More freed hostages
fly from Iraq, Kuwait
Nearly 500 more foreigners flew out of Iraq and occupied Kuwait on
Tuesday, ending four months at swords’ point following the Iraqi
invasion of the oil-rich emirate.
One freed British hostage said he saw bodies on the street outside his
Kuwait hideout Tuesday morning.
Three chartered flights brought 243 foreigners from Kuwait to
Baghdad to join hundreds of other hostages on three chartered jetliners
that left Iraq for Bangkok, London and Frankfurt.
Callum Strachan, dressed in a traditional kilt from his native
Scotland, saluted the other hostages by playing his bagpipes as the
foreigners cleared Iraqi passport control.
“The people who deserve the greatest admiration are the Kuwaitis
who sheltered us despite the fact that they could be executed on the spot
if they were found helping us,” said 51-year-old Briton Ken Emsden.
He said there still was gunfire every night in Kuwait and that he saw
the bodies of four civilians in the street Tuesday morning.
“We’re just happy it’s finally over,” said Sid Hatcher, 35, of
Knoxville, Tenn., who was held at an industrial site in Iraq.
Diplomats said just 14 Americans were on the flights from Baghdad.
There were no Americans on the flights from Kuwait to Baghdad.
“We must have gotten them all,” said one American consular
official, referring to earlier evacuation flights from the Persian Gulf
emirate. He spoke on condition of anonymity.
In Washington, the Bush administration said a planned evacuation
■ flight Thursday is “likely to be the last” for Americans and will
probably also carry home the remaining staff of the U.S. Embassy in
| Kuwait.
i “We would anticipate that once all Americans who want out have
| been able to get out that we would remove the entire staff of the
| embassy,” said White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater.
The plane bound for Frankfurt on Tuesday carried 16 freed hostages.
■ The flight to London carried 310 people, nearly all of them Britons.
A Japanese-chartered jetliner left Baghdad for Bangkok with 159
people aboard, including 14 Japanese diplomats from Kuwait. Nearly
all the others were former Japanese hostages.
Diplomats said about 400 Americans were expected to remain in
! Iraq and Kuwait, mainly people with dual U.S.-Iraqi citizenship or
S American spouses of Iraqis.
_____________
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Hot air balloon strikes tower
in urban area; four die in fall
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AP
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - A hoi
air balloon struck a broadcast tower
near the city’s downtown Tuesday
and crashed in a wooded area behind
the WBNS television studios, killing
four people.
Three men, all licensed hot air
balloon pilots, and a woman riding in
the gondola were killed, police said.
Radio station WTVN-AM reported
that the balloon took off from Mo
hawk Middle School, but no students
from the school were on board.
Lt. Randy Thatcher of the State
Highway Patrol said the balloon went
into a steep climb to clear the broad
cast lower.
“It snagged on the top of the an
tenna and fell,” Thatcher said. “Half
the descent was fairly slow until all
the air was out of the envelope. Then
it fell straight down very fast.”
John Rcmy, a reporter for WTVN,
said he was on his way to work when
he saw the balloon hit the tower,
which is 1,069 feet tall. He said the
balloon appeared to fall about 900
feet.
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Mass starvation causes new trouble
throughout war-torn Liberian cities
MONROVIA, Liberia (AP) - Four
year-old Falah Saah, too weak from
starvation to cry out, could only
murmur listlessly as he lay in his
mother’s lap.
“I want drink, drink, drink,” he
said softly, nearly drowned out by the
moans from other sick children in the
ward at Island Hospital, one of only
two hospitals still operating in Monro
via, the capital of war-wrecked Libe
ria.
His mother, Maita Solui, said he is
one of only three of her seven chil
dren to survive the West African
country’s year-long civil war.
Hundreds of children have died of
starvation, and doctors say that unless
a huge food aid program is launched,
thousands more will succumb.
Other youngsters, brutalized by
seeing mothers raped and fathers,
brothers and sisters killed, became
child soldiers in the rebel armies.
Falah’s eldest brother joined up and
was killed.
The physical and mental condition
of the surviving children has raised
fears about the future generation of
this West African nation. Relief work
ers say the degree of starvation has
been so great that many children who
live will suffer brain damage.
The child soldiers suffer in other
ways. At the rebel base in Caldwell,
outside the capital, a young boy played
with a remote-control toy car. Draped
over his shoulder was a machine gun
— a real one.
“I’m a man. I have killed like a
man,” boasted another little boy. He
looked 6 or 7 years old, with a gun
nearly as tall as he was, but refused to
give his age.
For orphans who have watched
their parents killed by Liberian troops,
the rebel camp offered a substitute
family, food, and an opportunity for
revenge.
“They are still little children, but
how are we going to convince them of
that when it’s all over?” said Myrtle
Gibson, a real estate agent who turned
to relief work. “How are we going to
make them real people again?
“After this war, we’re going to
have a lot more wars to fight.”
Hunger is the most immediate
problem. Starving Monrovians ate the
city’s pet dogs and cats months ago.
They ale zoo animals, including chim
panzees. Then they turned to the
vegetation, eating weeds and slash
ing down palm trees to eat the filling
but non-nutritious Fiber under the bark
A little food is on sale — bunches
of green leaves and weeds, some sto
len tinned goods, a few oranges, looted
rice. But few can afford it.
The Belgian branch of the interna
tional aid group Doctors Without
Borders started supplementary feed
ing now reaching 3,000children with
help from newly arrived United Na
tions workers.
U.N. representative Michael Heyn
said the relief workers hoped to soon
feed 25,000 children. But he said
90,000 children in Monrovia alone
need a special diet to recover.
Island Hospital has become a cen
ter for orphans of the war, children
who have lost their parents in pan
icked rushes away from the fighting.
Then there are the wounded, like a
little girl whose leg had to be ampu
tated, a boy who lost an eye.
Ellen James and other health work
ers go out on the streets to bring in
starving children, but they can only
help a few.
“We pick up 10, maybe 12; mean
while they are dying in their hun
dreds,” she said.
The hospital has no running water
and little electricity. A generator was
turned on only for emergency opera
tions because of a fuel shortage.
Monrovia has been without running
water, electricity and regular food
supplies for six months.
The victims in the war have been
mostly civilians. It is not known how
many have died — certainly more
than the 10,000 killed in the fighting
that began last Dec. 23.
The war began a rebellion against
the corrupt and oppressive govern
ment of the late President Samuel
Doe and turned into a tribal conflict
with three warring armies.
They agreed to a cease-fire on
Nov. 28, but an interim government
and other provisions still remain to be
negotiated.
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