Neutron bomb: a warning to Taiwan backers
BY announcing its capability to make a neutron bomb, China has sent a message via the most powerful medium on earth — the atom — that Taiwan better not harbour ambitions of a “two China” existence nor should anybody encourage it to do so.

China bans sects for ‘inciting’ instability
BEIJING, July 22 — China today banned Falun Dafa and Falun Gong sects for “inciting” social and political instability in the country.

JFK Jr.'s ashes scattered at sea
FALMOUTH (MASSACHUSETTS), July 22 — A solemn ceremony was held at sea today as the ashes of John F. Kennedy Jr, his wife Carolyn and her sister Lauren Bessette were dropped into the ocean from a US Navy vessel near the island of Martha’s Vineyard.

US House votes out anti-India Bill

WASHINGTON, July 22 (PTI) — US House of Representatives has defeated a disguised anti-Indian amendment moved by Republican Congressman William P. Goodling seeking to bar US military aid to any country that does not vote with Washington for at least 25 per cent of the time at the United Nations.

Though the amendment, which was defeated by 256-169 votes, was couched in general terms, the 116-member India caucus cochaired by Gary Ackerman and Indian Americans flooded every Congressman and state delegation to vote against it because they saw in it symbolism which was important.

“In practical terms, this amendment (if passed) would serve as a symbolic slap at India,” Congressman Frank Pallone said opposing the move yesterday.

“At a time when Congress is working on a bipartisan basis to lift the unilateral sanctions imposed on India last year — as evidenced by the manager’s (Chairman of the International Relations Committee Benjamin Gilman, the floor manager for the Bill) amendment (extending the sanctions waiver authority for the President by a year) which we adopted earlier this week, enactment of the Goodling amendment would be set back much of the progress we are trying to make,” he said.

“Under the Goodling Amendment, all diplomatic, political, strategic or economic interests would be sacrificed to the mostly symbolic indicator of General Assembly Votes — often on issues of peripheral importance.”

India bashers had rallied behind the amendment but heavy lobbying by the India caucus and Indian Americans turned the tide.

UNI: Democratic Congressman Gary L. Ackerman, who led the fight to defeat the anti-India Goodling amendment in the US House of Representatives, said last night that the measure sought to penalise India, by denying American military assistance, without affecting such help to Pakistan.

Mr Ackerman, who is co-chairman of the congressional caucus on India and Indian-Americans, in a statement, said that “when the vote on the tally board indicated that the measure was surging ahead, we sprung into action to rally the pro-India forces (in the House) to stop the momentum. And, we strongly turned the vote around.”

The amendment if passed, would have withheld US assistance from countries that vote with the US less than 25 per cent of the time at the United Nations. India figures in that list.

The House rejected the measure. It was taken up during the debate on the state Department’s Authorisation Bill.

Window on Pakistan
Nawaz Sharif in the dock

Pakistan’s print media, particularly the Urdu press has its own typical style of giving sharp and shrieking headlines. While this gives its own kind of flavour and colour, it strikes deeply at sobriety and seriousness.

Take Pakistan’s armed intrusion into the Kargil sector of Jammu and Kashmir, the befitting reply from the Indian armed forces, the consequent pressure from the world community, the Washington meeting of Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and U.S. President Bill Clinton and the final withdrawal of the Islamabad-backed intruders and Pakistani armed forces. Most newspapers had one way to look at that. Nawa-i-Waqt, a mass circulated daily, takes the hardline to teach India a lesson and rejects the Washington agreement. “India has decided to go to the United Nation’s Security Council in September, says the Nawa-i-Waqt, quoting Information and Broadcasting Minister, Pramod Mahajan, in its July 16 issue.

Nawa-i-Waqt is very critical of the handling of the Kargil issue. One news story from Lahore said, “Mothers of martyrs of Kargil are seeking an account from the government, a nation of lions is led by Jackals (cowards)”.

A day earlier, the same paper said, “The Mujahideen have unmasked the Indian government’s double facedness and shown it to the world and Sharif is responsible for Pakistan’s sullied face outside the country”. But to add some balance, there is a story. “We want Kashmir and we cannot lose Pakistan for the sake of Kargil”, says Ali Bakhsh Sumro, the Pakistan National Assembly Speaker. This story goes on to tell about the official line.

But Nawa-i-Waqt’s inside articles are at times more sober and take a hard look at reality. Strangely, the feeble economy of Pakistan and the bad unemployment situation does not get the treatment these issues deserve.

On the other hand, English newspapers like the Pakistan Times present a contrast. Take the July 16 issue. While some stories do have the slant typical to many newspapers here too, the approach is sober. An inside picture on the Kargil jehad rally in Lahore tells its own tale.

The main editorial, “Who will tame the police force,” takes care of the rampant corruption, inefficiency and the pre-independence mould to which Pakistan is still geared. It says, “The colonial officers were replaced by the politicians who were mostly feudal — and those who had developed a feudal mentality and a tradition of collaborating with the administration. Although the feudals had been created and pampered after the 1857 uprising, yet there existed an effective check in the shape of the British civil servants. Further restraints were woven into society by way of liberal thoughts generated during the 17th and 18th century in Europe. The newly freed countries had the civil servants trained by the British but they fell victims to attrition, or became a part of the oppressive society.

Police service was transformed the most. They fell a victim to the tussle for power, customary feudal intrigues, and a new generation of politicians who were unfamiliar with the real democracy needed by the new nation.”

Something which can be said about our own cops indeed.

Another leader criticising the BBC (The Pakistan Times, July 18) admitted. “That occupying any sovereign country’s territory is nowadays next to impossible for countries of the contemporary world because of various factors, the number one being that occupation is no more a manageable affair in economic and defence perspectives. Not even a country enjoying the status of a super power can afford to go for such an option despite the fact that history has witnessed military action by the superpowers, lately by the solo super power, the USA, on various occasions on one pretext or the other.

“Even then there had been no occupations in the recent past. Actually, occupations of the past days have been replaced by newer strategies. Inroads and incursions are these days made through economic levers, with the US-dominated IMF and World Bank performing the leading role in this connection. Pakistan is unfortunately one of the top-most victims of these strategies and none of its leaders and governments have ever been able to extricate it from the economic misfortunes that have multiplied in the wake of international conspiracies.”

— Gobind Thukral

Beijing for ‘quasi-military’ action

BEIJING, July 22 (PTI) — China is planning “quasi-military” action against Taiwan to “punish splittist” Taiwanese President Lee Teng-Hui, media and diplomatic sources today said.

The issue would dominate the upcoming annual Chinese leadership conclave, they said.

Until the Taiwan crisis erupted over Lee’s new definition of cross-strait relations as those between two sovereign states, the conclave at the northern seaside resort of Beidaihe, scheduled for early next month, was expected to draw up China’s economic reform plans, diplomatic sources said.

Lee’s repeated remarks had changed the entire agenda of the Beidaihe conclave, one source commented, who also referred to the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s statement that the Taiwanese leader had embarked on a dangerous path and “gone too far” on the road to “split” China.

The sources said the Chinese leadership under President and Communist Party general secretary Jiang Zemin was leaning towards quasi-military action “comparable to, if not more severe than” the war drills staged close to Taipei in 1995 and 1996.

“Jiang has convened an enlarged meeting of the Central Military Commission (China’s top military organ) as well as the party Central Committee’s leading group on Taiwan affairs,” a leading Hong Kong newspaper said.

A People’s Liberation Army (PLA) source said some elite troop units from the seven military regions had already been transferred to the “frontline” province of Fujian.

The source quoted a senior general as saying at the Central Military Commission meeting: “If military means have to be taken, we should do it sooner rather than later.”

Diplomatic sources in Beijing said a final decision on any action would be made at Beidaihe after assessing possible reactions from the USA and other countries.

WASHINGTON (Reuters): US President Bill Clinton has appealed to China and Taiwan to show restraint in their current standoff, saying a military solution was “unthinkable”.

The Pentagon cancelled a visit to Taiwan by a low-level working group, while senior US diplomats go to Beijing and Taipei trying to calm tensions in the face of China’s threat to invade the island if it tries to declare independence.

Mr Clinton said the Pentagon trip was cancelled because “I didn’t think this was the best time to do something which might excite either one side or the other and imply that a military solution is an acceptable alternative.”

The Washington Times reported the trip was delayed to show US displeasure with Taiwan’s change in position and said the Clinton administration was considering a cut-off or a slowdown in military sales to Taiwan.

Neutron bomb: a warning to Taiwan backers

BY announcing its capability to make a neutron bomb, China has sent a message via the most powerful medium on earth — the atom — that Taiwan better not harbour ambitions of a “two China” existence nor should anybody encourage it to do so, says a commentator on security issues, Cecil Victor.

It is a typical Chinese riposte to the message delivered so crudely by the USA through the roof of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. The message was : “You are no big Sheikh in global politics so stay clear of Taiwan.” It was accompanied by an announced intention of setting in place, just off the Chinese coast, a “nuclear umbrella” over Taiwan.

Components of the proposed “umbrella” were discussed extensively in the media. It would include an Aegis-type cruiser, stationed off the Chinese coast, with advanced phased-array radars which would be able to detect, at the very moment of launch, any Chinese nuclear-tipped missile and trigger counter-measures that would destroy the missile and its warhead over China itself thereby causing extensive damage. It is called the “destroy on launch” doctrine.

When making public its neutron warhead capability China insisted that it was a totally homegrown project. Be that as it may, the important thing is that Beijing followed up his announcement with a very strident warning that any attempt by Taiwan or anyone else to perpetuated a “two China” situation would run counter to its efforts at reunification of the island, where the Kuomintang (KMT) under Gen Chiang Kai Shek sought refuge after the debacle on the mainland. Beijing made it plain that if peaceful efforts at reunification were rebuffed there would be no hesitation in the use of arms to achieve it.

What China is telling the world, more particularly those who are protagonists of the “two China” concept, that it can take care of the Kuomintang elements without damaging the infrastructure on which they lay claims to a separate nationhood a la Bosnia, Kosovo, etc.

The underlying message also is that China need not accept a Hong Kong style arrangement by which a population inured to a colonialist scheme of things should be allowed to enjoy the fruits of that system within a “one nation, two systems” culture.

Having rid itself of the progeny of the Kuomintang with its neutron bomb China would then be able to reduce the pressures on the population centres on the mainland by transferring them to Taiwan.

It is to this blunt, and somewhat macabre message, that the US administration was quick to respond by denying that it was seeking to impose a “two China” regime in the Pacific. But it did express the hope that the “status quo” is not disturbed.

— Asia Defence News International

Columbia launch again put off

CAPE CANAVERAL (Fla.), July 22 (Reuters) — The space shuttle Columbia’s historic mission with the first woman commander at the helm was called off today because of bad weather, the second postponement in 48 hours.

After aborting the first scheduled launch with six seconds remaining just after midnight on Tuesday because of a faulty sensor, launch controllers were forced to scrub it again early today when a lightning storm moved into the area.

Columbia had been due to blast off from the Kennedy Space Centre 12:28 a.m. but with five minutes of the countdown remaining NASA controllers delayed the launch to allow the storm system to pass.

NASA had been hopeful the lift-off would still go ahead, but the 52-minute window available for the launch to put the Chandra x-ray observatory into earth orbit ran out.

NASA officials will discuss options for rescheduling the launch which was to have been witnessed by First Lady Hillary Clinton, daughter Chelsea Clinton and members of the U.S. women’s world champion soccer team.

JFK Jr.'s ashes scattered at sea

FALMOUTH (MASSACHUSETTS), July 22 (DPA) — A solemn ceremony was held at sea today as the ashes of John F. Kennedy Jr, his wife Carolyn and her sister Lauren Bessette were dropped into the ocean from a US Navy vessel near the island of Martha’s Vineyard.

More than a dozen family members were aboard the navy cutter USS Briscoe as a Catholic priest spoke over the remains of the three victims. The mourners included John Kennedy’s sister Caroline Kennedy, his uncle, Senator Edward Kennedy, and cousins Maria Shriver and William Kennedy Smith.

The ceremony took place about 5 km from where Kennedy’s private plane crashed last Friday.

Tomorrow, at 11 a.m. (local time) a memorial mass will be held for John Kennedy and his wife at St. Thomas More Catholic Church in New York. US President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton are expected to attend.

China bans sects for ‘inciting’ instability

BEIJING, July 22 (PTI) — China today banned Falun Dafa and Falun Gong sects for “inciting” social and political instability in the country.

The decision announced by the Ministry of Civil Affairs through the official Chinese National Television network and the Xinhua news agency dubbed the group as “illegal”.

“According to investigations, the research society of the Falun Dafa had not been registered under the law and had allegedly been engaged in illegal activities, advocating superstition and spreading fallacies among people.

The central committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) also issued a circular, forbidding members from practising the Falun Gong, a mixture of meditation and Buddhist and Taoist philosophies. Members of the Falun Gong say they are not an organised religion. The founder of the group, Li Hongzhi, is based in New York. It claims to have a following of some 100 million people.

Priam’s treasure
MOSCOW: A leading Russian museum will ignore German calls to return gold artefacts from the site of ancient Troy, hauled to Moscow as wartime booty, the museum’s director has been quoted as saying. The antiquities, a collection of pre-Mycenaean jewels and plate known as Priam’s treasure, were unearthed by German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann at Hisarlik in Turkey in the 1870s. — Reuters

USA frees N. Koreans
WASHINGTON: The United States of America has said an American detained in North Korea for the one past month was released on Tuesday. State Department spokesman James Rubin on Wednesday said the detainee had declined to sign a privacy act waiver, inhibiting officials from giving further details. The Stalinist state had “decided to expel American citizen Mrs Karen Jung-Sook Han from its territory on July 20, who has been detained for violating a DPRK legal order.” — Reuters

Dinosaur fossils
BUENOS AIRES: Fossils from a newly discovered land-roving dinosaur adapted to a temperate climate have been unearthed on an Antarctic island near the tip of South America in what experts are calling a rare find. Two geologists from the Antarctic Institute of Argentina showed the 74-million-year-old fossilised bones to Fernando Novas, a palaeontologist with the Argentine Museum of Natural Sciences. “This was a type of dinosaur as yet unknown. Now five species of dinosaur have been discovered in Antarctica,” Novas said. — Reuters

Suicide by dolphins
MOSCOW: Exceptional warm summer temperatures in Russia’s northern seas are driving polar dolphins over the edge this summer - or rather on to the beach. Fishermen plying the White Sea bay of Kandalash in north western Russia have already found six of the creatures that apparently chose to throw themselves onto dry land to perish rather than stay in the warm water, the Itar-Tass news agency reported on Wednesday. With Russia’s record-breaking summer heat wave expected to hold for two more weeks, more cases were expected. — DPA

Biggest sculpture
BEIJING: A Chinese craftsman has created a gigantic stone peach weighing 399.5 kg, the largest in the world. Ding Jizhou, a master sculptor in central China’s Henan province, spent 10 years to complete the work, which has been accepted by the Guinness Book of World Records, an official report said. The peach is regarded as the symbol of longevity in China. — PTI

Needless genetic tests
WASHINGTON: Unregulated genetic tests, with needless surgeries, because of mistakes made in assessing the results, are taking human toll, the Washington Post reported. Genetic tests, to predict a person’s medical future, are more difficult to perform and trickier to interpret than conventional medical tests. Several people have undergone preventive surgery, including removal of breasts for fear they would develop cancer or other diseases, only to learn later that the technician made a mistake, the Post reported on Wednesday. — PTI

Cockroach as mascot
WELLINGTON: Regarded worldwide as a dirty pest, the cockroach has become the official “millennium bug” for New Zealand, which will be among the first nations to experience the real effects of Y2K. “Ken” the cockroach was unveiled on Wednesday as the spearhead for a government-funded campaign to infest New Zealand households with a “be prepared” message. A cockroach was chosen as mascot because the bugs were “the ultimate survivors,” Chairman Basil Logan said. — AP