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More Intersting News from the Publi
Subject: More Intersting News from the Publications
UK to discourage trade with Burma
12:04 p.m. Jun 19, 1997 Eastern
LONDON, June 19 (Reuter) - Britain's new Labour government said on
Thursday it would not spend any money promoting trade with Burma until
Rangoon made progress on democracy.
Foreign Office Minister Derek Fatchett said in a parliamentary written
answer that British officials would also point out that activists have
urged business not to trade and invest in the military-ruled state.
Britain has repeatedly criticised Burma's military rulers, the State Law
and Order Restoration Council (SLORC). Last week London protested at the
arrest of some 100 members of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's
National League for Democracy (NLD).
Suu Kyi's NLD won a May 1990 election by a landslide but the SLORC
refused to accept the result.
``The government will not provide any financial support to companies for
trade missions to Burma or for trade promotion activities within Burma
until there is progress towards democratic reform and respect for human
rights,'' Fatchett said in his written answer.
``Officials in the UK and at the British embassy in Rangoon will
continue to provide British companies with routine advice...''
``Wherever possible such advice will...draw to businessmen's attention
statements by Aung San Suu Kyi and other pro-democracy leaders
discouraging trade and investment in Burma.''
Fatchett said Britain would be encouraging its European Union partners
to take similar action. ^REUTER@
Hong Kong Standard
Cambodian PM regrets Albright's no-show
PHNOM PENH: United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright
cancelled a trip to Cambodia because of security concerns, and the
country's First Prime Minister said on Thursday he regretted the
decision.
``I am very regretful that she is not coming because I wanted to meet
her and talk about a number of major issues,'' Prince Norodom Ranariddh
told reporters.
US State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns told reporters travelling
with Mrs Albright that Cambodia's security situation was ``serious and
unpredictable'' and would not have permitted the type of visit she
wanted.
Ranariddh said Mrs Albright had considered stopping off at Phnom Penh
airport for talks with him and Second Prime Minister Hun Sen, but the
two premiers had agreed that such a visit would not have been
appropriate.
``She wanted to come to the airport, but Hun Sen and I agreed that if we
just met her at the airport we would be breaking the principles of
protocol,'' the prince said.
Mrs Albright is due to visit the region again in three weeks for an
Association of Southeast Asian Nations meeting, and Ranariddh said he
hoped she would visit Cambodia at that time.
Ranariddh and Hun Sen share power in a coalition formed after 1993
elections supervised by the United Nations. But relations between the
two have been deteriorating since last year when Ranariddh demanded a
greater share of power to govern in the provinces.
The political tension resulted in a battle on the streets of Phnom Penh
between bodyguards loyal to the two prime ministers last week.
The disintegrating Khmer Rouge guerilla force has also become a key
issue of contention between the two with both men seeking political
advantage as the group splits up.
Ranariddh also said on Thursday that there was no fresh news on the fate
of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot.
He said the guerilla faction that rebelled against Pol Pot and captured
him had to turn him over to authorities if it wanted to make an amnesty
deal with the government.
Ranariddh and Hun Sen were due to hold separate talks on Thursday with
special envoys from the Group of Seven industrialised countries who were
expected to express the group's concern about the political tension in
Cambodia.
Claude Martin, the French Foreign Ministry's deputy secretary general,
and Yukio Imagawa, a former Japanese ambassador in Phnom Penh, arrived
in Cambodia on Wednesday.
G7 leaders and Russian President Boris Yeltsin, meeting in Denver last
weekend, called for an end to the political chaos and violence in
Cambodia that they said threatened to shatter the relative stability
since the 1993 elections.
At the end of their summit, the G7 urged Cambodia's fractious leaders to
``demonstrate their commitment to holding free and fair elections by
setting a specific date''.
Ranariddh announced on Tuesday that he and Hun Sen had agreed that
Cambodia's next general election will be in May 1998. - Reuter
Albright's trip underscores divisions on Vietnam
HANOI, Vietnam: United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright's
visit to Vietnam highlights emotional divisions in the US over relations
with its one-time enemy.
Mrs Albright was to arrive late on Thursday. Her plans include signing a
copyright agreement and breaking ground for a US consulate in Ho Chi
Minh City, formerly known as Saigon.
American business leaders based in Vietnam are applauding the visit.
Back in the US, however, many relatives of American servicemen still
missing from the Vietnam War say Mrs Albright's focus should be on
healing old wounds before making business deals.
In the weeks ahead of her visit, the prisoner-of-war lobby group,
National Alliance of Families, sent dozens of faxes to newspapers,
embassies and Vietnamese government offices asking Vietnam to surrender
American servicemen into Mrs Albright's custody.
``The secretary should be asking Vietnam to be more forthcoming on the
POW issue,'' said Dolores Apodaca Alfond, chairwoman of the Bellevue,
Washington-based group.
Ms Alfond's brother, Major Victor Apodaca, is still missing in Vietnam,
more than 30 years after his F-4 Phantom was shot down near the
demilitarized zone that used to divide South and North Vietnam.
Ms Alfond, a vocal critic of President Clinton's Vietnam policy, has
repeatedly urged the president to limit ties with Hanoi until the
POW-MIA issue is fully resolved. About 1,600 US servicemen remain
unaccounted for in Vietnam.
By contrast, business executives say Washington has been moving too
slowly to expand relations with Vietnam.
Washington's cautious re-engagement with Vietnam began in 1994, when
Clinton lifted a decades-old embargo on Hanoi and allowed American
businesses to open representative offices in Vietnam.
Formal diplomatic ties were established the following year, but it took
until May of this year to actually exchange ambassadors.
``From a business standpoint, we like to see things move faster,''
American Chamber of Commerce President Brad LaLonde said. ``Anything
dealing with the United States and Vietnam and their relationship has
been slow coming and controversial.''
During her visit, Mrs Albright will announce plans to open a US
consulate in the economic hub of Ho Chi Minh City, a Foreign Ministry
spokesman said.
In exchange, Vietnam plans to open a consulate in San Francisco to cater
to the large Vietnamese community living in California.
``Having the consulate in Ho Chi Minh City is very important for
American businesses that are operating there and have not been receiving
the support they need,'' Mr LaLonde said.
In meetings on Friday with Premier Vo Van Kiet and Communist Party
General Secretary Do Muoi, Mrs Albright will discuss economics, but also
human rights issues and the search for America's MIAs and POWs.
Her trip comes just six weeks after Vietnam and the United States
exchanged ambassadors, a move Ms Alfond says was a tragic error.
``We now have diplomatic ties with the same communist government that we
fought and died against,'' Ms Alfond said in a telephone interview from
her home in Washington state. ``We're now treating them like friends
while they're holding our boys prisoner.''
The National Alliance of Families insists Vietnam is holding live
American POWs - a prospect most experts, including US Ambassador and
former POW Pete Peterson, say is highly unlikely.
For Peterson, who spent 6-1/2 years in the notorious ``Hanoi Hilton''
prison, Washington is better served by engaging Vietnam, building a
relationship and cooperating on the POW and MIA issue.
Mrs Albright is expected to sign a copyright agreement that should clear
the way for improved trade ties.
``The copyright agreement will help US businesses, but it will also help
Vietnam,'' said Ho Chi Minh City-based American lawyer Michael Scown.
``With copyright protections in place, Vietnam is likely to attract more
high-end technology imports.''
Her visit is the second by a US secretary of state. Warren Christopher
visited in 1995. - AP
Top cultist pleads guilty to subway gassing murder
TOKYO: A former top member of the doomsday cult Aum Shinri Kyo pleaded
guilty on Thursday to murder charges in the Tokyo subway gassing that
killed 12 people and injured thousands more.
Yasuo Hayashi, 39, was arrested in December on a remote southern island
after 20 months on the run. He was the last person among five Aum Shinri
Kyo cult members accused of planting lethal nerve gas on Tokyo subways
in March 1995, which left 12 dead and thousand others injured.
In his first trial session at the Tokyo District Court on Thursday,
Hayashi admitted he stabbed three plastic bags containing sarin nerve
gas with a sharpened tip of an umbrella inside a subway car, court
officials said.
Prosecutors say Hayashi alone was responsible for the death of eight
passengers and the injury of nearly 2,500 others.
Japan's Kyodo News service said Hayashi, who once was called the
``murder machine'' of the cult group, apologised to the court: ``I'm
really sorry for what I did. I went on the run because I was so scared
that I would not escape capital punishment if I was ever arrested,''
Hayashi told the judges.
Hayashi also pleaded guilty to charges of assisting murder in a separate
nerve gas attack in June 1994 that killed seven people in the central
city of Matsumoto, as well as a failed attempt to release cyanide gas at
one of Tokyo's most crowded railway stations in May 1996.
Prosecutors have charged Hayashi with murder in conspiracy with his cult
guru Shoko Asahara, who founded Aum Shinri Kyo. Asahara is being tried
separately for murder charge in the subway gassing.
Asahara has acknowledged that his group produced the nerve gas. But he
told the court that senior disciples ignored his repeated orders in the
days before the March 1995 attack to call it off. Asahara has denied
responsibility for 16 other charges he faces. - AP
Bangladesh
Eight feared drowned in border crossing attempt
REUTER in Cox's Bazar
Eight Burmese Muslims are feared to have drowned when crossing a
swirling border river trying to enter Bangladesh.
Bangladeshi border guards recovered three bodies but five were still
missing after a boat, carrying 12 Rohingya Muslims from Burma's Arakan
province, sank in the Naf River early on Tuesday.
"The accident occurred apparently because of the heavy load on the small
boat ferrying the Rohingyas to Bangladesh to join thousands of other
illegal entrants," a police officer said.
"There had been a strong current in the river and the wind was blowing,"
he said.
The guards rescued four others in the Cox's Bazar district, police said.
Bangladesh reported a fresh influx of Burmese Muslims this week,
apparently set off by food shortages, unemployment and forced labour in
Arakan.
"Some 20 to 30 families sneak in each night," said a police officer in
Cox's Bazar, which borders Arakan.
"At least 5,000 Burmese Muslims . . . have entered Bangladesh in the
past month," he said.
The influx began despite about 21,500 Burmese Rohingyas being detained
already in two camps, waiting to return home after the long-running
repatriation process was disrupted on May 1, officials said.
The officials blamed the suspension on delays by Burmese immigration
authorities.
More than 250,000 Muslims fled to southeast Bangladesh in early 1992
from Burma's Muslim-majority Arakan province, complaining of military
persecution.
The Straits Times (Singapore)
Asean sets up network to save region's environment
By Luz Baguioro in Manila
MANILA -- Asean plans to set up a regional network to protect the
region's biological wealth through institutional links among
member-countries and with the European Union.
Mr Victor Ramos, the Philippines' Environment and Natural Resources
Secretary, said that the Asean Regional Centre for Bio-diversity
Conservation (ARCBC) would help member-countries curb destruction of the
environment.
"Given the complexity and the magnitude of the problem, there is an
urgent need to support initiatives aimed at developing linkages and
synergies and integrating efforts on a regional basis," Mr Ramos said.
The ARCBC will be set up in August in Laguna province in the Philippines
with a grant of 8.5 million European Currency Units (S$13.9 million)
from the European Union. National Bio-diversity Reference Units will
also be established within existing institutions in other Asean
countries.
Asean has committed 1.8 million ECUs to the centre over the next five
years.
Experts said the region's increasing economic prosperity has incurred
environmental costs for South-east Asia, considered the world's richest
region in terms of biological wealth.
Rapid and continuing depletion of these resources is blamed on
indiscriminate logging, destruction of mangrove forests and corals,
population pressure and industrial pollution.
Environmental experts reckoned about 70 per cent of the region's
original vegetation cover and 40 per cent of its coral reefs have been
destroyed.
In the Philippines, for instance, as much as three quarters of the
country's 44,000 sq km of coral reefs had been destroyed by 1981. And
only 149,000 ha of mangrove forests remain, from the original 450,000 ha
in 1918.
South-east Asia also has the highest rate of species loss in the world.
About 120 plant species endemic in the Philippines are threatened with
extinction. About 100 bird species in Thailand are endangered, and at
least six have become extinct in recent years.
Although many protected areas have been identified within Asean,
Philippine officials said efforts to manage these areas effectively are
hampered by the lack of trained personnel, low levels of public
awareness and the lack of information to back management strategies and
trans-border conservation policies. The limited sharing of information
among member-countries is also an obstacle.
Aside from Asean, the Philippines will also be getting support from the
United Nations Industrial Development Organisation in coming up with
ways to reduce destruction of the environment brought about by
small-scale mining operations.
The new technologies will reduce and eventually cut out the use of
mercury and cyanide by small-scale miners in gold rush areas in the
southern Philippines, said Mr Edwin Domingo, acting director of the
Mines and Geosciences Bureau.
FOUR DROWN: Four Myanmar nationals died and six others were missing
after two boats carrying them illegally into Bangladesh sank in the
frontier river, officials said yesterday.
Six others were rescued and later detained by Bangladeshi guards after
the boats capsized early on Tuesday in the Naaf river. -- AFP.
Filed at 9:49 a.m. EDT
By The Associated Press
BEIJING (AP) -- Chinese authorities have torn down mosques and canceled
religious classes to counter unrest among Muslims in the northwestern
province of Xinjiang.
At least 40 people have been arrested in the crackdown in the province
around the Xinjiang city of Yining, where Feb. 5 riots killed at least
10 people and injured 140, according to the state-run newspaper Xinjiang
Daily.
Authorities have stepped up efforts nationwide to forestall any trouble
that might disrupt Hong Kong's return Tuesday to China.
Of particular concern are border regions like Xinjiang and Tibet. In
Xinjiang, the Muslim ethnic majority has grown increasingly angry over
Chinese rule and an influx of Chinese settlers.
Like other religious believers, Muslims are generally allowed to
practice their faith, within limits proscribed by the ruling Communist
Party. But authorities have tightened control over unauthorized
religious activities after protests and bombings in the spring.
They shut down 133 mosques and closed 105 clandestine classes. Teachers
found to be promoting Muslim separatism were fired and about 500 of
their students were dismissed, the newspaper said in a June 21 report
seen today in Beijing.
The report said the local Communist Party had recruited hundreds of new
officials, militiamen and police to impose order and help with poverty
relief.
Filed at 6:21 a.m. EDT
By The Associated Press
PHUKET, Thailand (AP) -- A U.S. citizen was shot and killed in what
appeared to be an execution-style slaying outside his home on the
southern Thai resort island of Phuket.
Danis Wayne Tong, 48, a native of San Francisco, was killed by two
bullets fired into the back of his head Tuesday as he parked his car in
his garage.
Tong's wife heard the shots and said she saw a man running from the
garage, then fleeing on a motorcycle.
Two men were seen loitering around Tong's house in recent days,
neighbors said. When they were confronted, they said they were police
investigating Tong for suspected drug trafficking.
Phuket police officials later said they were not investigating Tong for
anything. Tong had lived in Thailand for several years.
Filed at 5:20 a.m. EDT
By The Associated Press
BEIJING (AP) -- Chinese authorities have torn down illegally built
mosques and closed down unauthorized religious classes in a campaign to
counter unrest among Muslims living in the northwestern region of
Xinjiang.
The crackdown in the region around the Xinjiang city of Yining, where
riots Feb. 5 killed at least 10 people and injured 140, has resulted in
the arrests of at least 40 people, the state-run newspaper Xinjiang
Daily reported in a June 21 report seen Thursday in Beijing.
Authorities have stepped up efforts nationwide to forestall any trouble
that might disrupt Hong Kong's return Tuesday to China.
Of particular concern are border regions like Xinjiang and Tibet. In
Xinjiang, the Muslim ethnic majority has grown increasingly angry over
Chinese rule and an influx of Chinese settlers.
Like other religious believers, Muslims are generally allowed to
practice their faith, within limits set by the ruling Communist Party.
But authorities have tightened control over unauthorized religious
activities following protests and bombings this spring.
They shut down 133 mosques and closed 105 clandestine classes. Teachers
found to be promoting Muslim separatism were fired and about 500 of
their students were dismissed, the newspaper said.
The report said the local Communist Party had recruited hundreds of new
officials, militiamen and police in a bid to impose order and to help
with poverty relief.
In a June 19 report, also received Thursday, the newspaper said 300
religious figures in the Xinjiang capital of Urumqi had been taken to
see an exhibition on combating terrorism.
Urumqi was shaken Feb. 25 when at least three bombs planted on public
buses exploded almost simultaneously, killing nine people and injuring
58.
On a weekend visit to Xinjiang, Defense Minister Chi Haotian ordered
soldiers there to increase drills and patrols to ensure a safe and
stable frontier. His comments apparently were intended to preclude
trouble along China's long border with its mainly Muslim Central Asian
neighbors.
June 26, 1997
UN Estimates Drug Business Is Huge
------------------------------------------------------------------------
A.P. INDEXES: TOP STORIES | NEWS | BUSINESS | SPORTS | ENTERTAINMENT
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Filed at 3:15 a.m. EDT
By The Associated Press
VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- Drug trafficking has become a $400
billion-a-year business worldwide, equal to 8 percent of all trade, the
United Nations said today in its first comprehensive report on the
illicit industry.
The report by the Vienna-based U.N. International Drug Control Program
estimated that illegal drugs are bigger business than all exports of
automobiles and about equal to the worldwide trade in textiles.
Seizures of drugs have been rising for about a decade, and the United
Nations estimated that police now intercept 30 percent of all cocaine
and 10 percent to 15 percent of heroin shipments. But demand and profits
are so high that police work has barely dented the business. Drug
traffickers find the risks worth taking.
``Profits on a mere fraction of the drugs successfully trafficked can
cover the costs of the lost cargo,'' the report said. Three-quarters of
all drug shipments would have to be intercepted to seriously cut into
the profitability of the business, it said.
The 300-page report was the first effort by the U.N. organization to
detail the worldwide drug business.
The world body said it hopes its broad description of the illicit
industry will help law enforcement agencies attack it more effectively.
Publication of the report comes at a time when Secretary-General Kofi
Annan is pressing the United Nations to get more deeply involved in the
fight against drugs and organized crime.
The U.N. report said the abuse of synthetic drugs, primarily stimulants,
has increased most rapidly.
Marijuana is the most widely used drug, the report said, with about 140
million users, or about 2.5 percent of the world population. However, it
estimated the number of users of synthetic stimulants at 30 million --
more than use heroin and probably more than use cocaine.
It reported a high level of use of methamphetamine in North America, the
Far East and some Southeast Asian countries.
Use of marijuana and cocaine among U.S. eighth-grade students doubled
between 1991-94, it said without providing details, and the average
first use of marijuana was at 13 years old.
The estimated $400 billion annual revenue -- 8 percent of total global
exports of $4.95 trillion in 1995 -- was generated by an industry
encompassing poor farmers in Asia and South America, laboratories, an
army of recruits to run the drugs, and a hierarchy that reaps the
profits.
International organized crime groups have plowed profits from other
illegal activities such as smuggling cigarettes and jewels into the drug
business. As the world financial network has expanded, money laundering
has become more professional and more global.
The report estimated profit margins for methamphetamine at 240 percent;
crack cocaine at 300 percent; and heroin at 100 percent. The average
price of a kilogram of raw opium in Pakistan is about $90 but sells for
$290,000 in the United States.
Filed at 2:10 a.m. EDT
By The Associated Press
BEIJING (AP) -- Veteran dissident Wei Jingsheng has been severely beaten
by other prison inmates who were told they could get reduced sentences
if they attacked him, human rights advocates said Thursday.
The beatings have accelerated a serious deterioration in Wei's already
poor health, family members told the New York-based group Human Rights
in China.
The 46-year-old Wei, China's most famous dissident, is serving a 14-year
sentence at a prison in northern Hebei Province, near Beijing, for
advocating democratic reforms.
The most recent beating, and most severe, occurred when Wei resisted an
order by the inmate guarding him to put down a screwdriver he had
planned to use, Wei told his brother and sister when they visited him in
prison on June 19.
Five other prisoners, also in charge of watching Wei, joined in the
beating, pushing Wei to the floor to make it easier to kick and pummel
him.
The day after the beating, the prisoner who initiated it was given a
reduced sentence as a reward for his actions, Wei's brother and sister
told Human Rights in China.
Wei asked his family to lodge a protest over the beatings with the
Justice Ministry. No one answered the telephone at the ministry early
Thursday.
Because of injuries to his neck, Wei now cannot hold his head erect
without using his hands for support. His heart and stomach ailments have
worsened, as has his high blood pressure, Human Rights in China said.
It said Wei has been refused outside medical treatment by prison
officials who say such care has not been sanctioned by their superiors.
Labor camp and jail officials often encourage prisoners to beat fellow
inmates, especially political prisoners, as a form of punishment.
Protests rarely result in any action on behalf of the victims.
One democracy campaigner, Chen Longde, attempted suicide in August after
he was beaten twice with clubs and cattle prods in a labor camp. Chen
survived his leap from a third-floor window but broke his hip and right
leg. He remains in poor health.
Wei, an electrician and onetime supporter of the government, first was
sentenced to 15 years in prison after taking part in Beijing's 1979
``Democracy Wall'' movement, when he and friends wrote, published and
distributed a magazine and pasted pro-democracy slogans on a city wall.
He took on the Chinese power center directly by writing acerbic letters
to then-paramount leader Deng Xiaoping.
He was released briefly in 1993 and then was re-arrested and given his
current sentence of 14 years.
"THERE WILL BE NO REAL DEMOCRACY IF WE CAN'T GURANTEE THE RIGHTS OF THE
MINORITY ETHNIC PEOPLE. ONLY UNDERSTANDING THEIR SUFFERING AND HELPING
THEM TO EXERCISE THEIR RIGHTS WILL ASSIST PREVENTING FROM THE
DISINTEGRATION AND THE SESESSION." "WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING THEIR
STRENGTH, WE CAN'T TOPPLE THE SLORC AND BURMA WILL NEVER BE IN PEACE."
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