February 2001 World Headlines

Thursday, February 1, 2001 - Web posted at 8:01:08 AM GMT

World News Summary

* LODAI, India - International relief poured into western India as the threat of disease lurked over tens of thousands of homeless earthquake survivors.

In the village of Lodai, near the epicentre of Friday's quake, the local doctor said some people had already fallen sick, including four children under three, probably from drinking contaminated water.

* MONROVIA - Liberia said a Guinean helicopter killed more than 10 people in a raid on a northern town, and aid workers said reports of fresh fighting in southeastern Guinea had forced them to leave the area again.

The escalating border conflict involving rebels from both countries has caught up hundreds of thousands of refugees in what the UN refugee agency has called its worst humanitarian crisis.

* GAZA - Israeli troops shot dead a 50-year-old Palestinian man as he was driving near the Jewish settlement of Netzarim in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian police sources said.

Palestinian hospital sources said Ismail Al-Telbani was shot in the chest.

The Israeli army had no immediate comment.

* KOSOVSKA MITROVICA, Yugoslavia - French peacekeepers fired tear gas at Kosovo Albanian protesters throwing stones and Molotov cocktails in the flashpoint town of Mitrovica, a Reuters reporter said.

* BOGOTA - Colombia's President Andres Pastrana extended for another four days a vast demilitarised enclave that has been under control of leftist guerrillas for the last two years.

It was the seventh time Pastrana renewed the Switzerland-sized territory, which he first declared off limits to the army in November of 1998 to start peace talks with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia to end a four-decade civil war.

* TOKYO - At least 34 people on board a Japan Airlines Boeing 747 jumbo jet were injured when the pilot swerved to avoid a mid-air collision with an aircraft on a flight from South Korea, a Transport Ministry official said.

* HONG KONG - Beijing has issued a stern warning that any attempt to turn Hong Kong into a centre for the Falun Gong spiritual movement or an anti-China base will not be tolerated.

But followers of the movement in Hong Kong were defiant on Wednesday, vowing to continue their activities in the territory and speak out against China's crackdown on their group.

* KHARTOUM - New US Secretary of State Colin Powell has sent a message to Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail, the latest contact signalling a possible thaw in relations, a newspaper reported.

* KHARTOUM - Twenty-two people drowned when their minibus plunged into the Nile after crashing into a larger bus on a bridge in Khartoum, a newspaper reported.

- Nampa-Reuters

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