Thursday, December 10, 1998
today's calendar
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W O R L D | Thursday, December 10, 1998 |
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US firm gives China defence
aid ‘illegally’ |
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Diana’s
ex-lover wants |
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Iran "recruiting"
Russian scientists |
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US firm gives China defence aid ‘illegally’ WASHINGTON, Dec 9 (UNI) — A secret Pentagon report concludes that Hughes Space and Communications, without proper authorisation, gave China technological insights that are crucial to the successful launchings of satellites and ballistic missiles, says the New Tork Times. According to the report, completed on Monday, the daily says Hughes scientists helped Chinese engineers in 1995 to improve the sophisticated mathematical models necessary to predict the effects of wind, high-atmosphere buffeting and other natural forces on a rocket launching. These formulae are important to designing nuclear missiles and launching satellites that do not explode or break apart. They help technicians calculate the appropriate angle of launch, the shape of the nose cone of the rocket, the tolerable limits of weather and other factors. The Chinese, the Pentagon said, had been using an oversimplified mathematical analysis, resulting in a series of failed satellite launchings. Hughes pointed out that shortcoming to the Chinese in 1995, when its scientists helped investigate the failed launching of a Hughes commercial communication satellite atop a Chinese rocket. The report concluded that Hughes had provided a defence service to China that violated American standards against helping Beijing make better satellites and missiles and required a State Department review. The company’s assistance to China raises national security concerns both with regard to violating those standards and to potentially contributing to China’s missile capabilities, it said. The company and other American aerospace concerns were eager to use Chinese rockets because they are cheaper than American or European competitors, but only if they could be made reliable. The Pentagon report said that contact between Hughes engineers and Chinese scientists allowed the Chinese to gain specific insight into specific launch vehicle design and operational problems and corrective actions. The report also says Hughes showed Chinese scientists flaws in the way they were attaching the cargo of rockets to the rockets themselves, including the strength of the rivets they used and the shape of the nose cone. In the case of the Chinese launchings, the cargo was satellites. But the technology is applicable as well to attaching a nuclear warhead to a missile. The daily quoted a spokeswoman for Hughes, which has denied any wrongdoing in the case, as having said that the company’s actions were approved at the time by the Commerce Department, which she said was the appropriate licensing authority. The Pentagon report did not say whether China had used the information for military purposes, but it said the transfer did not likely alter the strategic military balance between China and the USA. The Justice Department has
been examining whether Hughes and Loral Space and
Communications violated export laws when they helped
Chinese rocket scientists understand the causes of
another failed launching in 1996. |
North Korea ready for war with USA SEOUL, Dec 9 (AFP) — Communist North Korea has said it would not avoid a war with the USA in a row over a suspected nuclear complex, threatening US forces with “annihilation” if they attempt to strike at the facility. Pyongyang’s official mouthpiece, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), carried the warnings in a string of dispatches yesterday in which it raged against alleged US moves to spark a fresh war with North Korea. “We neither want nor avoid a war,” kana said in a dispatch monitored here. “If a war is imposed, we will never miss the opportunity. The aggressors will never escape the fate of forlorn wandering spirits. “This is (North Korea’s) warning to the United States and its followers who worked out the ‘Operation Plan 5027’ for the second Korean war of aggression long ago and are putting spurs on its implementation,” it said. The “Operation Plan
5027” spelled out US military contingency plans in
case of war on the Korean peninsula, where it has 37,000
troops stationed against a possible North Korean attack. |
Diana’s ex-lover wants letters back LONDON, Dec 9 (AP) — Princess Diana’s former lover James Hewitt has sued the law firm handling her estate in an attempt to recover the love letters she wrote to him, which he says were stolen. The former army officer claims that 64 letters written to him by the Princess between 1989 and 1991 were taken from his home by a subsequent girlfriend and have emerged in the possession of the law firm handling her estate. Mr Hewitt claims in legal documents that the letters, signed either in Diana’s own name or with a pseudonym, were taken from a safe in his home, then were passed to a staff member at Kensington Palace, then to a police detective, and finally to the law firm of Lawrence Graham. The firm has not responded to his requests for return of the letters, the lawsuit says. His former fiancé, model Anna Staiand Ferretti, was arrested in April amid allegations that she tried to sell the letters to a tabloid newspaper, The Mirror, for £ 150,000 ($ 247,500). The Mirror handed the letters over to the late Princess’ private office at Kensington Palace, without publishing them. The Police later announced Ms Ferretti would not be prosecuted. Had the case gone to trial, the letters could have become court exhibits. The Princess’s mother, Frances Shand Kydd, said she and the other executors of her daughter’s will would be happy to hand the letters back, provided Mr Hewitt guaranteed their “safe keeping.’’ After Mr Hewitt cooperated
in a 1994 book about their affair, called “Princess
in Love,’’ Diana acknowledged the relationship
and said he had let her down. The affair began when he
gave her riding lessons and the two are believed to have
exchanged many letters, handwritten on blue airmail
paper, when he served as a tank commander in the Persian
Gulf war. |
Iran "recruiting" Russian scientists NEW YORK, Dec 9 (PTI) — Iran is recruiting unemployed or underemployed Russian scientists to carry forward its biological weapons programme, especially germ arsenal, the New York times has reported. Despite denials from Tehran that Iran was not engaged in manufacturing biological weapons, the paper quoted Russian scientists admitting that at least five of their colleagues had gone to Iran in recent years. Others had accepted contracts that allowed them to continue to live in Russia while conducting research for Tehran. The paper said more than a dozen former Russian germ scientists had entered into contracts with Iran and two had reportedly confessed about Tehran’s desire for biological weapons. The USA feared that Iran was making a germ arsenal as more and more Russian scientists had disclosed their links with Iran, the paper said. In Washington, the US state department expressed concern over Iranian attempts to use Russian scientists to develop its biological weapons programme. The paper said Iran had a powerful reason to acquire such weapons as most of them believed that Iraq used biological and chemical weapons during Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s and many countries in the region, including Israel, Syria and Iraq, were suspected of having germ arsenals. Unidentified Iranian officials were quoted as saying the research was not offensive, which was, however, dismissed by veterans of the Soviet and US germ programmes. “It is often hard to
distinguish between a drug and a weapon or between
offensive and defensive research,” Lev.S.
Sandakhchiev, Director of Vector Laboratory, which made
deadly viruses for weapons in Soviet times, was quoted as
saying. |
UN Council warns Taliban UNITED NATIONS, Dec 9 (PTI) —The UN Security Council has accused the Pakistani-backed Taliban militia in Afghanistan of committing large-scale human rights violations including reported killings of thousands of Shias and sheltering international terrorists. In a unanimous resolution, it threatened the Taliban with unspecified measures unless they ceased fire and started negotiating with other ethnic groups in the country for a peaceful resolution of the conflict. It also slammed the Taliban for production and trafficking in drugs and continuing discrimination against women. Demanding an end to faction fighting in the country, the lengthy resolution expressed concern over increasingly ethnic and religion-based persecution, particularly against the Shias during their takeover of the northern part of the country and the threat it posed to the unity of the state. It reiterated its call for an end to foreign interference, “particularly the involvement of foreign military personnel,” and the supply of arms and ammunition to all parties. Stressing that the suppression of international terrorism was essential for the maintenance of peace and security, the council said it was “deeply disturbed” by the continuing use of Afghan territory, especially controlled by the Taliban, for sheltering and training terrorists and planning terrorist acts. It backed the sending of civilian monitors to Afghanistan to promote respect for minimum humanitarian standards and deter massive and systematic violations of human rights and humanitarian law. The resolution asked the Secretary-General to continue efforts to send a mission to investigate reports of “grave breaches and particularly serious violations of international humanitarian law” especially “mass killings and mass graves of prisoners of war and civilians and destruction of religious sites”. It demanded that the Taliban cooperate with the mission and ensure the safety and freedom of movement of the personnel. However, Pakistani
Ambassador Ahmad Kamal criticised the council resolution
which came in the wake of the Secretary-General’s
report, saying it was one-sided and biased and would do
no good to the council’s image. |
Yeltsin out of hospital MOSCOW, Dec 9 (AP) — Russian President Boris Yeltsin was released from a hospital today after receiving treatment for more than two weeks for pneumonia. He moved to a country residence outside the capital, the Kremlin said. Mr Yeltsin has rarely been seen or heard since he went to the hospital on November 22. He emerged briefly on Monday to fire Chief of Staff Valentin Yumashev and three of his deputies before returning to the hospital three hours later. Mr Yeltsin’s spokesman Dmitry Yakushkin said that the President had been moved to the his residence and would receive “periodic check-ups at the hospital,” according to the Interfax news agency. Mr Yeltsin has been a part-time President for months as his health has declined. He has played little role in Russia’s pressing economic problems. The Russian economy
slumped earlier this year, partly in response to
Asia’s economic travails, and plummeted after August
17. |
Netanyahu refuses to reject accord JERUSALEM, Dec 9 (AFP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused to yield to MPs demanding that he renounce the Wye river accord to keep their support for his fragile governing coalition, a statement from his office said. Mr Netanyahu yesterday
rejected the demands of the Greater Israel lobby in
Parliament which insisted that he “denounce the
accord and proclaim the annexation of the
territories” of Biblical Israel now inhabited by
Palestinians, his office said in a statement. |
Nobel panel failed to agree on Gandhi OSLO, Dec 9 (Reuters) — The head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee after Second World War helped block a peace prize to Mahatma Gandhi and even opposed an award to the Red Cross, according to a hitherto unpublished diary. Excerpts of Gunnar Jahn’s diary, made available to Reuters, give an unprecedented glimpse into arguments and rivalries in the secretive five-member committee which controls what many consider the world’s most prestigious award. Jahn, who served on the committee from 1942-66, was a head of the Central Bank and a leader of the Resistance to the Nazis who occupied Norway during the war. His typed diary has been locked in the Nobel Institute under a 50-secrecy rule. "This diary is the only direct source of the committee’s internal deliberations," said Geir Lundestad, Director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute. "It gives a clear impression of (Jahn’s) style — he seemed a grumpy man." In 1947, for instance, two of the five members wanted to give Gandhi the prize for his philosophy of passive resistance that won India Independence from Britain that year — the first documentary evidence of how close Gandhi came to winning. Gandhi’s omission from the list of laureates is often considered the worst error in the history of the prize, first awarded in 1901. Historians say Norway's gratitude to Britain after the war and a trace of racism may have deprived Gandhi of the award. Jahn, an opponent of giving Gandhi the prize, said he told committee members about Gandhi: "He is obviously the greatest personality proposed and there are very, very many good things to say about Gandhi. But we must remember that he is not only an apostle of peace, he is also a nationalist." Jahn said he was worried, after two committee members came out in favour of Gandhi, that former Foreign Minister Birger Braadland, might also vote for him and hand him the prize. When Braadland did not, Jahn said he had understood international relations. Martin Tranmael, another committee member opposed to Gandhi, said warring between India and Pakistan after the collapse of the British Raj in 1947 had to be resolved first. The 1947 prize ended up going two main quaker organisations, the friends service council of Britain and the American Friend Service Committee. Gandhi was assassinated in January 1948 - a year Jahn made no entry in his diary. Two years later, committee members did not even consider allied wartime leaders like Britain’s Winston Churchill or US President Harry Truman for the first award after the war. The committee had not made any award since 1939. Jahn successfully argued for a 1945 award to former US Secretary of State Cordell Hull, who helped set up the United Nations, but bitterly opposed the majority decision to make a retrospective award of the 1944 prize to the Red Cross. "I was least happy that the prize went to the International Red Cross," he wrote. He accused a Norwegian Red Cross leader of exploiting it for "scandalous publicity for the Norwegian Red Cross, which has done nothing in the International arena". Lundestad said the committee’s style had changed from one of strong personality clashes under Jahn. "It seems that the committee members had much more fixed opinions than the present committee," he said. Northern Ireland
politicians John Hume and David Trimble, heads of the
biggest Catholic and Protestant parties, receive the 1998
Nobel Peace prize in Oslo on Thursday for their work to
end 30 years of sectarian violence. |
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| Iran, Iraq swap war dead remains TEHERAN: Iran and Iraq on Tuesday exchanged the remains of soldiers killed during the 1980-1988 war, an Iranian official said. The remains of 121 Iranian soldiers and 213 Iraqi troops were exchanged at the Shalamcheh region along the border between the two countries, said General Mir Feisal Baqerzadeh, head of a committee overseeing the search for missing soldiers. The two nations, which are yet to sign a formal peace treaty, are coordinating an effort to look for the remains of those missing. — AFP Life term Clinton honoured Indian book Aspirin risk |
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