《大学英语II》新闻听力训练 原文

News Item 1

联合国气候变化大会在巴黎召开

The United Nations Conference on Climate Change has opened in Paris with world leaders all describing global warming as an urgent threat. Leaders of the countries, most vulnerable to drought and rising sea levels said immediate action was required to prevent catastrophe. Negotiators have 12 days to reach agreement on limiting the rise in global temperatures to two degree Celsius about pre-industrial levels. Nigeria’s environment minister Amina Mohamed said there was an air of optimism around the conference on its first day.“Everybody is pretty upbeat here. The pressure is to keep the momentum and the ambition and I think people are hopeful. And certainly we are having conversations here in Paris that haven’t happened over the last few years. A lot is already on the table. It is really for us to try to put that into agreement.”News Item 2

发现马航MH370疑似残骸

The French authorities will fly a piece of aircraft debris from an Indian Ocean island to France later today where it will be examined to see if it comes from a missing Malaysian airliner. Experts say it appears to be a wing component from a Boeing 777. Jennifer Park reports from Kuala Lumpur.“Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak says initial reports on the debris show it was very likely from a Boeing 777 but that it is too early to speculate whether it belongs to MH370 until his investigators can examine it. One Malaysian team has been sent to where the debris was found and another to the French city of Toulouse for the inspection. Officials say it may be several days before they have any answers.”

A top Australian official has told the BBC he’s increasingly confident that the wreckage found in Reunion is from the missing Malaysian airliner. Martin Donald heads the Australian Transport Safety Bureau which is leading the search for the plane in the Eastern Indian Ocean. He said he still believed the search would eventually find the passenger plane.

“The analysis that we've done with the satellite data is highly reliable, and the

search vessels, equipment and cruise we have had on the Indian Ocean, covering the area very thoroughly also are of high quality highly reliable. So we think we are looking into right place to a high degree of certainty and we are confident that we have the quality research to cover that area and find the missing aircraft.”

News Item 3

欧元区财长为解决希腊债务危机提出新方案

Euro zone treasury officials have begun assessing the latest Greek proposals for a way out of the debt crisis. The package that Athens submitted on Thursday to its international creditors includes the kind of austerity measures that Greek voters rejected in a referendum last Sunday. Chris Morris reports from Brussels. “The proposals include tax rises, pension reforms, spending cuts and promises of privatization. Measures rejected in last Sunday’s referendum will now be conceded. But this is no capitulation by the Prime Minister, Alexis Tsipras. In return, he is asking for far more than was offered last month. Greece wants a new three-year bailout from the Euro zone. It wants more support to promote economic growth, and it wants its huge debt burden to be restructured. In that, it now has support from the IMF, the U.S. Treasury and the President of the European Council, Donald Tusk.”

News Item 4

尼泊尔发生大地震

The government of Nepal says it believes at least fifteen hundred people have been killed by a devastating earthquake. The Information Minister, Minendra Rijal, says that number could triple in the next 24 hours, as many people are still thought to be buried in the debris of collapsed buildings. Mr. Rijal said it was a calamity of enormous proportions. The epicenter of the quake was between the capital, Kathmandu and the city of Bokhara. A BBC journalist in Kathmandu says thousands of people are spending the night outside in the open, fearing further tremors.

The earthquake triggered avalanches in the Himalayas, and a number of climbers are known to have died on Mount Everest. Neil Norton, who’s leading a team of climbers on the north side of the mountain, said the fate of climbers on the southern side was uncertain.