24 killed in police firing in Ambon
JAKARTA, Nov 26 — Indonesian security forces killed at least 24 persons and injured more than 100 when they opened fire on a group of Muslims and Christians fighting in eastern Indonesia’s strife-torn city of Ambon, residents said.

Agency’s apology over BBC’s sex expose
MILAN, Nov 26 — Elite, the agency that has represented such top models as Cindy Crawford and Naomi Campbell, has apologised to models and their families after a BBC documentary showed a top executive soliciting sex.

PM invites Khaleda for talks
DHAKA, Nov 26 — Faced with mounting challenge from political rivals to resign and call early elections, Bangladesh Premier Sheikh Hasina has urged Opposition leader Khaleda Zia for talks to solve any problem, eschewing the politics of enforcing shutdowns.

China to ‘ratify’ CTBT
BEIJING, Nov 26 — Despite the US Senate’s rejection of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), China intends to go ahead with its ratification process and pledges not to conduct more nuclear tests, China’s top arms control official has said.

Chechen rebels form ‘govt-in-exile’

MOSCOW, Nov 26 (UNI) — Chechen separatist leaders, now under siege in the Caucasus, have reportedly decided to form a government-in-exile, but rebels positioned near troops are still awaiting hundreds of mercenaries from Pakistan, the Russian media has said.

The top rebel leadership has recently met and preferred to choose the Azerbaijan capital Baku, or “some city”, in Turkey as the new separatist capital, the daily Izvestia quoted Russian official sources as saying.

But Novosti said the rebels still holding their positions in areas, not far from where the Russian troops were, awaiting some 1500 foreign mercenaries — from Pakistan, Bosnia and Lebanon. Besides some Turkey-based hardliners have reportedly held negotiations with some Czech firms for the supply of 40 T-72 tanks to Chechen militants.

Meanwhile, Russian fighter planes have been ‘’strictly’’ instructed against striking residential areas ‘’even if rebels were entrenched there’’.

The fighters are to bomb only to prevent the exit and entry of militants as this would encourage the natives to push the rebels out of their hideouts, says the daily Komsomolskaya Gazeta Grozny.

Eighty per cent of Grozny, has been under siege and by mid-December defence planners expect to clear the capital without firing a shot.

Russia is launching a new phase of its military operation in Chechnya aimed at defeating separatist rebels in the mountainous southern areas, a Reuters report quoted First Deputy Chief of General Staff Gen Valery Manilov as saying.

He told a news conference here today that he hoped the phase, which would extend Russian control over all Chechen territory, could be completed by the end of the year.

He also said President Boris Yeltsin had ordered the government to prepare and present for parliamentary ratification a draft law offering amnesty to rebels who had not committed serious crimes.

Meanwhile, Russian combat planes were “relentlessly” pounding the other two major cities of Argun and Urus-Marten that were still under rebel control, the defence press service said last night. “All cellular communication systems in the two cities and other parts of the state have been destroyed”.

ISTANBUL (Reuters): an envoy of Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov today warned that Russian forces were preparing to use chemical weapons in their military onslaught on the breakaway Caucasian region.

“We have gathered information that Russia is planning to use chemical weapons in Chechnya”, Mr Hassan Abumuslumov told a news conference here.

Mr Abumuslumov, who described himself as Mr Maskhadov’s special representative, gave no further details.

“In the name of the Chechen people we are calling on the people of the world to stop the genocide and prevent the use of chemical weapons,’’ he said.

“As much as Russia was criticised at the OSCE (Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe) summit, there was no clear result. The OSCE reaction effectively supported the genocide which is continuing in Chechnya,’’ he said.

3 mass graves in East Timor found

JAKARTA, Nov 26 (DPA) — Indonesia’s human rights investigator has said at least 25 bodies have been discovered in three mass graves in East Timor, believed to be the victims of pro-Jakarta militia killings, a report said today. Three of the victims were Catholic priests.

The Jakarta Post quoted Mr Munir, a member of the Commission for the Investigation of Human Rights Abuses in East Timor, as saying that the remains were recovered from Oeluli beach of Kobalima district, 3 km from the East Timor border.

Mr Munir said the bodies were buried one-and-a-half metres deep in three closely located graves, adding that some of the bodies could still be identified.

“We got information on these mass graves from witnesses we interviewed during our first visit here in October”, he was quoted as saying.

The witnesses were quoted as saying that the victims were killed during an attack on a church in Suai by a pro-Jakarta militia, backed by the Indonesian military, on September 6. The witnesses said the bodies were then transported to their current location, about 20 km southwest from Suai.

“We found three bodies in the first grave, 11 in the second grave and 11 in the third grave,’’ Mr Munir said, adding that the bodies in the first grave were identified as those of three Catholic priests.

The chairman of the commission, Mr Albert Hasibuan, said early this week that it will soon summon the country’s military top brass for their alleged collusion in the orgy of murder, rape and arson in East Timor.

Military-backed militias went on a rampage across East Timor in the wake of the August 30 UN-run independence vote. The rampage destroyed many towns and forced half of the territory’s 800,000 people to flee.

“We have performed autopsies on the bodies — one of them died of gunshot wounds and the other two died of knife wounds,’’ The Post quoted Mr Munir as saying.

Mr Munir, who is on a three-day fact-finding mission with committee member H.S. Dillon and a six-member forensic team, said yesterday’s exhumation was witnessed by the local police chief and officials.

“The bodies were then taken to Atambua hospital for further examination,’’ he stated, adding that forensic experts will also bring hair tissue and other evidence to Jakarta today for further examination.

Indonesia’s nine-member independent commission was set up on September 22 and has until the end of the year to complete its job.

The inquiry has powers of subpoena which can be enforced by the police and has been touted by the Indonesian Government as its official East Timor investigation. Jakarta has rejected a similar UN inquiry.

It’s Big Spice vs Ice Spice in NZ poll
from Jane Clifton and Karen Holdom in Wellington

WOMEN are increasingly running the show here in New Zealand, but the unreconstructed Kiwi Bloke will have his little joke. Popular shorthand for New Zealand’s two-woman contest for the prime ministership is “Bossy versus Chilly”. Or alternatively, Big Spice versus Ice Spice.

Big Spice is Jenny Shipley, the country’s first woman Prime Minister, a strapping, capable farmer and mother. Ice Spice is Labour leader Helen Clark, poll favourite in this election, a capable and elegant academic, Nordic skier, opera buff and gourmet cook.

New Zealanders have seen a slew of women in top jobs recently, but the political sorority is frosty. Though Clark and Shipley are socially liberal and follow similar monetary prescriptions, each engages sharply different sentiments among voters. Clark has a particularly strong pull with women voters, as leader of the party most likely to temper, if not reverse, the free-market policies New Zealand has followed since the mid-1980s, and to restore the state’s welfare provision. Shipley is an unblinking advocate of further privatisation, less tax and discouragement of welfare reliance; she has even preached celibacy for the single girl. Shipley has the edge in the personal popularity stakes.

It has taken Clark six years to get this close. Her aloof style took time to catch on with voters; months before the last election, her senior shadow cabinet asked her to step down. She kept her nerve, and near-doubled Labour’s vote from a poll low of 14 per cent.

Her personalised advocacy on behalf of health and welfare casualties and her meticulous canvassing has cemented her hold on labour. Focus group research finds her the most highly rated politician for competence and intelligence.

The clash of two women has at times wrong-footed the male majority of parliamentarians, and even the female-dominated political media. Conservative MPs have been castigated for criticising Clark’s decision not to have children, while her awkward-looking attendances at rugby games have been the butt of jokes unknown to the nerdiest male politician faking an interest in sports. Shipley riled male colleagues by declaring that “whiskey bottle politics” was over a dig at senior MPs’ tradition of networking and plotting over drinks late into the night.

So what are Shipley and Clark offering female voters? Neither leader is campaigning on introducing paid maternity leave (New Zealand is one of three OECD countries which fail to provide it), making childcare costs tax-deductible or getting equal pay for women (men still earn 20 per cent more). While 20 per cent of Shipley’s 44 members are female, there is just one other woman in the Cabinet. In Clark’s corner there are two women on the front bench with Clark, while three others are expected to hold Cabinet positions if she gets into power.

But with neither National or Labour likely to gain a clear majority, the spotlight has shifted off the women who lead the major parties and on to the men who run the minor ones and who will hold the balance of power. While Shipley and Clark would both love to go it alone, the sad reality is that they simply can’t do it without the boys.

— The Guardian, London

24 killed in police firing in Ambon

JAKARTA, Nov 26 (DPA) — Indonesian security forces killed at least 24 persons and injured more than 100 when they opened fire on a group of Muslims and Christians fighting in eastern Indonesia’s strife-torn city of Ambon, residents said.

Mr Alwan, spokesman for Ambon’s Al-Fatah mosque, confirmed that at least 16 Muslims were killed and 50 others were wounded when the police mobile brigade opened fire to break up the fighting.

“Most of the dead and the wounded suffered from gunshot wounds”. Mr Alwan said, adding that the wounded were taken to the Al-Fatah hospital.

Meanwhile, a spokesman at Ambon’s Protestant church and other eyewitnesses said at least eight Christians were killed and more than 50 others were injured.

Mr Alwan said the clashes between Muslims and Christians broke out late on Thursday evening and went on until the police intervened today. Explosions from home-made bombs were heard throughout last night, he added.

AFP adds: Two women were burnt to death and a man was shot and wounded in an attack by an unidentified group in the troubled Indonesian province of Aceh, the police said today.

The attackers burnt several houses in Panji Mulia village in central Aceh district yesterday, leaving two women dead, First Lieutenant of the district Den Martin said.

One of the armed assailants asked a man identified as Suryanto if he was Javanese and shot him in the leg twice after he said “yes”, First Lieutenant Martin said.

Agency’s apology over BBC’s sex expose

MILAN, Nov 26 (Reuters) — Elite, the agency that has represented such top models as Cindy Crawford and Naomi Campbell, has apologised to models and their families after a BBC documentary showed a top executive soliciting sex.

The agency’s Milan office said yesterday that its worldwide chairman, John Casablancas, had issued a statement offering the agency’s “unconditional apologies’’ for the “shocking, unacceptable and totally incorrect’’ behaviour of some agency executives.

The BBC documentary aired earlier this week used a hidden camera to follow a woman reporter as she went undercover in Milan for six months pretending to be an aspiring model.

Hundreds of young girls come to Milan each year looking for work and end up victimised by unscrupulous agents and public relations agencies that ply them with free drugs, send them to nightclubs and encourage them to have sex with “clients’’, sometimes for payment, according to the documentary.

Four executives at Elite appeared in the film and have since been suspended by the agency pending an investigation.

“They will see the documentary and will have the chance to justify themselves before being disciplined,’’ the agency said in a statement.

Elite Europe chairman Gerald Marie appears in the documentary saying to the woman journalist as he was filmed with a hidden camera: “I’ll give you one million lire ($ 525) if you go to bed with me.’’

Elite also said it would re-examine the chaperone system that had been used to protect under-aged models “so that cases like those revealed by the documentary won’t be repeated’’.

Assistant Milan prosecutor Ferdinando Pomarici yesterday opened an inquiry into the affair, with possible charges of exploiting prostitution. No further details were immediately available.

PM invites Khaleda for talks

DHAKA, Nov 26 (PTI) — Faced with mounting challenge from political rivals to resign and call early elections, Bangladesh Premier Sheikh Hasina has urged Opposition leader Khaleda Zia for talks to solve any problem, eschewing the politics of enforcing shutdowns.

“Please don’t kill people by throwing bombs. Don’t create sufferings for them by calling unnecessary hartals (strikes). Join the policies of development and ask any question you like in Parliament”, Ms Hasina told a huge rally in western Kushtia district yesterday as strike-related violence in Bangladesh left one dead and 50 injured.

Yesterday’s strike, the sixth this month and 25th since January was marred by a petrol bomb attack on a truck killing its driver and seriously injuring two others as opposition activists used home-made bombs in clashes with the police.

Ms Hasina said by rejecting the offer of talks, the Opposition leader proved “they do not believe in discussion and democracy. What is their demand? Opposition parties are not even clear on their one-point demand”.

In a post-strike statement, Ms Khaleda demanded the transfer of power to a neutral caretaker administration and immediate resignation of the government, otherwise, she threatened that the ruling party would be forced by a “mass upsurge” to quit.

Meanwhile, the Opposition alliance late last night announced a fresh street campaign programme on December 2 to step up their ‘oust government’ movement.

China to ‘ratify’ CTBT

BEIJING, Nov 26 (PTI) — Despite the US Senate’s rejection of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), China intends to go ahead with its ratification process and pledges not to conduct more nuclear tests, China’s top arms control official has said.

“China’s determination to get the CTBT ratified remains in place,” Director-General of the Department of Arms Control and Disarmament of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Sha Zukang, said.

He, however, did not give a timeframe for signing the CTBT and said the treaty was currently before Chinese Parliament, the National People’s Congress (NPC) and that the US Senate’s rejection of the CTBT would not affect China’s stand.

In the meantime, Sha said China would not carry out further nuclear tests. “China solemnly vows not to carry out any nuclear test before ratifying the CTBT, and to honour all obligations under it after its ratification,” Sha said.

Sharif's wife to enter active politics

ISLAMABAD, Nov 26 (PTI) — Deposed Pakistani Premier Nawaz Sharif’s wife Kulsoom Nawaz has announced her entry into active politics till the time her husband is freed and democracy restored in Pakistan.

Kulsoom, who reached Karachi last night to watch proceedings of the plane hijacking case against Mr Sharif, his brother Shahbaz, and others, told the media persons at the airport that she would "coordinate" with workers of Mr Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League until he comes out of jail.

"I will coordinate with Muslim League workers until Mian Saheb comes out (of jail)," she was quoted as saying.

Mr Sharif’s daughter Mariam Safdar said women members of the family would remain politically active till the time the male members of her family, including her father and uncle Shahbaz Sharif, were released.

Asked whether they would come out on the streets to demand the release of the male members, they said: "We have come out to tell the PML workers that they are not alone. We are also with them. Injustice is being done to us and we are trying to fight with that and whatever the situation demands we will do."

27 killed in clashes
LAGOS: President Olusegun Obasanjo has ordered the police in Lagos to shoot suspected rioters on sight after ethnic clashes which left at least 27 persons dead. Mr Obasanjo on Thursday told nation-wide television that he had ordered the arrest, dead or alive, of members of a hardline nationalist group he blamed for the pitched battles which erupted in a market on the northern outskirts of the former capital. — AFP

Plot to kill Milosevic
BELGRADE: Yugoslav security forces have arrested five men suspected of conspiring to murder President Slobodan Milosevic the Beta news agency has reported. The men, all Serbs, were working for the French intelligence services, Yugoslav Information Secretary Goran Matic claimed on Thursday. — DPA

Minister resigns
JAKARTA: Senior Indonesian Minister Hamzah Haz has resigned his Cabinet post, the first to quit since President Abdurrahman Wahid was elected last month, a palace source said on Friday. His replacement as Coordinating Minister for Welfare would be Basri Hasanuddin, an academic from Sulawesi Island, the source said. No reason was given for the departure of Mr Haz, leader of the Muslim-backed United Develop-ment Party, who has been repeatedly named in the local press as among three ministers Mr Wahid had ordered to be investigated over corruption allegations. — Reuters

Turkmenistan pulls out
ASHGABAT: Turkmenistan has pulled out of a treaty allowing Russia to patrol its southern border with Iran and Afghanistan, a Foreign Ministry official has said. Around 300 Russian soldiers, mostly officers, are deployed along Turkmenistan’s southern flank, once considered the soft underbelly of the Soviet empire. “Turkmenistan sent a note on May 20 this year saying that it intended to leave the treaty with Russian on the joint protection of the Turkmen border in November”, the official said on Thursday. — Reuters

Salman Rushdie
BERLIN: Flanked by two Nobel laureates, India-born author Salman Rushdie received an honorary doctorate for his life’s work from Berlin’s Free University during a ceremony marked by heavy security. Guests invited to the presentation on Thursday were asked to show up two hours early because of stringent security checks. — AP

Mother gets damages
LONDON: A British mother who gave birth to a disabled baby after a sterilisation operation was awarded £ 1.3 million in damages by a court on Thursday. Gail Taylor (38) was awarded the record pay-out for wrongful birth against Shropshire health authority in central England. — DPA