U.S. Israeli support
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) -
Police fired tear gas at 2,000
students demonstrating out
side the U.S. Embassy on
Thursday to protest what they
perceived as U.S. support for
last week’s Israeli airstrikes on
Lebanon.
At least three students
fainted from the gas, witnesses
said.
The university students
staged a similar protest that
spread to the streets
Wednesday at the American
University of Beirut campus.
There, they called for the
expulsion of the U.S. ambas
sador.
Lebanese troops and police
had surrounded the fortified
U.S. Embassy compound in
Aukar, a Christian suburb
north of Beirut. They tried to
disperse the demonstrators,
who chanted “Death to
America” and “Death to
Israel.”
The students hurled rocks
and tomatoes at the troops and
police, witnesses said. No
injuries were reported among
police or troops.
Earlier this month, Israeli
warplanes destroyed three
power stations and a Hezbollah
base in Lebanon, wounding at
least 15 civilians. The airstrikes
retaliated for a series of deadly
guerrilla operations against
Israeli occupation forces in
southern Lebanon. The
Hezbollah attacks have killed
seven Israeli troops in recent
weeks.
Prime Minister Salim Hoss
criticized Israel’s decision to
appoint a three-person Cabinet
committee with the power to
order immediate retaliatory
strikes on Lebanon.
He said formation of the
committee “demonstrates the
unlimited arrogance of Israel’s
power.” He urged the United
States and France to condemn
the move.
Hoss also contacted the
foreign ministers of Syria,
Egypt, Kuwait and Jordan, as
well as Arab League Secretary
General Esmat Abdel-Meguid,
urging action against Israel.
The Iranian-backed
Hezbollah group is leading a
guerrilla war to oust Israeli
troops from the southern
Lebanon zone that Israel set up
in 1985 as a buffer against
cross-border attacks.
Hoss’ comments came
amid mounting anger in
Lebanon over the American
stance during the latest flare
up, perceived to be supportive
of Israel. U.S. Secretary of
State Madeleine Albright has
accused Hezbollah of being
enemies of peace.
U.S. Ambassador David
Satterfield, meanwhile, said
his country was trying to
secure a meeting of an interna
tional committee that monitors
compliance with a 1996 under
standing to spare civilians
from the conflict. Israel walked
out of a meeting last week
when guerrillas killed an
Israeli soldier in south
Lebanon.
The Israeli airstrikes have
provoked anger across the
Arab world.
Egyptian Foreign Minister
Amr Moussa said Thursday
that Egypt will not accept the
continuation of Israel’s
“aggression on Lebanese civil
ians and civilian installations,”
according to Egypt’s Middle
East News Agency.
In protest of the airstrikes,
Egyptian Parliament Speaker
Ahmed Fathi Sorour canceled
a meeting scheduled for March
5 that was to be attended by
heads of parliaments of Israel,
Jordan and Italy
In Kuwait, children bran
dishing toy machine guns
joined flag-waving adults
today in front of the Lebanese
Embassy in a show of support
for Hezbollah.
Groups: Chechens tortured
MALGOBEK, Russia (AP) -
Chechens trying to leave their war
ravaged republic are being tortured in
Russian detention camps and subject
ed to severe beatings, rapes and other
brutality, refugees and human rights
groups say.
The allegations come on the heels
of other complaints of human rights
abuses in the Russian offensive in
Chechnya, including reports of sum
mary executions of civilians in
Grozny, the Chechen capital.
Russian officials deny the allega
tions, but Chechens who have fled into
neighboring republics tell similar,
grisly accounts of their detention in
_ camps that Russia says it set up to fil
ter out rebels who are trying to escape
disguised as civilians.
A 21 -year-old Chechen, lying in
pain in a bed in Malgobek in neigh
boring North Ossetia, said his ordeal
began Jan. 22 when police dragged
him off a bus of refugees and took him
to a camp in the Chechen village of
Chemokozovo.
The man, who asked that he be
identified only by his first name,
Ruslan, said he was forced to run a
gantlet of masked policemen swing
ing truncheons, had his clothes torn
off and was forced to stand naked in a
cold storage room.
“I asked what they were detaining
me for, but they didn’t answer,” he
said. He was released only after his
mother paid a bribe to the camp direc
tors, he said.
At least three such camps are oper
ating, according to Peter Bouckaert, a
researcher for the Human Rights
Watch group in the region.
“Russia appears to have declared
any Chechen male to be a suspected
rebel, subject to arbitrary arrest and
Tamps Hill/Npwsmakprs
A CHECHEN WOMAN returns to Grozny on Monday after fighting in the city
ended. She carries with her the only possessions she salvaged from her
apartment: a carpet and a portrait of her father.
brutal treatment,” he said.
The allegations were echoed by
the World Organization Against
Torture, which issued a statement in
Geneva on Thursday saying: “We can
not ignore that the filtration camps are
indeed concentration camps where
Russian soldiers are committing the
worst atrocities, in all impijnity,
against their prisoners.”
In Washington, State Department
spokesman James R Rubin said
Thursday that “Russia has a clear
obligation to investigate the numerous
credible reports of civilian killings and
alleged misconduct by its soldiers
promptly.”
Sergei Yastrzhembsky, who is act
ing President Vladimir Putin’s aide for
Chechnya information, on Thursday
reiterated denials of torture at
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Chemokozovo.
The allegations are “the number
one topic in the information war the
Western mass media have unleashed,”
he said on Russia’s ORT television.
“Routine work like in any other deten
tion center is going on there.”
He said that European Union
observers would be allowed into the
camp to see the situation for them
selves but gave no date of a possible
visit. The Council of Europe’s human
rights commissioner, Alvaro Gil
Robles, is due to arrive in Moscow on
Feb. 24, but his office could give no
details of the trip.
Ruslan, the refugee, told of a rou
tine of torment, in which detainees
were often beaten in a hallway in the
early morning, their cries awakening
others in their cells.
Ruslan said guards hit him in the
spine with a hammer. He says he has
not been able to stand erect since.
An investigator accused him of
fighting on the side of the Islamic
rebel groups that have battled Russian
soldiers during the six-month war and
demanded names and addresses of
rebels, Ruslan said.
Nel3raskan
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THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
Editor: Josh Funk
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Plane
crashes in
junkyard
RANCHO CORDOVA, Calif.
(AP) - Moments before his DC-8
cargo plane crashed into an auction
yard of junked cars, the pilot
reported problems with the balance
of the aircraft, investigators said
Thursday.
Emery Worldwide Flight 17
plunged into the yard Wednesday
night, killing its three crew mem
bers and setting dozens of cars
ablaze. •
The pilot described a “center of
gravity” problem shortly after
leaving Mather Field in suburban
Sacramento, investigators said.
That could mean, among other
possible causes, a shift in load,
incorrect cargo weight or mechani
cal problems, Preston Hicks of the
National Transportation Safety
Board said Thursday.
Investigators were trying to
locate the plane’s flight data
recorder and cockpit voice
recorder in the smoking wreckage,
Hicks said.
nit jJiaut, cat lying a iuau ui
transmission fluid, clothing and a
small packet of detonators for auto
air bags, was at 800 feet when it
tried to return for an emergency
landing. It crashed in a fireball
about a mile east of the field short
ly before 8 p.m.
One witness said the plane hit
the ground belly first and was
immediately engulfed in flames.
Those aboard were dead by the
time fire crews arrived at the site,
said Capt. Dan Haverty of the
American River Fire Department.
Firefighters were hampered by
intense flames, which burned for
several hours after the crash.
Smoke was visible in the moonlit
night several miles away.
“There was no chance of res
cue,” Haverty said.
The victims were identified as
Capt. Kevin Stables, 43, of Berlin,
N. Y., who had been with Emery for
five years; First Officer George
Land, 35, of Placerville, Calif.,
three years; and Second Officer
Russell Hicks, 38, Sparks, Nev., 1
Zi years.
Company spokesman James
Allen Said the crash was the first
fatal accident in the company’s 50
year history.
Nobody on the ground was
injured. x
The crash at the Insurance Auto
Auctions salvage yard set as many
as 200 cars on fire, many with gas .
in their tanks, causing several
explosions.
■ Washington, D.C.
Pentagon rejects call to halt
anthrax vaccine
WASHINGTON (AP) - The
Pentagon on Thursday rejected a
House panel’s call to halt troop
inoculations against anthrax,
insisting that the vaccine is safe
and that the threat of biological
warfare is real.
A spokeswoman said the
Defense Department intends to
continue toward its goal of immu
nizing all 2.4 million members of
the active and reserve military
against anthrax, which is a natural
ly occurring bacteria that, when
inhaled, can cause death within a
few days.
In a report released Thursday,
the House Government Reform
national security subcommittee
said the anthrax vaccine does pro
vide a degree of protection to those
who receive it.
■ Washington, D.C.
Fed may continue raising
interest rates
WASHINGTON (AP) -
Federal Reserve Chairman Alan
Greenspan called the economy’s
record-breaking performance the
best in a half century, but he
warned Thursday that inflation
remains a threat to the economic
good times that many Americans
are enjoying.
Wall Street viewed
Greenspan’s remarks to the House
Banking Committee as confirma
tion that the Fed will continue to
rachet up interest rates this year
until the economy slows to a more
sustainable pace.
■ France
Prime minister promises
aid to fishing industries
PARIS (AP) — In a country
where gourmet food is a way of
life, many diners have slashed oys
ters from their menus after fierce
storms and a Dec. 12 oil spill dealt
a double blow to the Atlantic shell
fish industry.
Shellfish farmers highlighted
their plight at a Paris news confer
ence Thursday, seeking more pub
lic funding to cushion die financial
blow in the hardest-hit areas.
Socialist Prime Minister
Lionel Jospin already has pledged
$45 million to help the fishing and
shellfish industries recover from
the storms and the spill.
On Dec. 12, a Maltese-regis
tered tanker, the Erika, split in two
and sank, spilling 3 million gallons
of oil into the sea. Later that
month, fierce galjes battered shell
fish farms along the coast.
■ Romania
EU questions cyanide conta
mination in Romania
BAIA MARE, Romania (AP)
- The European Union’s top envi
ronmental official demanded to
know Thursday how tons of
cyanide contaminated two major
rivers, killing masses of plant and
fish life in its path.
The cyanide poured into
streams from a containment dam
at the gold mine in Baia Mare,
passing through Hungary and
Yugoslavia in the Szamos and
Tisza rivers before returning to
Romania on the Danube.
EU Environment
Commissioner Margot Wallstroem
called the spill a “major environ
mental accident, and to the people
living by the rivers, this is a cata
strophe.”