Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 1, 1996)
Mideast summit is set, outcome uncertain By Barry Schweid Associated Press WASHINGTON — President Clinton’s politically risky Mideast summit was back on track Monday as Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat shook off Egyptian advice and said he would attend as promised. “Our expectation is he is coming tonight, and we look forward to it,” said State Department spokesman Nicholas Bums. “We understand there was some hesitation.” In a phone conversation today, Clinton failed to' persuade Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to join with King Hussein of Jordan in assisting the negotiations. Nor was Bums able to offer assur ances Arafat and Israeli Prime Minis ter Benjamin Netanyahu would meet face-to-face. “We will have to see what hap pens,” he said. Hussein was due to arrive in early evening, Netanyahu around midnight and Arafat early Tuesday morning. Mubarak, who is angry at the Is raeli government for its policies, is sending his foreign minister, Amr Moussa. “It would have been prefer able to have Mubarak here,” Bums said. Presidential spokesman Mike McCurry said the talks would begin today and probably include a session Wednesday. Other sources, speaking on condi tion of anonymity, disclosed that Arafat’s hesitation was prompted by the Egyptian government. The Egyp tians are furious at Netanyahu for opening a new entrance to a tourist tunnel near Muslim and Jewish holy sites in Jerusalem. The talks are designed to diffuse tensions and revive faltering peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority over the future of Jerusalem. Bob Dole, the Republican presiden tial nominee, discussed the Middle East developments with his senior for eign policy advisers today. Jeane Kirkpatrick, ambassador to the U.N. during the Reagan administration, told reporters afterward that Dole was “deeply concerned” by the latest Mid east violence. “The administration’s foreign policy is in a serious state of disarray with one failure after another,” Kirkpatrick said. The summit was thrown into ques tion by reports the Palestinian leader wants to postpone the meeting until its success can be assured. Netanyahu left for the United States as planned, but Arafat drove to Egypt to meet Mubarak before heading later to Luxembourg to meet European for eign ministers. Clinton sounded hopeful in an nouncing Sunday that Netanyahu and Arafat had accepted his invitation to Washington. “I think they’re both concerned about the way events spun out of con trol, about the loss of life, the injuiy, the eruption of old tensions and bit terness,” the president said. Netanyahu’s decision Tuesday to open a second entrance to a tourist tunnel near the Temple Mount and sites sacred to Muslims and Jews touched off angry Palestinian protests. Netanyahu, even while agreeing to go to Washington for U.S. mediation, said Sunday that he would not discuss the tunnel reopening with Arafat be cause it was Israel’s business alone. A senior U.S. official acknowl edged Sunday that Clinton was tak ing a political risk in intervening just five weeks before the presidential elec tion. If the mediation fails, or if Clinton puts heat on Netanyahu, he could lose some points among the elec torate. Netanyahu eyes continuous negotiations for accord AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, heading to Washington for a summit with Yasser Arafat, proposed today to hold continuous negotiations to work out all remaining obstacles to implementing the peace accord. Netanyahu said he and the Pal estinian leader would be directly in volved in such negotiations. Speaking to reporters, Netanyahu sought to create a posi tive atmosphere after the peace pro cess was put in jeopardy by clashes last week that killed 73 people — the worst fighting between Israelis and Palestinians in decades. The crisis began after Israelis enraged the Palestinians by open ing a new entrance to an archaeo logical tunnel that runs alongside one of Islam’s holiest sites. A senior Netanyahu aide told reporters on his plane that the Is raeli leader expected Arafat to re affirm his renunciation of violence. “I call on both sides immedi ately after the conference in Wash ington to enter into continuous ne gotiations at an agreed-upon loca tion and to hold them until agree ment is reached,” Netanyahu said. Netanyahu is apparently look ing for a Camp David-style meet ing, similar to the one in 1979 in which Israeli and Egyptian nego tiators isolated themselves in the Maryland presidential retreat un til they reached their peace treaty. Netanyahu promised that after an agreement was reached on is sues such as Israel’s soldiers in Hebron, the Israeli closure of the West Bank and Gaza Strip and a Palestinian airport in Gaza, Israel would “move into implementa tion” Arrests made in four-year-old slaying of Omaha student OMAHA (AP) — Two childhood friends who allegedly kidnapped and sexually assaulted a high school stu dent have been arrested in the four year-old slaying death of Kenyatta Bush. Adam Barnett, 21, of Omaha was charged Monday with first-degree murder. His friend, Jeremy C. Sheets, 22, was charged in an arrest warrant with first-degree murder. Sheets, who recently joined the Navy, was arrested Sunday in Lisbon Falls, Maine. Prosecutors were trying to extradite him back to Nebraska. Barnett and Sheets, then 17 and 18, lived in Omaha at the time of the slay ing. Bush’s disappearance on Sept. 23, 1992, rattled the community as hun dreds of volunteers searched for the honor student and former homecom ing queen. Her body was found 10 days later wrapped in two large rugs near a road in Washington County. About 3,000 mourners attended her funeral. Police, who believe Bush’s death was a random act of violence, do not have a motive. “All I can tell you is it was a ran dom kidnapping, sexual assault and homicide,” said Charles Circo, deputy chief of criminal investigation. “The two people that are arrested were both friends. There is no rela tionship that we have been able to identify with the victim,” Grco said. The break in the case came two weeks ago when a concerned person came forward with some new infor mation that led police to Barnett. He was arrested Friday on an unrelated misdemeanor change. One day later, he was booked on murder. Sheets was arrested Sunday. Why didn’t the informant come forward sooner? “They didn’t have the information before,” Circo said. At one time, police had focused on an acquaintance of Bush’s. In 1994, a police officer said suspicious behav ior at the time of Bush’s disappear ance “has caused us to continue con sidering him a suspect.” Police never identified the name of the suspect. On Monday, Circo said: “That per son would not cooperate with us. He was never identified by the police de partment ... as a suspect.” James M. Davis, an Omaha attor ney and current candidate for the U.S. Congress, alleged in early 1994 that he represented the young man who was the prime suspect and he claimed police were trying to force his client to confess to the crime. According to police, Bush drove to school on Sept. 23, after dropping off her younger sister at a day-care cen Ler. Known as Bunny to her family, Bush lived with her mother and step father, Barbara and LaFem Stennis. She was last seen in a hallway of school at about 8:36 a.m. by friends and faculty. She did not attend her al gebra class at 8:40 a.m. Her stepfa ther found her car the next morning parked near the high school. Her par ents reported her missing Sept. 24 at. 9 pjn. Police believe she died shortly af ter being abducted. Her death certifi cate said she died of a cut throat, but police have declined to confirm how she died. Congressional leaders spar over two-year GOP record In a televised debate Re publicans and Democrats argue taxes and Medicare. WILLIAMSBURG, Va. (AP) - In an unprec edented campaign debate, Republican and Democratic leaders clashed cordially Sunday night over taxes, Medicare and the record of the GOP-controlled Congress. “We have delivered genuine welfare reform ... We had common sense health reform ... We’re going to have immigration reform,” said Senate Majority Leader TVent Lott. “We have delivered for the American people,” he said, while the first GOP-led Congress in 40 years was on the verge of wrapping up its work. House Democratic Leader Richard Gephardt countered that Republicans “tried to cut Medi care to pay for tax cuts for the wealthiest Ameri cans; they tried to cut school lunch and student loans.* hi addition, he said, the GOP tried to “raise taxes on working Americans.” Lott; of Mississippi, and Gephardt, of Mis souri, were joined by House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia and Democratic leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota in colonial Williamsburg, Va., for the 60-minute debate televised live on PBS. The dash occurred a little more than five weeks before Election Day. Moderator Jim Lehrer setthe stakes in the opening moments of the encounter. “The outcome of those (elec tions) will decide which party will control Con gress” in January. Speaking to reporters afterward, Gephardt said the debate reinforces a national wave in lis party’s favor. “It’s not just 435 local elections,” he said. ‘There’s a national set of issues that should be iiscussed between the leaders.” In the debate’s final moments, Lott said a renewed Republican majority would try again to pass tax cuts and balance the budget. Daschle touted the Democrats’ “Families First” agenda, which stresses modest measures to improve health and pension coverage for Americans. For the most part, the congressional lead ers discussed issues they have disagreed over since the day Gingrich took the gavel as speaker in January 1995. They rarely if ever raised their voices, though. And whatever their personal feelings — the relationship between Gephardt and Gingrich is particularly strained they addressed one another by their first names as they sat facing each other at wooden desks. The debate briefly turned pointed near the end, though. Gingrich accused the AFL-CIO of spending millions to defeat Republicans this fall, using “dues money that is coerced” from its members. Daschle retorted that Republicans had in vited polluters into the committee rooms last year “to figure out ways” to make the air and water dirtier. The Democratic leaders challenged Repub licans, too, on two of the most memorable mo ments of the 104th Congress — the twin gov ernment shutdowns of last winter. “It was wrong. It was irresponsible,” Gephardt said. Neither Gingrich nor Lott defended the shutdowns, and the speaker conceded, “I think wedid learn a lot over that.” Black delegates plan to sue over alleged CIA conspiracy ST. LOUIS (AP)—Delegates to the first National African-American Leadership Summit said Sunday they planned to sue the government over allegations the CIA delib erately introduced crack into black commu nities. “You can go to jail for conspiracy. But this is not just a conspiracy theory—this is reality,” Nation of Islam lawyer Arif Muhammad told several hundred delegates who stayed for the end of the three-day sum mit. Muhammad urged blacks to make lists of people who had been adversely affected by crack cocaine. He said he and several at torneys were preparing to file a class-action conspiracy lawsuit against the government. The convention was billed as a push to get Democrats and Republicans to pay more attention to the concerns of black Ameri cans. _ Several hundred delegates capped their meeting by ratifying a 56-page national agenda to be sent to the Democratic, Repub lican and Reform parties. It calls for better housing and education for blacks, abolishment of the Electoral Col lege, campaign finance reform, proportional representation and the strengthening of his torically black colleges. It also expresses anger over allegations reported by the San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News that the CIA sold tons of cocaine to the street gangs in South-Central Los An geles and tunneled millions in profits to a CIA-run guerrilla arniy fighting to over throw the Sandinista government in Managua. During the keynote address Saturday night, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan called the cocaine allegations “the most important revelation since Watergate.” FAX NUMBER: 472*1761 The Daly Nebraakan (USPS 144*080) to puMshed by the UNL Publications Board, Nebraska Union 34.1400 RSI., Lincoln, NE 68588-0448, Monday trough Friday during the academic year, weekly during summer soniont Readers are encouraged to submit story ideas and comments to the Daily Nebraskan by caling 472-2588. The pubic has access to tfie Publications Board. , SubsMBion Dries to $56 for one year. Postmaster: Send address changes to the Daily Nebraskan, Nebraska Union 34, 1400 R St.. Unooin.NE 68588-0448. Second-class postage paid al Lincoln, Neb. ALL MATERIAL COPYRIGHT 1996 DAILY NEBRA8KAN