11:31.catastrophic mechanical failure. Engine failure, electrical torture
:11:32. > :11:35.could -- short circuit, an accident, basically. On Saturday
:11:36. > :11:51.morning, the discovery, going back over the records, that both of these
:11:52. > :11:56.communication systems on board were deliberately turned off. That
:11:57. > :12:04.changed it to a suspicion of foul play, because there was no
:12:05. > :12:07.subsequent communication. It is possible that, initially, they could
:12:08. > :12:11.have looked at whether there was a medical emergency on-board, did they
:12:12. > :12:15.have to turn back if somebody had had a cardiac arrest. Then there
:12:16. > :12:19.would have been a three digit code that would have been transmitted by
:12:20. > :12:22.the pilot. That did not take place, so we are in a completely different
:12:23. > :12:32.area now in terms of the investigation, some of the initial
:12:33. > :12:41.measures that were taken quite quickly are now having to be gone
:12:42. > :12:44.back over. All the data is being re-examined. That will take some
:12:45. > :12:50.time, it involves a great many countries. We are in the realms of
:12:51. > :12:57.open speculation. I have read, Rupert Murdoch tweeted about his
:12:58. > :13:01.thoughts, a former US government has said the plane has been taken off to
:13:02. > :13:08.hit some city in India. How easy is it, no, for 26 countries to
:13:09. > :13:13.cooperate on Security and intelligence? Everybody has a vested
:13:14. > :13:17.interest in finding out what has happened to this plane. It is quite
:13:18. > :13:22.absurd that in the 21st century, this digital age in which we live,
:13:23. > :13:25.in which we are hacked and tracked every minute of the day, something
:13:26. > :13:33.the size of a Boeing 777 can go missing. It is much easier for it to
:13:34. > :13:38.go missing over the ocean. That is the harsh reality of this. For it to
:13:39. > :13:44.go missing over land, for long, is very difficult. It would be picked
:13:45. > :13:52.up by somebody. Somebody would pick it up. More likely, the National air
:13:53. > :13:57.defence radars of those countries it has gone over, especially if it has
:13:58. > :14:04.gone as far as Kazakhstan, it could not have entered their territory and
:14:05. > :14:15.Passover places like Pakistan without being detected. To go over
:14:16. > :14:19.the ocean is possible. -- pass over. I know you can speculate but is
:14:20. > :14:23.anyone giving you any guidance at all as to why anyone would want to
:14:24. > :14:27.do this? Absolutely none. I have spoken to a number of government
:14:28. > :14:31.agencies, unless they are really hiding something and really
:14:32. > :14:36.bluffing, they have got no idea. I don't think they know anything more
:14:37. > :14:44.than you and me on this one. Was there any kind of break chatter?
:14:45. > :14:52.Apparently no. They would not necessarily tell the media, but
:14:53. > :14:56.Washington is notoriously leaky on this. If there was a hint of a
:14:57. > :15:03.terrorist plot it would have come out through Washington. The US press
:15:04. > :15:07.tends to get hold of these things. I have not seen anything about this. I
:15:08. > :15:11.will not say which way it is but the things they are looking at our
:15:12. > :15:21.mental stress, Break Down, suicide, pilot error, some kind of family
:15:22. > :15:23.issue, then there is the idea, was it possibly interfered with from
:15:24. > :15:45.outside? That is being investigated as well. In other news, US naval
:15:46. > :15:49.commandos have taken control of an oil tanker flying the North Korean
:15:50. > :15:52.flag that had loaded crude oil at a port held by rebels in eastern
:15:53. > :15:55.Libya. A statement from the Pentagon Press Secretary, Rear Admiral John
:15:56. > :15:59.Kirby, said no-one was hurt in the operation, which was carried out at
:16:00. > :16:01.the request of the Libyan and Cypriot governments. The ship,
:16:02. > :16:04.Morning Glory, was boarded in international waters south-east of
:16:05. > :16:06.Cyprus and is now returning to Libya.
:16:07. > :16:10.A car bomb attack on a barracks has left at least five soldiers dead in
:16:11. > :16:13.the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, medical sources say. One report says
:16:14. > :16:16.the attack targeted people leaving a graduation ceremony for officers.
:16:17. > :16:20.Benghazi is often the scene of attacks by Islamist groups and
:16:21. > :16:28.separatists. A convicted Mafia boss will not be
:16:29. > :16:32.eased sent back to his home country. He was found guilty of Mafia
:16:33. > :16:40.association and extortion in Italy in 1999 and given a seven-year jail
:16:41. > :16:47.term. Much more to come on BBC World News. We will have a special report
:16:48. > :16:58.on attempts to get messages across the Syrian border.
:16:59. > :17:01.The French authorities are imposing restrictions on motorists in Paris
:17:02. > :17:04.as part of efforts to tackle dangerous levels of air pollution.
:17:05. > :17:08.From today, drivers will only be allowed to use their cars every
:17:09. > :17:11.other day. The capital has been shrouded in haze for for nearly a
:17:12. > :17:14.week. It's only the second time the restriction has been imposed.
:17:15. > :17:16.Earlier I asked our Paris correspondent, Hugh Schofield, why
:17:17. > :17:19.it was happening. It is happening because these are dangerous levels
:17:20. > :17:22.of pollution which we saw peaking at the end of last week. Even though
:17:23. > :17:29.the scientists say that the levels should be going down anyway today,
:17:30. > :17:37.it was still high, and it was decided over the weekend to bring
:17:38. > :17:46.into play this extraordinary measure. Only odd number plates are
:17:47. > :17:50.allowed to drive today, tomorrow it will be even number plates. There
:17:51. > :17:54.are exceptions, you see people breaking the rules and UC police
:17:55. > :18:01.with controls, pulling over cars with even number plates and so on.
:18:02. > :18:06.If they are electric, hybrid, or if they have three or more passengers
:18:07. > :18:11.it is fine, if not they have to pay a fine. It seems that the resumes
:18:12. > :18:22.are playing the game, and figures from the traffic monitors show that
:18:23. > :18:26.the levels of traffic is down about half than an ordinary day. The
:18:27. > :18:30.problem will be working out whether it is that which is effective or
:18:31. > :18:35.whether the pollution was going down anyway because the predictions were
:18:36. > :18:39.that the peak has passed and it was due to decline today anyway. The
:18:40. > :18:44.Government, certainly the Green party in government, is very happy
:18:45. > :18:52.with this because they say this should kick in automatically when
:18:53. > :18:57.these thresholds have been passed, when the number of air particles
:18:58. > :19:03.reaches a dangerous level. This is BBC World News. The headlines: After
:19:04. > :19:05.the celebrations, Crimea 's Department declares independence
:19:06. > :19:17.from Ukraine following the referendum on Sunday. The region's
:19:18. > :19:20.de facto Prime Minister is travelling to Moscow, formally to
:19:21. > :19:22.request that it becomes part of Russia.
:19:23. > :19:25.26 countries are now involved in the search for the missing Malaysia
:19:26. > :19:28.Airlines plane. The pilots of the missing airliner have come under the
:19:29. > :19:31.spotlight after authorities revealed that they think it was the co-pilot
:19:32. > :19:33.who spoke the last words to ground controllers before the plane
:19:34. > :19:37.disappeared. North Korea's ambassador to the UN
:19:38. > :19:39.has walked out of a hearing on human rights violations in his country,
:19:40. > :19:43.when a Japanese representative began to speak. The meeting is discussing
:19:44. > :19:46.a UN report which describes North Korea's crimes as being as chilling
:19:47. > :19:49.as those of the Nazis or Cambodia's Khmer Rouge. But North Korea's ally
:19:50. > :19:53.China has described the document as divorced from reality. A number of
:19:54. > :19:56.people who managed to escape from North Korea have travelled to Geneva
:19:57. > :19:58.for the meeting. Imogen Foulkes reports.
:19:59. > :20:01.The journey from North Korea to the United Nations in Geneva has been
:20:02. > :20:05.long and difficult. Kim Jung Il can't forget the regime he escaped
:20:06. > :20:07.from 17 years ago, a regime which the UN investigation claims uses
:20:08. > :20:23.terror, violence, and starvation to control its people. TRANSLATION: Our
:20:24. > :20:27.family had a bit of corn because my mother had a small business but my
:20:28. > :20:30.friend's family lived off acorns. My friend in high school died of
:20:31. > :20:33.starvation. I watched him die. Deliberate famine is just one
:20:34. > :20:36.chilling allegation in the 400-page investigation. There are also
:20:37. > :20:39.horrific details of prison camps, even drawings made by former
:20:40. > :20:45.prisoners of the living lying with the dead and inmates forced to eat
:20:46. > :20:52.snakes and rats to survive. The investigators believe the UN must
:20:53. > :20:57.act. Too many times in this building there are reports and no action.
:20:58. > :21:03.Well, this is a time for action. We can't say we didn't know. We now all
:21:04. > :21:07.do know. Anyone who wants to know can read the report. The report
:21:08. > :21:13.recommends sanctions against North Korea's leaders, even referral to
:21:14. > :21:16.the International Criminal Court. The North Korean defectors who have
:21:17. > :21:24.travelled to Geneva are pinning their hopes on action from the UN
:21:25. > :21:28.Human Rights Council. TRANSLATION: There is no chance of change with
:21:29. > :21:31.the current regime but I have faith in the UN to put pressure on.
:21:32. > :21:41.Eventually the current system will collapse. The Government has to
:21:42. > :21:44.change, we need a new system. Those hopes may be disappointed. The Human
:21:45. > :21:47.Rights Council can advise but only the UN Security Council can refer
:21:48. > :21:51.North Korea to the International Criminal Court. There, China, which
:21:52. > :21:57.says it prefers dialogue to sanctions, has a veto. So today the
:21:58. > :22:00.world's top human rights body will have to consider what it can
:22:01. > :22:02.possibly do about one of the most detailed accounts of atrocities ever
:22:03. > :22:29.produced, atrocities which the victims hope surely cannot be
:22:30. > :22:32.ignored. Three years into the war, exiled
:22:33. > :22:35.Syrians are trying to reach back into their own country. One Syrian
:22:36. > :22:38.opposition radio station, US-backed Watan FM, broadcasts to Syria from
:22:39. > :22:45.Istanbul. James Reynolds has spent the day at the station. From this
:22:46. > :22:49.rooftop, they present Good Morning Country. This woman used to read the
:22:50. > :23:01.news on Syrian state TV but she got fed up with being told what to say
:23:02. > :23:05.social went into exile. People in Syria changed. We were afraid so
:23:06. > :23:10.much last time but now we want to be free to speak. We want to say what
:23:11. > :23:19.we want and we are not afraid of anyone. The station has sent radios
:23:20. > :23:29.to Syria, and it asks its listeners to phone in. Some of them are very
:23:30. > :23:36.tired, they just want to finish at any price. They don't want to come
:23:37. > :23:40.back, they want to bring him to the prison and to the court and to get
:23:41. > :23:52.the right from him. The other one to make a deal with President Assad to
:23:53. > :23:56.stop destroying the country. They arrange the music. At the start of
:23:57. > :24:04.the war inside Syria, this man did the same thing for the Government.
:24:05. > :24:19.Five months after the revolution, our -- I made songs. You made songs?
:24:20. > :24:26.Yes, it is a famous song in Syria. If I didn't still work now, I would
:24:27. > :24:36.kill myself. At night, he plays with the opposition. In this war, his
:24:37. > :24:41.music is used to inspire both sides. It is the smallest planet in our
:24:42. > :24:52.solar system and it is getting even smaller according to NASA scientists
:24:53. > :24:55.who say that Mercury has shrunk in diameter by about 14 kilometres,
:24:56. > :24:57.since it was formed more than four billion years ago. Pallab Ghosh
:24:58. > :25:01.explains. The planet Mercury, dwarfed by the sun. It is the
:25:02. > :25:04.smallest planet in our solar system and over the years, it has become
:25:05. > :25:07.smaller. NASA's Messenger spacecraft has spent the past three years
:25:08. > :25:14.photographing the planet. And this is the result, the first complete
:25:15. > :25:18.picture of Mercury. On the ground, chemicals, known as volatiles, that
:25:19. > :25:21.simply shouldn't be there anymore. Now, NASA has published, in the
:25:22. > :25:26.journal Nature Geoscience, that the planet has shrunk by 4.5 miles from
:25:27. > :25:29.its centre to the surface. We are learning more every month, we are
:25:30. > :25:33.nearly three years into NASA's orbital mission around Mercury and
:25:34. > :25:45.there's still a year to go. And I think there are more surprises to
:25:46. > :25:48.come. I am staggered already, it is rich in volatile elements that it
:25:49. > :25:52.shouldn't have, it has recent volcanic activity, it has ice in the
:25:53. > :25:56.craters near the poles and it is shrinking, as we expected - but in
:25:57. > :26:00.ways we hadn't expected. I am sure there is more to come. The mission
:26:01. > :26:03.is showing that what many thought to be the dullest planet in our solar
:26:04. > :26:13.system is more interesting and interesting than astronomers had
:26:14. > :26:18.imagined. Doing at least two and a half hours of vigorous exercise each
:26:19. > :26:23.week cuts the chances of developing flu, according to new data. The
:26:24. > :26:27.findings were made by the online gloom survey run by the London
:26:28. > :26:31.School of hygiene and tropical medicine, but the downer is that
:26:32. > :26:37.researchers said that moderate exercise did not appear to have the
:26:38. > :26:42.same protective effect. Two and a half hours of vigorous exercise a
:26:43. > :26:47.week is necessary. A reminder of the top story: The parliament in Crimea
:26:48. > :26:59.has declared independence from Ukraine following Sunday's
:27:00. > :27:02.referendum. This is BBC World News. Back tomorrow, see you then.