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Germany has grounded air traffic across its northern airspace because of ash from an erupting volcano in Iceland.

Bremen and Hamburg airports closed early on Wednesday, with traffic at Berlin's airports due to stop later.

However air traffic is returning to normal in other parts of northern Europe, a day after about 500 flights were cancelled across the region.

Iceland's Grimsvotn volcano erupted at the weekend, but experts say ash levels in most places are now diminishing.

Europe's air traffic control body Eurocontrol said no flights were expected on Wednesday at Bremen and Hamburg airports, which on a normal day handle about 120 and 480 flights respectively.

The ash cloud is expected to affect Berlin from 1100 (0900GMT). Lufthansa, the national carrier, said it expected a total of 150 of its flights to be cancelled.

Eurocontrol said the cloud could also affect parts of Poland. There are no restrictions on flights in any other part of Europe.

Germany's transport authorities have taken a tough view on the potential dangers posed by the ash, says the BBC's Stephen Evans in Berlin.

There has been no outright criticism of the decision from German airlines, but there is unease in the industry that Germany's rules regarding flying through volcanic ash are different from the rest of Europe, our correspondent says.

The head of the country's airport organisation said Europe-wide rules were needed.

France's civil aviation authority has said it expects very little disruption to air traffic and was not expecting to close any of the country's airspace.

But Britain's weather service said the concentration of volcanic ash in UK airspace would decrease significantly over the course of Wednesday.

The Met Office said however that if Grimsvotn volcano continued to erupt at "current variables", much of the country could be affected by ash on Friday, with flights being potentially disrupted.

The volcano began erupting last Saturday, sending clouds of ash high into the air.

Experts say the eruption is on a different scale to that of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano last year, when millions of travellers were stranded amid concerns about the damage volcanic ash could cause to aircraft engines.

amid [əˈmɪd]prep. (表示环境)处于…环境中, 处于…状态中

European Union transport commissioner Siim Kallas said: "We do not at this stage anticipate widespread airspace closure and prolonged disruption like we saw last year."

Icelandic President Olafur Grimsson told the BBC: "The eruption is gradually being diminished and the ash cloud is definitely smaller than it has been so we are pretty optimistic now."

The US has ordered all its non-essential diplomats and family members of embassy staff to leave Yemen as fighting there escalates.

At least 48 people have been killed since Monday in clashes between tribal fighters and government troops.

President Ali Abdullah Saleh has again said he will not step down and leave Yemen, despite mounting protests.

He has so far refused to sign a transition deal that would see him resign in favour of a unity government.

The US State Department has also warned Americans against travelling to Yemen.

"The security threat level in Yemen is extremely high due to terrorist activities and civil unrest. There is ongoing civil unrest throughout the country and large-scale protests in major cities," said the state department in a travel warning.

unrest n. [ʌnˈrɛst, ˈʌnˌrɛst] 动荡,动乱, 骚乱, 不安宁

"The Department of State has ordered all eligible family members of US government employees as well as certain non-emergency personnel to depart Yemen.

"US citizens currently in Yemen should depart while commercial transportation is available."

The UK Foreign Office also advises against all travel to Yemen, as it has done since April, strongly urging any British nationals in the country to leave by commercial means.

Fighters from a powerful tribal group, the Hashid, are said to have taken control of several public buildings in the capital Sanaa after several days of fighting government troops.

Sanaa's airport was reportedly shut temporarily on Wednesday after tribal fighters opposed to President Saleh clashed with government forces.

The clashes began on Monday after forces loyal to President Saleh moved against the compound of Hashid leader Sheikh Sadeq al-Ahmar.

Witnesses say hundreds of people are fleeing the violence in the capital, where residents said fighting was continuing on Thursday.

"There are still sporadic artillery hits and gunfire in Sanaa and we're unsure what's happening outside the city," said the Yemen Times' managing editor, Jeb Boone, in a telephone interview with BBC World News.

"We don't know whether tribesmen are forcing their way into the city or whether the government forces are pushing them out."

Mr Saleh refuses to stand down, despite growing international pressure.

The session against the 69-year-old was halted on Thursday when his lawyer said he was in "poor physical state".

extradition [ˌɛkstrəˈdɪʃən] n. (根据条约或法令对逃犯等的)引渡

Gen Mladic, arrested on Thursday after 16 years on the run, faces genocide charges over the 1992-95 Bosnian war.

His extradition to the UN war crimes court at The Hague could take a week.

Gen Mladic was indicted in 1995 for genocide over the killings about 7,500 Bosnian Muslim men and boys that July at Srebrenica - the worst single atrocity in Europe since World War II - and other crimes.

The BBC's Mark Lowen, outside the court in Belgrade, says Gen Mladic's wife, Bosiljka - who recently said she thought her husband was dead - turned up to visit him.

She did not reply when asked how her husband was - probably embarrassed because of what she had asserted before, our correspondent says.

Having lived freely in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, Gen Mladic is believed to have disappeared after the arrest of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic in 2001.

Following the arrest of former Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic in 2008, Gen Mladic became the most prominent Bosnian war crimes suspect at large.

On Thursday, Serbian TV showed footage of the former general wearing a baseball cap and walking slowly as he appeared in court in Belgrade.

The extradition hearing was stopped when Gen Mladic's lawyer, Milos Saljic, said his client was unable to communicate.

Mr Saljic argued that Mr Mladic - who looked frail and walked slowly during the initial hearing - was unfit to stand trial.

But a senior Serbian war crimes prosecutor said he believed the defence was exaggerating the general's health problems in an attempt to delay extradition.

Reports in Serbian media suggested that one of Gen Mladic's arms was paralysed, which was probably the result of a stroke.

Mr Saljic said: "He is aware that he is under arrest, he knows where he is, and he said he does not recognise The Hague tribunal."

Serbia had been under intense international pressure to arrest Gen Mladic and send him to the UN International Criminal Tribunal to the former Yugoslavia in The Hague.

After the arrest, the government banned public gatherings in an effort to prevent any pro-Mladic demonstrations.

But hundreds of ultra-nationalists clashed with police in the northern city of Novi Sad, and there was a smaller demonstration involving several dozen protesters in the centre of Belgrade.

The government is now keen for a speedy extradition of Gen Mladic, whom Serb nationalists still regard as a hero, the BBC's Mark Lowen in Belgrade reports.

President Boris Tadic said Gen Mladic's arrest had brought Serbia and the region closer to reconciliation, and opened the doors to European Union membership.

Mr Tadic rejected criticism that Serbia had been reluctant to seize Gen Mladic.

A spokeswoman for families of Srebrenica victims, Hajra Catic, told AFP news agency: "After 16 years of waiting, for us, the victims' families, this is a relief."

Gen Mladic was seized in the province of Vojvodina in the early hours of Thursday.

He had two guns with him, but put up no resistance, officials said.

Serbian security sources told AFP news agency that three special units had descended on a house in the village of Lazarevo, about 80km (50 miles) north of Belgrade.

The single-storey house was owned by a relative of Gen Mladic and had been under surveillance for the past two weeks, one of the sources added.

surveillance n. [sɚˈveləns] 盯梢, （对犯罪嫌疑人或可能发生犯罪的地方的）监视

Local resident Zora Prodariovic told the BBC: "I'm really surprised. "My mother lives four doors down from here and I've never seen him."

Reports that Gen Mladic had been living under the assumed name Milorad Komodic have been denied by Serbian Interior Minister Ivica Dacic.

Serbian media say he was not in disguise - unlike Mr Karadzic, who had a long beard and a ponytail when he was captured in Belgrade three years ago.

His family says Gen Mladic is too sick to go, but the Serbian government is widely expected to reject the appeal.

Gen Mladic is accused of committing war crimes during the Bosnian war, including the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of 7,500 Muslim men and boys.

Thousands of people rallied in Belgrade on Sunday against Gen Mladic's arrest.

The demonstrators hailed the general as a Serbian national hero. About 100 people were arrested during clashes with police in the Serbian capital.

The BBC's Mark Lowen in Belgrade says it could take up to three days for the ministry of justice to decide on the appeal but he adds that it is likely to be rejected earlier, with Serbia's deputy war crimes prosecutor already dismissing the claim of ill health as a delaying tactic.

Our correspondent says the government will hope Gen Mladic's departure will quell any further demonstrations by his supporters.

The Hague tribunal says it will not specify on which day Gen Mladic will arrive, but our correspondent says there is speculation he could be sent on a night-time flight, without prior warning.

The BBC's Duncan Kennedy says Sunday's protest was held by a few thousand people for whom Gen Mladic remains a hero.

Gen Mladic's lawyer, Milos Saljic, said on Sunday that his client's health had deteriorated, despite an earlier decision by a Belgrade court that he was fit to be handed over to the UN court.

"I can tell you that his health condition today is much worse than yesterday. It is worse psychologically," Mr Saljic told the Associated Press.

Serbia's deputy war crimes prosecutor Bruno Vekaric said that "my impression is that he is acting in a very composed manner".

"As far as his mental state is concerned, believe me, he looks more normal than many others," Mr Vekaric said.

He also dismissed as ungrounded media reports that Gen Mladic had hearing difficulties and that his right arm was paralysed.

At least 7,000 supporters of Gen Mladic rallied in central Belgrade on Sunday to hear speeches from nationalist politicians and decry Mr Mladic's arrest.

"Co-operation with The Hague tribunal represents treason," said Lidija Vukicevic of the Serbian Radical Party.

"This is a protest against the shameful arrest of the Serbian hero."

The demonstrators also denounced Serbia's pro-Western President Boris Tadic.

Gen Mladic's arrest is considered crucial to Serbia's bid to join the European Union.

He evaded capture for 16 years after the end of the Bosnian conflict - just one of the ethnic wars unleashed in the 1990s by the break up of Yugoslavia.

As the rally ended, the mood turned ugly. Some of the demonstrators clashed with police, throwing stones and flares.

About 3,000 people, many of them former Bosnian Serb soldiers, earlier held a separate protest against Gen Mladic's arrest in the Bosnian village of Kalinovik, where he was born.

On Sunday, Gen Mladic's son, Darko, said that despite the tribunal's indictment, his father had told him he was not responsible for the killings in Srebrenica, committed after his troops overran the town.

"He said that whatever was done in Srebrenica, he had nothing to do with it," he said after visiting Gen Mladic.

Gen Mladic was seized in the village of Lazarevo, about 80km (50 miles) north of Belgrade.

Following the arrest of Radovan Karadzic in 2008, Gen Mladic had become the most prominent Bosnian war crimes suspect still at large.

He was indicted by the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague in 1995 for genocide over the killings that July at Srebrenica - the worst single atrocity in Europe since World War II - and other alleged crimes.

Having lived freely in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, he disappeared after the arrest of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic in 2001.

President Tadic has said the arrest brought the country and the region closer to reconciliation, and opened the doors to EU membership for Serbia.

The head of China's General Staff of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) has confirmed that China's first aircraft carrier is under construction.

Gen Chen Bingde refused to say when the carrier - a remodelled Soviet-era vessel, the Varyag - would be ready.

A member of his staff said the carrier would pose no threat to other nations.

The 300m (990ft) carrier, which is being built in the north-east port of Dalian, has been one of China's worst-kept secrets, analysts say.

Gen Chen made his comments to the Chinese-language Hong Kong Commercial Daily newspaper.

The PLA - the largest army in the world - is hugely secretive about its defence programme.

The carrier was constructed in the 1980s for the Soviet navy but was never completed. When the Soviet Union collapsed, the rusting hull of the Varyag sat in dockyards in Ukraine.

A Chinese company with links to the PLA bought the Varyag claiming it wanted to turn it into a floating casino in Macau.

The carrier is thought to be nearly finished, and is expected to begin sea trials later this year.

But the BBC's Michael Bristow in Beijing says that does not mean it will then be ready to undertake operational duties.

Learning how to operate it - and fly planes off it - will take a few more years to master, our correspondent says.

Lt Gen Qi Jianguo, assistant chief of the general staff, told the Hong Kong Commercial Daily that even after the aircraft carrier was deployed, it would "definitely not sail to other countries' territorial waters".

deploy vt. [dɪˈplɔɪ] (尤指军事行动)使展开; 施展; 部署

"All of the great nations in the world own aircraft carriers - they are symbols of a great nation," he was quoted as saying.

Lt Gen Qi said China had always followed a "defensive" principle for its military strategy.

"It would have been better for us if we acted sooner in understanding the oceans and mapping out our blue-water capabilities earlier.

"We are now facing heavy pressure in the oceans whether in the South China Sea, East China Sea, Yellow Sea or the Taiwan Straits," he said.

China is engaged in maritime border disputes with several countries - including Vietnam and the Philippines.

The US, which has 11 fully-capable carrier strike groups, has also expressed concern about its rising naval ambitions.

The PLA has invested heavily in submarines. It is believed to be close to deploying the world's first "carrier-killer" ballistic missile designed to sink aircraft carriers while they are manoeuvring at sea up to 1,500km offshore, and it is building its own stealth fighter aircraft along with advanced carrier-based aircraft built from Russian designs.

ballistic adj. [bəˈlɪstɪk] 发射的;弹道(学)的; 衡量冲击强度的

All of these can target US bases, US ships and US carriers in Asia.

India is another emerging power pursuing a similar path - with an ex-Soviet carrier being modified for the Indian Navy, and work already under way on a first home-built vessel as well.

Over time, these developments will affect the maritime balance of power in Asia, says the BBC's defence and security correspondent Nick Childs.

China says other countries have nothing to fear, but its recent assertive diplomatic and military muscle-flexing has created waves in the region, he says.

Germany's health minister says new E. coli infections from a deadly outbreak are dropping significantly and the worst of the illness is over.

Daniel Bahr said he was cautiously optimistic the outbreak had peaked, but warned that more deaths were expected as new cases emerged each day.

The outbreak has so far left 24 dead, infected 2,400 and left hundreds with a complication that attacks the kidneys.

Germany has been criticised across Europe for its chaotic response.

Health authorities initially wrongly blamed Spanish cucumbers. Then an organic bean sprout farm in northern Germany - the centre of the outbreak - was thought to be responsible.

Scientists are still examining samples taken from the farm. While some of the samples have tested negative for the rare strain of enterohaemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC), the results of other tests are still pending and expected later on Wednesday.

Farmers across the continent have suffered hundreds of millions of euros of losses as fresh vegetables have been thrown away and sales and prices have slumped.

Earlier, the EU proposed 150m euros (£134m) of compensation for farmers.

But agriculture ministers said they wanted much more and that their producers of fruit and vegetables should be compensated for the full amount of their losses, estimated at up to 417m euros (£372m) a week.

Fresh cases of the new strain are still being reported every day, including 94 in Germany on Tuesday.

Mr Bahr told ARD television: "There will be new cases and unfortunately we have to expect more deaths but the number of new infections is dropping significantly.

"I cannot sound the all clear, but after analysing the latest data we have reasonable cause for hope. The worst of the illness is behind us."

Under fire for its handling of the crisis both inside Germany and from the wider EU, Chancellor Angela Merkel's government is holding an emergency summit in Berlin on Wednesday to assess the situation.

Mr Bahr will be joined at the meeting by Agriculture Minister Ilse Aigner, EU Health and Consumer Affairs Commissioner John Dalli, government representatives from each of Germany's 16 states as well as health experts.

Critics argue there are too many different agencies involved and this has led to a bungled investigation, says the BBC's Tristana Moore in Berlin.

The government is still warning consumers to avoid eating raw foods such as tomatoes, cucumbers, salad and bean sprouts.

Mr Dalli earlier warned Germany against issuing any more premature - and inaccurate - conclusions about the source of contaminated food. Information had to be scientifically sound and foolproof before it was made public, he said.

premature adj. [ˌpriməˈtjʊr, -ˈtʊr, -ˈtʃʊr] 草率的，仓促的

foolproof adj. [ˈfulˌpruf] (方法、计划、系统等设计得)万无一失的,肯定成功的

"It is crucial that national authorities do not rush to give information on the source of infection that is not proven by bacteriological analysis," he told the European Parliament.

crucial adj. [ˈkruʃəl] 决定性的, 紧要关头的, 至关重要的

"This spreads unjustified fears [among] the population all over Europe and creates problems for our food producers."

But Hamburg state's senator for health, Cornelia Pruefer-Storcks, defended the local authorities' decision to issue a warning about Spanish cucumbers at the beginning of the crisis.

"We had a different situation here in Hamburg when we put out the warning about Spanish cucumbers and removed them from the shelves," she told a news conference.

"In two lab tests we had positive E. coli results, which were confirmed twice by the government laboratory and the EU laboratory, and so this was not a process of consideration but rather it was imperative."

Ms Pruefer-Storcks also said that all test results so far on bean sprouts, which were thought on Sunday to be the source, had been inconclusive.

But she nevertheless said that clinics dealing with the outbreak had told "us that the situation is gradually improving".

"We are seeing the first patients discharged, others are getting much better, so the first glimmers of hope are on the horizon."

Germany's national institution responsible for disease control and prevention, the Robert Koch Institute, said the number of new cases had declined, but added that it was not certain whether it would continue.

Meanwhile, Dr Guenael Rodier, director of communicable diseases at the World Health Organisation (WHO), said that if the origin of the infection was not identified soon it might never be found.

He told the Associated Press that the German investigation had been "erratic" but that solving such an outbreak was "not an impossible task".

Western and Arab nations are to meet in the United Arab Emirates to discuss how events in Libya might develop if Col Gaddafi were no longer in power.

The so-called Contact Group is also expected to firm up its pledge to set up a fund to help the Libyan rebels.

The meeting comes as Nato intensified its air strikes on government targets in Tripoli.

Meanwhile, 14 rebels were reportedly killed in the city of Misrata as they tried to push back government troops.

Health officials and a rebel spokesman said more than 20 others were wounded when government forces responded with heavy artillery fire.

In a separate development, the chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC) said there was evidence that Col Gaddafi had ordered the rape of hundreds of women as a weapon of war against rebel forces.

And in Geneva, the UN Human Rights Council is due to debate a report on alleged human rights violations allegedly committed by both government troops and the rebels.

Top government officials from the Contact Group - which includes Britain, France and the US, as well as Arab allies Jordan, Kuwait and Qatar - will be meeting in Abu Dhabi later on Thursday.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has already arrived in the UAE.

Ahead of the talks, a senior US official was quoted by Reuters as saying that "the international community is beginning to talk about what could constitute [an] end game" to the Libyan conflict.

"That would obviously include some kind of ceasefire arrangement and some kind of political process... and of course the question of Gaddafi and perhaps his family is also a key part of that," added the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

British Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt, who is also expected to attend the talks, said that "the contact group will also reiterate the unequivocal message... that Gaddafi, his family and his regime have lost all legitimacy and must go so that the Libyan people can determine their own future".

unequivocal [ˌʌnɪˈkwɪvəkəl] adj. 只有一种含意的;清楚明白的

"Until Gaddafi does so, the pressure will increase across the board: economically, politically and militarily," Mr Burt said.

At least two powerful explosions rocked Tripoli late on Wednesday.

It was not immediately clear what was targeted in the air strike, but it reportedly happened close to Col Gaddafi's residence.

Last week, Nato extended its air operations for another 90 days and increased the scope of its UN-mandated campaign to protect civilians. Since then, attack helicopters have gone into action and command centres in Tripoli pounded.

The report the UN Human Rights Council will debate in Geneva on Thursday contains what the authors say is evidence of war crimes - including murder, torture, and indiscriminate attacks on civilians - committed by the Libyan regime, and of serious violations by rebel forces too.

Col Gaddafi is sending government representatives from Tripoli to answer the charges in this report after his usual diplomatic team to the UN in Geneva defected en masse in February.

On Wednesday, the ICC's chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said he was looking into allegations that hundreds of women had been raped on Col Gaddafi's orders.

Mr Moreno-Ocampo said rape was a "new aspect of repression" by Col Gaddafi's regime.

The prosecutor said he was also looking at possible evidence that pro-Gaddafi security forces had been given medication such as Viagra to enhance their sex drive.

In March, a Libyan woman, Eman al-Obeidi, made headlines around the world after she burst into a Tripoli hotel and said she had been raped by Col Gaddafi's troops. She is recovering at a refugee centre in Romania.

Testimony from captured Libyan soldiers that rape was used as a systematic weapon of war was taken by the BBC's Africa correspondent Andrew Harding in May.

There has so far been no comment on the allegations by the Libyan authorities.

Last month, Mr Moreno-Ocampo asked ICC judges to approve arrest warrants for Col Gaddafi, his Saif al-Islam, and intelligence chief Abdullah al-Sanussi.

China has accused Vietnam of "gravely violating" its sovereignty in an escalating
row over disputed waters in the South China Sea.

Beijing said Vietnam had endangered Chinese sailors' lives and warned it to stop "all invasive activities".

It follows an accusation by Vietnam that a Chinese fishing boat rammed cables from an oil exploration vessel inside its exclusive economic zone.

China is engaged in maritime border disputes with several countries.

The South China Sea includes important shipping routes and may contain rich oil and gas deposits.

The Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also have rival claims in the area; China's claim is by far the largest.

The US has also expressed concern about China's rising naval ambitions.

China's foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei said Chinese fishing boats were chased away by armed Vietnamese ships on Thursday.

He said that during the incident the fishing net of one of the Chinese boats became tangled with the cables of a Vietnamese oil exploring vessel which continued to drag the Chinese vessel for more than an hour before the net had to be cut.

China insists the Vietnamese vessel was operating illegally in the area.

"By conducting unlawful oil and gas surveys in seas around the Wanan Bank of the Spratly archipelago and by driving out a Chinese fishing vessel, Vietnam has gravely violated China's sovereignty and maritime rights," said Mr Hong.

"China demands that Vietnam cease all violations," he said, adding that Vietnam should "not take actions that would complicate and expand the dispute".

Beijing's strong-worded statement followed Vietnam's accusation that a Chinese fishing boat had "intentionally rammed" the exploration cables of a Vietnamese boat - the second such incident in two weeks.

That vessel, chartered by state energy giant PetroVietnam, was conducting a seismic survey inside its 200 nautical mile exclusive economic zone on Thursday, said foreign ministry spokeswoman Nguyen Phuong Nga.

She described the "premeditated and carefully calculated" attack as part of China's attempts to control disputed waters.

"This is unacceptable to Vietnam," she said, adding that her colleagues had met Chinese embassy officials "to express our opposition to such acts".

On Thursday, hackers from both countries planted patriotic messages on hundreds of websites, including government sites.

It follows anti-China protests by hundreds of Vietnamese over the weekend.

China's ambassador to the Philippines, Liu Jianchao, has insisted China's intentions were peaceful and said that China was not looking for oil in the disputed waters and, therefore, no other country should.

"We're calling on other parties to stop searching for the possibility of exploiting resources in these areas where China has its claims," he told reporters.

The Philippine government has accused two Chinese patrol boats of harassing a Philippine oil exploration ship on 2 March this year.

The Philippines has said it has seen new structures being built on islands which it claims.

"That's part of our exercise of jurisdiction. It's not harassment," Mr Liu said.

He also rejected the involvement of the United States in regional attempts to resolve the long-running territorial dispute.

territorial adj. [ˌtɛrɪˈtɔriəl, -ˈtor-] 土地的;领地的;属地的

China prefers to tackle each conflicting claim with each country separately.

Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines have led regional efforts to seek a multilateral resolution of the conflict.

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