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| Saturday, November 11, 2000, Chandigarh, India   
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IT pact with Singapore SINGAPORE, Nov 10 — India and Singapore are poised to take a major step forward by putting information technology in the vanguard of the new found synergy between the two countries. US Election 2000 Bush sets up transition team
Sunshine state may cause biggest sunset WASHINGTON, Nov 10 — When they finally write the history of this presidential election, the key names in the story could be those of Al Gore, George W Bush — and Theresa LePore. Poll fiasco becomes butt of jokes |
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 Arafat willing to meet Barak at summitWASHINGTON, Nov 10 — Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat said he would be willing to attend another Middle East summit, with President Bill Clinton as host, provided it was well-prepared “to ensure its success.” WASHINGTON: President Clinton, right, and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, left, stop at the front door of the West Wing of the White House prior to Arafat's departure after meeting with Clinton to discuss the West Asia peace process on Thursday in Washington. The translator in the middle is unidentified. — AP/PTI photo It’s crunch time for Russian Army 21 die in security forces’ crackdown 6 LTTE rebels killed Clinton warns India
on proliferation Pak closes border to Afghan refugees 200th anniversary of White House celebrated
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IT pact with Singapore SINGAPORE, Nov 10 — India and Singapore are poised to take a major step forward by putting information technology in the vanguard of the new found synergy between the two countries. President
K. R. Narayanan was given a warm and ceremonial welcome at the wooded Istana here this morning which is the official residence of host President S.R. Nathan. Even as Mr Nathan attached tremendous importance to the long overdue official visit of the Head of State from India which is taking place after a gap of nearly three decades, Mr Narayanan had no doubt that “a new stage has been set to impart greater dynamism and content to India-Singapore relations”. Mr Nathan and Mr Narayanan, assisted by their respective delegations, held discussions for 45 minutes on bilateral matters and the recent developments in the ASEAN region. The two sides formalised the establishment of a task force on economic cooperation which will be co-chaired by the Finance Ministers of Singapore and India. The first meeting of this task force is expected to take place in the next few weeks in New Delhi. Singapore and India also signed agreements for cultural exchanges between the two countries for a two-year period from 2000-2002 and loaning of Indian artefacts of rare value to the Asian Civilisation museum located in this vibrant and high-tech city state. Mr Nathan and Mr Narayanan also briefly exchanged views about developments in China. The visiting dignitary gave his perceptions and impressions as Mr Narayanan had recently paid an official visit to that country. The Look East policy first
unveiled by former Prime Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao in 1994 is being given the proper content by both sides. Having faced problems in doing business with China with Singaporean investments virtually stuck in China, leadership of this country feels that it might be a better proposition to do business with India which offers a huge market. It is in this context that Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong has made forays to India earlier this year in January and prior to that successively in 1994 and 1995. Officials here admit that after long period of inactivity, Singapore’s relationship with India is now beginning to get on track. Singapore wants to capitalise on India’s vast potential of software experts and take advantage of the expertise available to them much closer home. The National
Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) with Mr Dewang Mehta as its president is playing the role of a catalyst. Mr Mehta told The Tribune that the potential for partnership in the IT sector is phenomenal and said software and allied trade between India and Singapore is expected to soar to US $1 billion by 2005. He spoke of the untapped possibilities of joint ventures and having strategic alliances aimed at markets in the United States, Japan, China and other ASEAN countries. This was not loud talk because Singapore had out of the world infrastructure facilities. Mr Mehta was particularly keen on nurturing a Singapore-India partnership in the IT sector to exploit the opportunities available in China. Mr Mehta is acutely aware of the IT scene in China having visited that country several times. NASSCOM has signed an agreement with the Singapore Information Technology Federation (SITF) for setting up an institute here on the lines of the IIITs in Hyderabad and Lucknow. When Mr Goh was in India in January, he emphasised that resisting the forces of globalisation was a futile exercise. “As such what governments must do is embrace globalisation. Global capital and trade will go where they are most productive”, he observed. |
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Bush sets up
transition team WHILE votes were still being counted in Florida yesterday, George W Bush adopted a presidential demeanour, summoning members of a “transition team” to the Texas Governor’s mansion to plan his move to the White House. As hours went by, the heavy iron gates at the mansion occasionally swung open for limousines carrying prospective members of a government team which showed strong signs of being a continuation of the last Bush administration, run by the Governor’s father. Condoleezza Rice, a foreign policy adviser to the elder Bush, arrived in the morning to discuss the foreign policy team and possibly her future as National Security Adviser. Bush aides also told journalists to expect an announcement concerning the appointment of Gen Colin Powell, a former four-star general and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, who is tipped for the job of Secretary of State. The focus on international affairs represented an extraordinary and deliberate display of self-confidence on Mr Bush’s part, at a time
when world attention was focused on the intricacies and accidents of Florida’s balloting practices. Earlier visitors included Andy Card, a former lobbyist for the motor industry who was Transportation Secretary for the elder Bush and who is now tipped to be Chief of Staff in a new Bush White House. Dick Cheney, the vice-presidential candidate and former president George Bush’s Defence Secretary, was put in charge of assembling the transition team which is supposed to pave the way for a smooth transfer of power in January. When it came to choosing a tough political operator to go to Florida to promote George Bush’s interests in the ballot recount, the campaign turned to James Baker, who served as Secretary of State and confidant to the candidate’s father. During the campaign, Governor Bush made as much effort to keep a distance from his father, as Al Gore did to stay away from Bill Clinton, especially after the elder Bush referred to George W affectionately as his ``boy’’ in an early campaign rally. But the Governor’s early, and possibly premature, appointments added weight to critics who said his election would amount to a Bush restoration. Several observers also remarked on a change in Governor Bush’s body language. When he emerged from the mansion on Wednesday to speak to reporters, he seemed to be making a deliberate effort to carry himself in a different manner from Bush the candidate.
(The Guardian) |
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Controversial ballot paper creator WASHINGTON, Nov 10 — When they finally write the history of this presidential election, the key names in the story could be those of Al Gore, George W Bush — and Theresa LePore. Ms LePore is the superviser of elections for Florida’s Palm Beach county. It is a place where the population mushroomed at the end of the 20th century, an affluent area which attracted tens of thousands of retirees from the north-eastern USA, lured by the sun and the absence of income tax. A lot are Jewish, most are Democrats and, for many of them, their eyesight is not what it once was. It was Ms LePore who decided that the ballot paper in Tuesday’s presidential election in the county needed to be rearranged so elderly voters could read the names of candidates more easily. With 10 names to cram on the ballot, she decided that two pages would be better than one, and rearranged the ballot paper so that the two pages meshed with one another. It was by far the biggest blunder of a series of Florida ballot irregularities and mysteries that have thrown the entire presidential election into chaos. It was a decision which led to 19,000 spoiled ballot papers being thrown into the bin on Tuesday night. And with them may have gone Al Gore’s claim to the White House. On the left-hand page of the ballot, Mr Bush’s name appeared at the top, with Mr Gore’s name below it. On the right-hand page, just between the two, was Pat Buchanan’s name. This meant that although Mr Gore’s name was second on the list, the hole which voters were required to punch to vote for him was the third from the top, below the holes for Mr Bush and Mr Buchanan. Ms LePore showed her redesign to the two other people on the local canvassing board which supervises the county’s elections, Carol Roberts and Judge Charles Burton. Both approved it for use on Tuesday. She showed it to representatives of the parties too. None objected. It was a decision which may have decided the fate of US presidency, to say nothing of the health care prospects of millions of Americans, the right of women to have a legal abortion, the possibility of reform to the campaign finance jungle and the future of international nuclear weapons agreements, among others. As a result of the confusion, thousands of voters in Palm Beach county did what they would not normally do. They voted for Pat Buchanan’s rightwing, anti-Israeli, isolationist programme. When they realised their mistake, some punched a second hole on the ballot paper, invalidating their votes. In Palm Beach county, 3,407 persons voted for Mr Buchanan, more than three times the number that voted for him in any other of Florida’s 67 counties. Even Mr Buchanan thought yesterday that that was far more than he should have got. “I don’t want votes that were not intended for me,” he said. But the really jaw-dropping figure was the number of ballot papers from Palm Beach that had to be discarded because they were punched twice. Ms LePore’s office confirmed that 19,120 ballot papers were invalidated because of this error on Tuesday night. In the US Senate election in the county, only 3,783 persons made a similar mistake. Yesterday, Ms LePore was crestfallen and apologetic. “I’ll never use facing pages like that again. I was trying to make the ballot more readable for our elderly voters. I was trying to do a good thing.’’ The argument about irregularities like those in Palm Beach county mounted as Florida continued to carry out a quite separate recount after Tuesday’s election showed Mr Bush just 1,784 votes ahead of Mr Gore in an electorate of 6m. Even when the recount is completed, the final result will not be officially declared until November 17, because overseas postal votes can still qualify until then, providing that they are postmarked on or before election day, November 7. Although Florida’s elections division director, Clay Roberts, said yesterday that a ballot box that was apparently left behind in one Dade county precinct on election might — and widely shown on national television — contained no ballots but only election supplies such as marker pens, irregularities alleged to have taken place in Florida’s poll include: Intimidation of voters:
In Woodville, outside Tallahassee, civil rights workers said that the Florida highway patrol set up a drivers’ licence checkpoint near the local polling station, and charged that its purpose was to pressure black voters into staying away from the polls. A third of the local population in Woodville is black. A spokesman for the highway patrol denied the allegation and said that the officers handed out 13 tickets to white motorists and six to blacks. A poll watcher for the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People in Hillsborough County near Tampa said a police deputy posted outside a polling station asked black men for identification and turned them away. Address changes:
One of the most widespread complaints was that voters who turned up with evidence of their changes of address were not allowed to vote because supervisors were unable to obtain authorisation from electoral authorities. This is normally a standard procedure for which telephone authorisation is regularly given, but lines were jammed across the state. “I got through once, at 7.30 in the morning,” said Nat Rothenburg, a poll supervisor in Lauderhill, where 500 voters were turned away. “I felt so bad for these people who wanted to vote.” Hazel Bostwick added: “I had clerks pulling out their hair because they couldn’t get through. It was not fair.” Closing of polling stations:
People in several parts of Florida complained that they were unable to vote because polling stations were closed and no instructions were posted about alternative sites. A school in Pompano Beach which had been advertised as a polling station remained closed all day. The turnout in that precinct was only two-thirds the turnout for the county as a whole. In Miramar City, constituents were directed to vote at a local fire station which was not in use as a polling station. In Hallandale Beach some voters said they were told the election “would be tomorrow” — Wednesday. Inaccurate voter rolls:
Officials received many complaints that individual voters were not allowed to take part in the election because their names were incorrectly omitted from the rolls. At Pembroke Pines, up to 50 apparently qualified voters were turned away because they were not registered. A similar complaint was reported in North Lauderdale. Billie Young, a voter in Tamarac, was told that she was not allowed to vote because she was registered as dead.
— The Guardian, London. |
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Poll fiasco becomes butt of jokes Around the globe, including in the USA, the presidential election crisis has become the butt of jokes, with one news headline proclaiming “America has become the laughing stock of the world.” According to Reuters, an edit page cartoon in the Denver Rocky Mountain News, drawing inspiration from a hit TV show (like Amitabh Bachchan’s “Kaun Banega Crorepati”), shows Uncle Sam, sitting on a hot seat, sweating, eyes bulging out as he played “Who wants to be a millionaire”, and being asked who won the presidential election. “Okay..I am pretty sure...I am going to...I think I am going to say...no...yes...oh”, Uncle Sam says before finally answering “Bush” only to hear the question now in the American lexicon — Is that your final answer? Popular US late night TV comedian Jay Lino had a dig at the national confusion: “I had a horrible night last night. I dreamed that aliens from outer space landed and said:
"Take me to your leader. I did not know what to do." News reports, commentaries and editorials in various parts of the world have had a field day in mocking at the predicament of the USA not being in a position to proclaim who is the next President to succeed Bill Clinton. Liberation of France had this to say: “US woke up on Wednesday morning to discover out there was no President-elect and that the election on November 7 was mired in a mixture of a banana republic farce and suspense worthy of a (soccer) World Cup final decided by penalty kicks.” The Cuban state organ Gramma noted sarcastically that while nobody was sure who had won the presidency, it was clear that a dead man had won a Senate seat in Missouri (reference to the late Governor of the state who was recently killed in air crash). An Oped article in the London Times
said: "What can be described only as an absolute chaos of an election will have given hope to dictatorships elsewhere.” The New York Times carries a report on how the television networks in the USA botched in their predictions on the outcome of the presidential race on the basis of an exit poll. They all relied on a single exit poll called Voters News Service. (VNS) . Until 1990, each network had its own exit poll service, but as a cost-cutting measure, the networks opted for the VNS consortium. The television networks’ economy measure that made them eat their predictions invited a wry media
comment: "Gee, may be they could just pay Peter (Jennings), Tom (Brokaw) and Dan (Rather) of ABC, NBC and CBS a little less for
saying: "I have no freaking idea.” Exit and opinion polls around the world have had embarrassing moments. The most famous fiasco was the 1948 US presidential election in which many newspapers and political pundits had a predicted a Truman defeat at the hands of Republican leader and New York Governor, Thomas Dewey. “It will take a long time for the journalism fraternity,” wrote
M. Hirsh Goldberg in his “Blunder Book”, “to live down the famous picture of Harry Truman holding up an edition of the Chicago Daily Tribune declaring, in World War II type, “Dewey defeats Truman”. Truman, seeking re-election had the last laugh with 303 electoral votes as against 189 secured by Dewey. It was probably the worst moment for the Chicago Daily Tribune, which carried the headline in bold type, in its early edition. London’s Daily Mirror mocked that America cannot make up its mind who should be its President. “The simplest thing may be,” it said, “for President Clinton to be asked to stay on for another four years. But the way things are in the states at the moment, the letter asking him to do that would probably get lost in the post.” |
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Arafat willing to meet Barak at summit WASHINGTON, Nov 10 (AP, AFP) — Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat said he would be willing to attend another Middle East summit, with President Bill Clinton as host, provided it was well-prepared “to ensure its success.” “This is why I am here,” Mr Arafat said yesterday after a two-hour meeting with Mr Clinton at the White House and a news conference in which he denounced Israel as the cause of violence that has shattered already enfeebled peace talks. “I would welcome any effort to convene another summit, provided we prepare for it and ensure its success,” Mr Arafat said later at a question-and-answer session sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations. He stressed the agenda must include Jerusalem’s future and Palestinian refugees, issues that he said cannot be deferred. Implying Mr Clinton would push the idea on Sunday when he meets at the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, the Palestinian leader said “President Clinton has promised to exert maximum effort” in the time he has left in office. Mr Arafat responded testily to queries about Palestinian children being part of the confrontation with Israel. Questioned about the children by an official of the pro-Israel lobby, American-Israel Public Affairs Committee, Mr Arafat shouted: “someone from AIPAC should have apologized for killing Palestinian children.” Earlier, US President and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat met here yesterday amid an explosion of Mideast violence, including the killing of one a PLO military commander by Israel, which Washington said raised “serious issues”. The State Department said Washington would be looking into the attack but refused to condemn Abeyat’s killing or call it an assassination. “The incident today dose raise serious issues,” spokesman Richard Boucher said as Mr Arafat and Clinton met in an effort to bring an end to the six weeks of deadly violence. |
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It’s crunch time for Russian Army MOSCOW, Nov 10 (Reuters) — President Vladimir Putin has said the fate of Russia’s armed forces and the country’s security rested on proposals that would controversially cut troop and civilian numbers by a fifth in five years. Speaking at the start of a Russian Security Council session on military reforms yesterday, Mr Putin told its members — including ministers and intelligence chiefs — it was crunch time for the country’s vast but underfunded forces after months of acrimonious debate. Russia had already announced cuts of 365,000 persons in the main Defence Ministry forces. Russian news agencies quoted Deputy Security Council Secretary Vladimir
Potapov as saying that the overall proposed cuts of 600,000 included those reductions. The new element — and the one that forced Mr Putin to cancel the last council session — is a planned cut of 130,000 in civilian staff and 105,000 military personnel from the 11 armed organisations not under the ministry’s control, such as interior troops and more obscure branches such as the railway troops. Itar-Tass news agency quoted Mr Potapov as saying that the overall cuts amounted to 19.7 per cent of all uniformed and civilian personnel in the “militarised structures”. |
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21 die in security forces’ crackdown JAKARTA, Nov 10 — Indonesian security forces have killed at least 21 persons across the restive province of Aceh in the last two days in a bid to prevent tens of thousands of people descending on the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, for a massive pro-independence rally tomorrow. Faisal Hadi, a coordinator of human rights groups in Aceh, said in addition to the deaths 101 persons had been injured in incidents in the province, on the northern tip of Sumatra. “It is clear the police and army were prepared to do anything to stop people reaching Banda Aceh for the rally,” he said. He said some fatalities were caused when convoys of trucks and cars refused to turn round at police roadblocks. Others were shot when they tried to reach the city by boat. “Police opened fire into the crowds while they were at sea and also trying to dock. There was no way they could miss.” The police admit to shooting 13 persons dead, “in self-defence”, but reputable human rights organisations monitoring events say the final death toll could be more than 40 once their staff have checked reports from remote areas.
(The Guardian) |
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6 LTTE
rebels killed
COLOMBO, Nov 10 (PTI) — Six LTTE rebels and a civilian were killed in sporadic fighting in the north and east while the Sri Lankan navy apprehended a country boat carrying 14 refugees deserting the
LTTE-held areas. An official press note said here today that six rebels were killed and three soldiers injured in northern Jaffna peninsula yesterday. The bodies of three militants recovered by troops were handed over to the
LTTE through International Committee of Red Cross. A civilian was killed when rebels fired at a group of labourers loading sand into a lorry at Meegaswewa in eastern Trincomalee yesterday. In another development, 14 civilians leaving the
held-held areas in north-west Mannar were taken into custody by the navy yesterday. The note said the civilians, hailing from the rebel-held Iranativu left by a small boat to escape attempts by
LTTE to impart compulsory military training, it said.
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Clinton warns India on proliferation WASHINGTON, Nov 10 (PTI) — US President Bill Clinton has warned India that Indo-US relations cannot reach their full potential “without progress on our non-proliferation and regional concerns” and feels there are no encouraging signs of resumption of talks between India and Pakistan soon. Mr Clinton expressed his views in a letter to the House Speaker covering US policy in various regions and dealing with nuclear and missile issues relating to India, mainly in the Pakistani context. |
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Pak closes border to Afghan refugees ISLAMABAD, Nov 10 (Reuters) — Pakistan said today it had closed its borders to refugees fleeing war and economic deprivation in Afghanistan after two decades of providing shelter. “There has to be an end to the influx of foreigners, Afghan refugees, into Pakistan,’’ Hasan Raza Pasha, Secretary of the Interior Ministry, told Reuters. “It has created all sorts of problems, not just economic.’’ The move, which had been preceded by growing complaints about the burden of sheltering millions of Afghans, comes as the number of refugees has been rising again in recent months because of severe drought and a renewal of the civil war. |
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200th anniversary of White House celebrated WASHINGTON, Nov 10 (Reuters) — President Bill Clinton and three of his predecessors yesterday celebrated the 200th anniversary of the White House, as the contest to determine its next incumbent remained unresolved. With the US presidential elections not decided even two days after the vote, Mr Clinton and three former Presidents attended a banquet in the East Room of the executive mansion to mark the occasion. Among the guests were former President George Bush and his wife Barbara. “In the 200 years of the White House’s history, never before have this many former Presidents and First Ladies gathered in this great room,” Mr Clinton said at the start of the dinner.
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Douglas Maher, left, a supporter of Republican presidential candidate Texas Gov. George W. Bush, debates with an unknown supporter of Democratic presidential candidate Vice-President Al Gore, outside the County Administration complex
on Thursday, in West Palm Beach, Fla. Protesters gathered to voice their opinion on a re-vote for Palm Beach County.
— AP/PTI photo
