:00:00. > :00:13.This is BBC World News Today. America's spy chiefs in the
:00:14. > :00:24.spotlight. US Congressmen demand answers over allegations they spied
:00:25. > :00:27.on friendly nations. Nothing that has been released has shown that we
:00:28. > :00:34.are trying to do something illegal. Or unprofessional. When we find a
:00:35. > :00:39.mistake, a compliance issue, we reported.
:00:40. > :00:43.-- we report it. Polio is back in Syria. The United
:00:44. > :00:45.Nations confirms ten cases among children, and warns the outbreak
:00:46. > :00:48.could spread. The desperate attempt to flee after
:00:49. > :00:51.months under siege, we have an exclusive report from inside Syria.
:00:52. > :00:55.Also coming up: Was this a political attack on China? Police say they are
:00:56. > :00:57.searching for two suspects, after a car crashed into a crowd in
:00:58. > :01:00.Tiananmen Square. And connecting two continents, a new
:01:01. > :01:03.underwater rail tunnel linking Europe to Asia is open for business,
:01:04. > :01:19.150 years after it was first proposed.
:01:20. > :01:25.Hello, welcome to the programme In the past hour, US intelligence
:01:26. > :01:27.chiefs have faced Congress to answer questions on allegations of mass
:01:28. > :01:33.surveillance and spying on foreign leaders. At the hearing, the US
:01:34. > :01:35.National Intelligence Director began by defending the way his staff
:01:36. > :01:41.operate, and expects more damaging leaks and allegations to come.
:01:42. > :01:49.The unauthorised disclosure of the details of these programmes has been
:01:50. > :01:54.extremely damaging. These exclude -- these disclosures of ripping our
:01:55. > :01:57.ability to conduct intelligence and keep the country safe. We cannot
:01:58. > :02:01.raise or make up for the damage we know has already been done and we
:02:02. > :02:06.anticipate more as we continue our assessment, and a small revelations
:02:07. > :02:10.emerge. The head of the NSA went on to say
:02:11. > :02:15.he will continue to take what he calls public beatings if it can
:02:16. > :02:20.better safeguard the US against possible terrorist attacks.
:02:21. > :02:24.It is much more important for this country that we defend this nation
:02:25. > :02:29.and take the beatings than it is to give up a programme that would
:02:30. > :02:34.result in this nation being attacked. We would rather be here in
:02:35. > :02:41.front of you today telling you why we defended these programmes than
:02:42. > :02:48.having given them up and have our nation or our allies be attacked and
:02:49. > :02:54.people killed. The interesting part is that we have shown we can do
:02:55. > :02:57.both. Defend the country and protect our civil butties and privacy.
:02:58. > :03:06.Johnny Dymond joins us now in Washington. US intelligence chiefs
:03:07. > :03:12.defending their record, no laws were broken, they say. No laws were
:03:13. > :03:19.broken and the characterisation of their agencies, they say, deemed as
:03:20. > :03:22.incompetent, inaccurate and misleading, sometimes all three
:03:23. > :03:28.They are pushing back against these stories and disclosures. This is an
:03:29. > :03:31.attempt to restore the image of the agencies which have been badly
:03:32. > :03:35.battered over the last few weeks, but there is also substance. The
:03:36. > :03:40.director of national intelligence was asked about finding out about
:03:41. > :03:45.the intentions of foreign leaders and if that was important, he said
:03:46. > :03:53.that was what he went in 1963. Do our allies do that to us? He was
:03:54. > :03:57.asked. Absolutely, he said. Confirming that everybody listens
:03:58. > :04:01.into everybody else. We played that clip of General Alexander talking
:04:02. > :04:06.about him preferring to take a beating and keep the policy -- and
:04:07. > :04:13.keep the policy going, he is not taking a beating from Congress.
:04:14. > :04:17.Are you surprised at that? It had felt in the past couple of days that
:04:18. > :04:21.the atmosphere was changing in Congress from one of defensiveness
:04:22. > :04:29.of the intelligence agencies to one saying, this is not on.
:04:30. > :04:33.I am a bit surprised. Things are changing, as more junior members of
:04:34. > :04:37.the committee pitch in. I thought it would be tougher. The meat of this
:04:38. > :04:43.will not be in the committee itself but in the legislation Congress is
:04:44. > :04:46.bringing forward. It looks clear legislation restricting the powers
:04:47. > :04:51.of the NSA will come forward and may pass through Congress.
:04:52. > :04:53.Thank you for joining us in Washington.
:04:54. > :04:56.Constanze Stelzenmueller is Senior Transatlantic Fellow with the German
:04:57. > :05:06.Marshall Fund. She joins me now from Brussels. In Germany, this NSA
:05:07. > :05:14.affair is dominating the your airwaves. It is the talk of the town
:05:15. > :05:19.and in political circles. Not a day goes by it is not at the
:05:20. > :05:25.top of the news, on the radio, in the newspapers, and you go to dinner
:05:26. > :05:31.parties, particularly in parties with Americans and diplomats, and
:05:32. > :05:34.everybody talks about it. It is embarrassing, the German
:05:35. > :05:40.chancellor was seen as being a friend of President Obama, he was
:05:41. > :05:44.visiting in the summer and they were standing side-by-side in Berlin and
:05:45. > :05:49.her phone was tapped for ten years. Apart from expressions of public
:05:50. > :05:54.outrage, what can Germany and Europe realistically expect from the US and
:05:55. > :06:02.its intelligence agencies now? The joke was in that speech which I
:06:03. > :06:05.attended in June, President Obama promised America would listen more
:06:06. > :06:09.to its allies. I do not think that was what was understood by his
:06:10. > :06:16.listeners and the Chancellor. Jokes aside, there are several problems.
:06:17. > :06:21.There is a breach of trust. You can save the Chancellor should not have
:06:22. > :06:27.been using an unencrypted phone I gather they converse. On another
:06:28. > :06:31.level, there is an unspoken rule leaders do not listen to each other,
:06:32. > :06:37.they talk on the phone and talk directly, they do not have each
:06:38. > :06:41.other tapped. There is a bigger problem. The American intelligence
:06:42. > :06:46.agencies clearly do not have enough supervision and control, that needs
:06:47. > :06:50.to change, that is a policy problem. Beyond that, there is clearly a
:06:51. > :06:55.phenomenon that everybody and probably European countries to a
:06:56. > :07:01.degree seduced by the technology. -- seduced. There is a risk agencies
:07:02. > :07:07.will do what they can if they are not stopped. And in increasingly
:07:08. > :07:13.chaotic politics, in a world of crisis management, it is difficult
:07:14. > :07:18.for leaders and for political setups to stop that. We need to figure that
:07:19. > :07:26.out. Very briefly, could you tell others
:07:27. > :07:29.realistically again, what can European leaders expect from the
:07:30. > :07:34.United States? There is a question about what President Obama knew or
:07:35. > :07:38.did not know about the tapping, but countries will look after their own
:07:39. > :07:43.interests. And when it comes to technology, America can do this
:07:44. > :07:46.better than most. The Americans and the British have
:07:47. > :07:51.an agreement to not tap each other, I hope that is respected, you never
:07:52. > :07:55.know. The Germans have been asking for a similar agreement for years
:07:56. > :08:00.and have not got it, they are asking more firmly for that now and that
:08:01. > :08:03.will be a place to start. If the President does not know what his
:08:04. > :08:06.agencies are doing, I suggest he should start finding out.
:08:07. > :08:13.Thank you for joining us. In Syria, thousands of civilians
:08:14. > :08:16.have been fleeing a suburb of the capital, Damascus, which had been
:08:17. > :08:19.under siege by government forces for months. Opposition fighters say the
:08:20. > :08:21.government tried to starve the people there into submission. Our
:08:22. > :08:23.chief international correspondent, Lyse Doucet, has sent this exclusive
:08:24. > :08:34.report from Moadamiyeh. A tide of people took to this road
:08:35. > :08:43.today, fleeing homes where they have lived under siege for nine months.
:08:44. > :08:50.Some now too weak to walk. They are all exhausted by their ordeal.
:08:51. > :08:55.Syrian troops sealed off Moadamiyeh Web rebel fighters had taken
:08:56. > :09:01.control, telling them, surrender or starve -- were rebel fighters.
:09:02. > :09:06.Civilians paid the price. Thank God we are out. Look, my body
:09:07. > :09:10.is shaking, there was no food, we had to eat grass, they would not let
:09:11. > :09:14.others eat. These are the last of the civilians
:09:15. > :09:20.trapped inside Moadamiyeh since March. Only a couple of thousand
:09:21. > :09:26.could escape and nothing was getting in, no medical supplies of food One
:09:27. > :09:31.Syrian said you could not even get a piece of bad inside Moadamiyeh. Less
:09:32. > :09:36.than -- a piece of red. Less than ten miles away, children
:09:37. > :09:41.died from starvation. Residents sent out messages begging the world to
:09:42. > :09:48.help, aid agencies asked for urgent access. The government finally
:09:49. > :09:58.agreed. Civilians could leave, they say this is the enemy.
:09:59. > :10:05.They are terrorists. Now we take civilians to safe places. Then those
:10:06. > :10:11.people are not their responsibility.
:10:12. > :10:14.Women, children leak less children, the elderly, were taken to a
:10:15. > :10:21.Shelter, men were separated from their families to be questioned
:10:22. > :10:23.about their involvement. In the home they left behind, the
:10:24. > :10:31.battle will now intensify. Syria's civil war has of course had
:10:32. > :10:39.a calamitous affect on the people of Syria. All too often, the victims
:10:40. > :10:42.are children. Today, the United Nations has confirmed ten cases of
:10:43. > :10:46.polio in the North of the country. It is a disease eradicated in Syria
:10:47. > :10:49.14 years ago. But polio is highly infectious. Refugees fleeing the
:10:50. > :10:51.violence of Syria's civil war typically live in cramped,
:10:52. > :10:59.overcrowded and unhygienic conditions. Aid agencies are warning
:11:00. > :11:01.of a potential polio epidemic. Polio is a highly infectious
:11:02. > :11:06.disease, mainly affecting children under five years old.
:11:07. > :11:08.According to the World Health Organisation, only three countries,
:11:09. > :11:11.Afghanistan, Nigeria and Pakistan, remain polio-endemic.
:11:12. > :11:23.Before the Syrian war began in 011, 95% of children were vaccinated
:11:24. > :11:27.against polio. Now, half a million children have not been immunised.
:11:28. > :11:30.There is no cure for polio, it can only be prevented.
:11:31. > :11:36.With me is Francesco Chicchi. He is the Senior Health Adviser and polio
:11:37. > :11:43.specialist with Save the Children. This is very worrying for Syria and
:11:44. > :11:51.the region, how come polio has come back? Since the outbreak of the
:11:52. > :11:55.conflict, you have a large group of newborn children in Syria who have
:11:56. > :12:00.not received routine vaccines including polio. Much of what
:12:01. > :12:04.happened was fairly predict the ball, it reached a tipping point
:12:05. > :12:09.where conditions are now favourable for the transmission of this disease
:12:10. > :12:14.because of the low number of children vaccinated. And there is a
:12:15. > :12:20.lot of movement, people internally displaced and leaving Syria to these
:12:21. > :12:24.overcrowded refugee camps. We are hearing of ten confirmed cases
:12:25. > :12:31.today, what numbers are we expecting or fearing? Exactly, cases that are
:12:32. > :12:35.clinically visible only a small minority of the people affected by
:12:36. > :12:40.the disease and a number of people will not have symptoms at will be
:12:41. > :12:47.carrying the disease. The fact there is so much displacement in Syria and
:12:48. > :12:54.outside doubles the threat in many ways occurs -- because we hope very
:12:55. > :13:02.much what we are seeing is isolated, at the danger is it spread
:13:03. > :13:06.across Syria -- but the danger. That is why humanitarian groups are
:13:07. > :13:10.saying there has to be a cease-fire so that younger children can be
:13:11. > :13:16.immunised against polio as they were before the outbreak. You have
:13:17. > :13:20.managed that in other complex, in Sudan, in Afghanistan, how realistic
:13:21. > :13:26.is this this might happen now in Syria? There is a very strong
:13:27. > :13:34.precedent and that is why we have put this forward. You have in
:13:35. > :13:43.countries such as Afghanistan, conditions were just as difficult,
:13:44. > :13:49.where the so-called days of tranquillity were respected. In the
:13:50. > :13:55.case of Afghanistan, ten years ago, this enabled the vaccination of
:13:56. > :14:02.about 6 million children in about two weeks. So there is a precedent
:14:03. > :14:06.and we should try it in this case. When we talk about an immunisation
:14:07. > :14:09.cease-fire, it sounds very clinical, but we are talking about chaotic
:14:10. > :14:14.conditions on the ground that change from day to day and as far as
:14:15. > :14:19.immunisations are concerned, they need to be refrigerated to be
:14:20. > :14:21.effective when they are given to the children, how is practically
:14:22. > :14:32.possible for aid agencies? It is going to be very, very
:14:33. > :14:35.difficult. We have vaccinated many thousands of children inside Syria,
:14:36. > :14:41.and it is going to be very challenging. It has limited
:14:42. > :14:50.conditions. I would not see that as the bottleneck. The main bottleneck
:14:51. > :14:52.is to monetary and access. We spoke about the difficulties of providing
:14:53. > :14:59.these immunisations, what is the likelihood, if we don't? Is that
:15:00. > :15:06.doesn't happen in Syria? -- if that doesn't happen? If we do not carry
:15:07. > :15:12.out a vaccination campaign, the outbreak might spread within Syria
:15:13. > :15:18.and potentially outside Syria. Thank you.
:15:19. > :15:22.Unconfirmed reports in China suggest a car crash and an explosion in the
:15:23. > :15:28.heart of Beijing yesterday may have been a suicide attack. Five people
:15:29. > :15:31.died when an SUV drove past security barriers and crashed into
:15:32. > :15:37.pedestrians at Tiananmen Square That is a sensitive location because
:15:38. > :15:42.it was the focus of pro-democracy protests in 1989.
:15:43. > :15:47.First came the fiery crash, in the heart of one of the most politically
:15:48. > :15:54.sensitive places in China. Next to and square, and just the country's
:15:55. > :16:03.iconic portrait of its founder. Next, the questions? Who was
:16:04. > :16:08.responsible? It has been said that the incident seemed to be a planned
:16:09. > :16:12.suicide attack. The people inside the SUV have not been identified,
:16:13. > :16:18.says the same source. But outside Beijing, vehicles are being stopped
:16:19. > :16:22.at a check point. A notice related to city hotels indicate police
:16:23. > :16:30.looking for two male suspects in connection with the episode on
:16:31. > :16:36.Monday. The attacks come from counties like this one, for they
:16:37. > :16:40.have witnessed clashes between ethnic minorities and security
:16:41. > :16:44.sources. They believe that the Chinese authorities suppressed their
:16:45. > :16:49.culture and customs. In Beijing several people hurt by the speeding
:16:50. > :16:55.SUV are receiving treatment at a local hospital. TRANSLATION: I
:16:56. > :16:59.thought if the car would hit us we would die White there, this man
:17:00. > :17:06.explained. But it hit a marble railing and it did not hit us. The
:17:07. > :17:12.car seems to appear, nobody noticed it. It suddenly came towards us I
:17:13. > :17:17.just moved to the side and the car rushed past.
:17:18. > :17:22.Chinese censors have been hard at work, wiping messages from Internet
:17:23. > :17:25.forums that start any meaningful discussion about the incident on
:17:26. > :17:29.Monday. As they scramble to connect the dots and figure out what Willie
:17:30. > :17:37.happened in Tiananmen Square, they are not turning to the public for
:17:38. > :17:40.help. -- what really happened. Two Kenyan soldiers have been sacked
:17:41. > :17:45.and jailed for looting during the terror attacks on the Westgate
:17:46. > :17:50.shopping centre last month. CCTV footage seems to show the soldiers
:17:51. > :17:57.carrying shopping bags out of the shopping centre. A third soldier
:17:58. > :18:00.also from the specialist combat unit is under further investigation.
:18:01. > :18:04.A Bolshoi ballet dancer has pleaded not guilty in court in Moscow over
:18:05. > :18:06.involvement in a shocking acid attack on the troupe's artistic
:18:07. > :18:08.director Sergei Filin. Pavel Dmitrichenko stands accused of
:18:09. > :18:11.masterminding the assault in January. The incident exposed bitter
:18:12. > :18:15.behind the scenes rivalries at one of Russia's greatest cultural
:18:16. > :18:20.institutions. There have been violent scenes in
:18:21. > :18:24.Brazil's largest city, Sao Paulo, for the second night running. The
:18:25. > :18:28.violence was in the north of the city and followed an incident at the
:18:29. > :18:34.weekend when a teenager was shot dead by police in the north of the
:18:35. > :18:38.city. In Moldovan dancer on the bridge of the ill-fated Costa
:18:39. > :18:45.Concordia with the captain has admitted that she was his lover
:18:46. > :18:49.Domnica Cemortan testified she was in a romantic relationship with the
:18:50. > :18:54.captain and was with him when the cruise ship ran aground last year
:18:55. > :18:57.killing more than 30 people. The captain faces multiple charges of
:18:58. > :19:03.manslaughter and abandoning ship and denies responsibility but faces up
:19:04. > :19:10.to 20 years in prison if convicted. A couple have been arrested in
:19:11. > :19:13.south-west France after car mechanics and a malnourished baby
:19:14. > :19:16.girl in the boot of the car. Staff at the carriage in the Dordogne said
:19:17. > :19:20.they heard the moaning from the back of the vehicle which the mother
:19:21. > :19:27.brought in for repairs. The child is thought to have been 15 months.
:19:28. > :19:29.It is a case that officials say defies the imagination.
:19:30. > :19:34.A garage owner detected an unpleasant smell. He looked in the
:19:35. > :19:42.boot and there in appalling physical condition lay a one-year-old girl.
:19:43. > :19:47.She was completely naked. On this side, there was an unbearable smell.
:19:48. > :19:52.She was in a garbage bag in the boot of the car. Her mother had kept
:19:53. > :20:04.secret her existence from her birth. Even the father claims that
:20:05. > :20:09.have known. Neither her size nor her weight corresponds to her age, and
:20:10. > :20:17.there are some psychological retardation is with medical patterns
:20:18. > :20:27.that do not qualify with her age. The neighbours say they are
:20:28. > :20:31.astounded. I have never seen a crib or knew about the baby or knew that
:20:32. > :20:36.the mother was pregnant, we only saw the other children playing outside.
:20:37. > :20:42.The child is responding to treatment in hospital. The couple have been
:20:43. > :20:47.charged with harming the child. It is thought the mother had some deep
:20:48. > :20:50.psychological disturbance. When the child was found in the car,
:20:51. > :20:56.according to the mechanic, the mother was completely unfazed.
:20:57. > :20:59.Now, a tale of a boat, bridge and a tunnel, but what is extraordinary
:21:00. > :21:04.about this underwater tunnel in Istanbul is that it is the first to
:21:05. > :21:09.link two continence. It was conceived in Turkey more than
:21:10. > :21:19.150 years ago, but the new rail link under the Bosporus River was finally
:21:20. > :21:24.inaugurated today. Actual construction took a while as well,
:21:25. > :21:29.it started back in 2004. In total, it is 1.4 kilometres in length
:21:30. > :21:36.underwater which makes it such an immense project. It was dog 60
:21:37. > :21:39.metres below. It cost $4 billion to build. As you can see, the
:21:40. > :21:44.ribbon-cutting ceremony wasn't exactly the smoothest. The Turkish
:21:45. > :21:48.Prime Minister was among those to speak and he said that the tunnel
:21:49. > :21:52.would bring people together and was an achievement for all of mankind,
:21:53. > :21:55.presumably including our correspondent James Reynolds, who
:21:56. > :22:01.was one of the first people to make the journey under the tunnel.
:22:02. > :22:05.For decades, there has been three basic ways to get from one side of
:22:06. > :22:09.Istanbul to the other. You could take a ferry boat like
:22:10. > :22:15.this or you could drive across using one of the bridges. The hardest of
:22:16. > :22:20.all chose to swim across and now, there is a fourth way to get from
:22:21. > :22:26.one side of the other. Use the new underwater tunnel. We are in the
:22:27. > :22:30.station and we are now on the way down towards the trains. We will be
:22:31. > :22:35.among the first people to take the train from the Asian sides to the
:22:36. > :22:39.European side. We are now on the train and it is making its way onto
:22:40. > :22:44.the Bosporus River from Asia to Europe. We are one of the first
:22:45. > :22:48.people to do this journey. The train is absolutely packed with people
:22:49. > :22:52.wanting to be among the first. If you look at the map, it doesn't have
:22:53. > :22:57.many stops, but it does have this patch of blue in the middle, that is
:22:58. > :23:03.the Bosporus River. You can see underneath the tunnel that crosses
:23:04. > :23:07.underneath. Some people here in Istanbul say they do not want beyond
:23:08. > :23:10.this train, they are worried that it may not be able to withstand
:23:11. > :23:15.flooding or earthquakes, but the government says nobody has anything
:23:16. > :23:20.to worry about. This is safe, and people here seem reasonably
:23:21. > :23:24.comfortable. That was James Reynolds reporting. A
:23:25. > :23:30.British man has been charged with hacking into US military and
:23:31. > :23:43.government computer systems. Carlos Burle -- Lauri Love is accused of
:23:44. > :23:56.hacking into NASA databases from his home in Stradishall.
:23:57. > :24:03.When the storm hit the UK yesterday, it reached gusts of up to 99 mph. It
:24:04. > :24:10.caused major problems in Germany, and in Amsterdam, a woman was
:24:11. > :24:15.crushed on the canal. The storm, done with the UK, moved
:24:16. > :24:21.on to ravage Western Europe. It powered into the Danish coast and
:24:22. > :24:26.closed the road link to Sweden. The winds here were up to 120 mph. They
:24:27. > :24:38.ripped apart the metal scaffolding on this loading in Copenhagen. -
:24:39. > :24:44.building. The winds sliced to Brussels. They sliced through
:24:45. > :24:49.Amsterdam, where along the canal, it was the trees being uprooted by the
:24:50. > :24:53.wind. A woman died when one of the trees fell on her. I cross the
:24:54. > :24:59.Netherlands, it is estimated repairs will cost some ?70 million. There is
:25:00. > :25:05.damage across large parts of Europe. In northern France, transport was
:25:06. > :25:09.hit hard. Train services at airports experienced huge delays. Things are
:25:10. > :25:16.beginning to return to normal as the wind dies down. Today, it is pretty
:25:17. > :25:18.much the car much of the storm, but it was a big weather event. The
:25:19. > :25:21.winds recorded from France to Scandinavia were among the strongest
:25:22. > :25:28.winds in the last decade. In Germany, several people died, one
:25:29. > :25:32.man and this tree fell on his car, but across Europe, most countries
:25:33. > :25:36.were well-prepared. Warnings had been issued, and while the Keira
:25:37. > :25:41.continues, many will feel it could have been a lot worse.
:25:42. > :25:46.The force of the storm that swept across northern Europe ripped up
:25:47. > :25:51.huge waves which may have helped one surfer set a world record in
:25:52. > :25:53.Portugal. Take a look at this. This is
:25:54. > :25:58.Brazilian surfer, Carlos Burle, who is riding what is believed to be the
:25:59. > :26:04.biggest waves ever conquered. The exact size of these waves is yet to
:26:05. > :26:08.be determined. But there are reports that the swells could have been 30
:26:09. > :26:12.metres high, which would equal the world record, and making that he'd
:26:13. > :26:19.even more remarkable, just moments before mastering is waves, he
:26:20. > :26:24.rescued a fellow surfer who had been knocked unconscious by a giant wave.
:26:25. > :26:28.What a day for him. The main news now, American
:26:29. > :26:37.intelligence chiefs have started giving evidence at a congressional
:26:38. > :26:44.hearing at guessing -- addressing snooping on foreign leaders.
:26:45. > :26:47.That is that from us here and the rest of the team, next up, the
:26:48. > :26:59.weather, from us, goodbye. A very unsettled outlook with more
:27:00. > :27:03.wind and rain for all of us this week and into the weekend. The next
:27:04. > :27:12.weather system coming off the Atlantic will bring rain in the next
:27:13. > :27:19.few days. A cold, clear night with a touch of Frost particularly in the
:27:20. > :27:22.suburbs and rural areas and in parts of the south of the UK. Wind and
:27:23. > :27:25.rain coming into Northern Ireland and in too much of Scotland, Wales
:27:26. > :27:30.and West in England during the day. Further east, we keep the brightness
:27:31. > :27:36.with some cold weather and damages then recovering to 14 degrees read
:27:37. > :27:42.the breeze will freshen up. -- temperatures then recovering. Some
:27:43. > :27:49.cloud and rain coming into the south-west and with a strengthening
:27:50. > :27:50.wind, not that comfortable. 14 degrees. Similar for Wales with