Liverpool's board split over two new bids to buy club

Liverpool have received two new bids that would wipe out the club's debts, but a huge split has divided the Anfield boardroom.

A source close to the negotiations said: "Both bids would significantly reduce the debt and give the current owners their original investment back."

But American co-owners Tom Hicks and George Gillett have claimed the offers "dramatically undervalue the club".

The pair tried to remove two members of the board prior to Tuesday's meeting.

Hicks and Gillett wanted managing director Christian Purslow and commercial director Ian Ayre replaced by Mack Hicks - son of Tom - and Lori Kay McCutheon, who is vice president at Hicks Holdings.

A Liverpool statement read: "This matter is now subject to legal review and a further announcement will be made in due course.

"Meanwhile [chairman] Martin Broughton, Christian Purslow and Ian Ayre continue to explore every possible route to achieving a sale of the club at the earliest opportunity."

The two bids, which the club statement described as "excellent financial offers", are thought to be from Asia and America.

BBC Sport understands the US bid is from Boston Red Sox owner John Henry's New England Sports Ventures.

The three independent members of the board - Purslow, Broughton and Ayre - favour a sale to one of the two new bidders and are weighing up whether to accept.

But it is thought Hicks and Gillett are against accepting as neither offer would allow the duo walk away with a profit.

They said they remained committed to "finding the right buyer for LFC, one that could support and sustain the club in the future", but added that it had to be "at a fair price that reflects the very significant investment we've made".

The joint statement continued: "We will resist any attempt to sell the club without due process or agreement by the owners.

"They have invested more than $270m [£170m] in cash into the club, and during their tenure revenues have nearly doubled, investment in players has increased and the club is one of the most profitable in the Premier League."

Liverpool were put up for sale by Hicks and Gillett in April with debts of £351.4m.

They initially sought an asking price of around £800m, a figure they subsequently dropped to £600m.

In August there were abortive bids from Hong Kong businessman Kenny Huang while a consortium fronted by Syrian businessman Yahya Kirdi had also expressed an interest.

Earlier on Tuesday, Kirdi was quoted as saying the group he represents were dropping out of contention, adding: "Once everyone is united and there's logic in the price and the overall deal, me and my group will be prepared to return to the table."

The owners paid £174.1m to buy the club in 2007, while also agreeing to take on the club's debt of £44.8m.

It was said to be a new dawn for the Anfield outfit, with outgoing chairman David Moores describing it as "a great step forward for its shareholders and its fans".

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Kenny Dalglish hopes buyer can be found

But little has gone right for either the club or its owners since then.

The club slipped into the Premier League relegation zone after losing at home to Blackpool at the weekend and were earlier knocked out of the League Cup by League Two side Northampton.

Many of the club's fans have become increasingly outraged at the pair's mismanagement of the club, which is said to be currently £237.4m in debt, and their failure to carry through promises to build a new stadium.

The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has set a deadline of 15 October for that debt to be repaid or a penalty fee of £60m will be due.

If not the bank has the option of extending the deadline once again, or deciding enough is enough and either selling the club to the highest bidder or putting it in administration.

Many fans of the Merseyside club are keen to see RBS call in the debt, even if it means them going into administration and receiving a nine-point penalty from the Premier League as a result.

Whether these bids signal the beginning of the end of a saga that has blighted the club in recent years remains to be seen.

UK seeks China aid partnership in Africa

China has become a formidable force in Africa

Britain is seeking a new partnership with China as a key to speeding up development and ending poverty in Africa.

In recent years, China has become a formidable force in Africa, investing billions of dollars in exchange for trade and raw materials that China needs to fuel its own booming economy.

This has sparked intense debate as to whether China should be seen as a predatory neo-colonial influence that bypasses issues such as human rights, or a welcome help for hard-up Western governments struggling to meet their commitments to international aid।

Now Britain's International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell has clearly said that China's involvement should be embraced.

"We are looking to work very closely with China," he told BBC News.

"And those discussions have already started. That is a high priority for the coalition government. In partnership with China we will be able to do much more to speed up development in Africa."

Western governments have been giving aid to Africa for decades, yet millions there still live in poverty.

Britain's aid budget is protected from pending spending cuts because of a UN commitment, but how it is spent is coming under increasing scrutiny.

Building up Tanzania

Britain is one of the biggest donors to Tanzania, a country that has had no real conflict or famine.

With a third of Tanzania's 41 million people living below the poverty line, Britain is spending more than £130m there this year.

But many Tanzanians are now looking at China's focus on trade and the economy as a key to moving them forward.

One third of Tanzania's 41 million people live below the poverty line

"We need infrastructure, infrastructure, infrastructure," says Emmanuel D Ole Naiko, executive director of the Tanzania Investment Centre.

"The Chinese are building roads, railways, factories. They are extracting coal and minerals. They are directing their investments so they can make this child grow."

Just about everywhere in the commercial capital, Dar es Salaam, you can see evidence of the Chinese at work.

They are building luxury apartments in anticipation of a Chinese-style economic boom; drawing up renovation plans for a railway they first built in the 1970s; and putting up a cardiac wing in a main city hospital.

There, more than 30 Chinese engineers and technicians run teams of Tanzanian workers.

Unlike workers with Western companies, the Chinese expatriates do not demand expensive perks such as housing, school fees and flights home.

They live on-site until the job is finished.

The unit will take a year to build and will be equipped and staffed by Chinese doctors.

'No strings attached'

Not far away, at the Sino-Tanzania Friendship Hospital that opened two years ago, Chinese doctors and pharmacists deal with local patients at highly subsidised rates।

"We get money from the Chinese that is cheaper with less conditions and for projects that Western donors consider to be too costly," says Tanzanian finance minister Mustafa Mkulo.

"One is a coal power project that will produce enough electricity for the southern part of Tanzania."

Many Chinese projects come in the form of soft loans that Mr Mkulo says are between 1.5% and 2%, far undercutting finance offered by the West.

Throughout Africa, China makes it clear that its deals come with "no strings attached".

While Western governments demand benchmarks on issues such as human rights, democracy and good governance, China lays down no such conditions.

"We treat African countries as brothers and sisters, as equal partners when we provide aid and assistance," says the Chinese ambassador to Tanzania, Liu Xinsheng.

"Assistance should not be used as a tool to intervene in the internal affairs of your friends. We will not impose anything on them."

Chinese take-over?

Mustafa Mkulo says there is a role for both China and the West

Britain remains one of the leading donors and trading partners with Tanzania.

According to the Tanzanian Investment Centre, it has carried out more than US$1.5bn (£940m) of trade in the past 10 years, creating almost half a million jobs.

In comparison, China's trade is valued at US$620m (£390m), but it is rising fast.

Both Tanzania and Britain insist, however, that there is no argument for China taking the place of the West.

"We need both," says finance minister Mr Mkulo.

"There is no crowding. The Chinese are developing a certain part of the country. The West has its own interest."

Britain's development secretary says Chinese involvement will not enable the government to cut the more than £7bn aid budget.

"I could spend the British development budget three times over," says Mr Mitchell.

"There is huge need out there. We need every penny. But from our partnership with the Chinese will come a very healthy development approach towards Africa."

But in much of Africa, they talk about the politics of aid, remembering the divisions created through aid given by the Soviet Union and the West during the Cold War.

Many are waiting to see if there can be a genuine partnership with China. Or - as in the past - whether it will turn out to be a competition for influence between more powerful countries.

'One year' to clean toxic spill in Hungary

The spill, which damaged bridges and houses, swept cars from roads

Hungary says it will cost tens of millions of dollars and take at least a year to clean up the damage caused by a spill of industrial toxic red sludge।

Emergency workers are trying to stop the spill, from an alumina plant, from flowing into major waterways, including the River Danube

A state of emergency has been declared in three western counties after the chemical waste burst from a reservoir.

Four people are known to have died, and 120 were injured. Six more are missing.

At least seven villages and towns are affected including Devecser, where the torrent was 2m (6.5ft) deep.

The flood swept cars from roads and damaged bridges and houses, forcing the evacuation of hundreds of residents.

The sludge - a mixture of water and mining waste containing heavy metals - is considered hazardous, according to Hungary's National Directorate General for Disaster Management (NDGDM).

While the cause of the deaths has not yet been officially established, the victims are thought to have drowned.

'Desperate effort'

Some 600,000-700,000 cubic metres (21m-24m cubic feet) of sludge escaped from the plant, 160km (100 miles) from the capital, Budapest, affecting an area of 40 sq km (15.4 sq miles).

Environment Minister Zoltan Illes told the BBC the clean-up would take at least one year and probably require technical and financial assistance from the European Union.

He described the spill as Hungary's worst chemical accident.

The spill flooded homes, roads and fields with toxic waste

"The area is very big, very heavy contamination, lots of human resources are needed, definitely machinery is needed," he said.

Mr Illes said a layer of soil 2cm deep (0.8 inches) would need to be removed from the whole of the contaminated region.

With 7,000 people affected directly by the disaster, a state of emergency was declared in the county of Veszprem where the spill occurred, and Gyor-Moson-Sopron and Vas, where the sludge appeared to be heading.

At least 390 residents have been relocated and 110 rescued from flooded areas, the NDGDM said.

Nearly 500 police officers and soldiers, including six emergency detection teams, have been deployed. Plaster has been poured into the Marcal river in a bid to bind the sludge and stop further flooding.

An alert has been declared for the Marcal and Torna rivers, and Mr Illes said workers were "desperately" trying to stop contamination of the Raba and Danube rivers.

Dr Attila Nyikos, of the NDGDM, told the BBC News website that a police investigation had been opened and tests were still being carried out to determine the environmental impact of the leak.

The sludge escaped from a reservoir at the Ajkai Timfoldgyar plant in the town of Ajka. Police say they have confiscated documents from the company's headquarters.

The plant produces alumina, a synthetically produced aluminium oxide. It is a white or nearly colourless crystalline substance that is used as a starting material for the smelting of aluminium metal.

Weeks of heavy rain are likely to have played a role in the accident, the BBC's Nick Thorpe reports from Budapest.

MAL Rt, the Hungarian company which owns the plant, earlier said that by EU standards the sludge had not been considered hazardous.

There had been no sign of the impending disaster and the last examination of the reservoir pond on Monday had shown nothing untoward, it added.

Drone attacks 'linked' to suspected Europe terror plot

Pakistan's ambassador to the US, Hussein Haqqani: "European, Pakistani and American intelligence services are working together to foil these plots"

Officials have linked a recent increase in US drone missile attacks in Pakistan to efforts to disrupt a suspected al-Qaeda plot to attack European targets।

The strikes include one on Monday which killed eight militants, among them five German nationals, Pakistan's ambassador to the US told the BBC.

The strikes have targeted Pakistan's tribal regions bordering Afghanistan.

A British man killed in a strike last month was to head an al-Qaeda faction in the UK, BBC's Newsnight has learnt.

"The activity we see in North Waziristan, in terms of strikes and terms of measures to try to get people from al-Qaeda and associated groups, is connected to the terrorist warnings that we have heard about potential strikes in Europe," Pakistan's ambassador to the US, Hussein Haqqani, told the BBC.

Mr Haqqani said Pakistan was working with European and US intelligence agencies to prevent the suspected plans to attack Europe and that people should not panic.

Security sources say a German man detained in Afghanistan in July had provided the first information about plans to launch commando-style attacks on targets in Britain, France and Germany.

As well as Paris and London, Berlin was cited in a US warning at the weekend as a possible target for a suspected al-Qaeda plot.

Several countries have issued travel warnings to their citizens, saying they should be vigilant while travelling in Europe.

Hamburg link

The US has carried out 26 drone strikes on Pakistan in the past month - the highest monthly total for the past six years.

US drone attacks have increased in the past month

Monday's attack destroyed the house of a tribal leader with close links to a local Taliban commander in a village 3km (2 miles) from North Waziristan's main town of Mir Ali.

Pakistani officials have said five German nationals were killed along with three other militants. A number of people were said to have been wounded.

Identification of the victims is being made more difficult because Taliban militants sealed off the area after the missile strike, taking away the remains for burial.

There have been concerns about the presence of German nationals in Pakistan's tribal areas.

According to German media, several Islamist militants disappeared from their homes in Hamburg in 2009 and were thought to have headed for North Waziristan.

On Monday, the German interior ministry revealed that 70 Germans had been given paramilitary training in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and a third of them had returned home.

In August, German police shut down a mosque in Hamburg which had been used by the 9/11 attackers and which the authorities believed was again becoming a focus for extremists.

Al-Qaeda in the UK?

The area around Mir Ali has been known to harbour militants from a number of foreign countries in the past.

A drone strike in North earlier in September killed a British national named Abdul Jabbar who had been living in Punjab province.

A British security source told the BBC's Newsnight programme that Jabbar was being groomed to head an al-Qaeda offshoot in the UK.

Intelligence agencies monitored a meeting of 300 militants in North Waziristan he attended three months ago where he was put forward as the leader of the new group, which was tasked with preparing commando-style attacks against targets in Britain, France and Germany, Newsnight has learnt.

British government officials declined to comment on the Newsnight report.

Palestinians mull talks walk-out over settlements

The Palestinian leadership has said it will not continue peace talks with Israel unless a freeze on Jewish settlements in the West Bank resumes.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas met political leaders after settlement building resumed this week.

Palestinian leaders met to agree a stance after Israel resumed settlement building this week

"The leadership confirms that the resumption of talks requires tangible steps, the first of them a freeze on settlements," said senior Palestinian official Yasser Abed Rabbo.

Israel said the talks should continue.

After the meeting of Palestinian leaders in Ramallah in the West Bank, Mr Abed Rabbo accused Israel of "obstructing the negotiations".

The BBC's Wyre Davies in Jerusalem says the statement requiring a freeze on settlement building is a reaffirmation of the Palestinian position, but is also a reminder that time is running out.

Shuttle diplomacy

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appealed to the Palestinians not to leave the negotiations.

"I call on President Abbas to continue the good and sincere talks that we have just started, in order to reach an historic peace agreement between our two peoples," he said in a statement on Saturday.

The Palestinians are not expected to make a final decision until after an Arab League meeting due to take place in Libya next week.

Meanwhile, US envoy George Mitchell is visiting Arab countries in an attempt to secure wider backing for continued peace negotiations.

Israel refused to extend a 10-month ban on settlement building in the West Bank which expired last Sunday.

Mr Netanyahu has said a further freeze could fracture his right-wing coalition government, which is dominated by pro-settlement parties, including his own Likud bloc.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since the Middle East war of 1967.

About 500,000 Jews now live in more than 100 settlements which are held to be illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this. About 2.5 million Palestinians live in the West Bank.

The Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip and is not taking part in the talks, has urged Mr Abbas to withdraw.

Direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians resumed in September after a break of nearly two years.

• 62% under full Israeli control. This area contains all Israeli settlements, roads used by settlers, buffer zones and almost all of the Jordan Valley • 38% under Palestinian civil control. In more than half of this, Israel has security control • There are 149 settlements and 100 outposts (settlements not authorised by Israel) • Population: 2.4 million Palestinians, 500,000 Jewish or Israeli settlers