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Sunday,
February 24, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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37 Maoists gunned down in Nepal
UNITA supremo dies in combat US ban on
Mugabe,
coterie
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Sindhi leaders oppose over division move I want no revenge: Pearl widow PM keeping House in dark: Chandrika
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37 Maoists gunned down in Nepal
Kathmandu, February 23 At least 15 Maoist rebels, who were believed to be involved in the attack in Accham last week, were killed in Surkhet district yesterday. Thirteen rebels were killed on the border between Kalikot and Achham while nine others were gunned down in other parts of the country, the officials said. More than 200 people including over 100 Maoists have been killed during the past week. Arms, ammunition and explosives were recovered and few insurgents were also arrested during the search and cordon operations. In a separate encounter, nine Maoists were killed in search operations launched by security forces in the neighbouring districts. Four were also killed in Dang, three in Salyan and two in Doti districts, the ministry said. Speaking at a function, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, said the “Maoist, will be crushed if all the people, political parties and the government united to fight the terrorists”. “We should not be discouraged by a single defeat,” he said adding the rebels were enemies of democracy. Security forces also completely destroyed terrorist training camps at Chhapra in Kalikot district, which were being used by the rebels to train their cadres in Achham, Bazura and Kalikot districts. Terrorists also killed a civilian at Krishnapur at Kanchanpur district and abducted two locals in Banke district last night. Meanwhile, a nationwide strike called by Maoist rebels virtually closed down the capital Kathmandu today, witnesses said. The city’s streets were deserted and shops remained closed on the second day of the strike enforced by the rebels to mark the sixth anniversary of the launch of their “people’s war” on February 13, 1996. Security forces patrolled the streets in armoured cars fearing further attacks by the guerrillas. In Kathmandu a young boy was injured when a bomb planted by suspected rebels exploded. Deputy Home Minister Devendra Raj Kandel said there had been no reports of further attacks overnight. More than 2,400 people have died since the Maoists launched their fight to overthrow the constitutional monarchy in 1996. UNI, PTI, AFP
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UNITA supremo dies in
combat Luanda, February 23 "In Moxico province, Jonas Malheiro Savimbi died in combat," Angolan national radio said. An unofficial UNITA contact in Lisbon, Rui Oliveira, declined to confirm his leader's death, saying: "We are waiting for our forces in the interior to get in contact with us; only after that can we talk." A senior Angolan intelligence officer speaking by satellite phone said: "Savimbi was killed on the battle front. He was shot several times." Savimbi and some of his troops had been surrounded by government troops since Monday, the intelligence officer said. Savimbi, 67, was the founding father of UNITA (the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola), which he says was born as an army of "12 people with knives", leading the rebel movement since 1966. Big and barrel-chested with matching ivory-handled pistols at his hip, Savimbi combined charisma, guile and a deep understanding of Angola's history to motivate his army to fight. The war in the former Portuguese colony in southwestern Africa has dragged on since 1975 and claimed an estimated one million lives. Presidential spokesman Aldemiro de Conceicao said in an interview with Portugal's private TSF radio: "We had a problem that just now has been removed," he added. Joao Laurenco, secretary-general of the ruling MPLA party, told state television that Savimbi had "chosen his own destiny". A Western diplomat in Luanda called Savimbi's death a "major breakthrough" for peace. "The war will end. Maybe UNITA will not disband straight away, but it changes the whole nature of the conflict. I can't imagine it continuing as before," the diplomat said. The report of Savimbi's death comes as the United Nations tries to revive peace talks between the Luanda Government and Savimbi's forces. The stocky, ebullient son of a railway stationmaster, Savimbi studied medicine in Lisbon and political science in Switzerland. He left Europe in 1961 to fight Portuguese rule and formed UNITA. His forces and allies came close to controlling Angola in fighting after the end of Portuguese rule. However, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, backed by Cuban troops, swept through the country and won widespread recognition as the government of Angola. Savimbi's charm worked as well in the West as it did in the Angolan interior. With the Soviet Union, via Cuba, backing the then-Marxist MPLA and the USA, through South Africa, supporting UNITA, Savimbi accepted the patronage of the white apartheid state, while styling himself as an African nationalist.
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US ban on Mugabe, coterie Washington, February 22 Tension is rising in Zimbabwe ahead of March 9-10 elections with Mugabe, 78, facing the biggest challenge to his 22-year rule from opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai. The Zimbabwe police fired on Tsvangirai's convoy on Friday, the Opposition said. President Bush suspended the entry into the USA of Mugabe and senior members of his government and their families, and people who through their business dealings benefit from the policies of the current Zimbabwe government. "In light of the current situation, the USA is imposing targeted sanctions on senior Zimbabwean officials because conditions for a transparent election process in Zimbabwe have eroded," said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer. Washington followed the lead of the European Union, which on Monday imposed a visa ban on Mugabe and 19 of his top officials because of the way Zimbabwe treated observers sent to monitor the upcoming presidential elections. The Europeans also froze the overseas assets of the 20 Zimbabwean leaders and withdrew the observer mission. "Mr Bush is concerned about the credibility of the upcoming election in Zimbabwe and believes that the campaign is being marred by political violence and intimidation and is taking place under restrictive election and media laws," Fleischer said. The Opposition movement for Democratic Change says more than 100 of its supporters have been killed in political violence since February, 2000, when militants loyal to Mugabe began invading white-owned farms. Reuters "The USA extends our friendship and support to the people of Zimbabwe. Mr Bush hopes that soon the people of Zimbabwe again will enjoy political and economic freedoms," he said.
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Sindhi leaders oppose over
division move London, February 23 Moves to divide Sind are “creating chaos and undermining the social fabric of society,” said the World Sindhi Congress (WSC), the international arm of several parties struggling for the community’s right to self-determination. Many senior leaders of Sindhi parties were in detention without trial for opposing these policies, the WSC said. The Pakistani Government is moving to split the Sind province in an attempt to break down the growing opposition to Pakistani policies in the region, the WSC said. Sindhi parties have accused the Pakistani Government of trying to break it up into “multiple unrecognisable administrative areas.” These plans include the separation of Karachi in the south, handing over coastal areas to the military, merging large parts of the north into the Punjab province, and the construction of large military cantonments in all major cities in Sind, the WSC said. Sindhi leaders would now confront these “evil plans” with a mass opposition movement, it said. “The situation is further worsened by deliberate efforts to destroy the economy of Sind,” the WSC said. “Sind is being denied its due share of irrigation water from the Indus and there is increasing unemployment and forcible dismissal of Sindhis from government jobs,” the WSC said.
IANS |
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I want no revenge: Pearl
widow
Karachi, February 23 In a national television address last night, President Musharraf said: “I can assure my countrymen that we will not leave any stone unturned to bring all these people involved in this murder to justice and set an example of them for other such people who may be thinking of such acts in the future,” he declared. Pearl’s widow Mariane, also a journalist and pregnant with the couple’s first child, said in New York calling her husband’s killing an “act of barbarism”, but dismissing the idea of revenge as too easy. “It is far more valuable in my opinion to address this problem of terrorism with enough honesty to question our own responsibility as nations and as individuals for the rise of terrorism,” she said. She hoped she “will be able to tell our son that his father carried the flag to end terrorism, raising an unprecedented demand among people from all countries not for revenge but for the values we all share: love, compassion, friendship and citizenship far transcending the so-called clash of civilisations.” The group claiming to hold Pearl called itself the National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty and accused the American of being a spy.
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PM keeping House in dark:
Chandrika Colombo, February 23 But within hours, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was accused by Ms Kumaratunga of flouting procedres in the Constitution on getting her approval, keeping Parliament and the Cabinet in the dark, and ignoring consensual norm governing a cohabitation arrangement between rival parties controlling presidency and Parliament. Apart from the President, the Left-wing Janatha Vimukti Peramuna also assailed the MoU. In a statement, it attacked clauses which seem to create legal parity between the armed forces and the LTTE and confer legitimacy on the LTTE’s territorial control over parts of the nation.
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