tribuneindia...Spotlight

			Friday, August 14, 1998
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ED chief shifted at Verma's request
NEW DELHI, Aug 13 (PTI) — Senior IAS officer, M.K. Bezboruah, who was heading the Enforcement Directorate (ED) since 1995, was today appointed Commissioner of Transport in the Delhi Government with immediate effect, official sources said. The appointment follows a request from the Delhi Chief Minister Mr Sahib Singh Verma to the Home Minister Mr L.K. Advani, sources said.

144 killed in Lanka
COLOMBO, Aug 13 (PTI) — In northern Sri Lanka some 144 people were killed in fresh fighting between the LTTE and the security forces, Army sources said here today. An Army spokesman told reporters that 110 LTTE rebels and 26 soldiers were killed when troops trekked eight km west of northern Mankulam town and confronted a large group of guerrillas, yesterday.

Taliban air attack
TEHERAN, Aug 13 (AFP) — Warplanes of the Taliban militia launched massive airraids today on the Bamian stronghold of the opposition Shiite Muslim faction Hezb-i-Wahdat in central Afghanistan, the official Iranian news agency IRNA reported. "The whole town is in flames," the news agency quoted eyewitnesses as saying, adding that there were many casualties. Meanwhile, Uzbek warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum said there was very heavy fighting between opposition troops and the Taliban Islamic militia in northern Afghanistan, IRNA reported

35 drowned
CHITTAGONG, Bangladesh, Aug 13 (Reuters) — At least 35 Bangladeshi fishermen were missing after three boats capsized in the Bay of Bengal during a storm, the police said today. They said 18 other fishermen had been rescued after the storm swept the coast near Cox’s Bazar and Chittagong Port yesterday.

Russian rocket
MOSCOW, Aug 13 (AFP) — A Russian rocket launching a retired Kremlin security adviser and two cosmonauts to the Mir space station blasted off without a glitch from Kazakhstan’s Baikonur space center today. Russian mission control said the Soyuz rocket took off without any hitches at 1:43 p.m. (0943 GMT). The space craft, carrying former presidential aide Yury Baturin, commander Gennady Padalka and engineer Sergei Avdeyev, reached orbit about 10 minutes later.

Rebels kill 8 cops
HONG KONG, Aug 13 (Reuters) — Eight Chinese police officers were killed in the northwestern Xinjiang region this week in attacks local residents believed were the work of separatists, a Hong Kong-based human rights group said today. The city of Kashgar, near China's border with Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, was under curfew since the August 10 killings, the information centre of human rights and democratic movement in China said in a statement. The local sources said the killings were thought to have been carried out by separatists, who have long waged a battle to set up an independent east Turkestan in the heavily Muslim region, the centre said.

ASI dies in blast
BHAGALPUR (Bihar), Aug 13 (PTI) — An assistant sub-inspector of police, K.C. Rao was killed in a blast inside Lodipur police station premises in Bhagalpur district, superintendent of police, M.V. Rao, said today. The cause of the blast, which occurred yesterday, was being ascertained, Mr Rao said.