WEDNESDAY,FEBRUARY 19,2003
NEWS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN = 9A
Bush says protests won't sway him
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Declaring that America's security should not be dictated by protesters, President Bush said yesterday he would not be swayed from compelling Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to disarm. "We will deal with him," Bush said as U.S. and British diplomats weighed another bid for U.N. backing.
"War is my last choice," Bush said at the White House as echoes of anti-war protests circled the globe. "But the risk of doing nothing is even a worse option as far as I am concerned."
Standing firmly against skeptical allies as well as the demonstrators, Bush said: I owe it to the American people to secure this country. I will do so."
Administration officials in Washington and at the United Nations in New York were discussing the possible gains as well as the risk of a diplomatic defeat if
"War is my last choice. But the risk of doing nothing is even a worse option as far as I'm concerned."
George W. Bush U.S. President
the United States proposed a new resolution to the Security Council to endorse force as an option to disarm Iraq.
One U.S. official said yesterday there was no decision on a text or even on whether to go ahead, though White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said, "I think it will be a simple and rather straightforward resolution."
Bush said a second resolution "would be useful," although "we don't need a second resolution. It's clear this guy could even care less about the first resolution. He's in total defiance."
In Rome, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Iraq had to "move very fast" to heed the call of the international community and cooperate with U.N. inspectors or face possible war. But he said it was up to the Security Council to decide if the inspections had gone on long enough.
France, with support from Russia and China, does not accept the U.S. view that the Security Council effectively endorsed force as an option to disarm Iraq in an earlier resolution that warned of "serious consequences" if Saddam persisted in defying U.N. demands.
With some 50 countries lined up to speak to the council in a session that could go over until Wednesday, early action by the United States and its close ally, Britain, was not expected.
Diplomats at the United Nations said a draft resolution could be circulated late today.
As for the protests around the world by millions of people opposed to war with Iraq, Bush said they were irrelevant to his duty to protect America.
"Size of protest, it's like deciding. 'Well I'm going to decide policy based up on a focus group.' The role of a leader is to decide policy based upon the security — in this case — security of the people," he said.
"Democracy is a beautiful thing, and that people are allowed to express their opinion," he said.
"Some in the world don't view Saddam Hussein as a risk to peace," he added. "I respectfully disagree."
Last Friday, an overwhelming majority of the 15 council members followed France's lead and called for extending U.N. weapons searches in Iraq. Secretary of State Colin Powell's argument that the searches were virtually useless was overridden.
Attack on South Korean subway kills 120
The Associated Press
DAEGU, South Korea — Kim Ho-keun, a 68-year-old grandfather, was about to get off the crowded subway when an explosion knocked him to the floor. He awoke in darkness minutes later, gasping for breath and desperate to escape a fiery attack that killed 120 people yesterday.
Struggling to call for help, Kim feared the worst until he heard a rescue worker's voice.
"I couldn't see him, but I saw his flashlight, so I grabbed his hand," Kim said from his hospital bed, tubes supplying him with
oxygen. "It was then that I thought to myself: I'm going to live."
Kim was one of the fortunate in Daegu, South Korea's third-largest city.
The fire started about 10 a.m. when a man lit a container of flammable liquid and tossed it. The blaze incinerated two six-car subway trains, killed 120 people and injured 138, many of them seriously. Rescue workers gave up the search for survivors by the afternoon.
A suspect who police say has a history of mental illness was under interrogation. Police said they did not know what motivated
the attack or what substance the attacker used to start the blaze.
The fire began in one train at a station, igniting seats and spreading to another train as it pulled in, officials said. More people died in the second train because many of the doors failed to open, trapping passengers.
YTN TV news channel reported the second train arrived four minutes after the fire started. It was not clear why the second train was not warned of the fire or diverted from the station.
Lim Dae-yoon, chief of Daegu city's east district municipal government, estimated the number
of people killed at 120. "We believe the death toll will not rise drastically from that," Lim said.
Many bodies were burned beyond recognition. Officials said they would have to wait for DNA tests to confirm the number of dead, which could take weeks.
Firefighters gave horrifying accounts of the scene underground. Many bodies were found on the subway stairs, where people apparently suffocated as they tried to escape. On the platform and in trains were the ashen bones of those trapped in the flames.
U.N. inspectors visit Iraqi weapons sites
The Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq — U.N. weapons inspectors visited five sites involved in the production of a banned missile yesterday as rockets became a new flashpoint in the Iraq crisis.
The United Nations is deciding whether to insist that Iraq modify the missiles or destroy them — a demand Saddam Hussein would likely find hard to meet.
Iraq's foreign minister, Naji Sabri, was asked last night what Iraq would do if told to destroy the missiles. He refused to answer, saying the question was too hypothetical.
The U.N. inspectors said yesterday they have put identification tags on components of dozens of Al Samoud 2 missiles, but they wouldn't say how many more remain to be inventoried. It remained unclear what they will do with the missiles they find.
"we are waiting for further instruction from New York." said a spokesman for the inspection teams in Baghdad, Hiro Ueki.
U. N. officials have banned the missiles because they have been tested at ranges greater than the 94-mile limit imposed on Iraq by U.N. resolutions adopted at the end of the 1991 Gulf War.
Giving up the Al Samouf 2 would mean sacrificing an important part of Iraq's defenses just as tens of thousands of U.S. and British troops mass on its southern border. But refusing to do so could give Iraq's enemies arguments to launch a war.
During a visit to Baghdad in January, chief inspector Hans Blix said the Iraqis suggested that when they fitted guidance and control systems and other devices to the missiles, they would be weighed down and flown within the legal distance.
Iraq was having trouble meeting another U.N. demand: encouraging scientists involved in weapons programs to grant private interviews to inspectors from UNMOVIC, the U.N. Monitoring and Observation Commission.
Ueki said only three of 30 scientists invited since the inspectors returned to Iraq in November have been willing to talk without a tape recorder — a condition the UNMOVIC inspectors insist on because they believe it will make the scientists more candid.
The three scientists who gave interviews were suggested by the Iraqi government — not requested independently by the U.N. team, Ueki said.
A separate team of U.N. nuclear inspectors has conducted more interviews but allowed the scientists to record them. On Monday, those inspectors interviewed Saad Ahmed Mahmoud, deputy director-general of the al-Rasheed Co., which makes rocket motors and infantry rockets.
Yesterday Mahmoud denounced the interview, calling it unjustified because it "came from a political decision imposed by the United States."
Ueki said the resumption of U-2 flights on Monday signaled that Iraq's cooperation with the inspectors was improving.
Millions in Northeast work to recover after crippling record snowfall
The Associated Press
BOSTON — The Northeast struggled to dig out yesterday from a paralyzing storm that unloaded up to 4 feet of snow, busted city snow-removal budgets and stranded thousands of people at airports up and down the East Coast.
The storm, blamed for 37 deaths, finally headed out to sea after taking a parting shot at Boston, which got an all-time record of 27.5 inches by the time the snowfall stopped yesterday.
Homeowners and motorists dug out their cars and doorways and toiled to reopen driveways that had been sealed shut by passing snowplows.
"What can you do?" said 38-year-old Brian Shipley of Rockville, Md., standing waist-deep in the mini-canyon he had shoveled in the path to his door. "You dig out and you get ready for tomorrow."
A few blocks away, acupuncturist Cindy Clark foresaw a lot of sore backs. "There's going to be more work than I can handle for a long time," she said, leaning against a shovel in her almost cleared driveway.
Major airports labored to resume service after the biggest snowstorm to hit the Northeast in seven years.
Boston's Logan International had only about 25 takeoffs and landings an hour, compared with
80 to 90 during a typical weekday. Baltimore-Washington International opened one runway for takeoffs yesterday morning and the first arriving flight in 21/2 days landed during the afternoon.
Thousands of people expecting to fly home from vacations were stranded at airports in Florida. With Northern airports still catching up yesterday, airlines could not meet the demand.
"As US Airways explained to us, everyone's going nowhere fast," David Kiley said at Baltimore-Washington, keeping watch over a half-dozen 9- and 10-year-olds in wheelchairs who had flown from Charlotte, N.C., to Washington for a basketball tournament. They had spent two nights in a motel.
The storm spread snow from the Plains to New England, caused floods and power outages, and closed schools from West Virginia to Massachusetts. Federal offices remained closed yesterday in Washington; they had been closed on Monday for Presidents Day.
Because the snowstorm struck on the long holiday weekend and during midwinter vacation week for many schoolchildren, traffic was lighter than usual and plowing was easier.
"This has been one of those storms where things could go either way, and it's gone the right way every time for us," said Peter
Judge, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency. "It was sort of Murphy's Law in reverse."
Boston's accumulation beat even the legendary Blizzard of 1978, when 27.1 inches of snow fell. But this storm did not pack nearly the punch. During the Blizzard of '78, hurricane-force wind created snowdrifts so big that thousands of drivers simply abandoned their cars. Ninety-nine deaths were blamed on the storm.
This snowstorm brought the fourth-heaviest accumulation on record for New York City —19.8 inches in Central Park. And for the region as a whole, it was the worst snowstorm since the Blizzard of 1996,blamed for at least 80 deaths.
for state and city governments, clearing away all that snow was a monumental headache.
Maryland's State Highway Administration was already $14 million over budget before the Presidents Day storm, which Gov. Robert Ehrlich estimated had cost the state an additional $20 million to $30 million.
Fairfield, Conn., budgeted about $200,000 for snow removal this season but already had spent $500,000 before the arrival of this storm, which cost at least $100,000, First Selectman Kenneth Flatto said. The storm is expected to cost cash-strapped New Jersey about $10 million
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