Livingston for compromise
WASHINGTON, Nov 9 — Bob Livingston, the top contender to replace Newt Gingrich as Speaker of the US House of Representatives, has said that Republicans must compromise with President Bill Clinton and other Democrats next year — rather than try to dictate legislation to them.

No police report on officials in ’97 plot: lawyers
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 9 — The prosecution in Anwar Ibrahim’s trial said today that there was no police report implicating senior Malaysian government officials in a 1997 plot to drive the sacked Finance Minister from office.

Clinton puts off attack on Iraq

WASHINGTON, Nov 9 (AP) US President Bill Clinton has put off a decision on whether to use force to try to reopen Iraq’s weapons sites to UN inspectors.

In a two-hour meeting with senior advisers yesterday, Mr Clinton directed them to weigh military and diplomatic strategies for a few more days.

Among the considerations are that Iraq’s likely response to an attack would be a permanent ban on the international search for illegal chemical and biological weapons.

As Mr Clinton weighed military action, Iraqi Ministers said they would not back away from a decision to bar UN inspections unless crippling economic sanctions were lifted.

Iraqi Trade Minister Mohammed Mehdi Saleh said Iraq had suffered so long under the UN sanctions that it had nothing to fear from new US threats.

"They will not kill in a military strike more than they are killing with sanctions every day,’’ Mr Saleh said, referring to the trade sanctions imposed by the Security Council after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

Reuters: Five UN arms monitors left Baghdad for Bahrain today after Iraq suspended cooperation with the UN commission searching for banned chemical and biological weapons, a UN official said.

Ten more inspectors would leave on Wednesday, Caroline Cross, Special Assistant to the Director of the Baghdad Monitoring and Verification Centre (MVC), told reporters.

Fifteen monitors left Iraq on Saturday after a decision by the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM) Chairman Richard Butler to cut its Baghdad-based staff by 20 per cent.

Cross said more than 100 staff would remain in the country after Wednesday and UNSCOM had the capacity to resume its work immediately.

“Five resident monitors left the MVC today...and there will be a further 10 leaving on Wednesday,” Mr Cross said.

“We do retain the capacity to start our work again and the people who are remaining behind do have the skills and the experience to do our work should that become necessary,” she added.

Iraq announced on October 31 that it would not cooperate with UNSCOM inspections till the Security Council reviewed sanctions imposed on Iraq following its 1990-1991 occupation on Kuwait.

But Baghdad has allowed the monitors to continue to maintain surveillance equipment at hundreds of sites already identified as having weapons of mass destruction.

Taliban ready for truce

KABUL, Nov 9 (AP) — Afghanistan’s religious militia is ready to extend a ceasefire with its opponents to give peace in their war-battered homeland a chance, a Taliban minister said.

“We are prepared for peace,” Taliban’s Deputy Minister of Health Sher Abbas Stanekzai said in a weekend interview. “The ceasefire deadline ended a week back, but none of the sides have violated the truce so far.’’

In a conciliatory gesture, Mr Stanekzai made an appeal to the Taliban’s main opponent former Defence chief Ahmed Shah Massood.

“Massood has also fought against the Russians,’’ a reference to the 1980s war against invading Soviet soldiers.

We request him to stop fighting and lay down his arms in larger national interest, said Mr Stanekzai.

Mr Massood’s Jamiat-e-Islami, led by former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani, is the only strong opposition group resisting the Taliban. Mr Massood’s forces have recaptured some lost ground including Taloqan, the capital of the northern Takhar province from the hard-line Islamic militia.

But the Taliban rejects the opposition’s demand to share power.

He said the Muslim insurgents, led by Massood, who took power from the Communists in 1992 after fighting to oust invading Soviet soldiers forfeited their right to rule when they turned their guns on each other.

ISLAMABAD (Reuters): Afghanistan’s Taliban movement today challenged the USA to prove by November 20 that Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden was a terrorist.

The Taliban’s supreme court told the Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) news agency that if no proof was submitted by the deadline, he would be deemed innocent of all charges of terrorism.

“We will wait till November 20. If anyone has any proof he is involved in terrorism, it should be submitted by then.”

The supreme court statement said that if no proof of his alleged involvement in terrorism was received by November 20, on this basis we will say he is clear.

The court said it would investigate Bin Laden after intense western pressure to extradite the Saudi dissident, who had lived in Afghanistan for several years before the Taliban swept to power in 1996.

Bin Laden is the alleged mastermind of the August bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania which killed hundreds and has been living in Afghanistan as a “guest” of the Islamic militia.

A spokesman for the Taliban in its southern spiritual capital of Kandahar confirmed the supreme court terms.

The USA has offered “5.0 million for the arrest of Bin Laden and in August attacked alleged training camps of his forces in southern Afghanistan.

Mujib case: move to bring more fugitives

DHAKA, Nov 9 (AP) — Thailand’s prompt extradition of a former army officer to face execution raised hopes today of bringing home more fugitives from the USA and Canada who were sentenced to death for plotting the 1975 assassination of the country’s first Prime Minister Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

Concluding a trial, delayed 23 years by Bangladesh’s bloody politics, a judge convicted 15 former military commanders on Sunday and ordered them to die by a firing squad in the killing of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, father of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Eleven are still fugitives. The convicted men said they would appeal the sentence to a higher court.

Only three of the defendants — Syed Farooqur Rahman, Sultan Shahriyar Rashid Khan and Muhiuddin Ajmed — were present in the courtroom when Dhaka District Judge Kazi Golam Rasul handed down the verdict.

The three were soon joined in the Dhaka central jail by Bazlul Huda, who was brought by a special flight from Bangkok, Thailand, two hours after the verdict was pronounced, under an extradition treaty signed early this year.

“The extradition of Bazlul Huda has encouraged us to step up efforts to bring the others back home for justice,” Shafiur Rahman, the top bureaucrat at the Home Ministry, said in a telephone interview today.

Two of the fugitives — Kishmat Hashem and Nazmul Ansar — are living in Canada as Canadian citizen. A.K.M. Mohiunddin Ahmed, another convicted man, is in the US applying for U.S. citizenship.

Mt Everest hero Hunt dies

LONDON, Nov 9 (AP) — John Hunt, leader of the British expedition which first climbed Mount Everest, has died at the age of 88.

Hunt died at his home in Henley-on-Thames on Saturday night, said his daughter, Ms Sally Nesbitt. The family’s announcement yesterday said only that Hunt died following a brief illness.

As leader of the expedition in 1953, Hunt decided it was his responsibility to remain at base camp while Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay climbed the last 400 feet to the summit.

Hunt was a Colonel in the British Army when he was tipped to lead the Everest expedition.

He retired in 1956 to become the first director of the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme promoted by Prince Philip.

He was knighted in 1953 and elevated in 1966 to the House of Lords, where he took the title of Baron Hunt of Llanfairwaterdine. He was a personal adviser to the Prime Minister Mr Harold Wilson during the Nigerian Civil War.

Glenn’s back, wants to go up again

CAPE CANAVERAL (Florida), Nov 9 (AP) — After a shaky reintroduction to gravity, John Glenn is "95 or 98 per cent back to normal,” walking briskly, telling jokes and urging old folks to follow their dreams.

“I feel very elated that things went well. We got a lot of the data we were looking to get and worked very hard up there,” NASA’s 77-year-old geriatric test subject said yesterday, his first morning back on earth.

“Obviously, we would like to ... go right back up again, but that is not to be. And so a sense of accomplishment I guess I feel, and a little bit of let-down that the whole thing is over, maybe, but nothing serious.”

In his first post-flight press conference, Glenn admitted he did not feel “too hot” when he stood and walked out of space shuttle Discovery on Saturday.

He was determined, though, to join his six crewmates for the traditional walk around the shuttle.

“If I would have been on my hands and knees I was going to do it,” said Glenn, who beat the oldest-spaceman record by 16 years. “I was not quite to that point, but obviously I was not doing my best gait out there. I was not disoriented, that would be too strong a word for it. But you are walking very spraddle-legged so you can keep your balance.”

Even after a good night’s sleep, Glenn still was being careful yesterday not to turn his head, which after nine days of weightlessness would have made him dizzy. He described it as being “alligator headed.”

Otherwise, he looked and sounded as fit as ever.

One of his much younger crewmates, in fact, was the only one to come back wounded. Stephen Robinson smacked his head when he came out of a tunnel in weightlessness he suffered an inch-deep gash over his right eye and the embarrassment of having to explain it to reporters.

Glenn could not resist poking fun at his crewmates and the few hundred journalists jamming the press conference, postponed from Saturday night because his medical tests ran so late.

Here is America’s first man in orbit complimenting his shuttle commander, Curtis Brown Jr.: I told him last night he was almost as good a commander as the one I had on my first flight.”

And when a camera tripod came crashing down just as Glenn was explaining what it was like readjusting to gravity, he cracked: “This is the dangerous part.”

Several hours later, Glenn and his shuttle crewmates arrived in Houston, where more than 1,000 persons packed an airport hangar to welcome them back. Mayor Lee Brown told the astronauts their mission had, “renewed an American love affair with space travel.”

Glenn will remain in Houston for three more weeks for medical tests, before leaving Florida. He said his shuttle mission was every bit as satisfying as his history-making ride aboard Friendship 7 back in 1962.

Livingston for compromise

WASHINGTON, Nov 9 (Reuters) — Bob Livingston, the top contender to replace Newt Gingrich as Speaker of the US House of Representatives, has said that Republicans must compromise with President Bill Clinton and other Democrats next year — rather than try to dictate legislation to them.

Republicans must acknowledge that voters effectively rejected much of their conservative agenda in last Tuesday’s election when they cut their House majority by giving Democrats a net gain of five seats, Livingston said.

"With a margin of only six votes in the coming Congress, I’m going to have to work with people who don’t believe the same (as) I do," he told ABC-TV’s "this week" yesterday.

House Republicans are to meet on November 18 to elect their leaders for the 106th Congress, which convenes in January.

Livingston, 55, is the front-runner to replace Gingrich, who last Friday, in response to a Republican revolt, announced he would not seek re-election as Speaker, a post that is second in line, behind the vice presidency, to the presidency.

Former Senate majority leader and 1966 Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole told the GOPAC conference yesterday the Republicans needed to do more to reach out to potential voters.

"It was a wake-up call for the USA. We’re not going to win national elections without more black votes, more Hispanic votes, more Asian votes, and women, particularly," Dole said.

No police report on officials in ’97 plot: lawyers

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 9 (Reuters) — The prosecution in Anwar Ibrahim’s trial said today that there was no police report implicating senior Malaysian government officials in a 1997 plot to drive the sacked Finance Minister from office.

But Anwar’s defence lawyers insisted on the sixth day of the corruption and sex trial that such a report existed, and a senior police officer testified that high-ranking officials had met individuals implicated in a possible smear campaign.

The defence had said on Friday that the report, which it said was dated September 3, 1997, linked at least two government ministers to a possible plan to smear Anwar’s name through allegations of sexual misconduct, which he has denied.

The defence said the report, like an earlier one dated August 20, 1997, had been written by outgoing police intelligence chief Mohamed Said Awang and given to Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.

Judge Augustine Paul on Friday had ordered the prosecution to try to obtain a copy of a report.

“For the record, I wish to state the prosecution has been informed that there is no report dated September 3, 1997, addressed to the PM (Prime Minister), signed or unsigned,” prosecutor Abdul Gani Patail told the court today.

But defence lawyer Christopher Fernando said Anwar, who has pleaded not guilty to 10 counts of corruption and sodomy, was sure such a report existed.

“My client is sure of it, he has read it and even knows the contents,” Fernando said.

The judge told the prosecution to produce an active member of the police intelligence wing to testify on the matter.

Anwar’s trial is the focal point of dissent in Malaysia, where protesters have launched sporadic street demonstrations calling on Mahathir to step down after 17 years in power.

In the initial phase of the trial, the prosecution is trying to prove that Anwar used his power as then Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister to interfere with a police investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct to protect himself.

Mohamed said, who was on the witness stand for the fifth day today, wrote the report dated August 20, 1997, which was sent to Mahathir and which said the allegations by the sister of Anwar’s former private secretary and his former driver were baseless.

Islamic Teachings
BONN: For the fist time, an estimated 35,000 Muslim children in Berlin have been allowed to receive Islamic instructions in schools following a significant German court ruling. The court ruled that the Islamic Federation, a group representing many of Berlin’s 220,000 Muslims, should be allowed to give lessons on the Quran and Islamic tradition in schools in Berlin that ended a long-drawn battle between Islamic organisations and the authorities on the issue. — PTI

Gorbachev’s views
MOSCOW: Russia should have a strong centre even as its countrymen should enjoy the fruits of a democratic set-up, according to former President Mikhail Gorbachev. “I favour a powerful leader (in the Kremlin) who at the same time should not become a super-president. The clout of the President’s office must be counter-balanced by an effective parliamentary system,’’ he said in a face-to-face programme on the “Voice of Russia”. — UNI

Arthritis drug
LOS ANGELES: A drug already being used to treat crohn’s disease, an inflammation of the bowel, also reduces symptoms and pain in rheumatoid arthritis patients, researchers said today. The drug infliximad, made by Centocor Inc. And marketed under the brand name Remicade, reduced pain and symptoms of the chronic joint condition by 52 per cent in patients using the drug compared to those not taking it, said researchers. — Reuters

OAU summit
OUAGADOUGOU: The leaders of Ethiopia and Eritrea left here after 24 hours of negotiations failed to produce a solution to a sporadic border war between the two countries. Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe also left Burkina Faso having failed, along with the host President Blaise Compaore and Djibouti’s President Hassan Gouled Aptidon, to persuade the two warring East African nations to accept a peace plan. — AFP

Confessions
CAIRO: Radio Cairo has pulled the plug on a popular call-in show that enraged conservatives by addressing taboo topics such as rape, infidelity, incest and premarital sex. The show’s host, Buthayna Kamel, said officials told her they would no longer allow the broadcast of “Nocturnal Confessions.” The show repeatedly was taken off the air in recent months. “It is time that I make my confessions to my listeners that the programme was stopped against my will,” Kamel, a prominent television anchor, said in a statement to the press. — AP

Referendum
LISBON: Portuguese voters have overwhelmingly defeated a referendum that would have brought about the division of the nation into eight regions, each with its own parliament and administration. With 85 per cent of the vote counted, the central election agency said more than 64 per cent of the electorate had voted against the referendum and just 36 per cent for its implementation. — DPA

King lights flame
PHNOM PENH: King Norodom Sihanouk led a brief ceremony on Monday to mark the 45th anniversary of Cambodian independence from French domination, in what was expected to be his last public appearance before leaving for medical treatment in China this week. The ailing but smiling king, who has been at the forefront of Cambodia’s chequered history for the past 45 years, lit commemorative flames to mark the occasion. — AFP