Last district of Bamiyan falls to Taliban
ISLAMABAD, Sept 29 — Afghanistan’s Taliban militia captured the last district of central Bamiyan province today and its jets bombed enemy positions to the north of Kabul, a Pakistan-based Afghan news agency said.

3 ex-ministers held for coup killings
DHAKA, Sept 29 — In a pre-dawn swoop today, the Bangladesh police today arrested three former ministers in connection with the killing of four imprisoned aides of Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, founding father of the nation, in a 1975 coup, in which he was also assassinated.

Germany set to change laws on immigration
BONN, Sept 29 — German Chancellor-Designate Gerhard Schroeder said his government would try to change the country’s immigration laws to allow dual citizenship and grant German nationality to children born to foreigner parents in Germany.

Iran’s terms for talks with USA
NEW YORK, Sept 29 — Iran has rejected a US “road map” for re-establishing diplomatic ties and demanded Washington change its policies towards Teheran before relations can improve.

Ousted Dy PM denied bail
Claims torture in jail

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 29 (PTI) — Sacked Malaysian Deputy Premier Anwar Ibrahim was today produced, bruised and battered after nine days in custody, in a court, which denied him bail despite his protestations of innocence.

The court, indicted Anwar on five counts of corruption and four of sodomy, while denying him bail even as he pleaded not guilty to the allegations levelled against him by authorities in a sessions court.

In response to each charge, Anwar replied “Not guilty. I claim trial”, the national Bernama news agency reported.

Anwar, detained on September 20 under the Internal Security Act providing for detention without trial, complained to court that he had been beaten till he fainted on his first night in custody.

The former Deputy Prime Minister, who appeared in court for the first time with a swollen eye and bruises, told the judge: “I appeal to you to protect me as even in police lock-up, I can be beaten up.”

“You can see it for yourself. After 10 days it is still like this,” he said drawing the court’s attention to his injuries. The former protege of Prime Minister Mohathir Mohammad was sacked on September 2 for demanding the latter’s resignation.

Anwar said the police beat him severely, “causing serious injuries until I virtually passed out until the next morning.”

“I was blindfolded and handcuffed, I was boxed very hard on my lower jaw and the left eye. I was also boxed on the right of my head and they hit me on the left side of my neck very hard,” Mr Anwar Saif said.

“I was then slapped very hard left and right until blood came out of my nose and my lips cracked. Because of this I could not use or walk properly.”

Judge Hasna Datuk Mohammad Hashim said “she cannot do anything’’ as the case had been transferred to the high court but permitted an eye doctor and a physician to examine him.

If convicted on charges of corruption, Mr Anwar faces a maximum of 20 years in prison and a fine $ 3,263 while sodomy charges could attract jail for 20 years or caning under the penal code officials said.

Mr Anwar, who appeared to have lost weight, sat on a bench flanked by police officials. He was allowed to talk to his wife and children before being led away.

Earlier, the Attorney-General’s office said there was prima facie evidence to charge Mr Anwar for the offences. The sacked minister would face a fifth charge of sodomy tomorrow.

AP adds: Mr Anwar, arrested on September 20, was charged by the police on nine counts of corruption and unnatural sex acts. The punishment for each count could be several years imprisonment.

Embassy blasts suspects indicted

NEW YORK, Sept 29 (AFP) — Two men, suspected of planning and executing bombings of the US Embassies in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam last month, have been indicted here on murder and conspiracy charges.

The two, identified as Mohammed Sadiq Odeh and Mohammed Rashed Daoud al’Owhali, were named yesterday in a four-count indictment in the August 7 bombings in which 258 persons were killed.

The indictment accuses the two men of belonging to Al Quada, the fundamentalist terrorist group linked to Saudi millionaire Osama Bin Laden. They are accused of conspiring to commit acts of international terrorism from 1994 to 1998.

They were arrested late last month in Nairobi by the Kenyan police, and brought to the USA. They were not present in court yesterday.

The indictment says Al’Owhali, a Yemeni national, travelled in late July from Lahore, Pakistan, to Nairobi and reconnoitred the US Embassy there on August 4, the police said.

Some 247 persons, including 12 Americans, died in the Nairobi bombing and 11 persons died in the bombing of the US Embassy in Tanzania.

LONDON (DPA): The British police has detained a 37-year-old Islamist as part of the worldwide hunt for the group that blew up the US Embassies in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam last month.

Officials said Khalid al-Fawwaz was suspected of terrorist links and was detained on Monday following an extradition request from the USA. Media reports said he was a leader of an Islamic fundamentalist group called Al-Qade that was active in Britain.

Al-Fawwaz is set to appear in court on October 5 for a remand hearing.

Arafat’s appeal for statehood

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 29 (AP) — In a historic speech to the General Assembly, Mr Yasser Arafat, asked world leaders yesterday to support Palestinian statehood in May next, saying this was the will of the Palestinian people.

“I would like to call upon all of you ... to stand by our people,” Mr Arafat told the leaders gathered at the assembly’s annual debate. “This independent Palestinian state must be established as an embodiment of the right of our people to self-determination.”

“The Oslo peace accords expire on May 4 (1999), and our people demand of us to shoulder our responsibilities and they await the establishment of their independent state.”

The Palestinian leader delivered the speech after returning from Washington, where he held a last-minute summit with the US President, Mr Bill Clinton, and the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, on an Israeli troop pullback from the West Bank.

Palestinian aides had said Mr Arafat wanted to seek support of United Nations member states, many of whom traditionally back the Palestinian cause over Israeli interests.

“Help us to achieve the national goal of our people in the establishment of the state,” he said.

Mr Arafat’s speech before the General Assembly had particular significance: Never before had Mr Arafat or any other Palestinian addressed the audience from the podium during the regular debate. The Palestinian observer mission was granted that right earlier this summer.

Mr Arafat noted the occasion in his opening statement, thanking the assembly for giving the Palestinians the enhanced status, “which we consider to be an essential step towards full membership.”

He closed his speech by saying, “I look forward to speaking with you once more when Palestine has taken its natural place in the community of nations as an independent state ...”

Mr Netanyahu said Mr Arafat and he had achieved a breakthrough on a long-elusive deal over West Bank territory. Mr Clinton set up a compressed schedule for concluding the accord.

‘Enough proof’ for impeachment probe

WASHINGTON, Sept 29 (AFP) — The Republican chairman of the US House Judiciary Committee, Mr Henry Hyde, has said he believed a preliminary impeachment inquiry against President Bill Clinton will be needed.

“I should think there is enough to warrant an inquiry,” Hyde said yesterday. The judiciary committee will decide whether to recommend to the full US House of Representatives such a preliminary inquiry during a meeting scheduled for next Monday.

Committee members are also expected to begin hearings soon to debate what constitutes “high crimes and misdemeanours” that could justify impeaching a President, Hyde said.

No President has ever been removed from office by Congress. In 1974, Richard Nixon resigned to escape this fate after being involved in the Watergate scandal.

Law professors and other experts would provide their views on the issue during the hearings which were to be organised by the subcommittee responsible for constitutional affairs, the Senator said.

He also announced that both Democratic and Republican members of the judiciary committee would visit independent counsel Kenneth Starr’s office this week to examine the remaining files concerning the Lewinsky matter.

Russia admits to being pressurised by USA

MOSCOW, Sept 29 (UNI) — Indo-Russian talks on strengthening defence cooperation will be held in Moscow on October 8 and 9, according to the Voice of Russia which reports Kremlin sources admitting for the first time that the US pressurised Russia to reduce the level of its defence cooperation with India.

An Indian delegation, led by Defence Secretary Ajit Kumar and including senior officers from all three wings of the Indian armed forces, arrives here next week for the talks, the radio announced.The radio said the drafts of an agreement regarding defence supplies to India, which were prepared during another Indian defence delegation’s visit to Moscow in summer this year, will be given final touches during the Indo-Russian talks .

The final draft of the agreement for Indo-Russian defence collaboration is expected to be signed by Russian President Boris Yeltsin during his visit to New Delhi in the first week of December, the radio said . The agreement will cover the period till 2010.The radio said Russia had reaffirmed its commitment to maintain defence supplies to India despite pressure from the USA to scale down the level of Indo-Russian defence collaboration .

The radio said Kremlin would ahead with an agreement regarding the supply of 10 new SU-10 fighter planes, new generation submarines and high-tech missiles to India, US pressure notwithstanding.

The radio disclosed Russia’s willingness to assist India in the production of anti-missile weaponry.Referring to the various anti-India measures adopted by the USA in the post-Pokhran era, such as suspension of credits and the refusal to provide high technology to India, the radio said the US pressure on Russia to scale down its defence cooperation with India was actually aimed at pushing out Russia from the Asian arms markets so that the American weapon manufacturers could fill the vacuum .

“All US attempts in this regard are futile and Moscow will continue vigorously to cooperate with India in the defence field as in the other fields for the mutual benefit of both countries”, the radio quoted Kremlin sources as saying .This is the first time that Russia has confessed to being pressurised by the USA to reduce the level of its defence cooperation with India.

Last district of Bamiyan falls to Taliban

ISLAMABAD, Sept 29 (Reuters) — Afghanistan’s Taliban militia captured the last district of central Bamiyan province today and its jets bombed enemy positions to the north of Kabul, a Pakistan-based Afghan news agency said.

Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) said the Taliban captured the last remaining district of Iran-backed Shi’ite Muslim Hezb-i-Wahdat faction’s Bamiyan province after residents hoisted white flags.

This brings the entire province under the Taliban control, although the presence of Hezb-i-Wahdat supporters in some villages could not be ruled out, the AIP said.

It quoted a Taliban spokesman saying the militia jets also bombed positions of Ahmed Shah Masood, military chief of the ousted Afghan Government, north of Kabul and his headquarters in the neighbouring Panj Sher valley.

The Taliban also reported exchange of artillery fire between militia fighters and Masood’s forces on the frontline near the Capital today, a day after Masood and his commanders met in Jabal-us-Siraj to discuss an attack on Kabul.

3 ex-ministers held for coup killings

DHAKA, Sept 29 (PTI) — In a pre-dawn swoop today, the Bangladesh police today arrested three former ministers in connection with the killing of four imprisoned aides of Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, founding father of the nation, in a 1975 coup, in which he was also assassinated.

The three politicians — Shah Moazzem Hossain (former Prime Minister), K.M. Obaidur Rahman (now a prominent parliamentarian of main opposition BNP) and Nurul Islam Manju (a former Awami League leader) — were arrested from their respective residences this morning, Additional Inspector-General of Police (Special Branch) Rahim Khan said.

All three were ministers in the Khondakar Mustaque government, which was formed after the assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rehman and many members of his family on August 15, 1975.

“They were arrested from their residences by the intelligence sleuths in connection with the killing of four leaders in Dhaka Central Jail,” he said.

The three were in police custody and were being interrogated.

The four aides of Mujibur Rehman — Syed Nazarul Islam, Tazuddin Ahmed, M. Mansur Ali and K.A. Kamruzzaman — were shot dead in the Dhaka Central Jail on the night of November 3, 1975.

Germany set to change laws on immigration

BONN, Sept 29 (PTI) — German Chancellor-Designate Gerhard Schroeder said his government would try to change the country’s immigration laws to allow dual citizenship and grant German nationality to children born to foreigner parents in Germany.

“We will make it possible to have dual citizenship,’’ he said. “We will find a solution to this.”

Schroeder’s comments at a news conference came amid reports that his Social Democratic Party and the Greens were hammering out a strategy on immigration laws to make a coalition government.

At present, Germany is the only major Western nation where nationality is believed to be passed through bloodline.

Mr Schroeder’s comments reveal that Germans now concede that nationality may also be acquired by being born in Germany.

Stating that modernising nationality laws was necessary, the Social Democrats had declared in their poll manifesto that children born in Germany to foreign parents should automatically receive German nationality.

“Germany is an outward looking country. We wish to integrate those foreigners living in our country who identify themselves with the basic values enshrined in our constitution,” the manifesto had said.

The ousted Christian Democrats of Mr Helmut Kohl had debated a proposal last year which sought to give dual nationality to immigrant children born in Germany.

The proposal had also envisaged that on maturity, these children would have to choose between German citizenship and that of their parents’ country.

Iran’s terms for talks with USA

NEW YORK, Sept 29 (AFP) — Iran has rejected a US “road map” for re-establishing diplomatic ties and demanded Washington change its policies towards Teheran before relations can improve.

Three months after US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright set down Washington’s conditions for renewed ties, Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi countered with his own country’s demands.

“The approach of the Islamic republic of Iran towards the USA will be commensurate with changes in US behaviour towards Iran,” Kharazi said in a speech at New York’s Asia Society yesterday.

Kharazi complained about US economic sanctions against his country, US opposition to oil and gas pipelines through Iran, and the freezing of Iranian assets.

He also listed the creation of radio-free Iran, and US support for “Iranian terrorists” working against Teheran.“There’s no ground for a political negotiation while these policies continue,” Kharazi said.

The speech was a direct response to an address by Albright at the same venue on June 17 in which she proposed a “road map” for future relations between Washington and Teheran.

In that speech, she set three demands for a thaw in US-Iran relations, saying Iran must stop pursuing weapons of mass destruction, support of terrorism, and attempts to undermine the Israeli-Arab peace process.

Coup bid denied
ISLAMABAD: The head of Pakistan’s armed forces has denied a London newspaper report that the Army planned a coup because of alleged corruption by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Gen Jehangir Karamat said in a statement on Monday that a report in The Sunday Observer that he was “on the brink of declaring martial law” was totally untrue. — Reuters

PM hurt in crash
LISBON: The Prime Minister of Cape Verde, Mr Carlos Veiga, was injured on Monday in a plane accident, the Portuguese news agency Lusa reported. Mr Veiga was taken to hospital in the Cape Verde capital, Praia, but his life is not in danger, Lusa said, citing a hospital source. The Minister of Justice and Territorial Administration, Mr Simao Monteiro, said that a bodyguard of Mr Veiga was killed and others were also hurt in the accident. — AFP

Hurricane death toll
MIAMI: The death toll in the wake of hurricane rose to at least 381 on Monday after officials in Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Cuba gave updated figures on the devastation caused by the storm’s passage through the Caribbean last week. Haitian officials said 147 persons were known to have died, and 40 were still missing. They said 167,332 persons had been rendered homeless by the hurricane. — Reuters

8 executed
BEIJING: Courts in two Chinese cities have executed eight persons, one of them a 19-year-old who stole 60 yuan ($7), a human rights group reported on Tuesday. After a mass sentencing rally on Monday, the Nine Dragon Hill district court in southwestern Chongqing city ordered seven persons immediately taken out and shot, the Hong Kong-based information centre of the Human Rights and Democratic Movement reported — AP

4 killed in clash
DHAKA: At least four persons were killed and 30 wounded in a fierce gunbattle between two rival, outlawed extremist groups in western Bangladesh, newspapers reported on Tuesday. — AFP