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BBC News with Moira Alderson.
FIFA's President Gianni Infantino has apologized for mistakes made in the process of his controversial proposal to sell shares in football's World Cup to private investors. The apology came in a letter signed by Mr. Infantino and FIFA's secretary general following a crisis meeting in Morocco. The letter said the FIFA Management Board reaffirmed its full support for him as president of the association. Dan Rowan reports. FIFA did admit mistakes regarding the plans and in a letter seen by the BBC Infantino apologized to the national member associations for errors, vowing there would be no repeat and promising a review. He will hope the meeting in Rabat represents a reset and helps draw a line under a hugely divisive and damaging crisis. But clinging to power could merely fuel the revolt against him and he's likely to make his opponents even more determined to identify a rival candidate to challenge him in next year's presidential election. The Nigerian government says more than 300 people have been freed in what it's described as "the largest ever rescue operation" by the security forces in a single day. More than half of the kidnapped victims were seized by suspected jihadists in Kwara state six months ago. The rest were taken from Niger state. British scientists say vaccines which don't need to be kept cool in a fridge have been successfully trialed in patients for the first time. Around half of all vaccines are wasted each year. James Gallagher has the details. Vaccines are like Goldilocks. They don't like it too hot or too cold. It's why most need to be kept in a fridge until they end up in a patient's arm. That's hard to do in poor, remote or war-torn parts of the world. These trials were on the tetanus diphtheria vaccine. It's normally a liquid but a sugar called trehalose was used to stabilize the vaccine as it was turned into a dry powder. The resulting vaccine was stored at room temperature for up to a year and then re-hydrated. The researchers said the vaccine was safe and appeared to produce similar immune responses to the conventional vaccine. Iran's foreign ministry spokesman says a joint announcement with Oman of a new route through the Strait of Hormuz is being finalized so long as what he's described as "certain third parties" do not interfere. Frank Gardner has the details. The deal, which has yet to be publicly endorsed by Donald Trump, envisages inbound shipping to the Gulf, passing along a northern route close to Iran's coast and under its notional control. Outbound shipping would pass to the south, avoiding an area believed to be sewn with sea mines. That doesn't sound that different from the longstanding traffic separation scheme that's been in place in the Strait of Hormuz since 1968. But what's changed is that Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps are now insisting on exerting some kind of sovereign control over the strait. BBC News. The Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, has described current interactions with the country's supreme leader as very difficult. But he insisted he had been able to have productive meetings with him. Mojtaba Khamenei has made no public appearances since he took the role. He was reportedly injured in one of the strikes launched by the United States and Israel. Michigan's left-wing Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate in November's midterm elections has called for party unity after his watershed victory over a centrist in the primaries. Abdul El-Sayed said any differences with his defeated fellow Democrat Haley Stevens paled in comparison to what unified them and they should now focus [on defending] on defeating the Republicans. Mr. El-Sayed's narrow victory was a rebuke to the Democratic establishment and followed an acrimonious and expensive campaign. The U.S. has suspended imports of avocados from the top-producing state in Mexico because of what it called a "threat against American interests." The authorities in Michoacan state link the suspension to the arrest of criminals known for extorting money from the avocado industry. Shipments are routinely subject to inspection by U.S. officials before they can be exported. Spain's North African territory of Ceuta says it's caring for more than a thousand children who entered from Morocco last week in a mass influx of would-be migrants. They're among the small number who've remained after most of the 72,000 people returned across the border. Here's Charles Haviland. Ceuta's leader, Juan Jesús Vivas Lara, says the territory is crying out for help from the Spanish government. He didn't say where the children originally come from but many migrants left in Ceuta are from countries further afield than Morocco. Spanish law provides for unaccompanied child immigrants to be sent to other parts of Spain. But some politicians oppose this and say every effort must be made to send the latest incomers back across the border. Nearly 90 people died trying to enter Ceuta last week. That's the latest BBC News. |