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BBC News with Zoe Diamond.

President Obama has declared the current outbreak of swine flu in the United States a national emergency. The move comes amid rising concern about the spread of the H1N1 virus. Medical officials warned earlier this month of a possible shortage of the swine flu vaccine. James Hodges has compiled this report.

The White House says President Obama’s proclamation of a national emergency will give medical officials more freedom to tackle the virus, allowing them to bypass certain federal requirements when deciding what action to take. Swine flu is now widespread in almost all of the American states, and it's passed epidemic levels in most of them. Health officials say children are being hit hard by the disease. They account for almost 100 of 1,000 people killed in America so far.

Two passenger trains have collided in Egypt. Witnesses say at least 15 people have been killed and more than 20 others have been injured. From Cairo, Yolande Knell sent this report.

It’s understood that one train crashed into another which was stationary on the tracks, close to Al-Ayyat in Giza Governorate to the south of Cairo. Several carriages were badly damaged. Rescue workers are now at the scene trying to remove bodies and the injured from the wreckage. There have been several serious crashes on Egyptian railway lines in recent years. Last year, 44 people were killed in northern Egypt, and back in 2002, at least 360 people were killed in a fire on a crowded passenger train close to the location of the latest crash.

A Saudi Arabian court has sentenced a female journalist to 60 lashes for her part in producing a television program, in which a Saudi man broke a major taboo in the deeply conservative country by describing his extra-marital sex life. The program caused a huge scandal when it was shown several months ago on LBC, a Lebanese satellite channel. Serbastin Usher reports.

The original program was part of a series called Red Lines. It examined taboos in the Arab world. Unmarried sex in Saudi Arabia amongst Saudis is one of the biggest. The Saudi man in the show Mazen Abdul Jawad provoked outrage by describing his techniques for meeting and having sex with Saudi women. He later tearfully apologized but was jailed for five years and sentenced to 1,000 lashes. Mr. Abdul Jawad blamed LBC producers for tricking him. The station's offices in Saudi Arabia were closed down and two of its producers - both female - put on trial.

Officials in Washington say a North Korean diplomat has made a rare visit to the US and has had talks with an American negotiator. A spokesman for the State Department said the diplomat Ri Gun met the American special envoy for North Korean nuclear disarmament, Sung Kim, in New York. Pyongyang walked out of multiple-lateral talks about its nuclear program six months ago after sanctions were imposed on it for testing nuclear weapons. It said it would only return to negotiations after direct talks with the US.

This is the World News from the BBC.

An American spokesman says President Obama has secured the full support of his French and Russian counterparts over policy towards Iran’s nuclear program. The spokesman says the president phoned both Nicolas Sarkozy and Dmitry Medvedev today, and both leaders backed a proposal deal on Iran endorsed by the UN’s nuclear agency, the IAEA. Tehran says it will respond to the plan this week.

The Pakistani army said that it has captured Kotkai, the hometown of the Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud a week after launching a large scale offensive against the militants’ strongholds in the South Waziristan tribal region. Local officials said three soldiers and four militants were killed in the operation to capture the town. Pakistan’s military spokesman General Athar Abbas said Kotkai had been an important base for militants.

"The place was a stronghold of terrorists with a majority of houses converted into strong bunkers. The town also has a training camp of Qari Hussein who is known as the mentor of suicide bombers. Security forces are in the process of clearing the built-up areas from IEDs, mines and booby traps."

A meeting of about 600 Church of England priests in London has ended with several signalling that they are ready to accept an offer from the Pope to join the Roman Catholic Church. The priests are members of the Forward in Faith group which is unhappy with the Church of England's position on issues such as women bishops and homosexual clergy. However, a BBC correspondent says other Anglicans are desperate to preserve the Church of England's historical role in uniting even Jellico protestants with those more sympathetic to Catholicism.

Pope Benedict has appointed a Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson to one of the most influential posts in the Vatican. Analysts say the appointment to the justice and peace office strengthens Cardinal Turkson’s position as a future papal candidate.

That’s the latest World News from the BBC.

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