destined for
Europe now passes through West Africa.
World News from the BBC.
The far-right British National Party has abolished its whites-only membership policy to allow black and Asian people to join. The party, which wants a halt to immigration into Britain, voted to change its constitution at an
extraordinary
general meeting after it was threatened with legal action by the government-funded Equality and Human Rights Commission. The party's leader Nick Griffin said people from ethnic minorities would be welcomed as long as they agreed with BNP principles. He said the party should no longer be branded as racist.
The oldest death row inmate in the United States has died of natural causes at the age of 94. The prison authorities in Arizona said Viva Leroy Nash died at the state prison in Florence. Nash was sentenced to death in 1983 for shooting a salesman after escaping from jail, but he
staved off
his execution with a series of appeals.
The best-selling British thriller writer and former champion jockey Dick Francis has died at the age of 89. His 42 novels including Forfeit and Whip Hand have been translated into 30 languages and have sold tens of millions of copies worldwide. Here is Nick Higham.
Dick Francis was one of those rare people who succeed in two quite different fields, a top jockey who became an author with worldwide sales of more than 60 million. As a professional jockey after World War Two, he rode more than 300 winners. When he retired in 1957, he wrote his autobiography, and his first novel Dead Cert was published in 1962. Another followed each year. The books provided readers with plenty of