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Wednesday January 12, 2005-- Zil Haj 01, 1425 A.H.
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Protesters clash with police in Nepal

KATMANDU, Nepal: Hundreds of demonstrators stoned government vehicles, blocked traffic and battled riot police in the Nepalese capital on Tuesday to protest the increase in fuel prices by the government. The protesters were angered by the 29 per cent jump in the cost of kerosene, which is used for cooking by most Nepalese. Gasoline prices also shot up 11 per cent and diesel by 17. It was the third time this year prices have increased. College students walked out of classrooms and joined other protesters who blocked the main streets of Katmandu with burning tires. Demonstrators hurled bricks at riot police, who retaliated by charging into the crowds with batons. No one was reported seriously hurt in the clashes. The government-owned Nepal Oil Corporation has the monopoly in importing and distributing petroleum products. Nepal imports all of its oil. The government said the increase in international oil prices forced it to hike its own. It said the corporation was losing an average of US$7 million a month, and the agency was almost bankrupt.

 

Ukraine halts publication of vote results

KIEV: Ukraine’s supreme court Tuesday halted the publication of the final results of a rerun presidential vote until it examines the last appeal by the defeated candidate, former Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich, Interfax reported. Yanukovich is expected to file his complaint with the high court on Wednesday afternoon, his campaign manager told reporters earlier Tuesday. Late Monday, the central election commission announced the final results of a December 26 rerun presidential vote, which opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko won with 52 percent of the vote. The results do not take effect until they are printed in two government newspapers — the publication that the high court halted on Tuesday.

 

Lithuania seeks world help to build new N-reactor

VILNIUS: Lithuania, which has pledged to close its Chernobyl-type Ignalina nuclear power plant by 2010, will seek international help to build and finance a new nuclear reactor, Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas said Tuesday. "The government wants Lithuania to remain a country with nuclear energy, but we do not have the financial means to build the new reactor," Brazauskas told journalists. "It would cost some 2 billion euros, a fantastic price for us, so we should work on this issue and seek advice," Brazauskas said after a government meeting on nuclear energy issues. The prime minister said Lithuania would seek advice from European Union (EU) energy companies and international experts further field. "If they show some interest, then we could consider building a new reactor," Brazauskas said. Lithuania halted the first of two reactors at Ignalina on December 31 in line with a pledge to the EU made during membership talks. The Baltic state acceded to the EU in May last year.

 

US Congressman ‘optimistic’ after talks with N Korea

BEIJING: US Congressman Tom Lantos said Tuesday he urged top-level North Korean leaders in Pyongyang to revive stalled talks over the Stalinist state’s nuclear ambitions and was "optimistic" over an outcome. "I’m considerably more optimistic than when I left Beijing a few days ago. I had extremely serious, professional, substantive and valuable talks with my North Korean interlocutors," Lantos, a Democratic Representative from California, told reporters at a briefing in Beijing. The US lawmaker, who was in North Korea from Saturday, met Supreme People’s Assembly vice president Yang Hyong Sop, Foreign Minister Paek Nam Sun, Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye Gwan and foreign ministry director-general Li Gun.

 

 

 

Crew lifts crashed US chopper from rice paddy

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia: The US Navy on Tuesday lifted one of its Seahawk helicopters from the rice paddy where it crashed in Indonesia’s tsunami-stricken Aceh province, a day after possible mechanical failure caused the chopper to go down during a relief mission. The Seahawk spilled water from its side as the US military used a H-53 Super Stallion helicopter to pick up the aircraft and move it to a nearby airstrip before a final lift back to the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier. The crash injured two of the 10 sailors on board, one had a fractured ankle and the other a dislocated hip, and they were expected to fully recover, said Lt Cmdr John Bernard, a US military spokesman.

 

Japan seeks debt moratorium for quake-hit countries

MANILA: Japan will ask other countries to impose a joint moratorium on debt servicing for countries hit by last month’s tsunami, Finance Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki said. Speaking at an economic forum in the Philippine capital, Tanigaki said that."Japan will call on other countries to jointly apply a moratorium on public debt services for a certain period of time when any disaster-stricken country so wishes." He also told the forum at the Asian Development Bank (ADB) headquarters that Japan had already provided 500 million dollars in grants to the countries ravaged by the tsunami that hit some 10 countries on December 26. Tanigaki also announced that Japan would provide an additional 20 million dollars in trust funds to the ADB for "supporting relief measures in devastated areas." He did not elaborate on which countries would be taking part in this proposed debt moratorium or how much in debt payments would be covered.

 

Russian-US firm plans seven space launches

MOSCOW: The Russian-US space launch firm International Launch Services is planning seven commercial launches in 2005 from the Russian space base Baikonur in Kazakhstan, the news agency ITAR-TASS said on Tuesday. Russian Proton-M booster rockets will be used in the launches. In the first launch of the year, an improved version of the Proton-M will put into orbit a US telecommunications satellite for Americom on February 3. The AMC-12 satellite will provide digital television, telephone and Internet transmissions to the Americas and the Caribbean. International Launch Services said it had 10 launch contracts through 2007.

 

Top Philippines broadcaster’s van gutted

MANILA: Armed men set fire to a television news van belonging to the Philippines’ top broadcaster before dawn on Tuesday in the latest of a series of attacks on journalists here, police said. The news crew of ABS-CBN were setting up in the capital Manila to deliver a regular traffic report when about six armed men forced them to lie on the ground, said police officer Edmond Favila.The men took the cell phone of one of the crew and then hurled a molotov cocktail into the expensively equipped van, setting it ablaze, police said. None of the crew was hurt and the attackers fled, they said. Favila said there were no suspects. Thirteen journalists were murdered in the Philippines last year.

 

Mbeki in Ivory Coast to promote peace

ABIDJAN: South African President Thabo Mbeki arrived Tuesday in Ivory Coast to take stock of peace efforts in the divided West African country, officials here said. Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo, the president’s office said, met Mbeki, who arrived from Gabon where he briefed other African Union leaders gathered for an AU Peace and Security Council summit on his discussions with the various Ivorian parties. He was to attend a special cabinet meeting of the government of national reconciliation that includes rebel and opposition leaders brought in under a shaky peace deal signed in 2003, officials said.

 

EU limits ban on Bulgarian poultry

BRUSSELS: The European Union has limited its ban on poultry imports from Bulgaria to one district after an outbreak of the highly contagious virus Newcastle disease there last month, the European Commission said on Tuesday. The ban will now be limited to the area of the original outbreak, the Kardjali region close to Bulgaria’s border with Greece and Turkey, instead of the entire country, it said. "It (virus) seems to be limited to one region so we are reducing it (ban) to one district," a Commission official told Reuters, adding that the ban would apply until May 16. Bulgaria halted its poultry exports a few days after the EU imposed its ban in late December. It mainly exports geese, duck and, especially, duck liver to Austria, Britain, France and Germany. Its total poultry exports are some 3,000 tonnes a year. Newcastle disease can be fatal for poultry but causes, at worst, a minor illness in humans. Chickens are the most susceptible poultry; ducks and geese are the least, although hosts for the virus can be both wild and domestic birds.

 

Vote yes to EU constitution: Zapatero

MADRID: Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero on Tuesday made an impassioned call to Spain to show the way in ratifying the EU constitution as it prepares to be the first country to vote in a referendum on adopting the text. Spaniards will vote on February 20 on whether to adopt the blueprint for ruling the European Union in the coming decades. About half of the EU’s 25 members will follow with referendums of their own during the year. The other members, including most notably Germany, will leave parliament to pass the text into law. Lithuania, one of 10 states, which joined the EU on May 1, became the first and so far only country to ratify the text in a parliamentary vote in November. The Spanish vote is thus being seen as a litmus test for the other ballots especially in countries such as France, due to hold its poll by the summer, and Britain, where polls show there is strong opposition to what is seen as "rule by Brussels."

 

British Airways suspends flights to S Arabia

LONDON: British Airways is to suspend all its flights between Britain and Saudi Arabia from March because of reduced passenger demand, the company said on Tuesday. BA will suspend its flights between London Heathrow airport and Jeddah and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia from March 27, it said. "The decision to suspend flights between the UK and Saudi Arabia is a difficult one to make as we have enjoyed a long history of flying between the two countries," said BA’s director of commercial planning, Robert Boyle. "However, the routes dont currently make a profitable contribution to our business and we are unable to sustain them while this remains the case," he added.

 

‘Sideways’ wins awards as Oscar buzz mounts

LOS ANGELES: The nation’s film reviewers raised their glasses to ‘Sideways’ on late Monday, bestowing five prizes on the wine connoisseur comedy during the 10th annual Critics’ Choice Awards, one of the best barometers of Oscar success. The low-budget road-trip saga, about two men confronting disappointment and heartbreak while touring southern California wine country, was lauded for best picture, supporting actor and actress, acting ensemble and writer.

 

CBS guilty of myopic zeal over Bush story: report

NEW YORK: CBS News fired four employees on late Monday after an independent report critical of legendary anchor Dan Rather found a ‘myopic zeal’ led the network to disregard basic journalism principles when it aired a faulty story on President Bush’s military service record. The panel was convened after a Sept 8, 2004, report by Rather on the ‘60 Minutes II’ news program claiming Bush won special treatment in the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War. It found CBS failed to determine the accuracy of key documents used in the report.

 

Murdoch to buy rest of Fox channel

NEW YORK: Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp on late Monday said it would take full control of its Fox Entertainment Group Inc, unit in a stock swap worth about $6 billion, which it said would simplify the media conglomerate’s structure. The deal, which sent Fox shares up 10 per cent, gives News Corp full ownership of its US entertainment assets such as 20th Century Fox film studios, Fox Network, Fox News Channel and its stake in satellite broadcaster DirecTV, which could make it easier for Murdoch to pursue acquisitions.

 

Nigerian woman burns husband

RIYADH: A Nigerian woman living in the Muslim holy city of Makkah poured boiling water on her sleeping husband because he wanted to take a second wife, a Saudi newspaper reported on Tuesday. "As he went for a siesta ... she poured boiling water all over his body," Al-Madinah said, without giving names. His condition in an intensive care unit was described as critical. "If he survives, a beautiful girl will be chosen for him to marry, regardless of the cost, and he will divorce the criminal wife," the man’s uncle said, quoted in Al-Madinah. Islam allows Muslim men to have up to four wives, so long as they have the means to support them and all the women are treated equally.

 

Moderate quake shakes Turkey

ANKARA: A moderate earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.1, struck Turkey’s southern Aegean coast Tuesday, sending residents into the streets in panic, the Anatolia news agency reported. At least one person was injured. The quake hit at 23.48 GMT Monday) and was centered in the province of Mugla, the Istanbul-based Kandilli Observatory said. Several aftershocks followed. It was also felt in the neighboring province of Aydin, Anatolia reported. One man was hospitalised in the resort town of Marmaris, in Mugla, with minor injuries after jumping from a balcony in panic, the agency said. There were no immediate reports of any damage to buildings. Quakes are frequent in Turkey, much of which lies atop the active North Anatolian fault. Two devastating earthquakes killed about 18,000 people in northwestern Turkey in 1999.

 

French FM still not sure reporter was kidnapped

PARIS: French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier on Tuesday refused to use the word ‘kidnapping’ to describe the disappearance last week of a newspaper journalist and her translator in Iraq. "At the current time, I would not speak about a kidnapping. We’re trying to find them. We’re mobilised, we’re seeking information, we’ve made all the right contacts," Barnier told private RMC radio.


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