Extracts. President Jiang Zemin to Visit DPRK from September 3 to 5 Jiang Zemin , General-Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and Chinese President, will pay an official goodwill visit to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea from September 3 to 5. Jiang is invited by Kim Jong Il, General-Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) Central Committee and Chairman of the National Defense Commission. This was announced here Monday by Yu Hongjun, spokesman of the International Department of the CPC Central Committee. **** NPC Chairman Meets Vietnam Guest Li Peng , chairman of the Standing Committee of China's National People's Congress (NPC , met with Vice Chairman of the National Assembly of Vietnam Vu Dinh Cu Monday afternoon in Beijing . **** President Jiang Zemin Meets Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra Chinese President Jiang Zemin met with Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra Monday afternoon in Beijing. The meeting is still going on at press time. Thaksin, who arrived here earlier Monday afternoon, paid the visit as guest of Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji. **** Falun Gong Follower in Guangxi Sentenced to Death for Murder Lan Yuanchang, a die-hard Falun Gong follower convicted of murder, has been sentenced to death with two years' suspension, with his political rights deprived for life. The verdict was announced on August 22 by the Intermediate People's Court of Liuzhou City, southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, in its first instance ruling. Despite education, Lan was still infatuated with Falun Gong, always seeking to "go to heaven and achieve nirvana." On April 16, Lan got to villager Wei Shaoming's house, asking for arsenic, but was refused. Then he decided to kill Wei so that Wei could accompany him to "going to heaven." With this idea, Lan grasped an ax to hit smashingly Wei's head from behind, bringing him down to the ground. Wei died on the morning of the following day in spite of medical treatment. **** Egypt Reaffirms Support for Regaining of Palestinian Legitimate Rights. A senior Egyptian official reaffirmed Egypt's support for the Palestinians in their struggle for regaining legitimate rights from Israeli occupation, the state- run MENA news agency reported on Monday. "Egypt strongly supports the Palestinian stance out of its belief in the justice of the Palestinian cause," said Osama al-Baz, political advisor to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, during his meeting with university students in the Egyptian Mediterranean coastal city of Alexandria on Sunday. Baz criticized Israel for trying to "delude the world into believing that it is facing Islamic terrorism," calling on the Arab media to expose such an Israeli lie and publicize the Palestinian justice cause against Israeli aggressions. He also urged Israel to freeze the expansion of Jewish settlements, pull out from the occupied Palestinian lands, end acts of violence against the Palestinians, and resume the final-status negotiations with the Palestinian National Authority. On his recent mission to the United States, Baz said that the U. S. administration listened "with open mind" to the Egyptian vision on the current situation in the Middle East, voicing hope that the U.S. would play a "more active" role in pushing forward the Mideast peace process. Baz led a high-level Egyptian delegation to Washington on August 13 for talks on how to deal with the tense situation in the Middle East, which has been witnessing continued bloodshed between the Palestinians and Israelis since last September. Egypt has been pushing the U.S. administration for months to intervene more actively to help break the cycle of violence and resume peace negotiations between the two sides. More than 700 people, most of them Palestinians, have been killed since the eruption of the deadly clashes between the Palestinians and Israelis late last September. **** Belarus Expels US Citizen for Interfering in Internal Affairs Belarus expelled a US citizen for "interference in the internal affairs of the republic," the Belarussian state television said Sunday. Robert Fielding from the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations was compelled to leave Belarus on Saturday evening and was banned from entering Belarus for five years, Russian news agencies cited the television as saying. Fielding had repeatedly visited Minsk and other large cities of Belarus at the invitation of the Belarussian Free Trade Unions formally to "share the experience of American and European trade unions in the relations between employers and employees," but has actually interfered with internal affairs of Belarus, the State Security Committee said Sunday. For instance, he called on the republic's voters to support opposition candidate Vladimir Goncharik in the coming presidential election to be held on September 9 at a seminar of members of the Free Trade Unions in the city of Grodno on last Thursday, said the committee. The security authorities also accused Fielding of making public statements that international bodies do not recognize the current Belarussian leadership, and of mobilizing the opposition for an unconstitutional removal of incumbent President Alexander Lukashenko from his office. "Any attempt at interference by aliens in Belarus' internal affairs will be cut short up to their compulsory deportation from the republic, regardless of their status," the committee said. **** New Bloodshed Hits Middle East Truce Prospects Israeli Warplanes Attacks Palestinian targets A furious weekend of Palestinian attacks and Israeli reprisals in which at least 11 people died have left the two sides further apart than ever in efforts to end 11 months of violence and seek a peace settlement. Israeli warplanes, tanks and bulldozers wrecked Palestinian security buildings on Sunday in response to seven Israeli deaths. Four Palestinians also died in the fighting. Palestinian President Yasser Arafat branded the strikes "barbaric", while Israeli Defence Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer referred to Arafat as "a cruel enemy". "Before us is a cruel enemy...because everything that happens in the field is precisely what he wants," Ben-Eliezer told a gathering of his centre-left Labour party. Israeli Warplanes Attacks Palestinian targets "We will fight terror to the bitter end. No one can expect us to sit quietly and do nothing when you know two suicide bombers are on their way to carry out an attack," he said. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon convened an overnight security meeting with cabinet ministers and security officials to discuss the latest violence. F-16 and F-15 jets left three Palestinian security headquarters in the Gaza Strip and West Bank in ruins in a pre-dawn bombardment after two Palestinian gunmen entered an Israeli base in Gaza on Saturday and killed three soldiers before they were shot dead. Two other Palestinians died in the Gaza fighting. In two separate incidents, three members of an Israeli family and an Israeli merchant were shot dead by Palestinian gunmen on roads that straddle the West Bank and the Jewish state proper. An armed group linked to Arafat's Fatah faction took responsibility for the two roadway shootings in the West Bank and Israel's response to the four deaths was not far behind. Israeli helicopters fired seven missiles and destroyed a Palestinian police post in the town of Tulkarm close to the point where clothing merchant Dov Roseman, 58, was killed when he came to trade with Palestinian villagers. ISRAELI TANKS ATTACK Israeli tanks also wrecked three Palestinian security posts by shelling in the city of Ramallah, wounding seven people. The latest attacks lowered the prospect for proposed truce talks between Arafat and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, who had agreed last week to meet under German auspices. Nearly 540 Palestinians and more than 150 Israelis have been killed since a Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation erupted in late September after peace talks stalled. One by one, Israelis buried their dead over the weekend, with families largely avoiding the publicity of television cameras. "When I opened the door I suddenly saw three people in uniform hugging me from every direction, they didn't have to say anything. I understood what happened," said Nissim Anza, father of Major Gil Oz who was killed at the Gaza army base, of the moment when soldiers came to inform him of the death. "From that moment, let's just say my world has changed, part of it perhaps has gone forever." Israel said it held Arafat and the Palestinian Authority responsible for the Israeli deaths. Arafat said the Israeli strikes would not deter the struggle for an independent Palestinian state. "I repeat that the mountain will not be shaken by the wind," Arafat, in his green military uniform with a sub-machinegun slung over his shoulder, told reporters as he inspected rubble around a ruined security building in Gaza on Sunday. In separate violence, three Palestinians, including an 11-year-old boy, were wounded during an exchange of fire with Israeli troops near the West Bank town of Bethlehem. **** Relation with China Enters Best Period: Putin Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday accepted the credential by Chinese Ambassador to Russia Zhang Deguang and appreciated the Sino-Russian relation as in its best stage. Meeting with the new Chinese ambassador in the Kremlin, Putin highly valued his friendship with Chinese President Jiang Zemin. Putin said the Russian-Chinese relationship has entered the best and the most effective period in history, which is enjoying sound development in all fields. He mentioned a good-neighborly treaty of friendship and cooperation signed recently by the two countries, stressing the treaty has laid reliable legal foundation for the development of bilateral relations in the 21st century. The treaty, signed here in July during Jiang's latest Moscow trip, summed up the preferential interests of the two nations and has become the guidelines for long-term cooperation, he added. Talking about the upcoming Moscow visit by Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji, Putin said he attaches great importance to the visit and that he is looking forward to meeting with Zhu. Zhang said that President Jiang cherished very much his personal friendship and good working relations with Putin and were looking forward to meeting him again at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation informal summit in Shanghai, China in October. **** Development of Long-range Attacking Capacity Reveals Splitlist Ambition. According to news from Taipei August 22, Taiwan Central University is scheduled to launch a space detecting rocket in southern Taiwan Island in mid-September. This will be Taiwan's first launch of a space rocket. However, Taiwan's development and launch of rockets aims not only at scientific experiment, but also contains the intention of developing long-distance projecting vehicles, and launching specific satellites. The space rocket detector set to be launched in September is a two-section, four tail-fin rocket, around 4-5 meters long and 30-40 cm in diameter, it uses solid fuel, and is developed by the Taiwan Chongshan Research Institute. The rocket is capable of propelling the test object to the space 80-140 km above the ground. Shortening the Time for Taiwan's Development of Medium- and Long-range Missiles The "Tsing Feng" ground-to-ground missile Taiwan developed in the 70s eventually was not put into batch production and deployed because it had only a range of 100 km. The main reason for the short range of the satellite was the lagging of the rocket driving technology. Beginning in the early 80s, on the basis of "Tien Kung" (Sky Bow) and "Hsiung Feng" missiles, Taiwan stealthily developed rocket motivation range-adding technology and proceeded to develop medium- and long-range ground-to-ground missiles. Sources say that Taiwan is developing medium-range ground-to-ground ballistic missiles with a firing range of 1,000-2,000 km. After nearly two years of research, Taiwan has already had the ability to manufacture medium-range ground-to-ground missiles. However, due to the limitation of technical force and financial funds, Taiwan's progress in rocket range-adding technology goes rather slow. In an effort to accelerate the development and deployment of medium- and long-range missiles, the Taiwan authorities have instructed the aviation, space and remote-metering institute under Taiwan Central University to sign a space science research cooperation agreement with an American university in South Carolina in 1999. After two years of research, with US technical help, Taiwan has decided to launch a space rocket in mid-September, which will shorten the time for Taiwan's development and deployment of medium- and long-range missile. Attempting to Send Military Satellite into Space Taiwan tries its utmost to develop medium- and long-range carrier rockets which militarily, besides being used in long-distance projecting weapons, have another important attempt to launch military satellites. The "satellite-launching program" worked out by Taiwan in 1989 included the development of carrier rockets, the planned rocket is capable of launching satellites and serving as medium- and long-range missile carriers. In January 1999, the "China Satellite-1" developed by Taiwan was sent into the space of US Florida State. The "China Satellite-2" and the "China Satellite-3" have also been planned to be launched into space in 2002 and 2004. However, Taiwan's projected satellites were and would be launched by foreign carrier rockets. Taiwan's lack of long-distance means of delivery not only greatly prolongs satellite launching time, but also prevents it from flagrantly developing military satellites. In order to rid themselves of this situation, the Taiwan authorities are developing large-power, long-distance rockets. The planned emission of space rocket in September will be an important test of Taiwan armed forces' development of long-range rockets and military satellites. Taiwan Rockets Directed at the Mainland While nominally Taiwan launches space rocket to "carry out scientific experiment", it actually develops medium- and long-range missiles and military satellites, its ultimate target is directed at the mainland. Undoubtedly, the space rocket detector Taiwan is about to launch will enable Taiwan's military forces to make a big breakthrough in their long-range combat capabilities. Currently, the missile weapons which equip Taiwan's armed forces are mostly short-distance operational weapons, however, with the support from the United States and other Western countries, the Taiwan authorities can use the following weapons to attack the mainland. "Tien Kung" tactical missile. This is a short-range ground-to-ground missile, with the firing range of about 100 km. Currently, this missile is secretly deployed in Taiwan Island proper, if it is deployed in the forward positions of Jinmen (Quemoy) Island and Mazu Island, the military and civilian targets of the mainland's Xiamen, Fuzhou and other areas will be threatened. F-16 fighter. This US-made advanced fighter plane can be used to attack the mainland's coastal and marine targets. "Hsiung Feng-3" missile. It was test fired secretly this July, its firing range reached 500 km, with its speed doubling the velocity of sound. The Taiwan military claimed that the missile high-speed flight and long-distance firing capability suffice to threaten water targets in Zhejiang, Fujian and eastern Guangdong provinces, and to attack ships and installations in harbors of these areas. "Hsiung Feng-2E is a kind of attacking continental medium-range cruise missile, with a firing range of about 1,000 km. Taiwan naval force' deployment of this type of missile will constitute threat to the interior areas of the mainland. Taiwan plans to buy eight 209-type diesel-powered submarines. The United States has approved selling to Taiwan four "Kidd"-class missile destroyers, which are large war vessels of over -8,000-ton class warships. In purchasing these formidable giants, Taiwan obviously aims to carry out attack operations against the mainland. Rocket Development Beset with Difficulties Although Taiwan has possessed a variety of short-distance carrier rockets and has achieved some breakthrough in the development of medium-range rockets, generally speaking, the development of Taiwan's rocket and aviation industry still lags far behind that of the United States, Russia, France and the Chinese mainland, it is inferior even to that of India , Pakistan and Brazil . There are various reasons behind Taiwan's lagging in the field of rocket development, but the most important reason lies in the fact that Taiwan people do not support the authorities' policy of using the development of medium- and long-range carrier rockets to intimidate the mainland. It is the general views of various social circles at home and abroad that the more Taiwan tries to threaten the mainland, the more difficult it will be for Taiwan to defend its security. Because this will not only cause Taiwan's huge military spending to sink into a bottomless pit and seriously hold back Taiwan's economic development and the improvement of people's livelihood, but also will aggravate the tension in the relations between the two sides of the Taiwan Straits. _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki Phone +358-40-7177941 Fax +358-9-7591081 http://www.kominf.pp.fi General class struggle news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe mails to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Geopolitical news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________
