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Tuesday, October 12,1999Page 2
Clinton asks for delay of vote
WASHINGTON (AP) - President
Clinton asked die Senate in writing on
Monday to put off voting on die nuclear
test ban treaty, warning that a likely
defeat in Tuesday’s scheduled vote
would “severely harm the national secu
rity.”
Republicans called his letter a first
step toward possibly postponing the
vote but sought further assurances the
issue wouldn’t come up again during
this 106th Congress.
“I firmly believe the treaty is in the
national interest,” Clinton wrote to
Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R
Miss., and Minority Leader Tom
Daschle, D-S.D. But he wrote that he
recognized he lacked the two-thirds vote
needed for ratification. “Accordingly, I
request that you postpone consideration
of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty
on the Senate floor.”
By putting his request in writing,
Clinton met one demand of his
Republican opponents. The letter was
silent on their insistence that Clinton
promise not to revive it during the 2000
election season, but White House offi
cials rejected that request.
“Even though there are campaigns
under way in the United States, we have
to take into account the larger national
interest,” said National Security
Council spokesman David Leavy. “It
would be irresponsible for the president
to limit his tools in dealing with some
thing as sensitive as nuclear testing.”
Lott’s spokesman, John Czwartacki,
said the letter was “merely a first step”
and noted that Lott, joined by Sen. Jesse
Helms, R-N.C., Foreign Relations
Committee chairman, has asked for
agreement that the treaty not come
before the Senate again before 2001.
“Senator Lott will discuss this rever
sal by the White House with his fellow
senators on Tuesday,” Czwartacki said.
“Now there must be agreement reached
in die Senate that it not come up again.”
Sen. John Warner, R-Va., chairman
of the Armed Services Committee,
called the letter “a significant step for
ward” and was working with Sen.
Daniel Patrick Moynihan, D-N.Y., to
Program will aid
mudslide victims
■ Low-income families
will receive fluids and
land, says Mexico leader.
TEZIUTLAN, Mexico (AP) -
The scope of the death and damage
caused by last week’s mudslides has
shocked Mexico and the world. But
where they occurred was no sur
prise.
A zoning plan drawn up last year
called for removing houses built hel
ter-skelter in the ravines of this
mountainside city.
There seemed to be no rush.
Some of the houses had been in
place for decades, and officials
lacked the funds or political might to
force residents to less perilous loca
tions.
But last week’s pounding rains
caused huge slabs ofhillside to break
away, sending avalanches of mud
rushing down on houses below.
By Monday, the official death
toll stood at 344 across southeastern
Mexico, but it was expected to be
much higher. Unofficial counts,
based on accounts from local offi
cials and witnesses, ran as high as
600.
More than 271,000 were forced
from their homes.
On a visit to Teziutlan on
Monday, President Ernesto Zedillo
announced a program to rebuild or
repair houses destroyed by the disas
ter. Under the plan, low-income fam
ilies who lost their homes were to
receive land, $2,000 worth of con
struction material and 88 days’ worth
of wages. Those whose houses were
damaged were to receive $200 to
$600 worth of material, while high
er-income families were eligible for
subsidized credits.
The flooding and mudslides
were caused by more than a week of
relentless rain, capped by a tropical
depression in the Gulf of Mexico.
On Monday, forecasters were still
predicting strong storms in nine
states.
The Tabasco state capital,
Villahermosa, was so gravely flood
ed that its streets became canals.
But the deadliest damage was in
Teziutlan, where rain fell for 60
hours without a break- and total pre
cipitation equaled 30 inches.
By Monday, at least 69 bodies
had been pulled from the muck at the
worst of the mudslides in the La
Aurora neighborhood.
A dozen people from the La
Gloria neighborhood wandered City
Hall on Sunday looking for help.
They were forced to flee when huge
chunks of earth tumbled onto their
neighborhood last week.
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It would be irresponsible fir the president
to limit his tools in dealing with something
as sensitive as nuclear testing
David Leavy
National Security Council spokesman
build support in both parties for post
poning the vote until 2001.
A Warner aide said the two senators
hoped to have a letter supporting the
delay signed by a majority of senators
from both parties on the desks of party
leaders Tuesday.
“This should be an easy call,” Sen.
Joseph Biden of Delaware, the Foreign
Relations Committee’s ranking
Democrat, said in a statement. “The
president has asked for a delay. Most
Democrats and many Republicans sup
port a delay. It’s clearly in our national
interest to put off this vote without any
further wrangling. I hope the Senate
puts the national interest first”
The treaty would impose a blanket
international ban on all nuclear test
explosions. Supporters estimate they
are 15 to 20 votes short of tibe two-thirds
majority needed for Senate ratification.
The pact has been signed by 154
nations, including the United States, but
ratified by only 51. It will not go into
effect if the United States fails to ratify it
Clinton sent the signed treaty to the
Republican-led Senate two years ago,
but leaders refused to move on it before
now. The only hearing on it was held last
week by the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee.
Church pays girl s bills
to prevent an abortion
LONDON (AP) - Weeks after the
British government launched a crusade
to cut the number of teen-age pregnan
cies, the Roman Catholic Church in
Scotland has revealed that it is paying
the bills of a pregnant 12-year-old to
prevent her from having an abortion.
The announcement provoked a furi
ous backlash Monday from abortion
rights advocates and renewed the debate
about how to curb Britain’s teen-age
pregnancy rate, the highest in Western
Europe.
“We are talking ... of money being
offered to a child to keep a baby, which
removes choice,” said Sarah Colbom,
head of the National Abortion
Campaign.
“Offering 12-year-olds cash for
babies is tantamount to bribery,” fumed
Sue Carroll, a writer for the tabloid
Daily Mirror. “And it stinks to high
heaven.”
But Monsignor Tom Connelly, a
spokesman for the Catholic Church in
Scotland, said the church’s offer gives
the girl “real choice, so the child in die
womb does not suffer at all, irrespective
of age or race or creed.”
Reports said the unidentified girl,
who lives in England and is midway
through her pregnancy, was advised by
teachers and social workers to terminate
the pregnancy because of her age.
Her parents reportedly contacted
the Scottish church’s Pro-Life Initiative,
a program that offers alternatives to
abortion and was set up two years ago
by Cardinal Thomas Winning, the
fiercely conservative leader of
Scotland’s 750,000 Catholics.
The family was offered immediate
financial help if the girl chose to go
ahead with the birth.
The church has not said how much
it will pay, but it has indicated it will
finance such items as a crib and stroller.
The Vatican was unable to say
Monday whether other dioceses make
similar financial arrangements.
Help offered to rape, AIDS
victims in South Africa
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa
(AP) - AIDS and rape are so common
in South Africa that an insurance com
pany is offering a policy to try to protect
rape victims from contracting the dis
ease.
The policy, to be introduced today
by the CGU Insurance Ltd, provides a
one-month course of anti-retroviral
drugs to prevent infection, a year’s
worth of AIDS tests and counseling.
The new policy arrives as South
Africa’s two ugliest social problems are
dominating the attention of the media
and public officials.
The government marked the first
year of its anti-AIDS campaign last
Friday, as a series of high-profile rapes
touched off a wave of protest from
women’s groups and anti-rape activists.
About 3.6 million South Africans
are infected with AIDS, roughly one in
eight adults, and the government says
1,500 new infections occur every day.
The predominance of the virus
makes rape increasingly lethal. An esti
mated 64,000 women and girls are
raped each year in South Africa.
The insurance policy has drawn a
complex response from anti-rape
activists and physicians, and even at
CGU itself.
“Itfc playing on the very real fears of
women that they might be raped and
might get HIV,” said Carol Bouwer,
head ofRape Crisis Cape Town.
■ Washington
Elizabeth Dole announces
campaign kickoff date
WASHINGTON (AP) -
Republican Elizabeth Dole said
Monday that she will formally kick
off her campaign on Nov. 7, hoping
, that date will turn into the anniversary
of her election to the White House.
“It’s exactly one year before the
first presidential election of the new
millennium, and our selection of that
date reflects my sense that we will
make history,” Dole said in a release.
The Dole campaign also con
firmed on Monday that she will join
other Republican presidential candi
dates in New Hampshire’s nationally
televised debate Oct. 28 at
Dartmouth College.
■New Zealand
Poor visibility delays
Antarctica rescue flight
CHRISTCHURCH (AP) - Poor
visibility in Antarctica early Tuesday
delayed a U.S. flight to the South Pole
to rescue a polar research station’s
doctor who has a lump in her breast.
Two Air National Guard Hercules
LC-130 cargo planes had been due to
fly to the coast of Antarctica on
Tuesday (Monday CDT), but high
winds and swirling snow meant the
mercy mission will have to wait until
Wednesday (Tuesday CDT) before
flying to McMurdo, on the northern
coast of Antarctica.
When the planes arrive in
McMurdo, they must wait until the
temperature at the Amundsen-Scott
South Pole Station rise above minus
58 degrees before flying there to res
cue Dr. Jerri Nielsen.
■Sweden
Scientist, 63, wins
Nobel Prize for medicine
STOCKHOLM (AP) - Dr.
Guenter Blobel of The Rockefeller
University in New York won the
Nobel Prize for medicine Monday
for protein research that shed new
light on diseases including cystic
fibrosis and early development of
kidney stones.
Blobel, 63, a native of
Germany who became a U.S. citi
zen in the 1980s, was cited for dis
covering that proteins carry signals
that act as ZIP codes, helping them
find their correct locations within
the cell.
Some hereditary diseases are
caused by errors in these signals
and the associated transport mech
anisms, the Nobel Assembly said
in announcing the prize.
■Japan
Official: After radiation
accident, leak continued
TOKYO (AP) - The plant at the
center of Japan’s worst nuclear
accident kept pumping small
amounts of radiation into the air for
more than a week before officials
discovered it, the operator said
" Monday.
Radioactive iodine 131 at dou
ble the legal limit was detected
Friday at a ventilator opening in the
building, but officials waited until
Monday to turn off the exhaust fan
and seal the opening.
The ventilator had been left
running after the Sept. 30 accident
that exposed at least 49 people to
radiation, according to JCO (£o.,
which runs the nuclear fuel repro
cessing plant in Tokaimura^ 70
miles northeast of Tokyo.
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