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| Thursday, December 7, 2000, Chandigarh, India   
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A confident George W. Bush said on Tuesday that he was ready to “seize the moment” as soon as the presidential election dispute was settled, while the Democrat vice-presidential candidate, Mr Joe, Lieberman, acknowledged that the Florida Supreme Court hearing this week would be the “final arbiter” of the outcome. All set for Estrada trial UN extends aid plan
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| Musharraf: ball in
India’s court ISLAMABAD, Dec 6 — Pakistani military ruler General Pervez Musharraf said today that the doors for talks with India were still open despite Delhi’s rejection of tripartite talks involving Islamabad to settle the Kashmir issue. 31 guerrillas die in Lanka
TOKYO, Dec 6 — A Japanese court today rejected a lawsuit filed by nearly 50 ageing Philippine women demanding cash compensation for being forced to work as sex slaves for the Japanese imperial army in the 1930s and 1940s. Curing diseases by
‘boiling’ patients 7 workers die in Dhaka clashes
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7 killed in SA poll violence JOHANNESBURG, Dec 6 (DPA) — Local elections in South Africa were marred today by seven deaths, and although the ruling African National Congress was expected to take 58 per cent of the votes, it suffered a setback in President Thabo Mbeki’s voting district. Mr Johannes van Zyl of the Democratic Alliance (DA) won 3,423 votes or 77 per cent, as compared to the 16 per cent won by the candidate of Mbeki’s ANC in the district where Mbeki and his deputy, Jacob Zuma, had voted earlier in the day, SAPA news agency reported. Results in the country’s second multiracial local elections since 1994, are expected by Friday. Five men and a woman, who died after gunmen opened fire on voters at a polling station in Mandela Park, east of central Johannesburg. In Somkele in Kwazulu-Natal province, another voter was killed in a shooting the police said. Five persons, said to be supporters of the opposition United Democratic Movement (UDM), were arrested in connection with the Mandela Park shooting, SAPA reported. Gauteng Provincial Police Commissioner Sharma Maharaj said 300 policemen had been deployed in the area where 13 UDM and ANC supporters were killed in political violence last year. Reinforcements were called in from Pretoria and Johannesburg. SAPA said the election was peaceful but slow. Tony Leon, a DA leader, said a lack of public interest was not due to voter apathy, but due to fatigue. “There have been four elections in six years,” he said, adding “when change does not happen people become cynical and disillusioned.’’ Political analysts said last week the elections would show whether the DA, created by the merger of the Democratic Party and the New National Party, could reach beyond its traditional electorate of white and mixed-race South Africans and attract black votes. Recent surveys showed much dissatisfaction in the ANC among blacks, mainly because of the former liberation movement’s failure to fulfil its promises. According to one of the polls, confidence in the government fell from 60 per cent in November last year to 43 per cent in September this year. |
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Bush transition team gets push A confident George W. Bush said on Tuesday that he was ready to “seize the moment” as soon as the presidential election dispute was settled, while the Democrat vice-presidential candidate, Mr Joe, Lieberman, acknowledged that the Florida Supreme Court hearing this week would be the “final arbiter” of the outcome. As Mr Bush spoke in Texas, his Republican running mate, Mr Dick Cheney, also reflected his party’s conviction that the contest with Mr Al Gore was swinging their way by telling congressional leaders in Washington that the transition to a Bush presidency was “up and running and operational”. Republican delight at Monday’s dismissal of Mr Gore’s legal challenge to the election results in Florida was plain for all to see as the Bush-Cheney team began to increase the tempo of their push for power. “The judge gave a very thorough opinion on Tuesday. It was a definitive opinion,” Mr Bush said as he arrived at the Texas capitol building in Austin. Earlier, he had received his first direct national security briefing from CIA officials since he and Mr Gore were both briefed on international intelligence developments last week. Officially the Bush team is sticking to its decision not to appear premature in laying claim to the White House before the Florida courts have finished hearing Mr Gore’s challenges. Mr Bush even went out of his way to appear magnanimous towards his rival on Tuesday, telling reporters that Mr Gore faced “a difficult decision”. “I can understand what he may be going through. It’s been a very interesting time for both of us,” he added. But the reality is that the Bush-Cheney team now believes it is only days away from forcing Mr Gore to concede the election, given Judge N Sanders Sauls’s ruling against the Vice-President in Tallahassee on Monday. Meanwhile, when the Rev Jesse Jackson called on supporters outside the Florida Supreme Court in Tallahassee last week to pray, Bush supporters driving past starting honking their horns and chanting: “Go home, Jesse! Go home, Jesse!” There was tension in the air. The biggest Bush demonstration in the state capital was almost completely white. Then, as the legal battle for votes heated up, the biggest and best-organised Democrat demonstration was outside the Supreme Court, and it was mostly black. Now as the election finally approaches its end-game, the racial divide split between the Democrats and Republicans grows wider than ever. There is a strong sense that the party that represents the African-American voter has lost because many of them were intimidated and disenfranchised, and that a Republican administration would enter the White House deeply distrusted by the black electorate. “It would be ludicrous to think that there won’t be great resentment,” Joanne Bland of the National Voting Rights Museum in Selma, Alabama, said on Tuesday. “But we have to use this as a catalyst and not sit back and lick our wounds.” Ms Bland, a veteran civil rights activist who was jailed more than a dozen times as a teenager in Selma for demonstrating for the right to vote, added: “These things didn’t just happen overnight, it’s the same old thing with a new face but finally people will see what has been going on.” It was significant that in the final whirlwind days of Mr Al Gore’s campaign the places he chose to visit in Memphis and in Philadelphia were black churches in black areas. Mr Gore may have appeared awkward as he tried to clap along to the gospel choirs which greeted his appearance, but it was nevertheless clear that he and his party enjoyed the wholehearted support of the congregations. While Mr Bush was being greeted and supported by the likes of Hank Williams Jr and Bo Derek, Mr Gore was being sung to on stage by such black stars as Stevie Wonder, Wyclef Jean and the Rev Al Green. In the end the Republicans had as much difficulty as ever in attracting the black vote. More than 80 per cent of male African Americans — and 90 per cent female — voted for the Democrats. Although Mr Bush made an effort to have black faces on stage at the Republican convention in Philadelphia, many remarked that the effect was that of a basketball game in Utah: an audience of white people gazing at a stage where black people they had never met were performing. No one worked harder to mobilise the black vote than Mr Jackson, and if all the intended votes had been counted and the Democrats had taken Florida — as most of the analysis indicates that it should have — Mr Gore would have been for ever in his debt. — The Guardian, London |
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All set for Estrada trial MANILA, Dec 6 (Reuters) — The Philippine authorities said today that security had been beefed up and the police was prepared to deal with the rallies when President Joseph Estrada’s impeachment trial begins at the Senate. They also said a plan by opposition groups to surround the Senate building, where Estrada faces Asia’s first impeachment trial from tomorrow, will not be permitted. Estrada faces charges of corruption and bribery and groups both opposed and in support of him have said they will hold demonstrations in front of the Senate. “We have been preparing for this for some time. We have been coordinating with the Senate security on this,’’ Executive Secretary Ronaldo Zamora told the local radio. “One side will be reserved for pro-Estrada forces and the other side for the anti-Estrada forces,’’ he added. “If they plan to surround the Senate, we will make sure that will not happen.’’ The activists will march in silence. At the Senate a flame will be lit and activists will cry out in unison, re-enacting the Old Testament story of the walls of Jericho crumbling before the Israelites. But the police said they would not allow demonstrations close to the Senate. Cabioon, ground commander for Senate security, said around 1,000 policemen would be deployed to barricade the Senate grounds, in addition to the 200 marines regularly assigned to perimeter security. Estrada will be thrown out of office if he is convicted on any one of the four charges of corruption, bribery, betrayal of public trust and culpable violation of the constitution by a two-third majority in the 22-member Senate. Political analysts say the trial can go either way and a full-page newspaper advertisement by an opposition group indicated the voting will be close. DPA adds: A lawyer of Joseph Estrada on Wednesday shrugged off plans by the prosecution to ask the chief executive’s mistresses to testify in his impeachment trial over bribery and corruption charges. Former justice secretary Estelito Mendoza, one of Estrada’s four defence lawyers, said the prosecutors appeared to have been annoyed when their motion to inspect luxurious homes allegedly owned by the President or his mistresses were rejected. The prosecution has insisted that the inspection of the lavish homes was “very material” to allegations that the President has unexplained wealth and failed to declare all his properties in his 1999 statements of assets and liabilities. |
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UN extends aid plan for Iraq UNITED NATIONS, Dec 6 (PTI) — The Security Council has extended the four-year-old “oil-for-food programme” for Iraq, granting some concessions that Baghdad was demanding, including faster delivery of electricity equipment, more fund for the poorest and additional $ 530 million to help its ailing oil industry. The council has also agreed in principle to release up to 600 million Euros of Iraq’s oil income in cash from the tightly controlled UN account, to train and pay maintenance workers in its already dilapidated oil industry. The opponents, however, said proper safeguards should be observed to ensure that the money did not reach the Iraqi government . In return, Iraq is expected to work with the United Nations and the council’s approval is needed to spend the additional amount. The unanimous resolution came last night, only hours before the programme was due to expire at midnight and after days of intense debate between Iraq’s supporters led by France and its opponent headed by the USA. The 15-member council decided to cut down the money given to the fund from which compensation is paid to the individual and corporations who were victims of Iraqi aggression against Kuwait in 1990 from 30 per cent to 25 per cent of revenue received from sale of Iraqi oil. The 5 per cent would be strictly used for humanitarian projects to address the needs of most vulnerable groups, the resolution said. |
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Musharraf: ball in
India’s court ISLAMABAD, Dec 6 (PTI) — Pakistani military ruler General Pervez Musharraf said today that the doors for talks with India were still open despite Delhi’s rejection of tripartite talks involving Islamabad to settle the Kashmir issue. “I hope Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee will positively respond to our offer. Now the ball is in India’s court”, he told reporters here. “We are waiting for Mr Vajpayee’s response as the reaction to our offer of tripartite talks has come from the Indian External Affairs Ministry,” he said. “Neither am I disappointed at the rejection nor is the issue closed,” General Musharraf said. An External Affairs Ministry spokesman in Delhi said yesterday that there was no room for tripartite talks. General Musharraf said Pakistan had ordered its troops to show maximum restraint along the border after India’s announcement of a ceasefire in Kashmir during Ramzan. |
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31 guerrillas
die in Lanka COLOMBO, Dec 6 (PTI) — Suspected LTTE rebels today blasted a civilian bus in eastern Batticaloa killing four persons and injuring 23 others, while 31 guerrillas and 12 soldiers were killed in army’s offensive to recapture some of the key areas in country’s north. An army spokesman said a Colombo-bound bus from eastern Batticaloa was caught up in the claymore mine explosion at Pallayaraddi village. Four persons, including a policeman, were killed in the blast. Of the 23 injured, the condition of three bus passengers including three Sinhalese doctors, was stated to be serious. Today’s attack was seen as a retaliation to yesterday’s limited army offensive in Jaffna peninsula in which troops captured over six sq km of the territory. Twentyone soldiers were injured during the day-long offensive, it added. |
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2 UK Acts of monarchy challenged LONDON, Dec 6 (AP) — A British newspaper said today that it was challenging two legal pillars of the monarchy in court on the grounds that they violated human rights. The Guardian, a left-leaning broadsheet, said the Act of Settlement and the Treason Felony Act — pieces of legislation that help define the status of the royal family within the Constitution — clash with the UK’s new Human Rights Act. The Act of Settlement of 1701 outlines the rules of royal succession and the powers of the crown. It bars non-Protestants, persons married to non-Protestants, children who are adopted and children born to unmarried parents from succeeding the throne. “No one can really defend an Act which forbids Catholics from becoming a country’s head of state,” said The Guardian’s Editor, Alan Rusbridger, said. The Act also discriminated against women by favouring male heirs, The Guardian said, and should be reinterpreted or removed from law. The newspaper also argues that the 1848 Treason Felony Act - which prescribes deportation for those who advocate republicanism - contravenes free-speech guarantees in the European Convention on Human Rights. The Guardian said the Act of Settlement had disqualified a number of persons from eligibility for the throne. As many are German, it placed an advertisement in the German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung inviting disqualified nobles to join the legal action, which will be led by human rights lawyer Geoffrey Robertson. “We very much hope that the odd Hapsburg or Saxe-Coburg might join in,” Rusbridger said. |
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Jail riots in Pak ISLAMABAD, Dec 6 (PTI) — Scores of prisoners have been injured in jail riots in southwestern Sind and North West Frontier Province when the inmates protested against the attitude of the jail officials and lack of facilities in prisons, reports here said today. The police teargassed prisoners in Central Prison, Dera Ismail Khan, in North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) yesterday to quell violence and prevent jailbreaks, NWFP Home Secretary Syed Mazhar Ali Shah said. |
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Court rejects plea in sex slave case TOKYO, Dec 6 (Reuters) — A Japanese court today rejected a lawsuit filed by nearly 50 ageing Philippine women demanding cash compensation for being forced to work as sex slaves for the Japanese imperial army in the 1930s and 1940s. In contrast to a similar case last week, the court failed to recognise their suffering or acknowledge that the army’s treatment of the women violated international treaties. Some 46 Filipinos had demanded $ 8.3 million in compensation for being forced to work as sex slaves for Japanese troops in the Philippines. An earlier suit by the women was rejected in 1998 by a lower court. They promptly appealed to the Tokyo High Court, which upheld the decision today. “The Japanese army raped us, and I was treated like a pig,” said 73-year-old Ortencia Martinez, adding “I will not forget the pain.’’ In handing down the ruling, Tokyo High Court Judge Masato Niimura said: “In light of international law, individuals are not granted the right to demand compensation from the country that did them harm.’’ A court official declined to provide details, but lawyers for the women said the ruling was so brief it took only five minutes to read. |
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Curing diseases by
‘boiling’ patients MOSCOW, Dec 6 (DPA) — Scientists in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk claim to have devised a new method of anaesthetisation which allows them to raise body temperature enough to kill bacteria, viruses and mutated cells without harming the patient. The technique allows body temperature to rise beyond the formerly fatal threshold of 42.5°C by 1.5 degrees, reaching the 43°C mark for effective purification, Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda reported yesterday. It can be used to combat diseases like hepatitis and cancer if applied in the early stages of cell degeneration, the researchers claim. The subject is attached to breathing apparatus and equipment to monitor heart and brain activity, and immersed up to the neck in a heated tank. |
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7 workers die in Dhaka clashes DHAKA,
Dec 6 (DPA) — Tension mounted in the southern Bangladeshi port of Mongla today following overnight clashes between striking dock workers and the police that left seven persons dead and 22 injured, trade union officials and witnesses said. Reinforcements of the paramilitary border troops were rushed to the country’s second-biggest seaport to restore order after more than 2,000 angry dock workers went on a rampage smashing transports and looting
shops, the witnesses said. Earlier, port officials had said four dock workers were gunned down by the police on Tuesday as the strikers broke through a road barricade and attacked the local police station with home-made explosives and stones. |
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Trees in swastika
pattern felled