8A = THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
WORLD WIRE
FRIDAY, AUGUST 23, 2002
U.S. allies decry Bush's claim that Iraq is a threat
The Associated Press
LONDON President Bush's latest jab at Saddam Hussein didn't get much public support from allies yesterday, and Russia challenged his view that the world would benefit if the Iraqi regime is toppled.
A day earlier, Bush said the United States is in no rush to go to war with Iraq, but he repeated his view that Saddam is a threat to world peace and should be removed from power.
The comments seemed aimed at calming speculation about a military confrontation, but the reaction yesterday underlined the deep-seated doubts and
opposition that Washington faces in its stand against Iraq.
In Moscow, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Trubnikov called the idea of an attack on Iraq "unacceptable," and he said his country did not agree Saddam should be ousted. On Monday, Russia confirmed it was talking with Iraq about a 10-year trade agreement.
Even Britain, Washington's closest ally in confronting Iraq, held back. British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw reiterated Thursday that military action remained an option, but he told British Broadcasting Corp. radio that the government's policy was to pressure Saddam
into anwing the resumption of U.N. weapons inspections in Iraq.
Many U.S. allies say they are not convinced the Iraqi leader poses an imminent danger.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has said he would not send troops to what he called an "adventure" in Iraq. Germany and Canada both sent soldiers to Afghanistan.
Other European allies have been noncommittal, while some Middle Eastern states have said they oppose or have serious doubts about fighting Saddam now.
Palestinian groups meet,attempt to unify
The Associated Press
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip The Palestinian Authority's security chief met with 12 rival Palestinian factions yesterday in a new effort to forge a united front and get militant groups to stop bombing and shooting attacks in Israel.
But the meeting ended with no apparent progress, and the radical group Hamas reiterated its opposition to a cease-fire.
Security chief Abdel Ruzel Yehileh left after three hours, refusing to talk with reporters.
Other participants said the meeting had been tense and no agreement was reached.
Yehiyeh is trying to get the radicals to accept a common Palestinian manifesto that could form the basis of peace negotiations with Israel. The Palestinian talks broke down earlier this month after Hamas and Islamic Jihad vetoed clauses calling for an end to attacks within Israel and implying recognition of Israel.
The original draft called for the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza
Strip and east Jerusalem, meaning acceptance of Israel within the borders preceding its occupation of those territories in the 1967 Mideast War.
A Hamas delegate to the new round of talks in Gaza City said before the meeting his group remained adamant in its objection to that plan and in its demand that all of historic Palestine should be in Arab hands.
"We are going to repeat our opposition and explain why." Mohammed Zahar said.
Rainforest in Brazil declared national park
The Associated Press
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil — A northern swath of Amazon rainforest bigger than Maryland and likely containing a treasure trove of undiscovered animal, insect and plant species became the world's largest tropical national park yesterday.
President Fernando Henrique Cardoso signed a decree creating the Tumucumque (too-moo-koo-MAH-kee) Mountains National Park covering a virtually uninhabited region of virgin rainforest in Amapa state, along Brazil's northern borders with Surinam and Guyana.
Tumecumaque, which means "the rock on top of the mountain" in the language of the Apalai and Wayana Indians, covers 9.6 million acres of forest-blanketed
mountains with granite outcroppings rising up to 2,300 feet above the forest canopy.
"With the creation of Tumucumaque Mountains National Park, we are ensuring the protection of one of the most pristine forests remaining in the world," Cardoso said.
"Plants and animals that may be endangered elsewhere will continue to thrive in our forests forever."
Cardoso also signed several laws regulating the use of genetic material gathered from Brazil's plant and animal species.
The move is one of several environmental measures the government is preparing ahead of the World Summit on Sustainable Development, which starts Monday in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Statue honors Irish rebel as his reputation soars
The Associated Press
CLONAKILTY, Ireland Eighty years after former comrades assassinated Michael Collins, the pragmatic rebel mastermind of Ireland's fight for independence was honored yesterday with his first public statue a measure of how long it has taken for the wounds of civil war to heal.
Senior figures from Ireland's two major parties, drawn from opposite sides of that brutal 1922-23 conflict, joined more than 5,000 visitors and the actor Liam Neeson to unveil a bronze likeness of Collins in Clonakilty, his home village in West Cork.
"In Collins's day the buck always seemed to stop with him. He is my hero. He still inspires me," said Neeson, the Northern Ireland-born star who portrayed the Irish Republican Army commander in the 1996 film
"Michael Collins."
Historians and politicians increasingly laud Collins, who was killed Aug. 22, 1922, in a roadside ambush. Aged just 32 but already a general, he commanded the army of the fledgling Irish Free State.
"He was the George Washington of Ireland," said Tom Morrissey, a retired American policeman who led U.S. fund-raising efforts for the 12-foot, $100,000 Clonakilty monument. "It's crazy that he's never had a proper statue before."
All sides agree Collins helped organize the Irish Republican Army into an effective guerrilla force in the 1919-21 war of independence against Britain. He became an expert intelligence gatherer, directing a wave of assassinations of senior police agents in Dublin.
But Collins was branded a traitor by hard-line colleagues
when he accepted a 1921 treaty with Britain that stopped short of independence but laid foundations for the modern Irish state. Collins famously conceded that by signing the document, "I may have signed my own death warrant."
His political nemesis, Eamon de Valera, led IRA die-hards against the treaty. In a cutthroat civil war, Collins' Free State Army crushed the anti-treaty faction, but de Valera survived to become Ireland's dominant politician of the 20th century — prime minister or president for most years from 1932 to 1972.
Ireland remains divided between fans of the practical Collins, whose pro-treaty colleagues founded the declining Fine Gael, and admirers of the intellectual, uncompromising "Dev" — whose Fianna Fail party is the perennial vote-winner. The new Fianna Fail leader,
Prime Minister Bertie Ahern, backed the Collins statue project.
"You'd never have had this statue put up while Dev was alive," said Dan O'Riordan, who traveled Thursday from a nearby village to join the pro-Collins crowd. "And I'd put good odds on somebody trying to tear it down again."
De Valera suppressed efforts to mark Collins' contribution to the Irish Free State, which de Valera rechristened "Eire" in a 1937 constitution. Twelve years later the state broke all ties with Britain and declared itself a republic.
Collins' reputation has soared with the past decade's peacemaking in Northern Ireland, a British state forged at the behest of its Protestant majority several months before Collins accepted the 1921 treaty.
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