By The
Associated Press
News Digest
■
Rwandans face
honors, fears
on return home
KIGALI, Rwanda—Melanie
Nyiranzabonimana had to
choose between two fears—the
certain horror of what she knew
and the horror rumored to await
her if she returned to Rwanda.
She decided that nothing
could be worse than what she’d
lived through. On Tuesday, she
was one of about 800 to board
yellow trucks for the trip home.
“All our husbands died of
cholera or dysentery in the
camps,” said
Nyiranzabonimana, 38, who also
lost five of her seven children.
“I’m more afraid of famine.”
Though she said she was hap
py to be back in Kigali, she
admitted she didn’t know how
her group of about 30 women
and children would find food or
shelter.
“There are so few men. Most
of them were killed,” she said.
The returnees were ferried
Tuesday the 90 miles from near
Goma, Zaire, by about a dozen
yellow cargo trucks. As many as
30,000 people have died of dis
ease and famine in refugee camps
near Goma.
1V1UM Ui II1C ILlUIllCtS Wtlt
women and young children, sur
vivors of the 14-week civil war
in which Tutsi rebels toppled the
Hutus and installed a new gov
ernment. The new leaders’ vow
to prosecute for war crimes and
unsubstantiated rumors of new
atrocities have frightened many
Hutus from returning.
A high-profile project to re
patriate 144 Hutus from the
Mugunga camp, home to the
defeated Rwandan army, was
canceled Tuesday after they re
fused to leave.
Camp elders and soldiers,
who sec repatriation as treason,
“said they would kill them if
they left,” according to U.N.
spokesman Panos Moumtzis.
“They wanted to see the list” of
refugees wanting to leave.
Even the estimated 5,000
people crossing back to Rwanda
daily is only a tiny fraction of the
estimated 800,000 remaining
refugees who fled the civil war
last month.
] Altman quits as deputy treasury secretary
WASHINGTON — Deputy Trea
sury Secretary Roger Altman, accused
of misleading Congress with his
Whitewater testimony, resigned to
day, the White House said. The Trea
sury’s top lawyer, Jean Hanson, also is
expected to step down.
White House Press Secretary Dec
Dee Myers said Altman, an old friend
ofPresident Clinton, toldClinton about
his decision.
Meanwhile, administration offi
cials, speaking on condition of ano
nymity, said Hanson has told col
leagues she will step down, but not
immediately. The officials said the
resignation is expected this week.
Rejecting suggestions that Altman
was forced out, Myers said, “This was
Roger Altman’s decision.”
The two are the latest casualties in
the Whitewater affair, which stems
from a real estate venture between the
Clintons and the owner of a failed
Arkansas savings and loan.
Altman, who spoke today at cere
monies where a postage stamp was
unveiled, declined to comment when
questioned later by reporters about his
njture.
Altman, a former Wall Street in
vestment banker, is a close friend of
the Clintons from their days at
Georgetown University. He was an
early star in the administration when
he helped steer the president’s budget
through Congress last year. At one
point, he was mentioned as a possible
successor to Treasury Secretary Lloyd
Bentsen.
Earlier in the week, the adminis
tration floated the name of Frank
Newman, undersecretary of the Trca
sury for domestic finance, as a possi
ble replacement for Altman.
Altman and Hanson have long been
rumored to be leaving. A third Trea
suryofficial underfire, JoshuaSteiner,
apparently will remain as Bentscn’s
chiefofstaff. There isaslight possibil ity
he could be reassigned, aides said.
Hanson testified that Altman or
dercd her to brief the White House
about the confidential Whitewater
investigation involving the president
and first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Altman said he did not recall giving
her that direction.
She also was rebuked for not im
mediately correcting Altman’s testi
mony about White House contacts with
Treasury officials, which later proved
to be incomplete.
Republicans have accused Altman
of giving confidential information
about the Whitewater investigation to
White House aides last February.
Altman originally acknowledged a
single contact on Whitewater but later
information showed there were at least
40.
Testifying this month, A1 tman said
he regretted that his original state
ment “may appear too narrow or per
haps incomplete.”
Administration officials pointedly
questioned whether Altman could re
store his credibility with Congress.
Republicans demanded his resigna
tion. White House officials have pri
vately pressed for Altman’s resigna
tion.
Key senators, including Sen. Don
Riegle, D-Mich., and Sen Paul
Sarbanes, D-Md., told White House
officials two weeks ago that Altman
had to go.
The resignation makes Altman the
latest casualty of the Whitewater af
fair. Another old Clinton friend, Ber
nard Nussbaum, resigned under pres
sure this spring as White House Coun
sel. Arkansas lawyer Webb Hubbell
resigned as associate attorney general
amid questions abouthis involvement.
The jobs of two other Treasury
Department officials, counsel Jean
Hanson and Joshua Steiner, chief of
staff for Bentscn, are in jeopardy. A
group of Republicans urged Bentscn
to fire them last week.
The official said Hanson’s resig
nation was not expected as soon as
Altman’s.
Baseball owners won’t turn to replacement players
NEW YORK — Unlike the NFL
owners did in 1987, baseball owners
won’t use replacement players.
“It’s not something anybody has
considered seriously at all. It’s not
about to happen,” management nego
tiator Richard Ravitch said Tuesday.
“Both the players and the owners found
in football the public wasn’t terribly
interested.”
Baseball’s longest midseason stop
page since 1981 entered its sixth day
today, wiping out 14 games and rais
ing the total canceled to 74.
If there’s no settlement by Friday
— and a quick deal doesn’t appear
likely — the strike would become
baseball’s second-longest in terms of
canceled games. The 1981 strike
wiped out 712 games.
No new talks are scheduled, but
Ravitch said the federal mediators
probably would call a meeting for
later in the week. The sides haven’t
met formally since last Friday, the
first day of baseball’s eighth work
stoppage since 1972.
“It’s not uncustomary in a labor
negotiation after a strike begins,”
Ravitch said.
Executive council chairman Bud
Selig, speaking by telephone from his
office in Milwaukee, agreed with
Ravitch’s view that replacement play
ers wouldn’t be a solution for baseball
owners, saying his negotiator’s view
was correct.
Firefighters work to contain California
fire, but some areas are too dangerous
SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — A
blaze that raged across 65 square miles
of central California was one-half
contained today, but some hot spots in
the rugged, hilly area remained too
dangerous to attack.
Calmer winds helped the 2,300
firefighters battling the 45,500-acre
blaze, which has destroyed 31 houses
and six mobile homes and caused
abput $10 million in damage. An ar
sonist started the blaze Sunday at a
campground.
“Baby pictures, everything. My
whole life is gone,” said George
Sullivan as he picked among the ruins
of his home. “It’s like being an undoc
umented person.”
Hundreds of people who had been
forced to flee as flames raced through
the oak-studded canyons were allowed
to returnTuesday night. Highway 101,
a major north-south route, was re
opened. Highway 41 remained closed
along a 10-mile east-west stretch.
Firefighters dropped water by air
craft and dug fire lines to combat the
blaze—California’s largest this year
— about 150 miles northwest of Los
Angeles. At least 13 firefighters sus
Western wildfires
States currently having uncontrolled
or uncontained fires:
1. Washington 4. Montana 6. Utah
2. Oregon 5. California 7. Arizona
3. Idaho
AP
lained minor injuries.
Twenty-seven major fires have
burned more than 388,000 acres in
Arizona, California, Idaho, Montana,
Oregon, Utah and Washington state,
according to the National Interagency
Fire Center in Boise, Idaho.
Replacement players were used by
NFL owners for three weeks during
the pro football strike of 1987, causing
the union to end the strike and fight its
battle in court. But baseball teams
play six times a week instead of once,
making it more expensive to open
stadiums if crowds and television rat
ings arc small.
Ravitch said the situations of the
NFL and major league baseball weren’t
ripe for comparison.
“Baseball is the quintessential
American sport. Everything is high
lighted,” he said. “If there’s a dispute
in hockey or basketball, do you think
that the federal government is excited
about it?”
With the slow progress of negotia
tions, players and owners are pre
pared not to come back this season.
The Toronto Blue Jays held their end
of-season organizational meetings
Tuesday.
“In some ways, I guess it did feel
like the end of the season, but we were
just taking advantage of available
time,” assistant general manager Gord
Ash said. “We all want to see a com
pletion to the season, but those of us
who went through this in ’81 are
aware there’s different phases.”
Meanwhile, Seattle Mariners pitch
er Jim Converse became the second
player on strike to be sent to the mi
nors, joining Chicago Cubs pitcher
Steve Trachsel, who was sent down
STRIKE SCOREBOARD
Baseball owners ruled out the idea of using replacement players during
the strike.
DAYS LOST
GAMES LOST
PAY LOST since strike
(highest-paid player)
»» ..
e
Bobby Bonilla, N. Y. Mets
$5,700,000
$218,033
PAY LOST since strike
(minimum salary)
e
Minimum salaried player
$109,000
$4,169
Salaries listed do not include prorated shares of signing bonuses or other guaranteed income, or
incentive bonuses earned or money lost because of lost opportunities for incentive bonuses.
AP
Monday.
Converse, optioned to Calgary of
the Pacific Coast League, had been
losing S595.63 per day during the
strike but will be paid at the rate of
$30,500 season.
In Jacksonville, Fla., a lawsuit filed
on behalf of fans and sports bar own
ers attempting to stop the strike was
dropped.
Glory Days Sports Pub and Will
iam Dcgar, president of People In
Support of our Teams, dropped the
suit after the Major League Baseball
Players Association threatened to seek
legal fees and costs if the plaintiffs
lost, according to Mark Rubin, one of
the lawyers who filed the complaint.
Lawyers clash over Simpson DNA
LOS ANGELES—Rival attor
neys in the O.J. Simpson double
murder case clashed angrily today
over a slip-up over DNA testing
that prosecutors said could result
in critical genetic evidence not be
ing ready in time for trial.
In the most emotional sparring
of the case, defense attorneys sug
gested prosecutors have been lying
to the Simpson camp and asked the
judge to force prosecutors to explain
why they shouldn’t be held in con
tempt of court.
Deputy District Attorney Marcia
Clark, her voice wavering at times,
said she hasn’t been withholding ev
idence from the defense.
Lawyers argued after Clark re
vealed that, unknown to her, some of
the blood samples collected by au
thorities weren’t delivered to a
Maryland laboratory and still need
ed to be tested. She wanted some of
those untested samples to be ana
lyzed at a state lab in Berkeley; it
wasn’t clear in the discussion why
that lab was chosen.
Shapiro said he doubted wheth
er Clark was telling the truth.
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