100 Women 2020: Who is on the list this year?

 

The BBC has revealed its list of 100 inspiring and influential women from around the world for 2020.

This year 100 Women is highlighting those who are leading change and making a difference during these turbulent times.

The list includes Sanna Marin, who leads Finland's all-female coalition government, Michelle Yeoh, star of the new Avatar and Marvel films and Sarah Gilbert, who heads the Oxford University research into a coronavirus vaccine, as well as Jane Fonda, a climate activist and actress.

And in an extraordinary year - when countless women around the world have made sacrifices to help others - one name on the 100 Women list has been left blank as a tribute.

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US election 2020: Biden to present team as Trump allows transition

 

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US President-elect Joe Biden will formally introduce the first people he has chosen for his cabinet later, as the transition of power gathers pace.

Many of the choices, already announced, are Mr Biden's colleagues from his years in the Obama administration.

John Kerry will be climate envoy, while foreign policy veteran Antony Blinken is nominated for secretary of state.

President Donald Trump has finally agreed that the transition process should start, after weeks of wrangling.

• What Biden's new foreign policy team tells us
• What is the presidential transition?

The General Services Administration (GSA), the federal agency overseeing the handover, said it was now acknowledging Mr Biden as the "apparent winner" of the 3 November election.

The move grants the Democrat access to millions of dollars in funds, as well as access to national security briefings and government officials, so he can properly prepare to take over the presidency on 20 January.

Mr Trump said the GSA must "do what needs to be done", but still refuses to concede the election, repeating unsubstantiated claims of a "rigged election".

Mr Biden is projected to beat President Trump by 306 votes to 232 in the US electoral college when it meets to formally confirm the winner on 14 December. This is far above the 270 votes he needs.

On Tuesday, Governor Tom Wolf said he had certified the victory of Mr Biden in Pennsylvania, one of the key swing states. Another, Michigan, certified the same result on Monday.

Who has Biden picked for the top jobs?

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image caption(L-R) Alejandro Mayorkas, Janet Yellen and Avril Haines are expected to be formally unveiled for posts

A statement from the transition team said those being nominated "are experienced, crisis-tested leaders who are ready to hit the ground running on day one".

It said: "These officials will start working immediately to rebuild our institutions, renew and re-imagine American leadership to keep Americans safe at home and abroad, and address the defining challenges of our time - from infectious disease, to terrorism, nuclear proliferation, cyber threats, and climate change."

The transition website has now switched to a .gov domain.

It is not yet clear when Mr Biden will be given his first classified national security briefing as incoming president. The so-called Presidential Daily Brief gives Mr Trump details of the latest international threats and developments.

Mr Biden revealed his key picks for his national security and foreign policy teams on Monday. Almost all of the top posts will require Senate approval.

• Antony Blinken was nominated as secretary of state - the most important foreign policy position. He is expected to manage a Biden foreign policy agenda that will emphasise re-engaging with Western allies
• Ex-US Secretary of State John Kerry will lead the incoming administration's effort to combat climate change. He was one of the leading architects of the Paris climate agreement, which President Trump withdrew from. Mr Kerry will not require Senate approval
• Avril Haines, a former deputy director of the CIA, was nominated as the first female director of national intelligence
• Alejandro Mayorkas was the first Latino nominated to serve as secretary of homeland security. He previously served as deputy secretary of homeland security under President Obama
• Jake Sullivan was named White House national security adviser. This does not require Senate approval. Mr Sullivan served as Mr Biden's national security adviser during Mr Obama's second term
• Long-time diplomat Linda Thomas-Greenfield was nominated US ambassador to the UN. She also served under President Obama, including as assistant secretary of state for African affairs between 2013 and 2017
• Reports say former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen will be the choice for treasury secretary

Metal monolith found by helicopter crew in Utah desert

 

media captionThe crew found the unusual object while conducting a count of big horn sheep in the area

A strange metal monolith has been discovered in the Utah desert by a helicopter crew, leaving local authorities baffled.

Wildlife officials spotted the "unusual" object while counting sheep during a flyover in a remote south-eastern area of the US state.

They said the structure had been planted in the ground between red rock.

There was no indication who installed the monolith, which was about 10 to 12ft (3.6m) tall.

In an interview with local news channel KSLTV, the helicopter pilot, Bret Hutchings, said: "That's been about the strangest thing that I've come across out there in all my years of flying."

IMAGE COPYRIGHTUTAH DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY

image captionThere was speculation that the monolith was installed by an artist

Mr Hutchings said a biologist counting big horn sheep in the helicopter was the first one to spot the structure from the sky.

"He was like, 'Whoa, whoa, whoa, turn around, turn around!'. And I was like, 'What?'. And he's like, 'There's this thing back there - we've got to go look at it!'," Mr Hutchings said.

IMAGE COPYRIGHTUTAH DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY

image captionLocal authorities appealed for information about the monolith on social media

Mr Hutchings speculated that the monolith may have been installed by "some new wave artist", or a fan of 2001: A Space Odyssey, the 1968 film directed by Stanley Kubrick.

Imposing black monoliths created by an unseen alien species appear in the movie, based on the writing of novelist Arthur C Clarke.

IMAGE COPYRIGHTUTAH DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY

image captionBig horn sheep are native to southern parts of Utah

The Utah Department of Public Safety Aero Bureau released images of the rectangular-shaped metal object in a news release last week.

It said authorities would determine if "they need to investigate further".

"It is illegal to install structures or art without authorisation on federally managed public lands, no matter what planet you're from," the department said.

The department has not disclosed the exact location of the monolith, fearing explorers may try to seek it out and "become stranded". The big horn sheep wildlife officials were counting are native to many parts of southern Utah, where the terrain is rugged.

As yet, no one has claimed responsibility for installing the structure.

Looking for answers, Utah's highway patrol turned to social media, writing in a post on Instagram: "Inquiring minds want to know, what the heck is it? Anyone?"

Most observers presumed it was an installation left by a sculptor, with some saying it resembled the work of late minimalist artist John McCracken.

Covid: India's festival season doesn't stop for coronavirus

 Millions of people are marking the Hindu festival of Diwali in India, but as shoppers pack markets in the capital, Delhi, there are concerns over rising coronavirus cases.

Doctors say they’re fearful of a medical emergency.

India already has the second highest number of Covid cases worldwide, but a relatively low death rate.

The country’s prime minister has so far ruled out a second lockdown.

Covid: Children more likely to be infected in second wave

 

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The number of school-age children with coronavirus has risen "significantly" in the second wave compared with the first, according to the government's scientific advisers.

Children are now more likely than adults to be the person bringing a Covid infection into a household.

But families with children are at no higher risk of severe illness.

The National Education Union (NEU) said it was "troubled" by the number of children testing positive.

The exact role children play in transmitting coronavirus has long been an open question.

It's clear young people as a group are at very low risk of becoming seriously ill from the virus themselves.

• R number for UK has fallen closer to 1

There is also some evidence younger children are less likely to even contract it in the first place.

But when it comes to older children, their role in passing on the virus has been much less clear.

A review presented to government and published on 13 November outlines the growing evidence older children can catch and transmit Covid-19 at similar rates to adults.

From around the time schools reopened in September, a rising number of children have been testing positive for coronavirus, according to the advisory group.

But the paper said the extent to which transmission was occurring in schools was "unproven and difficult to establish".

Two major surveillance studies by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and Imperial College London show infections among people aged 16-24 were increasing in September.

By October increases could be seen throughout the 2-24-year-old age bracket.

There were signs of rising infection in the wider population before schools went back, however.

The government's Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) has previously said reopening schools was likely to increase transmission of the virus.

Chief Medical Officer for England Chris Whitty also acknowledged this, but said trade-offs would have to be made to allow schools to remain open while controlling the virus.

The 13 November advisory paper said there were "significant educational, developmental and mental health harms from schools being closed".

Schoolchildren and young adults have experienced a much faster rise in infections than other age groups in the second wave.

Prof Mark Woolhouse at the University of Edinburgh said this was "not surprising given that schools are operating much closer to normality than most other parts of society".

The review made clear it was not possible to separate contacts in school from contacts around school including travelling to and from, and socialising afterwards.

• UK coronavirus cases up by 27,301 on Friday

However, teachers were no more likely to test positive for coronavirus than other workers, according to ONS data.

Dr Sarah Lewis, an epidemiologist at the University of Bristol, said this was "reassuring" and suggested "the measures in place to reduce transmission in schools are working".

People living with secondary-school-age children were 8% more likely to catch the virus.

But research by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the University of Oxford found that people living with under-18s had no increased risk of becoming seriously ill from Covid.

The NEU said it was concerned by the "finding that children aged 12-16 played a 'significantly higher role' in introducing infection into households in the period after schools reopened their doors to all students".

The union suggested this was down to "the difficulty of social distancing, the absence of face masks inside classrooms, the problems of ventilation, the size of 'bubbles' and the cross mixing on school transport, as well as of secondary pupils mixing outside school".

Iran denies al-Qaeda leader was killed in Tehran

 

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image captionTwo attacks on US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania by al-Qaeda killed hundreds in 1998

Iran has denied a report that a leader of militant group al-Qaeda was killed in its capital Tehran in August.

The New York Times newspaper reported that Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah, al-Qaeda's second-in-command, was shot dead in the street by Israeli agents following a request from the US.

Iran said it had no al-Qaeda "terrorists" living in its country.

Abdullah is accused of planning the deadly attacks on American embassies in Africa in 1998.

Abdullah, who is more commonly known by his alias Abu Muhammad al-Masri, was gunned down along with his daughter by two assassins on a motorbike on 7 August, the New York Times reports, citing anonymous US intelligence officials.

The report claimed that Iran had initially sought to cover up al-Masri's death, with Iranian and Lebanese media reports describing the victims of the 7 August shooting as a Lebanese history professor and his daughter.

However, Iran's foreign ministry denied the report on Saturday, saying: "From time to time, Washington and Tel Aviv try to tie Iran to such groups by lying and leaking false information to the media in order to avoid responsibility for the criminal activities of this group and other terrorist groups in the region."

There was no immediate comment from either US or Israeli officials.

• What's happened to al-Qaeda?
• Africa's Sahel becomes latest al-Qaeda battleground

Al-Masri was one of the founding members of the jihadist group which has wreaked devastation across the Middle East and parts of Africa and carried out the 11 September 2001 attacks in the US.

He was accused of being behind the bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed 224 people in 1998.

He had been in Iran since 2003, initially under house arrest but later living freely, American intelligence officials quoted in the New York Times said.

Any link between Iran and al-Qaeda would be highly unusual - the two sides have fought each other in conflicts, and represent the two main and sometimes opposing groups of Islam - Iran is largely Shia Muslim, while al-Qaeda is a Sunni jihadist group.

Al-Masri still appears on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorist list, where a $10 million reward is offered for information leading to his arrest.