No bipartisanship, says White House
WASHINGTON, Jan 29 — The White House lashed out at what it called the “Republican impeachment trial” being conducted in the Senate against President Bill Clinton and complained that the spirit of bipartisanship had evaporated.

NATO warns Serbs, Kosovars

BRUSSELS, Jan 29 (AFP) — NATO has warned both sides in the Kosovo conflict to sit down and talk peace, or else face the consequences with the deployment of ground troops one of the options.

The tough talk from NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana came yesterday on the eve of a six-power contact group meeting in London that is expected to come up with a blueprint for peace in the Balkans’ most dangerous tinderbox.

The French President’s Office issued a statement after talks in London between French President Jacques Chirac and British Prime Minister Tony Blair saying that the two were “ready to envisage’’ sending troops to Kosovo along with their NATO partners.

The forces would “accompany the putting into place of a negotiated accord,’’ the Elysee Palace statement said.

“Our aim is intense negotiations, with international involvement, within days rather than weeks,’’ British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook said earlier.

In a formal statement in Brussels, Mr Solana said the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation had “decided to increase its military preparedness to ensure that the demands of the international community are met.’’

Asked about the possibility of NATO troops being deployed inside Kosovo, Mr Solana replied: “We don’t rule out any option, but I would not like to be more precise at this point.’’

WASHINGTON: The massacre of 45 persons in the Kosovo village of Racak was ordered by senior Serbian officials who organised a cover-up after the killing sparked an international outcry, The Washington Post said on Thursday.

According to telephone intercepts by western governments, Serbian troops were ordered “to go in heavy” on January 15 to find the guerrillas who a week earlier ambushed and killed three Serbian troops near Racak.

“It was a search and destroy mission,” said a source familiar with the calls between military leaders in Kosovo and officials in Belgrade on the massacre day and succeeding days.

The conversations were between Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Nikola Sainovic, in Belgrade, and Interior Ministry General Sreten Lukic, in Kosovo, the daily said.

In one telephone conversation as tank, artillery and machine gun fire around Racak could be heard in the background, western sources said, Mr Sainovic asked Mr Lukic how many people had been killed in the attack, to which the General replied that at the moment the toll stood at 22.

The following days, the sources said, Mr Sainovic and Mr Lukic expressed concern about the international outcry and discussed how to make the killings look like the result of a pitched battle.

UN council to set up panel on Iraq

UNITED NATIONS, Jan 29 (PTI) — Unable to deal effectively with Iraq over disarmament and other related issues, the UN Security Council is to set up a panel to assess the matters, council diplomats have said.

The panel is expected to look into the issues of humanitarian needs, the status of looted Kuwaiti property and the fate of thousands of Kuwaitis said to be missing since the Gulf war, besides Iraq’s disarmament.

There was wide consensus in the 15-member council to set up a panel to study the issues as a first step to resolving the vexed question of resuming oversight in Iraq, they said here.

The proposal was made by Canada in an apparent bid to defuse the rising tension between Russia and the USA and was immediately supported by all.

But others opined that it would merely postpone the hard decisions that the council has to take without resolving any issue.

The panel, they said, just could not help a sharply divided council to move towards any concrete action on Iraq in the wake of Baghdad’s decision not to allow UN weapons inspectors in.

Canada has proposed the panel include 22 commissioners of the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) overseeing elimination of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency and the UN Under Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs.

But Russia, which is demanding disbanding of UNSCOM and resignation of its Chairman Richard Butler, questioned the inclusion of UNSCOM commissioners.

“Any assessment should include evaluation on the ground,” Russia’s Ambassador to the UN, Mr Sergey Lavrov, said.

The UNSCOM inspectors were pulled out shortly before mid- December air strikes by the USA and the UK following Mr Butler’s complaint that Baghdad was not fully cooperating with them. But after the bombings, Baghdad refused to allow inspectors in.

The major question before the council is how to resume the oversight programme to ensure Iraq does not build or acquire weapons of mass destruction.

Russia and France want the sanction imposed in the wake of Baghdad’s attack on Kuwait eight years ago to be lifted and a long- term monitoring system set up. The USA and the UK want inspectors back but have not so far proposed how it can be done.

UNSCOM Chairman Butler himself sent a paper recently to the council emphasising that surprise inspections were needed in Iraq by inspectors understanding how it hides its weapons.

Sharif faced coup in October?

ISLAMABAD, Jan 29 (UNI) — Military Generals had decided to topple Mr Nawaz Sharif’s Government in October last year, but then Army Chief Gen Jahangir Karamat’s refusal to fall in line saved Pakistan from a fourth military take-over in its 51-year-old history.

According to a report in an Urdu daily, these Generals, under the leadership of the then Chief of General staff, Lt. Gen Ali Quli Khan, had been preparing to stage a military coup since March and it was at their behest that General Karamat proposed the establishment of a national security council.

The proposal kicked off a heated debate in the country and mortified the Government, as it was construed to be armed forces’ vote of no-confidence in Mr Sharif’s administration. As the people debated the proposal, Lt-General Khan told General Karamat not to think of resigning his post.

“You give us the signal and then see how we confine Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif to Raiwind,” he told General Karamat, according to the newspaper.

But when Lt-General Quli Khan sensed that General Karamat was bent upon tendering his resignation, he himself established contact with Chief Minister of Punjab Shahbaz Sharif to leak to him the Army chief’s intention to resign and to express his opposition to the proposed national security council.

By trying to win the confidence of Mr Shahbaz Sharif, Lt-General Khan wanted to be promoted as the Army chief. But when he was superseded by Lt-General Parvez Musharraf, he held back his resignation in the hope of becoming Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee. But by then the Government had known the whole story behind the proposal for a national security council, the report stated.

Angola — yet another UN deadlock
by Mohan Bhatt

With the collapse of the peace process in Angola, the UN has failed to become an effective agent to bring about peace in yet another country. Last month it was in Iraq when the joint US-UK air strikes shattered the uneasy calm in that West Asian country.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has proposed winding up the UN Observer Mission in Angola (MONUA) after two of its planes were downed over the past month. The escalation in the fighting between the MPLA (Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola) forces of President Jose Eduardo dos Santos and the rebels of UNITA (National Union for Total Independence of Angola) has made it difficult for the world body to operate from there. The planes were downed near Huambo, a town under UNITA’s control, hence that force has been blamed for the downing.

Now the UN Secretary-General faces a dilemma as his proposal for winding up the UN mission has been stoutly opposed by key UN Security Council members and by the “troika” overseeing the Angola peace process — the USA, Russia and Portugal — while some African nations are concerned over the UN pullout plan.

The UN Council members in a draft statement proposed a limited UN presence in its capital, Luanda, with a special UN representative (not in New York as Annan has proposed) and a staff of up to 100 members, excluding the humanitarian relief workers. With the mandate of MONUA expiring on February 26, a fresh lease of life to the mission is needed. It appears the UN chief has not been able to carry with him members of his own body on his move to wind up the mission.

Never has the UN chief been reduced to such a pusillanimous figure and the UN council so torn by the vetoes of the Big Five!

The performance of the UN Security Council has been dismal on Iraq, where it has become a mute spectator to air strikes by the USA and the UK, and has been unable to control clashes in the “no-fly zones” imposed by the Western powers in the aftermath of the Gulf war. Taking advantage of the deadlock in the UN council, the USA and the UK carried out the air strikes without its authorisation to come nearer its goal of weakening Iraq’s military might and creating unrest, so as to bring about the downfall of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. The UN has been powerless in such a situation when a super power in a fit of bravado arrogates to itself the role of the police and punishes those who, it feels, are going against its national interests. A 1991 Security Council resolution was used by the two Western powers to justify the air strikes even though the ground situation has changed since then.

The latest conflagration has been in the West African country of Sierra Leone, where troops of the elected President, Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, are pitted against the forces of the Revolutionary United Front, keen to oust him. Kabbah’s men are backed by the ECOMOG forces led and maintained by Nigeria. The rebels, though no match to the disciplined ECOMOG, are said to get arms and supplies from neighbouring Liberia. The ragtag RUF forces, seeing their fortunes turn, looted and burnt parts of the capital, Freetown, before they were forced to fall back. Here also the UN faces a dilemma and the fighting may force a pullout of its humanitarian staff.

The Leftist Government forces control the Angolan coast and get the money to buy sophisticated arms from the rich oilfields off the coast. The UNITA rebels, led by veteran Jonas Savimbi and backed by the USA and the West, control the interior, particularly Andulo and Bailundo. This is where most of the diamond mines are located.

This former Portuguese colony, which became free in 1975, has been torn by war for over 30 years. Neither the Lisbon peace accord (1991) nor the Lusaka Protocol (Nov 1994) have brought peace any nearer. UNITA has so far not met its obligations, nor has it disarmed its fighters as agreed upon at Lusaka.

The no-holds-barred clashes between MPLA and UNITA has resulted in an exodus of refugees pouring into the cities, particularly its capital, Luanda, of whose 10 million population 50 per cent are refugees.

The UN has failed to control conflicts where the interests of the only super power are involved. How long can the world body tolerate the shenanigans of the West led by “Uncle Sam” and “John Bull”?

No bipartisanship, says White House

WASHINGTON, Jan 29 (Reuters) — The White House lashed out at what it called the “Republican impeachment trial” being conducted in the Senate against President Bill Clinton and complained that the spirit of bipartisanship had evaporated.

In party-line votes, the Senate last night rejected Democratic attempts to set a time limit on the trial and instead endorsed a Republican plan setting procedures that leave the length of the proceeding open-ended.

“The spirit of bipartisanship evaporated today, leaving us with a Republican impeachment trial,” said White House spokesman James Kennedy, noting that the Senate votes fell far short of the two-thirds majority needed to remove Mr Clinton from office.

Abandoning the normally measured comments he has made about the proceedings, Mr Kennedy complained that “Republicans missed an opportunity to bring bipartisan closure to all of this.”

“It seems clear that while the Republicans do not have the votes to end this Presidency, they do have votes to extend this trial and they are using this power to their advantage,” he said.

“As long as they exercise the power they have to keep it going, there is literally nothing that can be done to stop it, he said. “They will have to make a judgement at some point that this should end. They haven’t done that.”

Charles, Camilla go public

LONDON, Jan 29 (AP) — Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles made their first public appearance together last night in a blitz of photo- flashes and clicking cameras, at last giving Britain’s photographers the picture they’ve been seeking for years. The two had arrived separately at the Ritz Hotel in central London, for the 50th birthday party of Mrs Parker Bowles’ sister Annabel Elliott, after days of speculation that this would be the night they went public as a couple.

Two minutes before midnight, the Prince and Mrs Parker Bowles walked down the stairs together, and hesitated briefly at the curb as their car pulled up. She climbed into the back seat on the left side, he went around to the right and climbed in beside her, and the car drove them away. There was no posing for the cameras, and no comment.

The romance, once the worst-kept secret in Britain, is out in the open. The pair visit each other’s homes, have met each other’s children, and have even issued a press release together. But they had eluded the cameras, arriving and departing separately at social events, and photographers were determined to get a picture of them as a couple.

“I cannot recall being so excited and nervous about taking a picture for long, long while,’’ said Arthur Edwards, veteran royal photographer for The Sun tabloid, as he awaited the big picture. I cannot remember the last time I felt this keyed-up.“It’s an archival shot that’s going to be shown in magazines and newspapers around the world,’’ he said.

Passers-by were surprised at the gathering of photographers.

It just shows that our appetite for this stuff is undimmed,’’ said computer consultant Mike Smith, 38. Personally speaking, I could not care much who Charles is seen with perhaps he should be left to get on with his life.’’

Secretary Julia Tarvey, 23, said, I think it’s a good thing, though, if Charles is allowed to show the world what he feels he’s a human being after all.’’

In the year following Charles’ 1996 divorce from Princess Diana, he and Mrs Parker Bowles seemed to making efforts to improve her public image. But Diana’s death in August 1997, halted that. In the past year, there have been signs of growing acceptance that Prince and Mrs Parker Bowles were a couple.

UN missions’ mandate extended

UNITED NATIONS, Jan 29 (PTI) — The Security Council has extended the mandates of its peacekeeping missions in Lebanon and Georgia until July 31.

The mission in Georgia was established in 1993 to monitor ceasefire between government and Abkhaz forces when Abkhazia attempted to separate from the country.

Expressing concern over failure of parties to conclude agreements on security and non-use of force, the return of refugees and displaced persons and economic reconstruction, the council urged parties to resume bilateral negotiations to resolve the issues and achieve a comprehensive political solution.

It condemned the activities by armed groups, including the continued laying of mines which, it said, endangered the civilian population, impeded the work of the humanitarian organisations and seriously delayed normalisation.

Dustin Hoffman
LOS ANGELES: A judge has ordered a Los Angeles magazine to pay actor Dustin Hoffman a further $ 1.5 million for running computer-generated photos of the actor in a dress and high heels. The decision brings the total damages bill over the incident to $ 3 million. Hoffman, 61, sued the magazine for using his name and image without permission. The magazine did a computer composite without Hoffman’s permission, using a still photo of him from his 1982 role of “Tootsie”, in which he played an out-of-work actor who gets a job disguised as a woman. — AFP

Couple kidnapped
KARACHI: Gunmen kidnapped a young couple from the Karachi airport on Thursday for marrying against the wishes of the woman’s father, a powerful lawmaker in Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s ruling Pakistan Muslim League, officials said. Humera, 28, and her husband, USA-based Pakistani businessman Mahmood Butt, were to leave for the USA when they were whisked away at gunpoint from Karachi airport by six armed men, witnesses said. Officials said they suspected the kidnappers were sent by Abbas Khokar, a member of the Punjab state legislature. — AP

9 die in blast
BEIJING: A nail bomb explosion in central Hunan province killed nine and left 65 injured when it was detonated in a busy market square, officials said on Friday. “This was definitely a man-made explosion because there were nails inside the explosives”, a spokesman for Vizhang county government told AFP. “The case is under a secret investigation and no more details are available now”, she added. The January 25 blast occurred in the late morning during a busy market in Yizhang. — AFP

Call for DDT ban
NAIROBI: The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) called at an international environment forum here has called for a total ban on the use of the highly toxic pesticide DDT by 2007. The WWF appealed to draw up a treaty to ban the “dirty dozen” — 12 highly toxic and resistant chemical products used throughout the world, including DDT. The WWF said in a communiqué that DDT, whose use against malarial mosquitoes is permitted by the UN World Health Organisation, should be used only as a last resort. — AFP

Death sentence
BEIJING: A Muslim separatist has been sentenced to death and another given a suspended death penalty in China’s troubled far north region of Xinjiang, Amnesty International has said. The two men were among 12 Uighurs tried at Korgas court, a small town on the border with Kazakhstan, for manufacturing explosives, the London-based rights groups said. The court sentenced Abdushukur Nurallah, 33, to death and handed down a death sentence suspended for one year on Perhat Mollahun, 35, after an “unfair secret trial”, Amnesty said. — AFP