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| Saturday,
November 25, 2000, Chandigarh, India   
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Arafat sure of solution to W. Asia tangle
‘No Gore appetite’ left to fight |
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Greek ex-king wins rights case Thai PM okayed killing: paper ‘Titanic’ wins Afghan hearts Cuban boy, mother flee USA
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Arafat sure of solution to W. Asia tangle MOSCOW, Nov 24 (Reuters) — Palestinian President Yasser Arafat arrived in Moscow today for talks with President Vladimir Putin and said he was confident that a solution would be found to end almost two months of West Asia violence. Russian officials said Moscow wanted to find a way to end a deadlock in the crisis and restart peace talks. A Palestinian envoy said Arafat would press Russia to exert influence on Israel and in the United Nations. Asked on arrival at Moscow’s Vnukovo government airport whether an end to the confrontation between Palestinians and Israelis could be found, Arafat told reporters: “This is one of the most important steps we are going to discuss (in Moscow). We are sure to find a solution.” “It is important not to forget that Russia is a co-sponsor of the peace process and they have a political role,” he added. Arafat’s six-hour stay in the Russian capital was to include a meeting with Russia’s special envoy to the West Asia, Deputy Foreign Minister Vasily Sredin, and the Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch, Alexiy II. Arafat headed first for talks with Sredin. Russia, seemingly eager to play a more prominent role in the stalled peace process, was quick to accept Arafat’s urgent request for talks. Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov told the Itar-Tass news agency that Russia, as co-sponsor of the peace process with the USA wanted to create a “workable mechanism” to halt violence in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza and restart negotiations. Russia, he said, remained in contact with both Israelis and Palestinians with this in mind. “The escalation of violence has reached such a level that it can spill out far beyond the bounds of this explosive region,” Ivanov told Tass. Palestinian peace negotiator Saeb Erakat told the daily Vremya Novostei that Arafat hoped Russia would use its punch as a member of the U.N. Security Council to put pressure on Israel. Late, yesterday Israel’s Deputy Defence Minister and a top aide to Arafat held surprise talks at the Erez crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip. JERUSALEM: Palestinian gunmen shot dead a Jewish settler in the West Bank today an Israeli official said. The official said the settler was shot in the stomach while driving on a main road near the town of Nablus. Palestinian officials were not immediately available for comment. Israel has agreed at a meeting with Palestinian officials to lift a blockade of Palestinian towns and cities if nearly two months of violence ends first, an Israeli government source said today Palestinian Cabinet Minister Jamil al-Tarifi told Reuters that Israeli Deputy Defence Minister Ephraim Sneh had promised at the talks yesterday to lift the blockade by the start of the Muslim holiday of Ramazan next week. CAIRO: Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has given a warning that “terror” could spread unless bloodshed between Israelis and Palestinians ends, newspapers reported today. In an interview published by the al-Gomhuria and Egyptian Gazette dailies, Mubarak also said that peace was the only guarantee of regional stability, but that Israel had done nothing to halt the violence and return to the negotiating table. Meanwhile, Arab states had pledged nearly $700 million to support the Palestinian resistance against Israeli occupation at meeting of Arab Finance Ministers here yesterday, participating countries said. An Arab summit on October 22 decided to set up two funds worth $1billion to help the Palestinians cope with the economic repercussions of eight weeks of Israeli-Palestinians clashes. Officials said so far Saudi Arabia has offered $250 million Kuwait and the UAE $150 million, each, Qatar $50 million, Algeria and Egypt $30 million, Oman and Yemen $10 million each, Syria $7 million, Jordan $2 million and Sudan $1 million. |
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Eight shot in
Cambodian mafia attack PHNOM PENH, Nov 24 (Reuters) — Cambodian police shot dead eight men and arrested more than 50 today after a gang went on the rampage in what one official said was an attempt to take over the capital. One civilian was among the eight killed during the fighting, the worst Cambodia has experienced since the July 1997 ouster of First Prime Minister Prince Norodom Ranariddh. The gang members attacked a police station near the city’s railway station at about 1 p.m. (local) and then headed for the Defence Ministry offices about 800 metres away, the police said. The shootout lasted almost an hour. Phnom Penh’s military police chief, Gen Chhin Chan Por, said the group was flying the flag of an anti-government group called Cambodian Freedom Fighters, but police was trying to determine if that group was responsible for the attack. Other police officials said the unidentified leaders of the gang may be associated with the anti-Communist Free Khmer or Free Vietnam movements. Several men being detained at the military police headquarters told newsmen they had been duped into joining the gang and were unaware of its leaders’ intentions. “They told me I would get a job as a construction worker in Phnom Penh, but when I arrived in Phnom Penh they gave me two guns,” said Nou Sareth, a 23-year-old from Kompong Cham province northeast of the capital. “I don’t know about their plot — they just asked me to follow them on the road.” |
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‘No Gore appetite’ left to fight DURING the long presidential campaign, Al Gore’s energetic and innovative media team fired off around a dozen e-mails a day to journalists covering the election. They rubbished speeches made by his Republican rival, George W Bush, they quoted every statement Gore made. They provided figures that proved the emptiness of Bush’s claims and touted Gore’s record on everything from the environment to prescription fees. Now the guns are silent. And while the main reason is obviously that the campaign is over, there is a feeling that Gore’s backers are gradually losing the stomach for the fight. Maureen Dowd, who with Gail Collins, has been providing some of the wittiest commentaries in The New York Times on the Florida events, summed Mr Gore’s problem in a column this week: “Al Gore wants the presidency more than the Democrats do. And the Republicans want the presidency more than W does.” “Gore is more rabid than his campaign team and party. Bush’s campaign team and party are more rabid than him. Each side will do what it takes. But the Bushes prefer to let the help get their hands dirty.” The “help” that is working for Gore has faced an uphill task since the moment he made his phone call to his rival to withdraw his concession of defeat on election night two and a half weeks ago. For every twist and turn that has gone Gore’s way, there seem to be two that have been to the Bush camp’s advantage. The Democrats are worried that the continuing fight shows Gore as a bad loser. They know they could be punished in the Congressional elections in two years’ time if Mr Gore wins the vote but loses the argument. They know, too, that if Bush wins, the Democrats chances of taking seats in those elections will be substantially increased as an electorate seeks to correct the imbalance. They fear the worst possible scenario — Gore loses both the presidency and the argument. The people who bankrolled Gore’s campaign are still writing cheques to fund the costly business of hiring the country’s most expensive lawyers to mount the legal challenges in Florida. But there is a sense that the time is coming when they will wonder if the money is being poured down a Palm Beach drain! When Floridas Supreme Court ruled that recounts taking place would stand, Gore decided to let it be known that he was quietly planning his own administration. “I believe it’s now appropriate for both of us to focus on the transition,” he said on Tuesday night. But since then, potential victory seems to be slipping away, and with it the support. While Gore’s most loyal aides say they still find it hard to believe that a convicted drunk driver who seems more at home playing with his dog, Spot, than tackling international issues could possibly become president, there is a weariness about the whole process and a feeling that this weekend the long battle may be over. Rightwing commentators have joined the process of moulding public opinion against Gore. “We know the whole thing has been rigged and we’ve known from the get-go,” said rightwing talk show host Rush Limbaugh in his widely syndicated show this week. While the claim may be a piece of dishonest partisan propagandising, it is one that is being taken up across the country. The Democrats, who are feeling the pulse in the states, may still be publicly backing Gore’s challenges but they will be noting shifts in public sentiment against their man. The financial markets have been giving their own verdicts on Gore’s chances. When it emerged that he would not get the Miami-Dade recounts, shares in tobacco, pharmaceuticals and Microsoft — industries or organisations that all believe they would benefit from a Bush victory — suddenly rose.
— The Guardian, London |
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US offer to
waive sanctions on Pakistan ISLAMABAD, Nov 24 (ANI) — The United States of America has offered talks for the waiver of new sanctions imposed on Pakistan for allegedly receiving missile technology from China, an official source said yesterday. The offer was conveyed through informal channels, the source said. While announcing sanctions against Pakistan, the US Government lifted the similar sanctions against China imposed under Category-II of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) and Helms Amendment. A US statement on Tuesday said: “for a two-year period, all new individual export licences for commerce or state-controlled items and all new US government contracts will be denied to the Pakistani Ministry of Defence, Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission, and their sub-units and successors.” In addition to these, all imports into the USA of the products of Pakistani Ministry of Defence and its sub-units and successors will be denied. An official source in Islamabad said the impact of sanctions on Pakistan would be negligible as the country was already under different kinds of US military and economic sanctions. “There is a jumble of US military and economic sanctions on Pakistan,” the official said. |
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Greek ex-king wins rights case BRUSSELS, Nov 24 — Greece’s former King Constantine was basking yesterday in the afterglow of a controversial legal victory in which the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the Greek Government had been wrong to confiscate his palaces and estates six years ago and should now pay him compensation. In a landmark decision which is expected to lead to a spate of similar claims from other deposed royals across Europe, the court in Strasbourg agreed that the contested properties belonged to Constantine as an individual and not to the Greek state. It also declared that the socialist government of Andreas Papandreou had violated the former King’s right to “peaceful enjoyment of his possessions”. Constantine, 60, who has lived in exile in London since he was deposed by a military junta in 1967, filed the claim along with two other relatives — his sister Princess Irene, who now lives in Madrid, and his aunt, Princess Ekaterini, who lives in Buckinghamshire, north of London. The ruling is a severe embarrassment to the Greek Government which has disputed the claim and is loath to give him a single drachma. At stake is a trio of exquisite palaces and estates which the Greek Government claims was obtained by Constantine’s ancestors under dubious circumstances. Speaking yesterday at his home in Hampstead, North London, Constantine proclaimed himself “extremely grateful” to the court in France. He denied his objective was to secure a cash settlement. The Greek Government made it clear yesterday that it was unlikely to hand back any of the disputed property but might think about a financial compensation. Constantine is believed to be looking for a settlement in the region of $1.4 billion. The Strasbourg court did not name a figure, instead giving the two parties six months to come to an agreement. The Greek monarchy was formally abolished after a 1973 referendum and its land was expropriated. This expropriation was reversed in 1979, but in 1994, the socialist government confiscated Constantine’s property.
— The Guardian |
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Thai PM okayed killing: paper BANGKOK, Nov 24 (Reuters) — Thai Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai approved a plan for killing a group of Myanmar convicts who took hostages in a dramatic 21-hour jailbreak from a Thai prison, the Bangkok Post said on Wednesday. The daily quoted an unidentified military source as saying that Mr Chuan had agreed with the action at a meeting with top police and military officers. Officials in the Prime Minister’s office were not immediately available for comment. Thai police marksmen shot dead all nine armed fugitives in a roadside ambush after they had escaped from a jail in Samut Sakhon, 40 km southwest of Bangkok. The gang had taken seven prison officials hostage and killed a volunteer who taught Buddhism in the prison. “The meeting agreed the hostage-takers must die to set a precedent for other people, because they had killed a Thai official and committed a serious crime,’’ the newspaper quoted the military source as saying. After the killings yesterday, Mr Chuan told reporters it was “good news’’ that the hostage-takers did not go free. |
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Malaysian floods claim 12 lives KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 24 (Reuters) — Twelve persons died and 8,000 were forced from their homes as monsoon rain lashed northern Malaysia, police and media reports said today. Thousands of Malaysian tourists were trapped in southern Thailand, which has been badly flooded and without power and telephone links for two days. The rain has worried palm oil traders who fear the harvest and transportation of the crop in the world’s biggest palm oil producer could be disrupted. Seventy homes and several cars were swept away by flood waters in the northeastern Malaysian state of Terengganu, hit by its worst flooding since 1995. A housewife and her eight-year-old son in the town of Besut became the state’s latest fatalities after they were electrocuted when the woman tried to repair a water pump. Nearly 1,000 persons were evacuated from Kedah, making it the fourth state after Terengganu, Kelantan and Perlis to be hit by the flooding caused by the seasonal northeastern monsoon. Local newspapers carried a photo of a policeman in Terengganu standing neck-deep in water using a public telephone to relay information after the police station’s computers were soaked by water. The police was using a helicopter to deliver food to residents displaced by flooding in Terengganu’s interior. Train services to many parts of the northeast were cancelled because of submerged rails and at least one flight from Kuala Lumpur to Kelantan state capital Kota Baru was turned back due to heavy rain. Rescuers evacuated hundreds of more residents in Kelantan on Friday as the water level in local rivers reached dangerous levels.
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‘Titanic’ wins
Afghan hearts AFGHANISTAN’S Taliban regime is trying to crack down on a craze for the Hollywood blockbuster “Titanic” which has swept through Kabul in an unlikely display of resistance to the militia’s hardline rule. Cinema, television and music have been banned in the capital since the Islamic movement seized power four years ago. But underground video shops run a healthy trade in films, with action movies and Bollywood dance classics particular favourites. Now a people whose lives have been devastated by two decades of war have fallen for a love story and “Titanic” fever has gripped the city. Under the counter at market stalls traders have been doing brisk business in clothes, perfumes, lipsticks and shoes all carrying pictures of the ill-fated ship. One variety of rice has been named “Titanic”. Hairdressers have been offering a Leonardo DiCaprio cut, short at the back with a floppy fringe, though all men are also required to have untrimmed beards. “Everyone has access to films but you have to keep a low profile,” said one Afghan aid worker. “People used to watch Indian movies because they could understand the language. Now they have American films, and Titanic is everywhere.” Taliban leaders have complained about this spread of foreign culture, which has even reached the cake shops of the main shopping street. “It should be emphatically said,” the official Shariat Weekly newspaper declared this month, “that the Chicken Street food stores should know that moulding their wedding cakes in the shape of the Titanic ship, the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal and other designs is something against our national and Islamic culture.” Bakers should choose designs from the few traditional Afghan monuments still standing despite all the fighting, the paper suggested. Such cakes would “show the growth of our culture and prevent the sway of alien and infidel culture”. Before the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Kabul was fun. Pakistanis would drive up for the weekend to escape their more conservative society and enjoy Hindi movies and dances at the ballroom of the Intercontinental Hotel on a hillside above the city. Now the hotel is empty, its walls pocked with bullet holes, its ballroom locked, its swimming pool dry. Afghans go to Pakistan for their holidays.
— The Guardian |
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Cuban boy,
mother flee USA BLANCA ARENA,(Cuba), Nov 24 (Reuters) —A five-year-old boy and his mother turned up yesterday in Cuba after taking flight by a speedboat from Florida, in a case dubbed “Elian in reverse” by
US media due to parallels with the Elian Gonzalez story. Without consulting the boy’s US father, Cuban-born Arletis Blanco took her son Jonathon Colombini illegally back to her homeland on November 12 — in the opposite direction of Elian and his mother a year ago — to start a new life on the island. The boy’s Florida-based father, Jon Kenneth Colombini, said he did not consent to his son’s departure and was fighting with help from the
FBI and US the Government to get him back. |
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