W O R L D

Mori survives no-trust move
TOKYO, Nov 21 — Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori today got back to the business of running Japan after surviving a no-confidence vote and averting a disastrous split in his party, but his days in the top job looked numbered.

County recount gives Gore slight gain
GEORGE W. Bush clung to his lead in the Florida election drama last night as the first of three controversial recounts neared its end without supplying Al Gore with the votes he needs to capture the White House.

Fujimori resigns
LIMA, Nov 21 — Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori formally submitted his resignation from Tokyo, ending a decade of hard-line rule and paving the way for a showdown in Congress to decide who will succeed him.

Suu Kyi ignores court summons
YANGON, Nov 21 — Myanmar (Burmese) opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi failed to appear in court today to answer a lawsuit filed by her elder brother for co-possession of her Yangon (Rangoon) home, court officials confirmed.

Sharif’s party splits on anti-govt front
ISLAMABAD, Nov 21 — Imprisoned former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s party was split yesterday on whether to join an anti-government alliance led by its political foe, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s party.

Nadeem fears unfair trial
LONDON, Nov 21 — Playing the communal card, Bollywood music director Nadeem Akhtar Saifee, facing extradition proceedings in connection with audio king Gulshan Kumar’s murder, said he would not receive a fair trial in Mumbai as he was a Muslim.

Blair finds Putin on right track
MOSCOW, Nov 21 — Britain’s Prime Minister Tony Blair praised Russia’s President Vladimir Putin as an intelligent and strong leader on the right reform track as the two men headed into a day of talks today.

UK to lure skilled aliens
LONDON, Nov 21 — British Prime Minister Tony Blair likes to be seen in the company of Reuben Singh to demonstrate his government’s commitment to a multi-cultural society.

Egypt recalls envoy to Israel

DUBAI, Nov 21 (UNI, Reuters) — Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak today ordered his Ambassador to Israel to return home immediately in response to “the Israeli aggression and the use of force against the Palestinian people”, regional news agencies said.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa announced that ambassador Mohammed Bassyouni has been recalled to Cairo for consultations concerning the Israeli “aggression” in Palestinian territories and the “deterioration” of the situation there.

Egypt has been among the leading Arab nations trying to negotiate an end to the bloody Israeli-Palestinian violence, which has claimed more than 100 lives. Last month, it hosted an Arab summit to discuss the situation in Palestinian areas.

Mr Moussa was quoted as saying that orders had been issued for the Egyptian permanent delegation at the United Nations to “immediately” consult the follow-up committee, constituted after the recent Arab summit, on implementing its decisions.

JERUSALEM: Fighting between Israeli troops and Palestinians raged early today, hours after Israel launched missile strikes on Palestinian security targets in retaliation for the bombing of a Jewish settlers’ school bus.

Fire-fights were reported near the West Bank town of Ramallah, in the divided town of Hebron and near several Jewish settlements and military bases in Gaza — areas where fighting has taken place during night.

At least 245 persons have died in almost two months of violence, most of them Palestinians.

Israel said the missile strikes yesterday were in retaliation for a deadly bomb attack earlier in the day against a bus taking children to school at a Jewish settlement in Gaza.

It accused “Tanzim”, Israel’s term for militants from Palestinian President Yasser Arafat’s Fatah faction, of carrying out the attack in which an Israeli man and woman were killed and at least four children were wounded. Fatah denied the charge.

Washington called on Israel and the Palestinians to rein in the violence before it spiralled ‘’out of control”.

Gaza City’s night sky was lit up by the missiles and flares which hit several buildings, including naval, civil defence and police installations, as well as the main police headquarters and offices of plainclothes security agencies.

The strike, which lasted for around an hour and involved at least five helicopter gunships, hit Palestinian Preventive Security and Fatah headquarters, the elite Force-17 unit’s base and a communications centre, the Israeli army said.

The EU’s special West Asia envoy Miguel Angel Moratinos was at Mr Arafat’s office for talks with the Palestinian leader as missiles slammed into nearby buildings, his spokesman Bernadino Leon said. Mr Arafat’s headquarters were not hit.

Leon said Mr Arafat told Moratinos he was “extremely angry” at the attack, which he called “a very dangerous escalation”.

Several hours after the strike, Mr Arafat visited Gaza’s Shifa hospital and examined damaged buildings in Gaza City.

Israel’s Deputy Defence Minister Ephrain Sneh said the strikes were “a warning” to the Palestinian Authority “of the meaning of a guerrilla and terror war against Israel”.

But Palestinians said the strikes made them even more determined to continue an uprising against Israeli occupation.

The latest upsurge of violence also gave UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s efforts to broker a role of UN peacekeepers greater impetus. He met Israeli and Palestinian envoys at the UN to discuss options for deploying UN observers to help calm the region’s worst violence in years.

Israel says it rejects any deployment of UN peacekeepers unless it occurs in the framework of a peace agreement with the Palestinians. The USA has stressed that no UN force could be sent without the Israeli consent.

Mori survives no-trust move

TOKYO, Nov 21 (Reuters) — Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori today got back to the business of running Japan after surviving a no-confidence vote and averting a disastrous split in his party, but his days in the top job looked numbered.

Mr Mori welcomed the defeat of the Opposition-sponsored no-confidence motion, which became a fait accompli after his reformist Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) rival, Koichi Kato, reversed his decision to vote in favour.

His first order of business was to ensure passage of an extra 4.78 trillion yen ($43.52 billion) stimulus budget through Parliament. Its approval eased fears that a delay would stall a fragile recovery in the world’s number two economy.

“It’s good that the no-confidence motion was voted down when Japan is confronting both domestic and international issues,’’ Mr Mori said after the pre-dawn vote on Tuesday.

“Now I should stand straight and do my best to carry on with the business of government.”

But the troubles of an unpopular Prime Minister with a reputation as a policy lightweight are from over, and anxious party officials moved to curb opportunities for error by the gaffe-prone Mori.

“We will request that Mr Mori refrain from making flippant remarks and from rash behaviour which may draw criticism,” Mr Junichiro Koizumi, head of Mori’s faction in the LDP, was quoted by the media as saying.

Mr Mori secured the victory in a vote that had been too close to call until a tearful Kato, worried his allies would lose party electoral backing if they cast their ballots for the opposition-sponsored motion, told them to abstain.

Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa, a party elder and former Prime Minister said Kato had won understanding for his views.

“It must have been difficult for you, but your thoughts have gained understanding in both the party and the public. That’s what I told him,” Mr Miyazawa told reporters after meeting Kato.

Mr Mori received yet more bad news today, when a survey by the daily Asahi Shimbun showed his approval rating had slipped to 18 per cent, the lowest since he took office in April.

County recount gives Gore slight gain
By Martin Kettle and Julian Borger in Washington

GEORGE W. Bush clung to his lead in the Florida election drama last night as the first of three controversial recounts neared its end without supplying Al Gore with the votes he needs to capture the White House.

With more than two-thirds of the votes recounted in Broward county, Mr Gore was showing a net gain of just 114 votes over Mr Bush. If that result was replicated in the other recounts, it would not be enough to overturn Mr Bush’s 930-vote lead for Florida’s decisive 25 Electoral College votes.

The recounts continued as lawyers for both sides appeared in Florida’s Supreme Court in Tallahassee for a hearing that would go a long way towards deciding whether Mr Bush or Mr Gore succeeds Bill Clinton on January 20.

Public opinion continues to back Mr Gore. A new Gallup poll showed that 60 pc of American voters think that the results of the Florida hand recounts should be included in the final result. But that could change in the light of the court ruling and if the process is seen to be dragged out.

Mr Gore’s chances of capturing Florida suffered another blow yesterday when a judge in Palm Beach county ruled that his court did not have authority to order a revote for electors who claimed they were confused by the county’s “butterfly ballot” paper on November 7.

Judge Jorge Labarga said he had been presented with no case law to show a new election was permitted.

Palm Beach county’s recount appeared to be producing even less change than was reported in Broward. With around half the precincts recounted, officials said there was “not much of a swing in either direction”.

“I’ve seen very little change, quite honestly,” Charles Burton of the Palm Beach canvassing board told reporters. No new figures were released yesterday to add to the net gain of 12 votes for Mr Bush that was announced on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the Democrats were divided yesterday (Mon) over how much further Al Gore should pursue his post-election struggle for the White House, as analysts predicted that a Gore presidency could inflict more damage on the party than a graceful surrender.

Meanwhile, Republicans closed ranks behind Bush, and threatened to fight the Vice-President all the way to the Electoral College and beyond if Mr Gore continued his attempts to force acceptance of Florida recount results through the courts.

Mr Bob Dole, the former Republican presidential candidate, called for a boycott of a Gore inauguration. While Tom DeLay, the majority whip in the House of Representatives, has sent out a memorandum to congressional Republicans reminding them they have the right to challenge the Electoral College votes of any states where the presidential election is disputed — a clear sign that the Republicans could try to overturn a Gore win arising from the manual recount in Florida.

The top Democratic leadership in Congress has so far stood by the Gore campaign’s insistence on a hand recount.

However, many inside the party are increasingly concerned that if Gore won as a result of the manual recount his presidency would be crippled by vengeful Republicans, who would be mobilised for a backlash in the 2002 congressional elections. (The Guardian, London)

Reuter adds: Florida’s Attorney-General Robert Butterworth, a Democrat, has urged state election officials to rescind their rejection of hundreds of absentee votes from military personnel abroad that had not been postmarked.

Florida’s canvassing boards threw out more than 1,400 overseas absentee ballots out of a total of about 3,500 for a variety of reasons, including lack of a postmark.

It is not known how many of those rejected were from military personnel, who were expected to favour Bush. But the campaign of the Texas governor, who currently holds a slim lead in Florida, said it was unfair that troops serving in foreign danger zones should have their ballots disqualified on “technicalities.’’

Fujimori resigns

LIMA, Nov 21 (Reuters) — Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori formally submitted his resignation from Tokyo, ending a decade of hard-line rule and paving the way for a showdown in Congress to decide who will succeed him.

“I’ve come to the conclusion that I should resign ... to allow an orderly transition,” Mr Fujimori said in a letter sent to Congress yesterday after a two-month political crisis sparked by corruption allegations involving his closest aide.

Mr Fujimori said in another letter to lawmakers that he felt the need to step aside to keep Peru from spiralling out of control before April elections. “Without (my resignation), the country would be committing suicide,” he wrote.

Mr Fujimori also said his second Vice-President Ricardo Marquez, seen as a yes-man, should replace him as head of the crumbling government.

And as three moving vans entered Peru’s presidential palace on Monday morning in a sign of the government’s imminent end, Congress geared up to move against both Mr Fujimori and Mr Marquez.

Under Peru’s constitution, Congress can oust a president on the grounds of “moral unfitness,” and Mr Zumaeta said a simple majority was all that was needed. The vote has been set for Tuesday.

Suu Kyi ignores court summons

YANGON, Nov 21 (DPA) — Myanmar (Burmese) opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi failed to appear in court today to answer a lawsuit filed by her elder brother for co-possession of her Yangon (Rangoon) home, court officials confirmed.

Court officials approached Ms Suu Kyi with the court summons twice last week to appear in court today but she refused to accept them, and refused to appear in court to face the charges lodged by Mr Aung San Oo, 58, Ms Suu Kyi’s estranged brother who resides in the USA.

By failing to appear or to send a lawyer to represent her in court, Ms Suu Kyi lost her right to cross-examine plaintiff witnesses, court official said. After a 30-minute examination of the case the Yangon Divisional Court adjourned to continue the trial on November 27.

Mr San Oo’s advocates have filed suit for co-possession of Ms Suu Kyi’s Yangon family compound where she has lived since returning to Myanmar in 1988.

Ms Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar independence hero Aung San, was kept under house arrest in her Yangon home between 1989 and 1995.

After many years abroad during which she married British national, the late Michael Aris, Ms Suu Kyi returned to her homeland to visit her ailing mother in 1988 and became involved in the country’s then-vibrant pro-democracy movement.

She has led the National League for Democracy (NLD) party since its inception in 1988, and is widely hailed as Myanmar’s chief opposition figure in a country generally cowed by its military leaders.

Ultras’ response dismays Pak media

ISLAMABAD, Nov 21 (PTI) — The negative response to India’s ceasefire offer by some militant groups is a great cause of dismay as it could “jeopardise the prospects of a peaceful solution”, a section of the Pakistani Press said here today while others responded in a guarded manner.

The Dawn newspaper in its editorial termed the Indian offer as “happy news” and said the negative response to the Indian ceasefire offer from some of the militants involved in the Kashmir conflict comes as “a cause of great dismay”.

“It is pity that even a remote opportunity of a political option should be ignored,” the paper said.

Stressing that Pakistan should welcome the Indian offer, the paper said, “It is hoped that the bigger Kashmiri militant factions and the political groupings will deem it wise to reciprocate the ceasefire offer.”

Pakistan’s Foreign Office yesterday described the offer as a “ploy” in India’s long-term goal of imposing a military solution to Kashmir issue, but admitted it would be watching developments carefully.

Another daily, The News, said the ceasefire offer by the Indian authorities was “enormously significant” but added, “How far this move will go hinges entirely on its (Vajpayee Government’s) sincerity of purpose.”

“This olive branch from (Prime Minister Atal Behari) Vajpayee is, therefore, an extraordinary gesture that does not gel with the usual policy successive governments in New Delhi subscribed to and implemented without ever computing costs,” the paper said.

In an interview to The News, spokesman for the Hizbul Mujahideen, Saleem Hashim, said the Hizb would react positively to the short-term ceasefire, provided “India recognises Kashmir as a disputed territory and agrees to tripartite negotiations for its solution.”

Another Pakistani daily, The Nation, in its editorial, said “New Delhi will have to do much before the announcement is seriously taken by anybody.”

The paper said, “Unless the cessation of hostilities is followed by a genuine and sincere attempt to resolve the core issue, peace may not extend beyond a month, which both the Indian troops and Kashmiri militants will use to improve their position on the ground in order to be better able to fight after Id.”

Sharif’s party splits on anti-govt front

ISLAMABAD, Nov 21 (Reuters) — Imprisoned former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s party was split yesterday on whether to join an anti-government alliance led by its political foe, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s party.

Mr Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (PML) said it had suspended four key members for occupying the party’s headquarters and thwarting a meeting that was to decide whether to ally itself with parties opposed to the military government.

Party sources said the rift in the PML, rudderless since Mr Sharif was jailed last year, may lead to a split between backers of Mr Sharif’s wife, Ms Kulsoom Nawaz and dissident who are challenging Sharif’s leadership.

Ms Kulsoom and her supporters had called yesterday’s meeting to decide whether or not to join the Grand Democratic Alliance, led by Ms Bhutto’s Pakistan Peoples Party against the military-led government of Gen Pervez Musharraf.

Opponents have argued that the PML should not join the alliance, which they still view as a political foe. Others want the issue to be discussed by a meeting of all former PML lawmakers and not just the few picked by Ms Kulsoom or Mr Sharif.

Nadeem fears unfair trial

LONDON, Nov 21 (PTI) — Playing the communal card, Bollywood music director Nadeem Akhtar Saifee, facing extradition proceedings in connection with audio king Gulshan Kumar’s murder, said he would not receive a fair trial in Mumbai as he was a Muslim.

In his appeal filed in the high court here yesterday against the decision of a magistrate in October, last year, to extradite him, Nadeem said when he first heard the charges he considered returning to Mumbai to face them, but later decided against it.

Blair finds Putin on right track

MOSCOW, Nov 21 (Reuters) — Britain’s Prime Minister Tony Blair praised Russia’s President Vladimir Putin as an intelligent and strong leader on the right reform track as the two men headed into a day of talks today.

Mr Blair, who arrived in Moscow last evening for a brief working visit, also held out hope for movement on one of the thornier arms control issues — Russian objections to a US plan for a strategic missile defence system.

Mr Blair, who gambled on the then President-elect Putin last April by rolling out the red carpet for him in London and saying he “talks our language” on reform, clearly felt the gamble was already paying off as he flew to Moscow.

Mr Blair said the challenges Mr Putin faced — an economy that had been on the verge of collapse, “desperate” infrastructure and a legal and judicial structure that had to be overhauled — were not widely understood in the West.

Mr Blair is in Moscow to pursue his policy of helping Russia manage change, including military reform and economic restructuring. He dined with Mr Putin at a pub immediately after his arrival.

Mr Blair saw opportunities to narrow differences between Moscow and Washington on a proposed US anti-missile shield — whoever the next US President may be.

UK to lure skilled aliens

LONDON, Nov 21 (DPA) — British Prime Minister Tony Blair likes to be seen in the company of Reuben Singh to demonstrate his government’s commitment to a multi-cultural society.

The Indian fashion chain owner drives a yellow Ferrari and a red Rolls Royce, and at the age of not yet 25 is counted among Britain’s wealthiest businessman, according to the Eastern Eye magazine.

Britain’s racial minorities generate annual income of more than £ 13 billion according to Ms Callender.

On average they are better educated than the indigenous whites and make a significant contribution to the skilled labour pool, Ms Callender says.

In addition around a quarter of the members of ethnic minority groups are under 25 years of age, and by 2050 the proportion of the population coming from these minorities will rise to 10 per cent from the current 5.5 per cent, she says.

Most of them hold British passports. They or their parents came to the country largely as part of the immigration wave of the 1960s that followed the end of the colonial era, and they regard themselves as British.

WORLD BRIEFS

Sacrificing kids to please goddess
DHAKA: A Hindu woman in western Bangladesh killed her two young children after she allegedly dreamed that Goddess Kali asked her to sacrifice them, a Dhaka newspaper reported on Tuesday. Shibani Rani, from a remote village in Sirajganj district, told the police that she killed Binash Chandra Rao (5) and Swapna (7) with a sharp-edged weapon on Saturday following the dream, the Daily Jugantor reported. — AFP

Hollywood agent is most powerful man
LOS ANGELES: A man little known outside Hollywood studios has beaten out Rupert Murdoch, Steven Spielberg and William Randolph Hearst for the title of the 100 most powerful industry figures in the past 70 years. Lew Waserman, tinseltown talent agent, who almost single-handedly destroyed the old system that kept stars contracted at low pay to the big studios, is number one on the list released on Monday by the Hollywood Reporter. — AFP

4,000-year-old tomb discovered
CAIRO: A Czech archaeological mission discovered a 4,000-year-old tomb from the time of the Pharaohs in Egypt’s Abu Sir region, south-east of Cairo, the government daily, Al-Ahram, has reported. The tomb belonged to Meri-Her-Shef, a high official under the reign of Pharaoh Pepi I, one of the first Pharaohs of the sixth dynasty (2345-2181 BC), Zahi Hawas, Director of antiquities at the pyramids in Giza, told Al-Ahram on Monday. — AFP

Chilean secret agent gets life term
BUENOS AIRES: A former Chilean secret police agent has been sentenced here to life imprisonment for his role in the 1974 assassination of former Chilean Gen Carlos Prats and his wife. Prats and his wife Sofia Cuthbert, who fled into exile from Chile when the Socialist government of Salvador Allende was overthrown in 1973, were killed here on September 30, 1974, when a bomb planted under their car exploded.
— AFP

Where kids fear exams more than parents’ death
SINGAPORE: Children in the city-state are more fearful of failing examinations than the death of a parent, a survey published on Tuesday. There is scarce time for play with three to eight hours of gruelling homework, going through assessment books and attending enrichment classes following school for the average 10-year-old, the study found. The bleak picture of childhood emerged from the survey commissioned by The Straits Times on attitudes and lifestyles of Singaporean youngsters between the age of 10 and 12. — DPA