F-16 row over, says Sharif
ISLAMABAD, Dec 19 — Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today announced that an eight-year-old dispute with the USA over 28 F-16 fighters which were never delivered has been amicably resolved.

Lockerbie trial: court grants time
THE HAGUE, Dec 19 — The International Court of Justice has granted the USA and the UK a three-month delay to file counter statements against a Libyan petition to block the extradition of two suspects in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing.

Bangladesh honour for Amartya Sen
DHAKA, Dec 19 — Nobel laureate Amartya Sen has been conferred the honorary citizenship of Bangladesh, his ancestral homeland where he grew up as a child.

• Pak censured for rights violations
• Chinese dissident sent to work camp

Russian PM coming today

MOSCOW, Dec 19 (UNI) — India and Russia will sign major agreements on defence, trade and economic cooperation during Russian Prime Minister Yevgeni Primakov’s visit to India beginning tomorrow.

Mr Primakov’s visit assumes greater significance in the context of the bombing of Iraq by the USA and UK, and identical views of both countries on world affairs.

Russia’s envoy to India Anatoly Chernoshevsky is optimistic about the Delhi summit consolidating the existing ties, especially in the defence and economic fields.

The highlight of the signing of the deals will be Russia’s readiness to share its technology in the power sector. A high official of the Russian Fuel and Power Ministry Pavel Bezurukhi told ‘Voice of Russia’ that the new power equipment will enable hydel and thermal power stations to cut down transmission losses.

The 69-year-old Mr Primakov, enunciated in 1996 the now famous "multi-polar world" theory and has worked as Pravda correspondent, Head of International Department in Moscow Radio, World and Economic Institute of Oriental Studies and the World Social and Economic Institute before his stint as Kremlin’s "political dynamite’’.

Mr Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet President, had banked on Mr Primakov’s diplomatic skills as a Politbureau member to tackle several international crisis of the 80s. The Russian Prime Minister is also credited to have almost persuaded Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in pulling out of Kuwait in the 1990-91 Gulf crisis.

Majority favours Saddam’s ouster

WASHINGTON, Dec 19 (AFP) — A strong majority of Americans say military force should be used to oust Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, according to a Time magazine/CNN public opinion poll.

The survey released yesterday showed 79 per cent of Americans in favour of military action that would result in Saddam’s removal compared to 17 per cent who were opposed to such a policy and 7 per cent who were unsure.

President Bill Clinton last month announced that his administration would work with the Iraqi opposition to try to bring about a new democratic-minded regime in Baghdad.

Two in three Americans said Mr Clinton ordered air strikes on Iraq because it was necessary and not to delay the impeachment vote in the US House of Representatives.

The impeachment debate, initially scheduled for Thursday, was postponed by one day after Mr Clinton ordered the US military into action in the Gulf on Wednesday.

Some 66 per cent of Americans said they had not lost confidence in Mr Clinton’s ability to govern despite the impeachment debate.

But respondents were almost evenly split on whether the investigation into Mr Clinton’s affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky and his attempts to cover-up the liaison had diminished his effectiveness as President.

‘Impeachment move didn’t trigger bombings’

LONDON, Dec 19 (Reuters) — British Prime Minister Tony Blair today dismissed any suggestion that President Clinton’s impeachment crisis in Washington was the trigger for the bombing campaign against Iraq.

He also sprang to the defence of Richard Butler and his team of UN weapons inspectors, charged with the task of eliminating Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, saying: “The inspectors have been constantly harassed, threatened, deceived and lied to”.

Mr Blair, writing in today’s tabloid Mirror newspaper, said the speedy decision to bomb was provoked by Butler’s report to the UN Security Council.

“Mr Butler’s report was very clear and damning,” Mr Blair said.

“We were presented with a stark but clear choice”.

“I utterly reject the suggestion that the timing was in any way influenced by political events in Washington,” he added.

Meanwhile, three demonstrators grappled with the police on the doorstep of 10 Downing Street here and five others have been arrested after an earlier protest at nearby Whitehall, a DPA report said.

The three protesters, who were led to the Downing Street by MP George Galloway, were wrestled to the ground as the Labour MP and another man, Arab lawyer Sabah al-Mukhtar, were led away by a senior police officer last night.

The men were found to have handcuffs on them and had been trying to handcuff themselves to the railings of No 10.

F-16 row over, says Sharif

ISLAMABAD, Dec 19 (Reuters) Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today announced that an eight-year-old dispute with the USA over 28 F-16 fighters which were never delivered has been amicably resolved.

Mr Sharif told a news conference that US President Bill Clinton telephoned him last night to convey a solution to “a major irritant in the Pakistan-US relations.”

Pakistan paid $ 658 million for the planes in 1990, but Washington kept the money and the aircraft to punish Islamabad for its nuclear programme.

Under the terms of the agreement, Pakistan will receive a total of $ 466.97 million of which $ 326.97 million will be paid in cash before the end of December.

The balance $ 140 million will be delivered over the next two years in wheat and other purchases, Mr Sharif said.

The figure includes a deduction to the USA as service charges, he said adding he did not know if the cash would be used to service Pakistan’s $ 32 billion in foreign debt or to buy alternative aircraft.

Over 33,000 ‘illegal’ Indians in USA
From Ela Dutt in New York

EVEN though a large number of them have been deported in the past two years, there are over 33,000 Indians still living illegally in the USA, says the U.S. Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS).

Following the passage of the 1996 Illegal Immigration and Reform Responsibility Act, which focussed entirely on halting illegal immigration, the INS acquired greater powers to deport aliens who had entered the USA illegally or had overstayed their welcome.

This resulted in the deportation of about 300,000 illegal aliens or “criminal aliens” in the past two years, a figure significantly larger than previous years.

“We estimate that there are five million persons living illegally in this country,” Andrew L. Lluberes, INS spokesman from Washington said. “Of that we estimate 33,000 are from India,” he told IANS.

Of the 114,000 persons deported in fiscal 1997, 293 were Indians. In fiscal 1998, 169,000 persons were deported, of whom 351 were Indians.

Of the 293 Indians deported last year, 33 were put under the category of criminals while the number shot up to 50 in 1998, Lluberes said.

The 1996 act “expanded the reasons for which someone could be removed”, Lluberes said citing the expansion in the definition of “aggravated felony”. While the monetary crime threshold had earlier been $100,000, it was reduced to $10,000 under the act.

The intensified efforts by the INS are also the result of additional millions of dollars made available to the agency to incarcerate illegal aliens and to investigate and apprehend them.

According to a New York Times report, the additional funds allowed the INS to triple the number of beds available in prisons across the country and increase its own staff by 80 per cent. Additional space in local prisons makes it possible to house illegal aliens before deporting them.

“We apprehend and take into custody more people than any other agency in the world,” another INS spokesperson, Russell A. Bergeron Jr., was quoted as saying by the New York Times. “The 1996 law gave INS vastly increased resources for stopping illegal immigration and it has also raised the penalties,” Lluberes said.

Indians, like other illegal aliens, had committed crimes ranging from minor drug offences to murder, Lluberes said, adding that there was no separate break-up for such Indians who had been deported.

“Indians get here the same way that others get in and it is a crime,” Lluberes said referring to the recent crackdown on an international smuggling ring for transporting aliens illegally into this country. — IANS

Lockerbie trial: court grants time

THE HAGUE, Dec 19 (AFP) — The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has granted the USA and the UK a three-month delay to file counter statements against a Libyan petition to block the extradition of two suspects in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing.

The United Nations High Court said in a report issued here yesterday that it had extended an expiration date for the arguments to March 31, 1999.

“In letters dated December 8, the UK and the USA, referring to recent diplomatic initiatives, asked the court to extend the delay”, the ICJ said.

The move was taken after the Libyan Parliament, on Tuesday, came closer to agreeing that the two bombing suspects could be tried in a neutral country.

But Libya maintains that the two suspects, if found guilty, should not serve any prison sentence in Scotland, as Washington and London demand, nor did the Libyan authorities expressly say they would extradite the pair.

The USA and the UK had agreed to try the two in a third country, probably the Netherlands, in an effort to move the judicial process forward.

Bangladesh honour for Amartya Sen

DHAKA, Dec 19 (UNI) — Nobel laureate Amartya Sen has been conferred the honorary citizenship of Bangladesh, his ancestral homeland where he grew up as a child.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina handed over the certificate of honorary citizenship to the world-renowned economist at a simple ceremony at Ganabhahan yesterday.

She also handed over a Bangladesh passport to the visiting scholar, saying: "You are ours".

Receiving the citizenship and passport, the Nobel Prize winner said: "I am overwhelmed by the honour... I am happy to return to Bangladesh ."

Prime Minister Hasina also presented gifts to Professor Sen, who is here to deliver public discourses on his economic viewpoint.

The gifts included an album containing photographs of the eventful life of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

Pak censured for rights violations

LONDON, Dec 19 (PTI) — The European Parliament has censured Pakistan for large-scale human rights abuses especially condemning the setting up of military courts to try civilians in trouble-torn Karachi city.

A resolution to this effect was adopted by the European Parliament over the weekend which said: “The European Parliament is profoundly disturbed by the content of Amendment 15 to the Pakistan constitution.”

Chinese dissident sent to work camp

BEIJING, Dec 19 (DPA) — Xu Wanping, who was among Chinese dissidents who founded a democratic party in Hunan province, has been sent to a prison work camp for three years, the Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Democracy and Human Rights said today.

Earlier this month, Xu, 36, who earlier this month was convicted of disturbing the public order, was confined to a prison work camp in the south-western city of Chongouing. He was arrested in late October with other members of the new party.

The work camp sentence is one of the most severe penalties given by China’s communist leadership to members and founders of the democrate party. The main founder of the party, Mr Xu Wenli, whom Beijing suspects of trying to overthrow the government, is scheduled to appear on Monday in court.

Wang Youcai and Qin Yongmin, both co-founders of the party, were put on trial on Thursday and are awaiting verdicts.

Caviar smugglers
NEW YORK: Three Polish men were indicted on charges of smuggling thousands of pounds of Russian caviar into the USA under a new provision adding sturgeon to an international treaty to protect endangered species. US officials alleged on Friday that the men sold approximately 19,000 pounds of imported sturgeon roe without a permit to US caviar dealers between April and November this year. They said the sturgeon roe was concealed in the luggage of airline passengers who were paid to be couriers. The indictment alleged that the caviar imports violated the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the Endangered Species Act. — Reuters

Mouse in aeroplane
KIRUNA, Sweden: A mouse grounded an SAS Swedish Airliner, forcing 70 passengers to be transported to other airports where they were booked on other flights. “It sounds like a joke, but it’s true,” SAS’s Kicki Nilimaa told the Swedish news agency TT on Friday. The mouse was discovered by a cleaning woman emptying an on-board trash receptacle overnight, but the startled woman let the mouse escape into the bowels of the plane. International airline regulations prohibit taking off with a live critter at large in the craft because of the danger to electrical cables and other equipment. — AFP

Gurdwara to be built
ESCONDIDO (California): After nearly two decades of renting space at a local school to hold religious services, the small but growing Sikh community in this town will soon have its own gurdwara. Groundbreaking ceremonies, hosted by the San Diego Sikh Society, were held at the proposed site in southwest Escondido and attracted hundreds of celebrants. Until the construction of the gurdwara has been completed about two years from now, the more than 300 Sikh families will continue to hold their religious services at a local school. To be built on a site of 1.3 acres, the gurdwara is estimated to cost at least $ 1 million, the money being raised through donations from the local Sikh congregation. — IANS

Sexual abuse charge
COLOMBO: A Sri Lanka citizen’s group has claimed that government troops have sexually assaulted women in villages bordering the war zone. “We can’t give you figures because some women spoke to us in confidence. There are many children fathered by soldiers who do not acknowledge the parentage,” said Niralka Fernando of the Independent Movement for Inter-Racial Justice and Equality. “Women go from camp to camp searching for the men who fathered their children only to be told by senior officers that they either are not there or have moved on,” Fernando said. — ANI