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Saturday,
May 3, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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2 survivors of Bhopal gas tragedy on fast 8 more SARS deaths in Hong Kong
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Bush warns ‘outlaw’ regimes
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India put on Priority Watch List Body of Indian millionaire found Shujaat refuses to head panel
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2 survivors of Bhopal gas tragedy on fast New York, May 2 Rasheeda Bee and Champa Devi, who have been joined in the strike by Satinath Sarangi of the International Campaign for Justice for Bhopal (ICJB), are protesting against Dow Chemicals’s alleged “failure to acknowledge the liabilities” and help victims, organisers said. As many as 8,000 persons were killed and thousands injured when a deadly gas leaked from the Union Carbide plant in Bhopal. Dow Chemicals later took over Union Carbide. But Dow Chemicals rejects the contention that it had inherited Union Carbide’s Bhopal liabilities. The survivors’ organizations have also filed an appeal against New York District Court’s dismissal of their claim for compensation for contamination related damages. “We hunger for justice,” the protestors yesterday chanted during a three-hour demonstration near the Wall Street, financial hub of the USA, and later continued their protest at the Union Square in downtown Manhattan under the shadow of Mahatma Gandhi’s statue. About 30 persons, including 24 students from Massachusetts -based Wheaton College and long-time supporters from India and the USA, fasted to show their solidarity with the victims of the gas tragedy. Rasheeda Bee and Champa Devi, along with Sarangi continued to stage protest at the Union Square till around 8 pm yesterday and then left as they were not granted camping permit for the night. The protest and fast here will continue till May 5 when they plan to move to Midland in Michigan state where the Dow Chemicals has its headquarters. They plan to hold a demonstration in front of the headquarters on May 8 when shareholders are due to meet. They have also sought a meeting with the company’s chairman William Stavropoulos on May 8 but so far they have not received any response. “A hunger strike is our way of emphasising the truth that the tragedy in Bhopal continues, and that Dow as Carbide’s new owner is now responsible for ensuring that justice is done in Bhopal,” said Rasheeda Bee.
PTI |
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8 more SARS deaths in Hong Kong Hong Kong, May 2 The latest figures bring the local death toll from Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome to 170 and the cumulative cases to 1,611, second only to mainland China. Of the local patients, 44 persons were discharged today, bringing the total number of discharged patients to 878. BEIJING: China’s ruling Communist Party has announced
awardees for four top medical workers, including three doctors who died fighting the SARS epidemic. The organisation department of the Communist Party’s central committee has awards the title of “national excellent Communist Party member” to the medical workers who died treating SARS patients, the official Xinhua news agency reported. They are Deng Lianxian and Yexin, doctor and charge nurse, respectively, in south China’s Guangdong province, Liang Shikui, a doctor in north China’s Shanxi province, and Li Xiaohong, a doctor at a people’s armed police hospital in Beijing. Even as the city quarantined over 12,000 persons for SARS, Chinese President Hu Jintao has called for a “people’s war” against the killer epidemic that has claimed over 330 lives nationwide, the state media reported today. Mr Jintao, also the general secretary of the Communist Party, urged the local authorities at all levels to be aware of the importance of the need to control the epidemic, Xinhua reported from the SARS-hit north Chinese city of Tianjin. Yesterday, the WHO declared Tianjin as a SARS-affected city. Meanwhile, more people and worksites in Beijing have been quarantined in an effort to help prevent the spread of SARS. According to the government, one more worksite was quarantined yesterday, bringing to two the number of worksites closed. The number of quarantined persons increased by 1,424 from Wednesday, bringing the total to 12,706. TORONTO: In a setback to Canadian efforts to declare itself free of SARS, Toronto reported two new cases of the disease on Thursday. Dr Donald Low, chief of microbiology at Toronto’s Mount Sinai Hospital, said the two new cases were of nurses who had been treating SARS patients. Toronto, with 23 deaths, is the only city outside Asia where people have died of SARS.
Agencies |
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S. Korea, China discuss SARS, nuclear issue Beijing, May 2 “The two heads of state exchanged views on bilateral relations, China’s campaign against Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and the recent Beijing talks on the nuclear issue of the North Korea,” the official Xinhua news agency reported. Reports from Seoul said, during the
telephone talks, Roh thanked the Chinese leadership for bringing together US and North Korean officials in Beijing last week to discuss Pyongyang’s alleged nuclear weapons programme. “The two leaders agreed to continue to cooperate for a peaceful solution to the North Korean nuclear issue, under the belief that Korean peninsula should be nuclear-free, Roh’s office said in a statement. Chinese premier Wen Jiabao attended the China-ASEAN special summit on SARS yesterday and promised to cooperate with the ASEAN member states in curbing the spread of the highly infectious disease.
PTI |
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Bush warns ‘outlaw’ regimes Washington, May 2 Casting the Iraq war as one phase of the overall fight against terrorism, Mr Bush spoke of victories in Afghanistan but warned that Al-Qaida network “was wounded, not destroyed.” “The scattered cells of the terrorist network still operate in many nations and we know from daily intelligence that they continue to plot against free people,” he said. “From Pakistan to Philippines to the Horn of Africa, we are hunting down Al-Qaida killers,” he told cheering officers and sailors aboard the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln which was returning to its home port on the West Coast after 10 months of service in support of the military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. “We will continue to hunt down the enemy before he can strike,” he said. Mr Bush said “any outlaw regime that has ties to terrorist groups and seeks or possesses weapons of mass destruction, is a grave danger to civilised world, and will be confronted.” “We are committed to freedom in Afghanistan, in Iraq and in a peaceful Palestine. The advance of freedom is the surest strategy to undermine the appeal of terror”, he told some 5,000 sailors on the carrier.
PTI |
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India put on Priority Watch List Washington, May 2 The other countries which are included in the list by US trade representatives are Argentina, the Bahamas, Brazil, Indonesia, Lebanon, the Philippines, Poland, Russia and Taiwan, besides the EU. Pakistan is included among 36 trading partners who are on the Watch List. TAIPEI: Taiwan on Friday regretted being kept on the Priority Watch List for intellectual property violators, but pledged to step up efforts to protect intellectual property rights (IPR). “This is the third year that Taiwan has been kept on the list. We express regret over the US government’s decision,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
PTI, DPA |
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Body of Indian millionaire found London, May 2 The body of Amarjit Chohan, also known as Neil, was found floating close to Bournemouth pier by canoeists on April 22 but the police identified it only last night. It is believed that the body of the Hounslow businessman had been in the sea for several weeks. The 46-year-old businessman, owner of a fruit freight firm, CIBA, with a £ 4 million annual turnover in Southall, went missing with his entire family more than two months ago. Post-mortem examinations have so far been unable to establish the cause of his death but the police thinks he may have been murdered by one of Britain’s top criminal gangs.
PTI |
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Shujaat refuses to head panel Islamabad, May 2 His refusal came late last night, giving a setback to the committee on the Legal Framework Order (LFO), which was set up by Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali on April 29 after three-days’ discussions with agitated opposition members, who for the past six months have not been allowing the National Assembly to function.
UNI |
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12 of family killed in Pakistan Islamabad, May 2 |
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Chinese submarine Beijing, May 2 |
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