40 Russian soldiers killed in Dagestan
MAKHACHKALA (Russia), Sept 11 — More than 40 government soldiers have died in fierce clashes with Islamic insurgents in Dagestan, officials said today, as neighbouring Chechnya mobilised after a week of Russian airstrikes on suspected rebel rear bases.


Sharif not to attend UN session
ISLAMABAD, Sept 11— Pakistan Premier Nawaz Sharif has decided not to attend the UN General Assembly (UNGA) session later this month following his country’s decision not to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty contrary to his pledge to the UNGA last year, media reports here said today.

Indonesia may allow peacekeeping force
JAKARTA, Sept 11 — Indonesia said today that it would have to be open to international offers of a peacekeeping force for East Timor if it was unable to restore order there, but gave no clue when that might be.

USA threatens more sanctions
WASHINGTON, Sept 11 — The USA has launched a multi-pronged campaign, through its officials, to make India and Pakistan sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the Fissile Materials Cutoff Treaty, a latest official document indicates.

Govt orders probe into Anwar’s charge
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 11 — The Malaysian Government moved swiftly to contain allegations by jailed former minister Anwar Ibrahim that political opponents had poisoned him, ordering a probe and detailing his “VIP” treatment in the jail.

KGB spy exposed in UK after 40 years
LONDON, Sept 11 — An 87-year-old widow living quietly in the English countryside was revealed today as the most important woman spy ever recruited by Soviet KGB in Britain.

Rocky grave for nuclear wastes
BLACKHAWK (California): The world’s biggest nuclear wastes management problem — America’s 77,000 tonnes of radioactive wastes accumulated from atomic test since inception, operations of decades of over 100 nuclear power plants, and of nuclear submarines of the US naval fleet — is now being tackled in right earnest.

40 Russian soldiers killed in Dagestan

MAKHACHKALA (Russia), Sept 11 (AFP) — More than 40 government soldiers have died in fierce clashes with Islamic insurgents in Dagestan, officials said today, as neighbouring Chechnya mobilised after a week of Russian airstrikes on suspected rebel rear bases.

Unofficially, the Russian death toll could be as high as 45, said an official at the military press centre here who asked not to be named.

The guerrillas also beat back a Russian advance on an important hill overlooking the Novolakskoye area in western Dagestan, inflicting heavy casualties on federal troops, military sources told AFP.

Yesterday Russian forces retook the village of Gamiyakh after bitter fighting, pushing the guerrillas away from the key transport hub of Khasavyurt although the rebels still control six other villages in the area.

The latest losses were the heaviest so far recorded by Russian troops in their month-long struggle.

In Grozny, Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov meanwhile extended a state of emergency and mobilised his armed forces in response to a week of Russian air raids on Chechen border villages which have left 150 people dead.

Moscow has furiously accused Grozny of allowing the Islamists to use Chechnya to launch their insurgency in Dagestan, and sent its jets deep into the breakaway Russian republic for the first time yesterday to strike targets west of the Chechen capital.

Sharif not to attend UN session

ISLAMABAD, Sept 11 (PTI) — Pakistan Premier Nawaz Sharif has decided not to attend the UN General Assembly (UNGA) session later this month following his country’s decision not to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) contrary to his pledge to the UNGA last year, media reports here said today.

These decisions were taken at a meeting of the Defence Committee of the Cabinet (DCC) which met under the chairmanship of the Prime Minister yesterday and deliberated at length on the latest security situation arising out of India’s draft nuclear doctrine, the largest circulated Urdu daily Jung reported today, quoting reliable sources.

Foreign Minister Sartaj Aziz will instead represent Pakistan at the UNGA, it said. The high-level delegation that includes Foreign Secretary Shamshad Ahmad and other senior officials of the Foreign Ministry will leave for New York on November 18.

The paper said the DCC, the highest decision-making body on security affairs, had detailed discussions on various aspects of the CTBT. It reiterated Pakistan’s declared policy of de-linking its stand on CTBT with that of India’s but decided that Islamabad could not adhere to it under the current environment of "pressure and coercion" when India was being given "full liberty to pursue" its nuclear policies.

The report said Pakistan’s latest stand on the CTBT would be announced at the CTBT conference in Vienna next month. Mr Sharif had during his address to the UNGA last year announced that Pakistan would adhere to the CTBT by September this year. The deadline lapses on September 23.

Fighting terrorism
India, Nepal reach accord

KATHMANDU, Sept 11 (PTI) — India and Nepal today decided to work closely to fight the scourge of terrorism, review the extradition treaty and revive the joint commission mechanism to give a fresh impetus to the entire gamut of bilateral relations.

Home Secretaries of the two neighbours would meet at the earliest to evolve a joint strategy to combat terrorism, a joint statement issued at the end of the four-day visit of External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh to Nepal said.

Both sides during the talks renewed their commitment not to allow their respective territories to be used for activities directed against or prejudicial to the security of the other, it said.

Winding up his "highly productive" visit to Nepal, Mr Jaswant Singh told reporters here that "we have agreed to review the extradition treaty and also consider the conclusion of an understanding on mutual legal assistance in criminal matters."

Mr Jaswant Singh, who had wide-ranging talks with Nepalese King Birendra, Premier K.P. Bhattarai, Foreign Minister Ram Sharan Mahat and other ministers, said the two sides had decided to revive the joint commission mechanism lying dormant for the last several years.

"It would be useful to have an umbrella body, co-chaired by the two foreign ministers, to oversee the entire gamut of bilateral relations and to monitor progress in various subsidiary negotiating fora," he said.

The joint commission will meet in New Delhi in the first quarter of next year, he said, adding it would be attended by Nepal’s Foreign Minister.

UN delegation in Dili
Indonesia may allow peacekeeping force

JAKARTA, Sept 11 (Reuters) — Indonesia said today that it would have to be open to international offers of a peacekeeping force for East Timor if it was unable to restore order there, but gave no clue when that might be.

“The offer of the deployment of peacekeeping forces must be considered as an option by the Indonesian Government,” armed forces Commander General Wiranto told CNN television in Dili.

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan and U.S. President Bill Clinton have urged Indonesia to accept foreign troops in the bloodied territory, where anti-independence militias have waged a campaign of death and destruction.

Indonesian troops have turned a blind eye to the militias and are accused of arming and taking part in some militia attacks on U.N. staff and East Timorese.

Gen Wiranto appealed for understanding for his troops in East Timor and suggested many of them had become too emotionally involved with East Timorese who were opposed to independence.

Dewi Fortuna Anwar, a senior aide of President B.J. Habibie, told a local television station the government must prove it was capable of quelling the violence.

“But we must have the right to choose. For example, if we accept peacekeeping forces, we must choose the countries... for instance Asean (the Association of South East Asian Nations) countries and countries which we have sent our forces to, like Egypt or South Africa,” Anwar said.

Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, the UK, Canada, the Philippines and Portugal have committed to join a U.N. peacekeeping force if Indonesia agrees to one.

Australian Prime Minister John Howard said the USA, Sweden, Thailand and France had agreed in principle to support such a force.

Mr Clinton, calling it imperative for Indonesia to agree to such a force said that there could be a development on the issue “in the next couple of days”.

A delegation of United Nations ambassadors arrived in the devastated East Timorese capital Dili on Saturday to assess security following a nearly week-long killing rampage by pro-Jakarta militias opposed to independence, U.N. officials said DPA report said.

General Wiranto, rumoured to now be effectively running the country, arrived on a separate plane earlier to meet the delegation, which included British Ambassador to the U.N. Sir Jeremy Greenstock, and Rene Van Rooyen, regional representative for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

The delegation was only expected to remain in Dili for a few hours of discussions with U.N. staff there and a short tour before returning to Jakarta, officials in Dili said.

Meanwhile eight persons were killed and 60 others injured when security forces opened fire on a all militia mob in the eastern Indonesian strife-torn city of Ambon, news reports said.

AUCKLAND (AFP): The USA on Saturday suspended all military sales to Indonesia, U.S. President Bill Clinton said here.

The U.S. President said it was “imperative” Indonesia allow in peacekeepers to stop the violence in East Timor and be expected a development “in the next few days.”

The USA on Thursday suspended all military-to-military exchanges and exercises with Indonesia to protest its failure to stop the violence in East Timor.

WASHINGTON: The Inter-national Monetary Fund has suspended discussions with Indonesia on its economic programme.

“IMF management continues to keep under close review ongoing developments in Indonesia and discussions for the next programme review are on hold,” an IMF spokesman said yesterday.

The IMF whose loans are helping Indonesia stave off financial collapse, had warned on Thursday of possible sanctions over the East Timor crisis.

CTBT, FMCT
USA threatens more sanctions

WASHINGTON, Sept 11 (PTI) — The USA has launched a multi-pronged campaign, through its officials, to make India and Pakistan sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) and the Fissile Materials Cutoff Treaty (FMCT), a latest official document indicates.

At the same time, it has given up, to a certain extent, on the missile issue as a “hopeless case” as it is too late to stop that activity in the Middle East-South Asia region, according to the “foreign policy agenda” which contains views of the White House, the State Department, the Defence Department and other officials.

The new policy on missiles is indicated by Samuel R Berger, National Security Adviser to President Bill Clinton who says, “Unfortunately, in regions like the Middle East and South Asia, politics dynamics weigh against agreements to limit these missiles.”

“India and Pakistan continue efforts through a variety of means to advance their nuclear weapon capabilities,” says John D. Holum, Assistant Secretary of State.

To sell nuclear non-proliferation to India and Pakistan, Peter R. Lavoy, Director of Counterprolife-ration Policy in the office of the Secretary of Defence, holds out threats of more sanctions.

“With new restrictions on US trade with all entities involved in nuclear and missile activities, the dual-use and conventional military efforts of scores of Indian and Pakistani firms will suffer.

“While the overall economic impact of these sanctions is uncertain, international investor confidence in and the flow of capital to India and Pakistan have plummeted. If India and Pakistan had expected the nuclear tests to improve their international standing and prestige, the results must be disappointing” he says in the document.

Asserting that the continued tussle over Kashmir has shown that nuclear deterrence “has not yet emerged in South Asia” he says: “Even if India and Pakistan do manage to establish nuclear deterrence, the fact will be that every Indian and Pakistani will live under the threat of nuclear annihilation. Welcome to the nuclear club”.

Holum admits that while Pakistan’s missile development is indigenous, in Pakistan’s case there is “extensive Chinese and North Korean assistance”.

Berger, while admitting that political dynamics weigh against agreements on missiles, says: “We are moving aggressively to strengthen the non-proliferation regime, by which I mean the international consensus and the international agreements and structures aimed at curbing weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles”.

Govt orders probe into Anwar’s charge

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 11 (Reuters) — The Malaysian Government moved swiftly to contain allegations by jailed former minister Anwar Ibrahim that political opponents had poisoned him, ordering a probe and detailing his “VIP” treatment in the jail.

The Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, also questioned as to why, Mr Anwar’s lawyers took weeks to disclose the test results of his urine sample instead of asking for immediate treatment.

Mr Anwar was taken to hospital yesterday after his lawyer said a pathologist in Australia had certified a dangerously high level of arsenic in Mr Anwar’s urine.

A family member said today that the former Deputy Premier was still in hospital and remained in high spirits.

KGB spy exposed in UK after 40 years

LONDON, Sept 11 (Reuters) — An 87-year-old widow living quietly in the English countryside was revealed today as the most important woman spy ever recruited by Soviet KGB in Britain.

The woman, known only by her codename Hola, passed atomic secrets to Moscow for over 40 years and said she would be prepared to do the same again today.

Hola, now a great-grandmother, lives freely in Britain and the government has reportedly ruled out any charges against her because of her advanced age.

Revelation of the top-level spy was made by dissident KGB officer Vasili Mitrokhin who smuggled out classified files from Russian foreign intelligence archives.

His revelations emerged in “The Mitrokhin Archive” by Cambridge academic Christopher Andrew, whose book was serialised in Saturday’s Times of London newspaper.

She was credited with helping to accelerate the development of the Soviet nuclear deterrent after the end of World War II.

She worked in the British non-ferrous metals research association in London whose work was critical in developing Britain’s nuclear bomb, the book excerpt said.

Stalin was said to have been better briefed on the development of Britain’s bomb than ministers in the government of British Prime Minister Clement Attlee because of all the top-level secrets passed on by Hola.

The grey-haired Hola, pictured in the Times out shopping, told the paper she had no regrets about her 40 years of spying as a committed communist ideologue.

“I am 87 and my memory is not what is was. I did what I did not to make money but to help prevent the defeat of a new system which had at great cost given ordinary people food and fares which they could afford, a good education and a health service.

Home Secretary Jack Straw, sparking a political row, was reported by the Times to have ruled that she should not be prosecuted or even interviewed by security services because of her age.

That provoked a furious response from Opposition Conservative party spokeswoman Ann Widdecombe, who said: “I am appalled... treachery is never forgivable.”

Rocky grave for nuclear wastes
From O.P. Sabherwal

BLACKHAWK (California): The world’s biggest nuclear wastes management problem — America’s 77,000 tonnes of radioactive wastes accumulated from atomic test since inception, operations of decades of over 100 nuclear power plants, and of nuclear submarines of the US naval fleet — is now being tackled in right earnest.

The Yucca Mountains of Nevada, close to the desert used for innumerable atomic tests, have been marked out as permanent home for these highly lethal wastes. The project for burying wastes deep in the hard rock heart of the Yucca Mountain is in full swing and is expected to be completed by 2010.

USA’s nuclear waste is currently stored in corrosion-resistant alloy canisters the size of compact cars, at military bases and in cooling pools and dry storage at more than 100 reactors in 34 states. These sites require constant monitoring.

Since the 1950’s researchers have worked on a variety of solutions to the vexed problem of permanent storage of these wastes. They had even toyed with the idea of “pie-in-the-sky” disposal solutions such as launching the waste into the sun or burying it beneath the ocean floor or the Earth’s polar ice caps”, says a Los Angeles Times report.

The final decision has gone in favour of burying the wastes Yucca. With its remote location and arid climate, officials estimate the desert repository can isolate the waste for at least 10,000 years. By then, atomic experts predict the radioactivity of the wastes will have diminished greatly. But, researchers are also examining the suitability of the Yucca Mountain site if the waste remains radioactive for a longer period — some say till about 1,00,000 years into future.

In India, nuclear spent fuel is reprocessed to extract plutonium. The plutonium extracted by reprocessing at the Tarapur, BARC, and now the Kalpakkam reprocessing plants is stored for fabricating fuel for advanced Indian reactors, specially the fast breeder test reactor (FBTR) and the 500 MWe prototype fast breeder reactor under construction at Kalpakkam. Plutonium 239, extracted by reprocessing spent fuel provides the core for India’s nuclear weapon arsenal. The nuclear wastes at the end of reprocessing makes disposal for Indian nuclear establishments considerably less hazardous.

The USA’s $ 35 billion nuclear waste burial project at Yucca Mountain, under construction for over a decade and now in an advanced stage, is seen by engineers as mankind’s most enduring engineering achievement, one that at least for very considerable time will defy nature’s fierce destructive powers. Specialists incharge of the project consider it to be a permanent answer to a nagging nuclear waste problem.

Still, there are critics of this $ 35 billion project — funded largely from income generated by nuclear energy customers. They argue that the chosen site is susceptible to earthquakes, pointing to magnitude 5.6 quake 12 miles away at Little Skull Mountain in 1992. A big tremor could crack open the waste containers they say. Critics are also concerned about the danger of transporting spent fuel and wastes to Yucca Mountain from reactors and military bases nationwide. It could be a “mobile Chernobyl”, they say.

Born outside womb
LONDON: A baby boy in London has made medical history by developing outside the womb in a multiple birth and surviving. Ronan Ingram was one of triplets delivered by caesarean section at King’s College Hospital in London after surviving an ectopic pregenancy in his mother’s fallopian tube. The boy created his own “womb” with his own blood supply by attaching himself to his mother’s stomach cavity, according to a report in The Sun newspaper. — DPA

Intelligence chief
CAIRO: Three days after the attack on Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, the government has transferred the intelligence chief and subjected three top police officials to face the disciplinary board. Intelligence chief Lt-Gen Hani El-Azebi has now been given the charge of border security force, while his deputy Lt-General Salemeh has been appointed the new intelligence chief. — PTI

Snake fright
HONG KONG: Twentyeight snakes were thrown into a Chinese restaurant in Hong Kong when it was full of people eating their lunch, the police and news reports said. Shortly before 1 p.m. five men wearing sunglasses entered the three-storey restaurant in the downtown Sai Wan district on Friday. They first threw a packet containing a foul-smelling liquid into the lobby, then ran upstairs and released the snakes and a large number of grasshoppers before fleeing. — DPA