BBC News with Jerry Smit.

Germany is sending its intelligence chiefs to Washington next week to address allegations that the United States has been spying on its allies. The government said it wanted to make sure an investigation into the monitoring of Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone was going forward. EU leaders say growing distrust to the US could harm the fighter against terrorism. From Berlin, Steve Evans.

There is no doubt in the anger in Germany over the spying allegations. The country's head of state President Gauck, said President Obama should now explain clearly what had happened and also how lost trust can be regained. Till that end, senior officials in the German security services will travel to Washington next week to talk to their American counterparts. What may be sought are assurances that new tighter rules are in place to govern who is seen as a legitimate target for surveillance and who is not.

A military curfew remains in force in the northeastern Nigerian city of Damaturu after an attack by suspected militants from the Islamist group known as Boko Haram. Here is Will Ross.

The city of Damaturu was rocked by gun fire for about 7 hours. By the time it ended around midnight, police, CID and army buildings have been burnt down. It's not clear how many people were killed, but a police ambulance took dead bodies to a mortuary. The streets of the main city in Yobe state are now deserted after the military impose a 24-hour curfew. One resident of the city said he saw 19 gunmen, some in military uniform, raid the hospital. Meanwhile, the Nigerian army says it's killed 74 suspected Boko Haram militants during ground and air strikes on camps in Bono state.

Syrian state television is claiming that Mohammad al-Golani, a leader in the Islamist rebel group the al-Nusra Front has been killed. There has been no independent verification of the report and an official Syrian news agency later withdrew a similar claim. The radical Islamist organization has been seen as one of the most powerful rebel groups in Syria.

The medical charity MSF says the more than 130,000 Syrians have fled heavy bombing in the northern Al Safira district in the past 2 weeks. They have been forced to flee to areas that are already struggling to cope with the huge influx of displaced people. MSF says humanitarian aid is insufficient and medical establishments are often being targeted. In New York, the United Nations Humanitarian Chief, Valerie Amos has told the Security Council that about 2.5 million Syrians were trapped beyond the reach of aid workers and that action was urgently required.

This is a race against time. As we deliberate, people continue to die unnecessarily. I call upon all members of the council to exert influence and take the necessary action to stop this brutality and violence.

World News from the BBC.

Hundreds of Eritrean refugees have held a mock funeral outside the Italian parliament to remember the victims of a ship wreck earlier this month. More than 350 people, most of them from Eritrea, drowned when their boat sank near the Italian island of Lampedusa. Italy's Prime Minister Enrico Letta has pressed fellow European leaders to give more help to Mediterranean countries to address the issue of illegal migration. But the EU pushed further discussion of the problem back to following summits.

Roma leaders and right activists in Bulgaria have expressed concerns about media coverage of the case of a blond girl removed from her Roma family in Greece. DNA test have established that the Bulgarian Roma couple are the parents of the girl named Maria. Here is report by Nick Thorpe .

As police in Greece and Bulgaria try to investigate whether any money changed hands between her natural parents and those with whom she was found. The case also illustrates the depth of poverty in which the Roma still live throughout Eastern Europe.

The director of the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, Krassimir Kanev, told the BBC that the media attention surrounding Maria's case could undermine years of patient work integrating the Roma into mainstream society and overcoming negative stereotypes of the Roma as child traffickers or thieves.

Layers for the Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta have asked the International Criminal Court to postpone his trial for crimes against humanity, citing last month's attack on the Westgate shopping center. They want the hearing, due to begin next month to be delayed until February. Mr. Kenyatta's defence team argue that the trial will prevent him from exercising leadership during what they described as an international crisis. Earlier, the court ruled that Kenya's deputy Prime Minister William Ruto had to attend most of his trial for crimes against humanity.

BBC News.