Deutsche Welle
English Service News
September 7th, 2001, 16:00 UTC
NATO has restarted the second phase of its Operation Essential
Harvest weapons collecting mission in Macedonia. Disarmament had
been suspended temporarily when the Macedonian parliament's debate
on draft reforms for improving the civil rights of ethnic Albanians
was dragged out. Parliament voted in favour on Thursday of draft
reforms including greater official use of the Albanian language and
more jobs for Albanians in the police sector and other public
service departments. NATO Secretary General George Robertson hailed
Thursday's vote as a historic decision which brought the Balkan
country back from the brink of civil war. In the meantime, NATO
forces have so far collected over a third of the targeted 3,300
rebel arms.
With just hours to the close of the biggest international
gathering on racism ever, South Africa has desperately sought an
agreement on the text regarding the Middle East. The South African
document supports the right of Palestinians to a homeland but
removes references to Israel as racist. Efforts to reach an
agreement on a final Durban Declaration have also been strained over
whether the slave trade should be labelled a crime against humanity
and the victim countries paid reparations. The conference, which
had been billed as a milestone in the international battle against
racism, has also struggled with demands from African states for
apologies for centuries of slave trading. African states were
insisting on an apology for slavery and colonialism in the accord,
which European and other states are resisting because it might open
them up to law suits.
In Northern Ireland, Roman Catholic girls have walked to and from a
Belfast school in peace for the first time in five days of
protests. But the absence of violence on the fifth day of the new
school term has not signaled an end to a crisis which has forced
Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid to cut short his vacation and
fly to Belfast for emergency talks. Protestants called off their
protests on Friday to hold a memorial service for a young man who
was killed by a motorist. In a bitter standoff between Catholics
and Protestants that has shocked the world, the school girls have
been forced to walk under police escort to the Catholic school in a
Protestant area that has become a flashpoint in Northern Ireland's
endless sectarian violence. Reid denounced the violence aimed at
the children as the "path to barbarism." He is to address the
situation over the weekend.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has given Foreign Minister
Shimon Peres only a limited mandate for planned ceasefire talks with
Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. Peres, in Italy for an
international business conference, told reporters Thursday that he
and Arafat planned to meet next week and then hold two more sessions
after an interval. Senior Israeli political sources said the talks
will focus only on a ceasefire and implementing the Mitchell report.
Meanwhile Russia and the Palestinian leadership have strongly backed
the peace blueprint as as a means for ending the Middle East
conflict.
German Foreign Minister Ruldoph Scharping has once again rejected
accusations that he used military aircraft for personal use.
Scharping faces a parliamentary hearing on Monday to confront
opposition allegations that he used military jets to visit his
girlfriend in Frankfurt. According to the German Ministry of
Defence, Scharping has flown about 50 times back and forth between
Berlin and Frankfurt since summer of last year. Analysts say that
even if he proves that the flights were authorized, Scharping's
credibility is still wrecked due a public relations gaffe in which
photos showed him splashing in a pool with his fiance while a
crucial decision over sending troops to Macedonia was being made in
the German parliament. Calls for Scharping's resignation have been
renewed amid claims that he is putting his love life ahead of his
job.
The trial of eight foreign aid workers accused of promoting
Christianity in Afghanistan was in recess on Friday, the Muslim day
of prayer. Twenty-four staff members from the German-based Christian
aid agency Shelter Now International were arrested almost five weeks
ago on charges of promoting Christianity. They could face the death
penalty. The Taliban's Foreign Minister said on Thursday that a
decree offering lenient treatment to foreigners accused of spreading
Christianity did not apply in this case. U.N. special envoy to
Afghanistan Francesc Vendrell has arrived in Kabul for talks with
the Taliban about the fate of the detained aid workers as well as
other issues.
The government of Zimbawean President Robert Mugabe has agreed to
adopt measures to stop the violent occupation of white-owned farms.
Zimbabwe, in the midst of an economic crisis, said during a
Commonwealth meeting in Nairobi that it would enforce the rule of
law in land reform. Self-styled veterans of Zimbabwe's independence
war have seized hundreds of white-owned farms since February last
year. Nine white farmers were killed and hundreds of farm workers
injured. The occupations have crippled agricultural production and
worsened Zimbabwe's economic recession. Britain has agreed to put
money into a U.N.-administered fund to compensate white farmers. The
government in Harare has said it would introduce political reforms,
including press freedom.
Serbian News Network - SNN
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http://www.antic.org/
