Saudis, Kuwaitis urge Saddam’s ouster
■ Iraq’s foreign minister accused
the nations of supporting the
U.S.-British airstrikes.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Iraq’s foreign minister
on Sunday accused Saudi Arabia and Kuwait of
actively supporting US.-British airstrikes last month
and urged Arab governments to ignore U.N. sanc
tions against Iraq.
Saudi Arabia’s official news agency, for its part,
urged Iraqis to'overthrow President Saddam
Hussein, saying he had killed and tortured thousands
of his own people. 1
Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa echoed
that unprecedented appeal, saying that Saddam is
“shaming the entire Arab region through his poli
tics.” His comments were to be published Monday in
The Berliner Kurier newspaper.
The Saudi and Egyptian statements - the first
direct call by Arab governments for Saddam’s ouster
- come a few days after Iraq’s president exhorted
Arabs to rise up against rulers “who boast of friend
ship with the United States.”
The exchange marks an escalation in the already
bitter feud between Iraq and Arab allies of the United
States.
Iraq was encouraged by popular protests
throughout the Arab world after the mid-December
airstrikes, and it has been disheartened that its fellow
Arab states did little to support it.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Mohammed Saeed al
Sahhaf said Kuwait and Saudi Arabia “have partici
pated directly and effectively” in the U.S.-British
attack, which targeted military and government
buildings in Iraq.
Hundreds of American cruise missiles sailed
through Kuwaiti air space during the bombardment,
he told reporters. -
Dozens of U.S. and British warplanes flew over
Saudi Arabia and Kuwait during the four days of
airstrikes, which came after U.N. weapons monitors
said Iraq was blocking their work.
Also, U.S. and British aircraft patrolling a no-fly
zone over southern Iraq operate from air bases in the
two Persian Gulf states.
Sahhaf said Iraq will demand compensation
from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia for “all physical,
material and psychological damage” inflicted as a
result of the southern no-fly zone.
The United States and Britain imposed no-fly
zones over southern and northern Iraq in an effort to
protect Shiite Iraqis in the south and Kurds in the
north from Iraqi military assault.
Sahhaf added that U.S. aircraft dropped leaflets
printed in Kuwait that urged soldiers in barracks in
southern Iraq not to move from their positions.
Meanwhile, in a move that could ease tensions
among the bickering neighbors, an official of a
Persian Gulf country said that Saudi Arabia will pro
pose an easing of sanctions against Iraq. The move
was to be made later Sunday at a meeting of foreign
ministers of six Persian Gulf nations. The official
spoke on condition of anonymity.
Saudi Arabia was making the proposal apparent
ly to defuse popular opposition to the sanctions with
in Arab countries. The embargo has impoverished
Iraq’s once-thriving middle class.
Sahhaf said the minimum step should be a uni
lateral lifting of sanctions by Arab countries.
U.N. resolutions say the sanctions will only be
lifted after U.N. weapons monitors certify that Iraq is
free of weapons of mass destruction. The sanctions
were imposed after Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait,
which triggered the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
Albanian rebels urged
to free captive soldiers
STARI TRG, Yugoslavia (AP) -
Yugoslav armored vehicles and
troops stood on alert near this north
ern village Sunday while interna
tional monitors tried to avert an
explosion of the Kosovo crisis, urg
ing ethnic Albanian rebels to free
eight captive soldiers.
Reflecting fears that the talks’
failure could prompt an all-out gov
ernment offensive, NATO
Secretary-General Javier Solana
appealed in Brussels, Belgium, for
the soldiers’ release and called on
both sides to show restraint.
Yugoslav Army forces pulled
back their armor a half-mile Sunday,
a monitors ^spokesman said, in an
apparent signal of cooperation with
negotiations.
The rebel Kosovo Liberation
Army issued a statement Sunday
night saying it would release the
captives only when international
mediators work out an agreement
that includes “our soldiers and civil
ians.”
The rebels also said they will
respect the cease-fire except when
they have to protect civilians and
themselves.
Yugoslav army and Serbian
police forces that threatened attack
if the soldiers were not released
remained arrayed outside the village
of Stari Trg, five miles northeast of
/4
Kosovska Mitrovica and 30 miles
from the provincial capital Pristina.
While holding fire in the north,
Serb forces also did not continue a
nearby retaliatory crackdown from
the previous day, when they shelled
several villages in the Podujevo area
12 miles east of Stari Trg, sending
residents fleeing.
An ethnic Albanian teen-ager
from Perane was killed in the
shelling, according to spokesman
Fernando del Mundo of the U.N.
refugee agency.
U.S.-led diplomacy to try to
bring about a political settlement on
Kosovo’s future has so far failed.
American envoy Christopher Hill
was back in Pristina on Sunday. He
met with Serb, ethnic Albanian and
international officials.
But Solana, while appealing to
the rebels to release the soldiers, sin
gled out the buildup of Serb forces
as unwarranted. He appealed to
Yugoslav President Slobodan
Milosevic to withdraw.
Also Sunday, the Kosovo
Information Center said a young
ethnic Albanian was killed and
another was wounded when they
came under fire near the southern
town of Urosevac the previous day.
More than 1,000 people have
been killed in clashes in the seces
sionist province over the past year.
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THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
Lewinsky’s words
will weigh heavily
WASHINGTON (AP) - When
100 senators sit in judgment of
President Clinton this week, Monica
Lewinsky’s words will be the heart of
the case against him - and the soul of
his defense.
Even if the former White House
intern is never called to the well of the
Senate to testify in person, the version
of events she told a grand jury will be
crucial evidence.
The 13 House managers for the
case will use Lewinsky’s testimony to
argue that Clinton lied under oath
about details of their intimate contact
and schemed to keep the affair out of
court proceedings.
White House lawyers will counter
with Lewinsky’s spontaneous declara
tion'to the grand jury: “No one ever
asked me to he.”
At the same time the White House
will argue that even if true, the charges
aren’t grave enough to justify ejecting
a president from office.
It would take 67 votes to convict
the president. If all 55 Republicans
want to oust him, the votes of 12
Democrats would be needed. '
The evidence the senators will
consider is divided into two articles ofv
impeachment. One alleges Clinton
lied in his Aug. 17 testimony to a fed
eral grand jury, the other that he tried to
obstruct Paula Jones’ sexual harass
ment lawsuit.
Most of the perjury allegations
stem from Clinton^ attempts to justify
for die grand jury earlier testimony in
the Jones lawsuit, where he claimed he
couldn’t remember being alone with
Lewinsky and denied having “sexual
relations” with her.
u
I wanted to help
her get on with her
life. Its just as
simple as that."
President Clinton
The obstruction of justice chaige
alleges a wide-ranging scheme to buy
Lewinsky’s silence, hide evidence and
encourage friends and aides to echo
the president’s lies, often unwittingly.
In his grand jury testimony,
Clinton insisted, “I was not trying to
buy her silence.... I wanted to help her
get on with her life. It’s just as simple as
that.” Lewinsky backs his account, tes
tifying she was never offered the job in
exchange for her silence.
White House lawyers argue that
Clinton acted as a man trying to keep
his illicit affair from his family and the
public but never urged anyone to lie.
The prosecution may not be able to
prove each chaige, but “the more detail
you layer, the more credible the story
becomes and the harder it is for the
president’s lawyers to construct a tale
of innocence,” New York University
Law Professor Stephen Gillers said.
Attorney Richard Ben-Veniste, an
outside adviser to the White House,
said the Clinton team will answer all
the charges with two arguments:
“They haven’t proved it, and even if
they have, it doesn’t amount to an
impeachable offense.”
Derailed train cars spill diesel fuel
MILFORD (AP) - Crews were
continuing to clean up as much as
80,000 gallons of spilled diesel fuel
Sunday that leaked from six train
cars after a derailment near the Big
Blue River.
The fuel no longer posed a dan
ger to the river after being collected
in a pit, authorities said.
The leaks occurred early
Saturday when 15 cars of a
Burlington Northem-Santa Fe train
derailed about a mile north of
Milford, said Gus Melonas, a rail
road spokesman. No injuries were
reported.
Nine of the derailed cars were
carrying about 26,000 gallons of
diesel fuel each.
None of the fuel reached the
river because workers were able to
quickly divert most of it into a pit,
Deputy Fire Marshal Ken Scurto
said.
Railroad crews had recovered up
to 5,000 gallons by early Sunday,
Melonas said. The state Department
of Environmental Quality and feder
al Environmental Protection Agency
were monitoring the cleanup.
The cause of the derailment
remained under investigation.
■Sierra Leone
AP producer killed while
covering nation’s civil war
FREETOWN (AP) - An
Associated Press television producer
was shot and killed and an AP bureau
chief was wounded Sunday when
their car was hit by gunfire while
covering Sierra Leone’s civil war.
Myles Tierney, 34, of New York,
was shot and died instantly. Bureau
chief Ian Stewart, 32, suffered a head
wound. AP photographer David
Guttenfelder also was in the car and
suffered cuts from broken glass.
■ Israel
Netanyahu: Palestinians
will not determine borders
JERUSALEM (AP) - Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
took a hard line Sunday on
Palestinian statehood, telling his
Cabinet that the Palestinians will not
be allowed to determine Israel’s bor
ders.
A senior Palestinian official,
meanwhile, insisted Palestinians
would achieve an independent state
with Jerusalem as its capital.
The Palestinians have said they
have the right to declare a state in
May whether or not terms have been
negotiated with Israel.
■ England
Disreputable Lord Bristol
dead of flu-like bug at 44
BURY ST. EDMUNDS (AP) -
The Marquess of Bristol, who squan
dered millions on drugs and was
jailed twice for heroin and cocaine
possession, has died, said the agent
for his estate, Simon Pott, on Sunday.
Bristol was 44.
Lord Bristol died in his sleep and
was found Sunday moaning at his
family’s estate in eastern England
near Bury St. Edmunds, Pott said.
He said Bristol had been suffer
ing from a flu-like bug for a short
time.
■ Kazakstan
President of fprtner republic
looks poised for re-election
ALMATY (AP) - Despite cries
of campaign violations, Kazakstan’s
president appeared poised to win re
election Sunday in die former Soviet
republic.
A spokesman at the Central
Election Commission reported that
more than 85 jfercent of Kazakstan’s
17 million people had cast their votes
by the time voting ended.
Officials said preliminary results
would not be known until this morn
ing.
■Israel
Poland’s president assures
resolution of camp dispute
JERUSALEM (AP) - Poland’s
president tried to assure Israel on
Sunday that a bitter dispute over a
Catholic church at the site of a Nazi
death camp in Poland will be
solved.
During a visit to Yad Vashem, the
Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem,
President Aleksander Kwasniewski
said the Polish parliament is prepar
ing a new law to preserve the death
camps and empower authorities to
intervene if anything controversial
arises at the sites.
