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Monday,
January 13, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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N. Korea
threatens ‘merciless punishment’ US
Governor lifts 167 death sentences Portugal
to shut down 8 Consulates Misappropriation
of Rs 100m by Pak Army ‘Panic
rooms’ to protect royal family Don’t
provoke repeat of Suez, Blair warned
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50
Taliban prisoners freed Court
summons Clonaid executive
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N. Korea threatens ‘merciless punishment’
Seoul, January 12 Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly was to arrive late today ahead of talks with President-elect Roh Moo-Hyun and Foreign Minister Choi Sung-Hong. Mr Roh, who succeeds outgoing head of state Kim Dae-Jung on February 25, has been playing a lead role in South Korean efforts to mediate an end to the stand-off but Pyongyang has so far snubbed all moves to reduce tensions. Mr Kelly last week hosted trilateral talks on the crisis in Washington with South Korea and Japan. After the meeting, the USA offered to hold talks with North Korea, although it insisted it would not “negotiate” over its demand that Pyongyang bring itself back into line with its nuclear commitments. But North Korea has shown few signs of ending its game of brinkmanship and announced it no longer considered itself bound by nuclear agreements. The enigmatic regime’s Ambassador to China, Mr Choe Jin-Su, said last evening the “moratorium about missile test fire will be no exception now that the USA has made invalid all the agreements reached between the USA and DPRK (North Korea).” Washington said in October that Pyongyang had admitted running a secret enriched uranium nuclear weapons programme in violation of a 1994 agreement, and responded by halting fuel shipments. North Korea retaliated by reactivating the mothballed Yongbyon nuclear plant, expelling UN monitors and then withdrawing on Friday from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT), which would limit possession of nuclear weapons to the USA, Russia, China, France and Britain. North Korea’s ambassador to Austria said yesterday that the Yongbyon complex would be up and running in a matter of weeks. There was no let-up in the regime’s brinkmanship today as it threatened to “mercilessly punish” the USA if its NPT withdrawal was met with sanctions, and called on the Korean people to unite against their common enemy. In a series of editorials in the ruling Communist Party’s Rodong Sinmun newspaper, Pyongyang sought to heap the blame for the current stand-off entirely on Washington, which it accused of planning an invasion. Washington responded with its own warning to Pyongyang that its threat to end the moratorium on missile testing “would further isolate” it from the international community. Officials here said Mr Roh would stress to Mr Kelly tomorrow the need to solve the issue peacefully through dialogue and for close consultation between Seoul and Washington.
AFP |
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US Governor lifts 167 death sentences
Chicago, January 12 Given the state’s “shameful” track record of miscarriages of justice, and the possibility that more innocent people might be sitting on death row, Governor George Ryan said yesterday he felt he had no option but to commute the 167 sentences to life without the possibility of parole. “Our capital system is haunted by the demon of error — error in determining guilt and error in determining who among the guilty deserves to die. Because of all of these reasons today I am commuting the sentences of all death row inmates.” Illinois has exonerated 17 persons since the state re-instated the death penalty in 1977 — more than any other US state, except Florida. Half of the 300 capital cases in the state have been reversed for a new trial or resentencing. “The fact I have seen in reviewing each and every one of these cases raised questions not only about the innocence of people on death row, but about the fairness of the death penalty system as a whole.” The Governor’s historic vote of no confidence, which clears out this northern’s state death row, was truly an 11th hour reprieve for the 167 inmates, coming just 48 hours before Ryan is due to leave office.
AFP |
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Portugal
to shut down 8 Consulates Hong Kong, January 12 Hong Kong Consul-General Joao Paulo Matos Sequeira said officials in Lisbon confirmed last week the plan to shut down the consulate here, the South China Morning Post reported. Sequeira said no closure date had been given yet, the report said. Portugal is also closing seven other consulates, including Porto Alegre in Brazil and those in Nancy, Rouen, Reims and Bayonne in France, the newspaper said. It gave no other details. Portugal is considering relocating its Hong Kong consular staff to its consulate in Macau, a gambling enclave near Hong Kong, to help expand services for the Portuguese in the Pearl Delta region, the report said. Around 8,000 Portuguese live in Hong Kong. Portugal first set up its consulate here in 1897, the report said.
AP |
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Misappropriation of Rs 100m by Pak Army
Islamabad, January 12 Misappropriations and irregularities of over Rs 70 billion were detected in various defence expenditures mostly in administrative expenditures, the South Asia Tribune said quoting a recent report of the Auditor-General. The expenditures did not include purchase of weapons, aircraft, ships, tanks, missiles or anything related to the nuclear programme, it said. According to the report, bulk of the expenses still remained closed to any scrutiny and the billions misappropriated under these accounts would never become public. An interesting aspect of the report is that Army Generals appeared totally out of control during the civilian government and expenses jumped from Rs 1 billion a year until 1993 to over Rs 6.3 billion in 1994-95, to an astounding Rs 43 billion in 1997-98 and another Rs 12 billion in 1998-99. The report said the Generals were totally in control of the financial affairs even during the elected political units of Benazir and Nawaz Sharif. “They had actually become reckless that they just did not bother about any accountability or scrutiny by the civilians,” it said. The report deals with the accounts till 1999, but the South Asia Tribune reports that the figure of these amounts would be over Rs 10 billion at present.
UNI |
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‘Panic rooms’ to protect royal family London, January 12 The high-security rooms are encased in 18-inch thick steel walls and are designed to protect senior members of the royal family from poison gas, bomb attacks or assassination by terrorists, “The Sunday Times” reported. The newspaper said the rooms were equipped with secure communications, beds and washing facilities, and were stocked with enough food and hot water for the royals to survive for at least a week. The new rooms had been built following a security review after the September 11 terrorist attacks in the USA, it said.
AP |
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Don’t provoke repeat of Suez, Blair warned
London, January 12 Labour MPs told Mr Blair yesterday that going to war with Iraq without firm evidence against Mr Saddam Hussain could provoke a repeat of the Suez, the botched military invasion by Britain and France that ended the career of the then Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden. Mr Blair is likely to make a personal appeal to Labour MPs over Iraq. The Prime Minister is being urged to change his approach when he addresses the parliamentary party on Wednesday. They want him to say that any military action will be aimed at ‘’liberating’’ rather than ‘’invading’’ Iraq. A senior Downing Street official said ‘’We have got a clear strategy through diplomacy and inspections and the issue should be resolved through it.’’ However one Cabinet minister is reported to have said Mr Blair was ‘’more likely than less likely’’ to back Mr Bush even if UN weapons inspectors did not find unequivocal evidence against Mr Saddam. BAGHDAD: Bedouin gunshop owner Yassin al-Jabbouri says Iraqi civilians are arming themselves to challenge the American invader. Iraqi clan groups, a key force in the country, are stocking up on rifles and pistols from the Iraqi Capital’s 45 retail gun outlets, taking heed of government calls for the populace to ready itself for a US invasion, Jabbouri says.
Agencies |
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50 Taliban prisoners freed Kabul, January 12 The men were freed from prison in the northern city of Kunduz yesterday and handed over to Pashtun tribal elders, said Gen Abdul Majid Rozi, contacted by satellite phone at Dostum’s headquarters in the northern city of Mazar-e Sharif.
AP |
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Court summons Clonaid executive Fort Lauderdale (Florida), January 12 The witness subpoena and summons were approved yesterday by a court at the request of attorney Bernard Siegel, who has filed a lawsuit asking the state to appoint a guardian for the child, the attorney said. The papers were delivered to Mr Thomas Kaenzig, a Clonaid Vice-President, before he spoke at the Money World 2003 conference in Fort Lauderdale, Mr Siegel said. If Mr Kaenzig fails to appear at the hearing on January 22, he could be held in contempt of court.
AP |
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