vv^
.. * fir. • •
— Monday
Nobel Prize contender
freed frorn-Chinesejail
■ Human rights groups
procured the release of the
pro-democracy campaigner,
who is now in Detroit.
t BEIJING (AP) - China’s most
prominent pro-democracy cam
paigner, Wei Jingsheng, was report
edly released from prison Sunday
and bound for the United States.
Wei, who has spent all but about
six months of the past 18 years in
prison, left aboard a flight to
Detroit, his sister Wei Shanshan told
Hong Kong Cable TV from her
home in Germany.
Wei s release came less than two
weeks after Chinese President Jiang
Zemin returned from a state visit to
the United States. Chinese officials
had denied suggestions they would
release Wei or other dissidents as a
goodwill gesture, describing the
prisoners as common criminals.
Chinese leaders usually are
happy to see dissidents go into
exile, where they often sink into
obscurity. But none has ever been as
high-profile as Wei, who has been
mentioned for years as a leading
contender for the Nobel Peace
Prize.
Wei, 47, suffers from fhrop|ic
high blood pressure and Heart and
stomach ailments as a legacy of his
captivity.
Recently, he has been placed
under 24-hour watch by fellow pris
oner's and held in a cell with one
glass wall, which made him feel like
a zoo animal, according to the New
York-based group Human Rights in
China.
Human rights groups appealed
to President Clinton before Jiang’s
trip in late October to demand the
release of Wei and other captive dis
sidents.
Wei was first arrested in March
1979 as part of the crackdown on
the Democracy Wall pro-democracy
movement. Sentenced to 15 years in
prison, he was released in 1993 in
the midst of China’s bid to host the
2000 Summer Olympics, but re
arrested a few months later after he
met with the top U.S. human rights
official.
He was sentenced in 1995 to 14
years in prison on charges of sub
version and conspiring to subvert
the government. “Everyone now
knows that lack of democracy has
seriously thwarted Chinese social
development,” he said in a 1979
essay “What Do We Want:
Democracy or New Autocracy.”
Human Rights Watch issued a
statement welcoming Wei’s release,
but stressing that it should not be
seen as a sign of major improve
ments in Chinese human rights.
is' ttfhsistertt 'with the
‘hostage! politik’ thk (Chinese lead
ers have pursued since 1989 - when
they need to offer a concession for
political reasons, they release some
one they should never have arrested
in the first place,” said Sidney Jones
the group’s executive director.
Here’s your chance to be heard
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WASHINGTON (AP) —
Despite the outward opposition of
Arab countries to a military strike
against Iraq, the White House is
confident the Arabs won’t stand in
the way of any U.S. action,
President Clinton’s top security
adviser said Sunday,
Sandy Berger said that in any
case the United States is ready to
go it alone if necessary.
The Arab nations understand
the threat posed by Iraqi President
Saddam Hussein, National
Security Adviser Berger said on
NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“In the end of the day, they are
not going to impede our ability to
do what’s necessary,” Berger said.
The administration cam
paigned hard among allies over
the weekend for support of strong
sanctions and possible military
retaliation against Iraq for
expelling American members of
the U.N. weapons inspection team.
President Clinton on Saturday
spoke to Russia’s Boris Yeltsin,
France’s Jacques Chirac and
Britain’s Tony Blair, urging a unit
ed voice in confronting Iraq.
Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright has been making 4he
same pitch in a tour of Persian
Gulf states and with the Russian
foreign minister, Yevgeny
' • Primalccrtc; : '; ; i
Whm-ttitpptiti'had been^eiid
for stronger U.N. sanctions
against the Baghdad government,
France, Russia and the Arabs have
resisted the idea of militarily pun
ishing Saddam for his latest chal
lenge to U.N. resolutions
approved after the 1991 Gulf War.
Foreign Minister Sabah al
Ahmed al-Sabah of Kuwait, which
Saddam occupied to spark the
war, said Sunday his country does
not support military action. The
Kuwaiti cabinet issued a state
ment urging a diplomatic solution
“so that the area could be spared
the dangers of tension and insta
bility, and the Iraqi people would
not be subjected to more misery
and suffering.”
But on CBS’ “Face the
Nation,” Bill Richardson, the U.S.
ambassador to the United Nations,
stressed that he was getting a dif
ferent message from Kuwait’s
defense minister, and that
Albright was successfully build
ing support for U.S. policy in the
region.
“We have no doubt that at the
end of the day they will be sup
porting whatever action we take,”
Albright’s spokesman, James
Rubin, added on ABC’s “This
Week.”
Defense Secretary William
Cohen, also on ABC, said Kuwait
and Saudi Arabia might-not face
an immediate Iraqi invasion, but
they fully understand the dangers
of Iraq’s chemical and biological
weapons, u ; l uaa
ifWe intend to intensify that
apprehension on their part” by
making clear that Saddam has the
capability to unleash devastating
weapons of mass destruction if the
U.N. inspectors are kept out of the
country, he said.
The administration officials
stressed that in the emphasis will
be on working out a diplomatic
solution for now. “Failing that, we
obviously would prefer if we had
to work multilaterally,” Berger
said. But he added that if the allies
don’t join a military action, “the
president has made very clear that
he has ruled out no option.”
In the event of a military attack
on Iraq, Hussein’s Deputy Prime
Minister Tariq Aziz told Time
magazine in an interview, various
groups sympathetic to the Iraqis
“would be in that mood” to carry
out terrorist attacks against
Americans.
Asked about that, Defense
Secretary Cohen said terrorist acts
against Americans launched at the
behest of Iraq “will be met with a
rather overwhelming response.”
As to when a decision on mili
tary force will be made, Cohen
said, “There’s no artificial dead
line, but I think we’re all aware of
the ticking of the clock.”
Iraq’s ambassador to the U.N.,
Nizar Hamdoon, said on CBS and
on CNN’s “Late Edition” that Iraq
realizes that in the eyes of the
United Nations its expulsion of
American inspectors is unaccept
able,^,; hAiHU ->'■*; fn: > . jli ti
But he said Iraq has “been cor
nered and forced into this situa
tion” by the U.N. Security
Council’s refusal to lift crippling
economic sanctions.
I
Iraq hospitals cleared for attack
IRAQ from page 1
interview with CNN that Iraq could
resume building biological
weapons within a week.
In Baghdad, fuel rationing
forced U.N. monitors overseeing an
oil-for-food program to halt their
work Sunday. The monitors, who
were unable to drive to work, said
they expect to send teams out today
after they secure fuel supplies.
The tightly monitored program
allows Iraq to sell $2 billion in oil
for six months in exchange for food
and other humanitarian goods.
Iraq, fearing the United States
might target oil refineries and stor
age tanks in the event of a military
strike, announced Saturday it was
introducing gasoline rationing.
The government on Sunday
ordered non-emergency patients to
be removed from hospitals in
Baghdad. It was not clear how
many people would be evacuated.
Hassan Abdel Jabar, a doctor at
Baghdad Central Hospital, said the
hospital would only accept emer
gency cases “because we are
expecting a strike by the
Americans.”
The United States and Britain,
meanwhile, worked to rally support
for strong action against Saddam.
“He is not a man that is going to
listen to any language of reason or
sweetness unless the person using
it is also carrying a big stick,”
British Prime Minister Tony Blair
said in a BBC television interview.
Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright cut short a visit'to Qatar
and left for neighboring Bahrain,
Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia to dis
cuss the standoff.
In Qatar, Albright lashed out at
Baghdad for refusing to comply
with U.N. resolutions demanding
the elimination of its weapons of
mass destruction.
“Unfortunately for the Iraqi
people, instead of meeting these
requirements, for six years,
Saddam Hussein has lied, delayed,
obstructed and tried to deceive,”
she said.
In Iraq, Foreign Minister
Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf
called for a peaceful solution to the
crisis.
“The use of military force has
proven that it does not lead to solu
tions, but to a complication of mat
ters,” he said in remarks broadcast
on Iraq television and carried by
Egypt’s Middle East News Agency.
Intent on rallying support for
Iraq, Deputy Prime Minister Tariq
Aziz planned to begin a tour of
North African countries with a trip
to Morocco on Sunday. Most Arab
states oppose military action
against Iraq. j
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