BBC News with Iain Purdon

Thousands of protesters have converged on Taksim Square in Istanbul hours after the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan rejected demands to drop a plan to redevelop a park in the city. He said extremists who were manipulating demonstrations which began as an environmental protest last week. James Reynolds is among the protesters in Istanbul. A lot of them just sitting on the verges of the park, others are chanting as one group which have been dancing a tango, other people are buying slices of watermelon and having barbeques. Most people here say that they will continue to protest and to come here in order to stop the government for redeveloping this area. And people here say that they were disappointed but not surprised by the Prime Minister's comments. People here say that if he's been stubborn their point of view, then they will be stubborn as well. One man said we would stay here till the ends; if they want to get us, they would have to use an awful lot of tear gas.

Austria says it will withdraw its UN peacekeepers from the Golan Heights after fighting between Syrian government forces and rebels. Officials say the mission is no longer tenable. Austria provides nearly 400 soldiers about a third of the UN peacekeeping mission. A UN spokesman, Kieran Dwyer insisted their work would go on. The mission in the Golan was set up 40 years ago to monitor the ceasefire line between Israel and Syria. This is no less important today than it was all those years ago. And with the fighting becoming more and more intense, this is a really serious risk to regional spillover of the conflict inside Syria. So rather than talking about the mission now becoming viable, what we focusing on it is making sure that it remains viable.

The Russian President Vladimir Putin and his wife Lyudmila have announced on state television that they have separated and their marriage is over. Lyudmila Putin said it was a joint decision and described their parting as a civilized divorce. The couple had been married for 30 years and have two daughters.

The White House has defended a national intelligence program that collected the daily phone records of tens of millions of Americans, it follows a British newspaper report that one of America’s largest telephone providers, Verizon, is under the government orders to hand over data relating to all its subscribers. From Washington Paul Adams. A senior administration official, unnamed and choosing his words very carefully, didn't directly confirm the existence of the court order. However, he pointed out that it didn't include the contents of conversations or the names of any callers, and was limited only to metadata such as numbers and durations of calls. The Official went on to say that such information has been a critical tool in protecting American from terrorist threats. Civil rights organizations have long warned that this kind of widespread surveillance is going on.

This is the World News from the BBC.

The Mexican army says it has rescued 165 migrants kidnapped by criminal gangs at least two weeks ago. They've been held hostages in a property in northern Tamaulipas state waiting to cross illegally into the United States. Most of the victims were from Central American countries. An army spokesman said the migrants were probably betrayed by human trafficking gangs who were paid to get them into the US, but instead, handed them over to other criminal organizations.

At least six Georgian soldiers have been killed in a suicide attack in southern Afghanistan, nine others were injured when the bomber drove an explosive filled truck into their base in Helmand province. It's the second such attack by suspected Taliban militants on the Georgian troops in a month, about 1,500 Georgian soldiers are serving in Afghanistan as a part of the NATO-led international forces.

Prince Philip, the Queen's husband has been admitted to a London hospital for an operation. Buckingham Palace said the 91-year-old Duke of Edinburgh was expected to remain in hospital for up to two weeks. Here's our Royal correspondent Peter Hunt.  After smiling and chatting with guests at Buckingham Palace Garden Party, Prince Philip was driven this afternoon to the London clinic where he walked unaided into the private hospital. Routine tests in recent weeks led to, what Buckingham Palace has called up, abdominal investigations during the past few days. Tomorrow, the Queen's husband, who have been 92 in four days' time will undergo an exploratory operation. It will be conducted under general anesthetic.

The British government is to pay millions of dollars in compensation to Kenyans who were tortured or mistreated by colonial forces during the Mau Mau insurgency of the 1950s. The out of the court settlement worth $30m including costs relates to more than 5,000 Kenyans represented by a British law firm.

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