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BBC News with Chris Barrow.
Parliament in Venezuela has given initial approval to legislation that would grant amnesty to jailed opposition figures of Nicolás Maduro's rule a month after he was ousted by the United States. The bill has the backing of the interim president, Delcy Rodríguez. Ione Wells reports. For years, there has been a tough crackdown on dissent in Venezuela. Hundreds of people including opposition politicians, journalists and anti-government protesters have been detained, sometimes accused of crimes like terrorism or treason. The government has always denied holding political prisoners and says it has released more than 600 people since December. Human rights groups, though, say that figure is higher than they have been able to confirm and that there are still more than 650 political prisoners in jail. If this law comes into force, it is thought it would pave the way for many more to be released. The Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel says his government is working hard to solve an energy crisis that's been exacerbated by U.S. efforts to block oil shipments to the country. He said transport, hospitals, schools and the economy have all been affected. Mr. Díaz-Canel said Cuba was ready for dialogue with the United States but only as an equal partner. Norwegian police are investigating the former Prime Minister Thorbjørn Jagland over his past ties with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. They said he was suspected of aggravated corruption. Another Norwegian is also being probed. Here's Charles Haviland. Thorbjørn Jagland was chairman of the committee that awards the Nobel Peace Prize and head of the Council of Europe when he's said to have established ties with Jeffrey Epstein in the 2010s. A special Norwegian police unit looking at newly released documents says Mr. Jagland is being probed on suspicion of aggravated corruption. Meanwhile, the World Economic Forum which organizes the annual Davos summit is investigating its president of nine years, Børge Brende, also a Norwegian, over his interactions with Epstein. He has acknowledged dining with the sex offender three times in 2018 and 2019, but says he was unaware of his criminal activities. Charles Haviland with that report. The U.S. and Russia have agreed to regular contacts between their top commanders. It comes after the expiry of the last nuclear arms control treaty. Here's James Landale. The Americans and the Russians have not had this formal dialogue between their militaries since 2021 when it was suspended because of Russia's imminent invasion of Ukraine. Now clearly in recent years, there have been ad hoc engagement between Russian and American senior military figures and I think clearly both sides wanted to resume them. So it's significant from a military point of view but I think it's also significant from a diplomatic point of view because it reflects the desire of this U.S. administration led by Donald Trump to normalize relations between the U.S. and Russia. World news from the BBC. A BBC Eye investigation has discovered a network of spy cameras in China filming people in hotel rooms without consent. The team uncovered several channels on the messaging platform Telegram. Wanqing Zhang reports. The rise of spy cam porn has caught the attention of the Chinese authorities. Last April, the installation of any cameras in hotel rooms was banned but watching spy cam porn hasn't been made illegal. So who is profiting from this misery? Posing as a buyer, I joined some of the most prominent channels on Telegram, including one run by an agent called AKA. Then AKA messaged me to promote a new website which costs 65 U.S. dollars a month. I monitor the website regularly for seven months and found content captured by 54 different cameras with about half operational at any one time. The U.N. says acute malnutrition in children has reached catastrophic levels in two more areas of North Darfur in Sudan following continued conflict and mass displacement. An alert from an international body monitoring food security, the IPC, said levels were nearly twice the famine threshold. It expects the situation to worsen further. The British Prime Minister's Office says the United States has backed a deal to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius and lease back a key military base. President Trump has signaled his approval for the move despite previously branding the deal an act of great stupidity. A chalk sketch of a foot by the Renaissance artist Michelangelo has been sold at auction in New York for more than $23 million. The previously unknown drawing is believed to be a study for one of the Italian master's most famous works, the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. That's the latest BBC news. |