W O R L D

200 arrested for anti-war protest
New York, March 28
The police arrested 215 protesters , including some 150 who lay down in the middle of New York’s 5th Avenue during the morning rush hour as part of a “die-in” in protest against the US-led war on Iraq. About 400 anti-war activists converged near Rockefeller Center in midtown Manhattan yesterday, many of them lying on their backs near the intersection of 49th Street and 5th Avenue and others holding signs and chanting “No War, No Oil, No Profit.”

US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair stand together after a joint news conference at the Camp David Presidential Retreat in Maryland on Thursday. The two leaders met to discuss the progress of the war on Iraq and plans for post-war reconstruction. — Reuters

GLOBAL MONITOR

Eric Walderman of British Royal Marine wears the kevlar helmet that saved his life after being hit by four bullets during a shootout in the Southern Iraq port of Umar Qsar. — Reuters

Removing Saddam difficult: Blair
London, March 28
Removing Saddam Hussein from power would be “tough and difficult,” Prime Minister Tony Blair said in an interview broadcast today. Speaking after wartime talks with US President George W. Bush, Mr Blair said it would take time to “prise the grip of Saddam off the country when it’s been there for over 20 years.”

Cast members of Musical Cats rehearse in Shanghai on Thursday. They will perform in Shanghai and Beijing between March 28 and May end. — Reuters

US envoy walks out of UN Security Council meeting
United Nations, March 28
Tensions in the U N Security Council escalated today with the US Ambassador walking out of a meeting during an Iraqi speech even as members appeared close to revamping the UN oil-for-food programme.

Baghdadis confident, sell dollars
Baghdad, March 28
Convinced that a US-British takeover of Iraq is looking less likely, Baghdad residents are increasingly selling their dollars and holding onto the local dinar which, a bit like Saddam Hussein, is standing its ground.

Iraq denies executing UK soldiers
Baghdad, March 28
Iraq denied a charge by British Prime Minister Tony Blair that it had executed British soldiers captured in the U S-led war on Iraq.

• ‘Uncle Saddam’ gets US DVD release

Videos

Iraq's Defence Minister says US-led forces would manage to encircle Baghdad within 5 to 10 days, but not without fierce street-to-street fighting. (28k, 56k)

Royal Marines have been moving their challenger II tanks in southern Iraq, preparing for a night of attack from Iraqi soldiers. (28k, 56k)

200 arrested for anti-war protest

New York, March 28
The police arrested 215 protesters , including some 150 who lay down in the middle of New York’s 5th Avenue during the morning rush hour as part of a “die-in” in protest against the US-led war on Iraq.

About 400 anti-war activists converged near Rockefeller Center in midtown Manhattan yesterday, many of them lying on their backs near the intersection of 49th Street and 5th Avenue and others holding signs and chanting “No War, No Oil, No Profit.”

The “die-in” resulted in about 150 arrests for disorderly conduct and blocking traffic, a police spokesman said. Other arrests came at smaller demonstrations at other intersections.

The two-hour peaceful protest, which closed part of 5th Avenue and snarled city traffic, was the latest of several acts of civil disobedience and anti-war demonstrations in New York and other large US cities.

Since last week, similar demonstrations have closed downtown San Francisco streets with more than 2,000 persons arrested.

“I’m against this illegal war of aggression,” said protester Daniel Grulich. “I think there are ways through diplomatic and multilateral action that we could have disarmed Saddam Hussein.”

Several of the demonstrators said they were also protesting media coverage of the war and accused “corporate media of making profits off the war.”

BOGOTA (COLOMBIA): Meanwhile, Colombians threw home-made hand grenades outside the US Embassy as thousands of demonstrators, some waving Iraqi flags, staged a violent anti-war protest in which at least 10 persons were injured.

The riot police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at the crowd of mostly university students yesterday, who were challenging Colombia’s diplomatic alliance with the USA over the war in Iraq. Reuters

Removing Saddam difficult: Blair

London, March 28
Removing Saddam Hussein from power would be “tough and difficult,” Prime Minister Tony Blair said in an interview broadcast today.

Speaking after wartime talks with US President George W. Bush, Mr Blair said it would take time to “prise the grip of Saddam off the country when it’s been there for over 20 years.”

“When you’ve had a whole series of security services repressing the local people, it was never going to be a situation these people were simply going to give up power and go away,” Mr Blair told BBC Radio.

Mr Blair flew back to London early today after two days of talks with Mr Bush and United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan about the war and post-war plans for Iraq.

BBC said in part of the interview to be broadcast later today, Mr Blair predicted a UN Security Council resolution mobilising humanitarian relief for Iraq would be passed within 24 hours. Yesterday. Mr Blair said he and Mr Bush had agreed to seek new UN resolutions on humanitarian relief, post-war plans and a promise to keep Iraq’s territorial boundaries intact.

“We’re not saying that the future of Iraq should be governed by the Americans and the British, we’re saying the future of Iraq should be governed by the Iraqi people,” Mr Blair told BBC.

“That is why we agreed — myself and President Bush, (Spanish) Prime Minister (Jose Maria) Aznar at the summit that we had in the Azores — that not just the humanitarian element but also the civil administration in Iraq should be governed by a UN resolution.”

At a press conference after yesterday’s meeting, Mr Bush said the trans-Atlantic coalition would keep fighting “however long it takes to win.”

Blair echoed that view. “I’ve always known that it was likely to have tough and difficult moments and I do point out again we’re a week into this and an awful lot has been achieved,” he told BBC. AP

US envoy walks out of UN Security Council meeting

United Nations, March 28
Tensions in the U N Security Council escalated today with the US Ambassador walking out of a meeting during an Iraqi speech even as members appeared close to revamping the UN oil-for-food programme.

Usually unfailingly polite, Mr John Negroponte, the US Ambassador to the United Nations, left the council chamber as Iraq’s UN Ambassador Mohammed Aldouri accused the USA of conducting a war to wipe out the Iraqi people.

“I did sit through quite a long part of what he had to say but I’d heard enough,” Mr Negroponte told reporters later. “I don’t accept any of the kinds of allegations and preposterous propositions that he put forward.”

Mr Aldouri spoke at the end of a two-day council meeting on Iraq, called by the Arab League, at which scores of non-council members denounced the invasion.

Behind closed doors, diplomats struggled with a resolution that would let Secretary-General Kofi Annan tap into billions of dollars in the UN oil-for-food programme to get relief supplies to the Iraqi people.

Most council members expected a vote on changes in the programme on Friday and Germany’s Ambassador, Gunter Pleuger, who is leading the negotiations, said he hoped to introduce a resolution before the end of the day.

But Russia and Syria opposed any immediate role for the USA and Britain to help coordinate the humanitarian programme in Iraqi territory they had secured, casting doubts on council unity in the future to help rebuild Iraq.

And the USA itself was studying new language proposed by British Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock that would eliminate a direct reference to a US-British role in coordinating the programme and underline Iraq’s sovereignty over its oil wealth.

Moscow’s UN Ambassador, Sergei Lavrov, indicated that he might still be open to a compromise, however, telling the Security Council, “We are prepared to resolve the questions of temporary amendments of procedures of the oil-for-food programme.” Reuters

Baghdadis confident, sell dollars

Baghdad, March 28
Convinced that a US-British takeover of Iraq is looking less likely, Baghdad residents are increasingly selling their dollars and holding onto the local dinar which, a bit like Saddam Hussein, is standing its ground.

At the Al-Saah money-changer in central Baghdad, 15 persons were seen coming in with greenbacks and leaving with suitcases full of dinars in one hour alone. “Today I sold $ 8,000 and bought only 5,000 worth,” said the exchange bureau’s owner, Hussein Haji.

The story is the same at another change bureau run by Ali Mohammed, who has $ 40,000 in his safe and is worried he won’t be able to get rid of it.

When US-led forces launched the war on March 20 to end President Saddam Hussein’s 24-year rule, the dollar was trading at 3,300 dinars after major demand for greenbacks from Iraqis fleeing ahead of the bombs, Mohammed said.

By late on Wednesday the dinar was trading at 2,850.

“The rebound came on March 23 when my countrymen discovered with pride that they could hold their own against the world’s top army,” Haji said. “The dollar fell to 2,900 dinars and hasn’t gone back up.” AFP

Iraq denies executing UK soldiers

Baghdad, March 28
Iraq denied a charge by British Prime Minister Tony Blair that it had executed British soldiers captured in the U S-led war on Iraq.

In an interview with Abu Dhabi television, Iraqi Information Minister Mohammad Saeed al-Sahaf said yesterday that Blair had “lied to the public” about the soldiers and added: “We haven’t executed anyone.”

At a joint news conference with US President in Camp David, Maryland, Blair denounced Iraq for releasing “those pictures of executed British soldiers”. Reuters

‘Uncle Saddam’ gets US DVD release

Los Angeles, March 28
A satirical documentary that portrays Saddam Hussein as a personal hygiene fanatic who likes to fish with grenades is getting a timely first time DVD release in the USA next week. “Uncle Saddam,” made by French freelance journalist Joel Soler in 2000, received critical acclaim at international film festivals two years ago and resulted in death threats against Soler at his Los Angeles area home. Reuters

GLOBAL MONITOR

. A rocket carrying Japan's first spy satellites take off from Tanegashima Space Centre, about 1000 km south-west of Tokyo, on Friday. Japan blasted its first spy satellites into orbit, giving Tokyo its first independent peek into heavily armed North Korea. — Reuters

EVEREST CLIMB IN RECORD TIME
KATHMANDU: A veteran Nepali climber, who has scaled Everest nine times, said he was planning to achieve the feat again in a record 15 hours. Lhakpa Gelu Sherpa, 35, wants to climb the 8,848 m mountain in a record time to celebrate the golden jubilee of the first ascent. He will climb from the advanced base camp, which is at about 5,800 m to the summit. AFP

HAND SLAP GETS HIM $ 1.2 M
SYDNEY: A senior Australian civil servant, with a doctorate in engineering, persuaded a court in Sydney that a slap on his right hand with a leather strap 19 years ago had blighted his educational outlook and career prospects. Paul Hogan, 32, won a damages payment of 1.2 m Australian dollars from the Catholic Church for the strapping he received when he was a 13-year-old schoolboy. DPA

LISA NOT PROUD OF MARRIAGE TO JACKSON
LOS ANGELES: It was one of the oddest mergers in showbiz — the furtive 1994 marriage between the self-proclaimed King of Pop and the daughter of the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll. But Lisa Marie Presley said her attraction to Michael Jackson, the second of her three husbands, was real. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, released on Thursday, she said she was turned on by his mysterious ways, wanted to protect him from child-abuse accusations and thought they could save the world together. Yes, she did sleep with him. And no, she’s not proud of the whole experience. Reuters

MOTHER THROWS CHILDREN INTO RIVER
TOKYO: A 32-year-old Japanese woman threw her children into a river in Japan’s north-western Niigata prefecture on Thursday from a 5-m-high bridge and one later died, the police said on Friday. The woman, whose name was withheld, threw the children, a 5-year-old son and a 3-year-old daughter, into the Kakizaki river the police said. DPA