BBC News with Jerry Smit.

The opposition in Zimbabwe has described the decision by the new President Emmerson Mnangagwa to appoint senior military figures to top jobs in his cabinet as a betrayal of people's hopes. Mr. Mnangagwa named a general as his Foreign Minister and the Airforce Chief as Agriculture Minister. President Robert Mugabe was ousted by the military last month after 37 years in power.

Gunmen dressed in burkas have stormed a college campus in Pakistan, killing nine people, most of them students. The Pakistani Taliban has said it carried out the attack in Peshawar. The gunmen have all been killed by the army.

Eight former Catalan ministers are appearing in the Supreme Court in Madrid to appeal for their release from prison, so that they can campaign for the regional elections in three weeks’ time. They were members of the cabinet that declared Catalonia's independence in October, a move deemed illegal by Spain's constitutional court.

Around 100,000 Roman Catholics in Bangladesh have attended an open-air mass led by Pope Francis. Later the Pontiff will meet refugees from the Rohingya Muslim minority who fled violence in neighboring Myanmar.

There had been protest in Honduras where the final results from Sunday's presidential election are yet to be declared. The main opposition contender Salvador Nasralla has complained a vote rigging. President Juan Orlando Hernandez is narrowly ahead.

A special panel chaired by the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has set a date for the planned abdication of Emperor Akihito. It's April 30th of 2019. By then, the monarch will be 85. The abdication will be the first in 200 years in Japan's royal family.

And the biggest lithium-ion battery in the world has started delivering power to Australia's electricity grid. The 100-megawatt device built by the US firm Tesla was completed within 100 days.

BBC News.