26/12/2015 World News Today

UN brokered deal to allow Syrian fighters to leave the Yarmouk

refugee camp has suffered a last-minute setback. More than

150,000 people in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and Brazil have

been driven from their homes by some of the worst flooding in the region

for decades. Meanwhile, in the UK, severe flood warnings, a danger to

life, have been issued for parts of the North of England after several

rivers overflowed. And we will find out whether ballet can really help

treat sufferers of Parkinson's disease.

A warm welcome to you. Plans to evacuate IS militants and Syrian

rebels from the Yarmouk refugee camp in Damascus have reportedly been

halted. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has said the delay is

for logistical reasons in order to secure the road to Raqqa. The UN

deal is said to provide a safe passage for the fighters and their

families out of Yarmouk. It would have allowed the UN to deliver

much-needed aid to the thousands of people who remain stuck inside the

camp. One of the reasons suggested for the hold on the evacuation is

the killing of a top rebel commander. The leader of the rebel

group in question was killed on Friday in an air strike. It is not

clear if it was a Syrian or a Russian air strike, but it is known

that the rebel group have been instrumental in fighting IS. So what

is the significance of the death of the commander? We take a look.

A sophisticated search for a top target, an unusual operation for the

Syrian government, but doable with Russian aid. The target is one of

the most important and influential Islamist leaders in the suburbs of

Damascus, Zahroun Alloush, leader of Jaysh al-Islam, was killed by fire

from what activists say was a Russian-made jet. But it is not yet

clear whether the plane was from the rational Syrian air force. Either

way, the Syrian government has claimed the credit. Jaysh al-Islam

is the biggest and most powerful rebel group that controls the

eastern area. While the Government makes a deal with Islamic State

fighters in the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp, they have killed the

leader of a group who have been successful in defeating Islamic

State militants and preventing them from getting closer to the capital.

Zahroun Alloush's group was backed by Saudi Arabia and was represented

in the Riyadh talks earlier this month that aimed at preparing the

opposition for peace talks with the as art regime. But for Russia, the

group is one of many identified as terrorists and should be fought.

Since the start of Russian air strikes in Syria in September, there

have been reports of targeted attacks against rebel groups while

fighting IS. Russia claims it is fighting Islamic groups. This comes

as a blow to the peace talks later this month. Zahroun Alloush was

thought to be instrument to finding a resolution. These protests are

some of many that took place calling for the release of prisoners and

accusing Zahroun Alloush of betraying the goals of the

revolution. He was even accused of being responsible for the kidnap of

a veteran UN human rights lawyer. The group has appointed a successor.

But this killing is a turning point in Syria's five-year war and sends

one message - Assad and Russia will decide who they will sit with at the

negotiation table. More than 150,000

people in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and Brazil have

been driven from their homes by some of the worst flooding

in the region in decades. Witnesses say there was no time, the

river rose with more force than it had for 50 years and above the

city's 17 metres embankment. TRANSLATION: The river Justin Rose,

we are used to crest of 12 or 13 metres, maximum 14 metres. -- just

rows. This was out of our hands. This city is used to flooding,

sitting on a river that separate Argentina from Uruguay. It is part

of a wider river system, a basin which feeds into one of the largest

river basins in the world. In Paraguay, many of the evacuated

families have built a temporary shacks. More than 100,000 people

have been forced from their homes and a number of power distribution

points have been knocked out. The president has declared a state of

emergency to free up disaster funding. November and December

rainfalls exceeded the average by more than 300 millimetres in some

areas. Flooding was predicted this summer due to help me, but

authorities never expected anything on this scale. -- due to El Nino.

Here in the UK, we've been receiving dramatic video all day of flooding

More than 350 flood warnings and alerts

are currently in force across England, Scotland and Wales.

The northwest of England has been particularly badly hit,

This is what happens when the rain just won't stop.

Across the North of England, towns and villages lie submerged.

they served Christmas dinner yesterday.

Today there was no chance of a Boxing Day meal.

As the water came in, the staff tried to bail it out.

The water levels rising as we are standing here now,

It is up to about two feet at the moment.

And that's in the kitchens? The kitchen's completely flooded.

We just have to wait for the level to drop.

These flood defences were put in by the army yesterday,

Ribchester was cut off this morning, and with the water rising,

pumps and sandbags were brought in to keep it at bay.

The extraordinary levels that we have seen, record-breaking

river levels now across Lancashire, has just overwhelmed even

So we always try - every house that we can keep dry

is important, and we will always try and do that.

But the levels that we have seen today right across the North

of England are meaning that we are seeing significant flooding still.

Fire crews went out in boats to help rescue those who were cut off.

In nearby Whalley, when the downpour became a flood, people were forced

Seven o'clock this morning, the water started coming up,

and over the past few hours, it has just come up and up.

We started trying to mop it up, which we soon...

Quite a good job for about an hour, and then it just overwhelmed us.

It is probably about two feet in our house now.

In Greater Manchester, the power of the storm is best shown

by what has happened to this 200-year-old building.

The former pub sits on a bridge in Summerseat in Bury.

As the rain hammered down and the river raged, it collapsed,

In Rochdale, the River Roch surged through the town centre,

flooding dozens of businesses and cutting off power

In west Yorkshire, Sowerby Bridge is amongst several towns

Cars which were parked in the dry are now roof deep.

In Manchester city centre, an unusual sight -

the River Irwell racing at speed, crashing past balconies

The rain has continued all day, and as it falls, the anxiety levels

Those in the middle of all of this feel as though there

Hot and windy conditions have pushed bushfires out of control

in the state of Victoria, in southern Australia.

103 properties have so far been destroyed by fire in the popular

holiday towns of Wye River and Separation Creek.

Fast-moving flames and thick smoke have brought panic and fear

to communities celebrating Christmas along Australia's

More than 50 houses have been destroyed in Wye River

Firefighters have struggled to control the blazes.

This fire has the potential to burn in January and February this year.

The forecast for a long, hard and dry summer is there.

Boots on the ground were supported by water-bombing aircraft,

The outbreak began last weekend, but intensified after being fanned

by strong winds as temperatures soared.

Many residents and holiday-makers were forced to flee as Christmas

festivities were abandoned when the scale of the threat

They were all prepared, putting their barbecues on,

they were cooking away, and all of a sudden they could see

They thought it was still four hours away, according

And then all of a sudden it was an hour away,

then half an hour away, so they just dropped everything,

stopped cooking and hopped in their car and headed here.

Conditions were so severe that authorities were advised to evacuate

A cool change has subdued some of the fires, and some heavy rain

Many bushfires are started by lightning strikes,

while others are sparked accidentally by campers

This is one of the most fire prone regions in the world.

Phil Mercer, BBC News, Sydney.

In other news, a wildfire in southern California

of parts of a major highway and led to evacuation of around 30

More than 600 firefighters were battling the fire,

which swept through an area with an extensive network of oil

Tensions remain high on the French island of Corsica -

a day after demonstrators vandalised a Muslim prayer hall

A fresh protest took place on Saturday as condemnation

poured in from both Muslim leaders and French officials

Police reinforcements are being called in and prayer rooms

and mosques on the island are being guarded.

A French journalist who wrote about China's policy

towards its Muslim Uighur minority is to be expelled.

Ursula Gauthier, who works for the magazine l'Obs,

said the Chinese foreign ministry had confirmed

She's the first foreign correspondent

Afghan security forces in the southern town of Sangin

are facing stiff resistance from Taliban militants.

The insurgents have been attacking key government positions

in the town in Helmand province for the past week.

Harun Najafisada, has sent us this update.

What the Afghan troops have done is basically stopping the Taliban from

further progressing in Sangin district. They have taken the war to

the Taliban, and they face stiff resistance by the militants. We are

getting conflicting messages from Sangin on who controls this

important and strategic town in south Afghanistan. The Afghan

government says they are in full control of Sangin town. The Taliban

claimed that they are there in large numbers, controlling parts of Sangin

district. Now, the fighting in Sangin, the fight for Helmand, has

been a difficult one, for the Afghan government. In 2015, the Afghanistan

got full responsibility for fighting the insurgency in their country, but

they are struggling, because they are lacking airpower, and that is

why a small number of American and British troops are in Helmand,

advising and helping Afghan troops in that regard.

Stay with us on BBC News, still to come, all the results

from the English Premier League football including Louis

van Gaal's Manchester United lose their fourth game in a row.

We saw this enormous tidal wave approaching the beach, it was

complete chaos. US troops have been trying to overthrow the dictatorship

of Manuel Murray aider. The Pentagon said it had been 90% successful but

had failed in its principal objective. The hammer and sickle was

hastily taken away, the Russian flag was hoisted over a Commonwealth of

independent states. Day broke slowly over Lockerbie. You can see what

happens when a plane eight stories high, a football pitch wide, falls

from 30,000 feet. Christmas has returned to Albania after waveband

lasting more than 20 years. Thousands went to midnight mass in a

town where there were anti-Communist riots ten days ago.

This is BBC World News. I'm Alice Baxter.

The latest headlines: A UN-brokered deal to allow Syrian rebel fighters

and their families to leave the Yarmouk refugee camp

More than 150,000 people in Argentina, Uruguay,

Paraguay and Brazil have been driven from their homes

by some of the worst flooding in the region for decades.

Iraqi government forces, supported by US air-strikes,

are making slow but sustained headway against fighters

from the so-called Islamic State group in the key city of Ramadi.

The Iraqi army is now reported to be within 500 metres

by snipers, suicide bombs and booby-traps.

There's also concern about the safety of hundreds

of families still in the city, as Thomas Fessy reports.

The battle for Ramadi rages on. Iraqi soldiers are closing in on the

heart of the city around the former government compound where the last

Islamic State fighters are organising their resistance. It is a

fight for several hundred meters each day, street by street, house to

house. The jihadis have been using strong defensive tactics,

transforming the city centre into a gigantic minefield.

TRANSLATION: Our troops are now advancing towards their targets, but

they were delayed because the criminals have booby-trapped

everything. They have even loaded vehicles with explosives, more than

they can hold, so they can cause maximum damage.

It has been five days of yet another destructive war in Ramadi. The city

has been a recurrent battlefield over the last decade. In May this

year, Iraqi soldiers fled in front of triumphant IS fighters expanding

their so-called caliphate in the country. Iraqi forces are keen to

put such an embarrassing defeat behind them, and retaking Ramadi

would bring momentum in the fight against Islamic State.

TRANSLATION: A few days only, and we liberate the whole city, we are

watching them and have killed many. Snipers have taken positions of the

rooms, God willing we will liberate Ramadi soon.

Coalition forces have carried out daily air strikes this week to

support the Iraqi ground offensive. But the battle is not over, and the

last IS militants holding out. Iraqi forces are facing stiff resistance

from Islamic State in Ahmadi, they are also concerns for families

trapped on the front line, how to get them to safety. The final

showdown could result in mass casualties. Thomas Fessy, BBC News,

Baghdad. One week on, authorities

in the Chinese city of Shenzhen have officially apologised

for a disastrous landslide that left more than 70 people

missing, presumed dead. was caused by the collapse

of a huge pile of construction waste,

not by any natural movement TRANSLATION: We sincerely apologise

to all victims, families of the missing people, injured people and

other people affected, and the whole society.

The incident was caused by a collapse of the piled up Marc,

rather than a landslide. It is not a natural geological disaster, it is a

workplace safety incident. It's a disease characterised

by tremors, slow movement and stiff muscles -

but new research has suggested an unexpected method of easing

the symptoms of Parkinson's. Academics from the University

of Roehampton in the UK, have found that ballet can have

significant physical and emotional Jayne McCubbin joined a class

in Liverpool Everyone in this dance studio has

Parkinson's, some worse than others, a neurological condition which stops

sufferers being able to control their movement, and yet they are

here for this. For the last three years,

researchers have monitored classes for parkinsonism is which of been

led by the English national ballet. They found it made a big difference

physically and socially. The problem is that you cannot coordinate your

arms and legs, they do not go where you think they are going to go.

Before a session, I meet Helen and Fiona. It does feel really strange,

but it is so beautiful, that it is associated with Parkinson's, which

is not beautiful. Ballet is very stylised, and it is as if your brain

has to tell you what to do, so it is easier to do it. If it is

spontaneous, it is much harder to do. The stylised movement you can do

it, and in my mind's eye, I am dancing as beautiful as I ever did.

This is where they come once a week, a class led by a ballet artist. When

everyone is participating, we are all dancers, sharing the experience,

the enjoyment of free expression. People might come in with a starter

or feeling less confident, but when we leave, everyone walks through the

door, free, fluid, that is really interesting to watch, that is great.

The study has shown that classes allow many to better cope with

symptoms, to become more fluid in their movement. It also helps to end

the social isolation, with the disease. There have been people who

say to me, the dancing has changed my life, I feel much more beautiful

now, confident, graceful. And for people with Parkinson's, that is so

valuable, because you can feel hideous with Parkinson's. The

disease is left at the door, along with walking sticks. It is

surprisingly see how confident the participants are when striding

around the room. You know you have a condition which is in durable, and

you have still got to live through the day, get on with your life. --

in curable. It can be difficult. You have got to be positive, life is

good. Howdy appeal? Feel beautiful! You are beautiful! Thank you so

much. -- how do you feel? Let's catch up with all the latest

sport with Marc Edwards. The pressure is very much on this

man, Manchester United manager at Louis van Gaal. They were beaten by

Stoke City 2-0 and are now without a win in seven games. They have lost

four on the trot in all competitions, their worst run in a

single season since 1961. Vanguard decided to start the game with Wayne

Rooney on the bench. -- Louis vanguard.

Obviously, when you leave out your captain,

people will say, was that the right decision?

I thought it was the right decision, otherwise I didn't do it.

No, because in the first half we gave it away,

and we did better in the second half, but then we don't have

the accuracy of the reporting this week.

Do you think you will be under scrutiny once again?

Yeah, but I don't think that is interesting.

I have said only that they have to stick by the facts,

The scrutiny is all right for me, I am used to that.

But I think always that you have to stick by the fact and that

Louis van Gaal talking to Alistair Mann.

Both goals were from Diego Costa. It is a fair result, you have to have

respect for our opponent, which is in a winning streak, they are

winning already for several weeks, and they had some very dangerous

strikes, but I think in the end we could have made a little bit more.

We had some chances in the first up already, it was a pity that Oscar

slipped away for the penalty. The results from the rest of the Premier

League matches. Southampton are beating Arsenal 3-0 with just under

ten minutes to play. England finished the first

day of the first test The test started badly

for the tourists, captain I think we should be pretty happy

with that, considering it couldn't have been better bowling conditions

for them. Losing the toss and being put in on that wicket, we would have

bowled ourselves, and the conditions could not have been much better, so

a really good effort from Nick Compton, playing the way he did. It

was enjoyable. That is all the sport for now, back to Alice.

Thanks, that is all from us. The weather continues to cause

problems, rain continues to fall