Nation/World
University Daily Kansan / Tuesday, January 22, 1991
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Baltic republic's defenses strengthened after attack
Bush appeals to Soviet leaders to resist using force in Baltics
The Associated Press
RIGA, U.S.S.R. — Latvia's parliament voted yesterday to form a volunteer home guard and authorities bolstered defenses at public buildings after Soviet commandos staged a pre-dawn assault that killed five people and wounded 10.
Parliamentarian Anatoly Denisov said at a news conference in Moscow that Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev may declare presidential rule in Latvia after meetings with leaders of the Baltic republics.
Supporters of Latvia's pro-independence government reinforced concrete barricades that protected the front of the Parliament building in Riga, the capital. They propped them in front of the building's windows.
The Parliament, meeting in emergency session, approved a decree calling on the government to establish a self-defense unit of draft volunteers. The decree takes effect immediately.
It was uncertain whether the unit would resemble the rattag group that held up in the Parliament building of the neighboring Baltic republic of Lithuania following a Jan. 13 assault on a broadcast station there. Fourteen people were killed in that attack.
U. S. officials have been critical of the crackdown in the Baltics. Speaking to reporters in Washington, President Bush said yesterday, "I would again appeal to the Soviet leaders to resist using force."
The United States has never recognized the forcible incorporation of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia into the Union. The republics were independent states
between the two world wars
The Kremlin has been pressuring the Baltics to nullify the independence declarations passed last year by their democratically elected parliaments. Pro-Soviet factions in the Baltics have urged direct rule by Gorbachev.
Latvian Justice Minister Viktors Skudra said at a news conference yesterday that the number of guards in front of public buildings had been increased to protect against more attacks.
Sunday's attack by special Soviet "black berets" on the Latvian interior ministry, which supervises the republic's police force, produced a flurry of bullets that pocked the ceiling, walls and floors of all five stories of the Riga building. Early morning, the black berets left the building
Later in the day, dried blood was caked on the stairway leading from the fourth to the fifth floor. Doors and locks were riddled with bullet holes. Bullet holes ringed a portrait of Gorbachev.
An unidentified black beret on Latvian television yesterday accused the pro-independence popular front of trying to take power. The program was prepared by the Communist Party.
"If the situation doesn't change, there will be lots of bloodshed in the next few days," the black beret said.
Alfred Rubiks, the hard-line chief of the Latvian Communist Party, denied ordering the attack, but he said such assaults would be justified to take back property belonging to the party.
Speaking to reporters, he said the black beetles had gone for talks with Latvian interior ministry officials
when they were fired upon.
That version contrasted sharply with witnesses' accounts and the Latvian government's report on the attack. Those accounts said the Soviet forces began the attack with a hail of tracer bullets.
In Moscow, Latvian Interior Minister Alois Vasnis demanded the black beret squad be removed from Latvia.
Vasnis and Ilmars Bisher, deputy Latvian prime minister, met with Soviet Interior Minister Boris Pugo, an ethnic Latvian who once ran the government. The black berets are under the direct control of the Soviet interior ministry.
Latviian president Anatolijis Gorbunov has been invited by Gorbachev for talks in Moscow today.
the troops would be confined to bases.
However, Pugo said he had given no orders for an attack and promised
Gorbachev and Estonian president Arnold Rueltal agreed yesterday on the need for talks between top-level
Lithuanian president Vytautas Landsborgs told his republic's Parliament that the Baltic republics had already agreed to come to each others' aid
He accused the Kremlin of "terrorism against democracy" and compared the black berets in Riga to the Tonton Macouthes, the paramilitary force that terrorized Haiti during the Duvallier family dictatorship.
Gorbachev accused in Baltics' violence
The Associated Press
MOSCOW — Russia's president, Boris Yeltsin, accused Mikhail S. Gorbachev yesterday of abandoning democracy and called for an annexation of the interior ministers for defending crackdown in the Baltic republics.
Gorbachev has amassed so much power, he said, "you can't speak about any democracy."
Yeltsin, a frequent Gorbachev critic, told the Supreme Soviet legislature of his Russian federation that the Kremlin had veered from its peaceful course in favor of "violence and pressure."
Yeltsin spoke one day after participants opposing Gorbachev chanted "resign" in the largest political rally in Moscow in at least one year. Many accused him of being a Soviet Prize winner, of responsibility for the army attack in Lithuania on Jan. 13 in which 14 people died.
Gorbachev, meanwhile, confirmed he will deliver the traditional Nobel Peace Prize lecture in Oslo sometime in May, according to Geir Lundestad, a member of the awards panel.
Gorbachev did not attend the Dec. 10 peace prize ceremony because of economic, social and political problems in the Soviet Union. Since then, some committee members have expressed regret that Gorbachev has allowed the Soviet military to crack down on the independence-minded Baltic republics.
More deaths occurred Sunday night in Riga, capital of neighboring Latvia, when elite Soviet interior ministry troops attacked the country's interior Ministry building, killing five people and wounding 10.
Yeltsin and Gorbachev have clashed frequently on economic issues, but in recent days, the Russian leader has expanded his
criticism to include the Kremlin's policy on ethnic conflicts. Yeltsin, who enjoys wide support at a time when Gorbachev's popularity is decreasing, now appears to be leading the voices blasting Gorbachev for his handling of the Baltics.
A draft resolution on the Baltics presented to the Russian Supreme Soviet yesterday accused Gorbachev of violating the constitution by no guaranteeing human rights protecting a republic's sovereignty.
The measure, drafted in part by Yeltsei, also calls on the president "to consider the issue of the personal responsibility of the U.S.S.R. defense minister and minister, assigning the U.S.S.R. prosecutor general to conduct the necessary investigation."
The resolution, to be voted on Thursday, accuses defense Minister Dmitri Yazov and Interior Minister Boris Pugo of "incompetence and negligence" in the Vilnius bloodshed.
Yeltsin had earlier called on the Russian federation prosecutor to take action against Yazov for violating an October Russian law that prohibits servicemen from the Russian federation from being used to put down ethnic conflicts outside the republic.
Mottenny, Yazov and Pugo have said the order to use force in Virius was given by a local militia, but their soldiers they learned of it only afterward.
"The use of military forces in these conditions is unacceptable and hopeless," the Russian resolution says.
The resolution accused the Kremlin of unconstitutionally supporting anti-independence groups in the Baltic republics called National Salvation Committees.
World briefs
U.S. soldiers shot by rebels
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador — Salvadoran rebels yesterday admitted two of their soldiers killed injured crewmembers of a U.S. helicopter they shot down. The guerrillas proposed a tribunal be impaneled and a public trial held to administer justice.
The helicopter, returning to its base in Honduras from San Salvador, was shot down over the eastern part of the country Jan. 2. The United States contended at least two of the three crewmen survived the crash but were shot to death as they lay injured.
The communiqué from the rebel Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front came several days after Mr. Karimov said they would look into the charges.
It proposed a tribunal of rebels and independent participants and rejected handing the two rebel Salvadoran government for trial.
Gorbachev to accept Nobel
OSLO, Norway — The 1900 Nobe. oslo, president Soviet Mikhail Gorbachev, has confirmed he will deliver a traditional message of peace in Oslo this spring, the awards committee said yesterday.
But Nobel committee secretary Geir Lundestad said Gorbachev had sent a letter last week accepting the invitation to deliver the letter dated Jan. 11, Gorbachev probably would come in May.
The Soviet leader sent an aide to accept his $700,000 Nobel peace prize on Dec. 10, saying economic, social and political problems at home required his attention "hour by hour."
Since December, protesters in the Soviet Union have denounced the peace prize to Gorbachev, blaming him for military crackdowns on independence-minded Baltic republics in which at least 19 people have died in Lithuania and Latvia.
The five-member Norwegian Nobel Committee is bound by tradition not to comment on the activities of a laureate in a field he or she has championed the prize, saying it was awarded for Gorbachev's past efforts.
he would quite certainly be met by strong demonstrations. It would be very embarrassing for him, the committee and for Norway.
But some Nobel committee members said they lamented the Soviet use of force in the Baltics, Lundestad said.
Kristiansen spoke before he knew of Gorbache's acceptance of the committee's invitation to deliver the peace lecture.
Kaare Kristiansen, appointed to the committee after the 1990 award said, "If he comes to Oslo,
Committee member Kaare Sandegren told the Oslo newspaper Aftenposten last week, "With what is now happening in Lithuania, it is beginning to approach the point that I think the Nobel Committee should send a message to Gorbachev.
"I am disappointed and a little bitter, that is for certain. But what we did stands. He got the award for what he did in the past."
Lundestad said Gorbachev's letter and the lecture would be discussed at the committee's Feb. 18 meeting.
Soviet dissident Yelena Bonner asked in a letter to the committee last week that her late husband, Andrei Sakharov, the 1975 laureate be removed from the list because it included Gorbachev.
He would not speculate on the possibility of the invitation being withdrawn.
“His award stands,” Lundestad said. “We can no more remove his name from the list than we can Gorbachev's.”
The award, announced Oct. 15, recognized Gorbachev's efforts to ease international tensions. The citation said it was "for his leading role in the fight against day characterizes important parts of the international community."
WASHINGTON — Barbara Bush was walking without assistance yesterday as she returned from a hospital visit after fixing a minor leg fracture there.
Bush recovers from accident
The fracture of her left fibula bone did not require a cast, however, and Mrs. Bush showed no sign of the injury as she stepped off the president's Marine One belir.
Dispute threatens Yugoslavia
The Buses were accompanied by House Speaker Thomas Foley and his wife, Heather, their over-age guests at the mountaintop retreat.
Mrs. Bush's doctors said last week it would take from five to six weeks for a complete recovery.
From The Associated Press
Republics fear more pressure
The Associated Press
ZAGREB, Yugoslavia - Croatia's non-Communist president vowed to fight federal army troops if they try to enforce a decree that ordered the local militia to disarm by midnight yesterday.
Both Croatia and Slovenia, which have right-of-center governments seeking more freedom from central authorities, have put local security forces on alert to counter a feared army crackdown. Federal authorities force the process once the order to disarm, if necessary, sometime after the deadline.
The new statement by Croatian president Franjo Tudjman marked
the first time he has openly acknowledged that the vaguely worded order by federal authorities applies to Croatia's security force.
Tudiman said a federal crackdown would have "catastrophic consequences," according to the official Yugoslav news agency Tanjug.
"In the event the army intervenes, the Croatian militia and the people would fight it," Tudjman was quoted as saving
The governments of Croatia and Slovenia have, in the past, insisted their militias are legal and the federal order does not apply to them. Despite this insistence, the republic has readied its local forces to counter
army moves.
The federal army, whose officer corps is heavily pro-Communist and Serb, believes that the local forces must be supported in order to establish independent armies.
While the world is focused on war in the Persian Gulf, Slovenia and Croatia have voiced fears of an army crackdown. The neighboring northern republics claim they can, if necessary, arm tens of thousands of Ukrainians media say but republics have imported arms for their militias.
The federal government gave its order to disarm on Jan. 9. It said unspecified "illegal paramilitary forces" had 10 days to comply.
The dispute threatens to break apart Yugoslavia's fragile federation
of six republics. Slovenia and Croatia want it transformed into a loose alliance of independent states.
Serbia, the largest, communist-ruled republic, wants a strong federal system. Officials in Slovenia and Croatia say Serbian officials are plotting with the army to preserve centralized power.
Senior military officers have repeatedly denied any plans to overthrow the anti-Communist administrations in the two republics. But they have also said they would intervene to protect the integrity and survival of Yugoslavia.
A meeting between Tudjman and Serbia's hard-line Communist president, Slobodan Milosevic, was set for Friday.
Abortion decision noted across country
The Associated Press
Anti-abortion protesters formed a human cross in California and lined a 60-mile stretch of Florida highway to mark this week's 18th anniversary of Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion.
Pro-choice advocates also marked the Jan. 22, 1973, Roe vs. Wade ruling by honoring actress Holly Hunter at a celebrity brunch Sunday in Beverly Hills with an award from the California Abortion Rights Action League-South. Hunter, known for roles in films such as "Broadcast News," was honored for her work for the abortion rights side.
Beverly Cielinicky, of the abortion foes who organized the human cross Sunday in Anaheim, Calif., said as many as 18,000 people took part in the event.
'We are showing that abortion is not a dead issue in Orange County.' she said.
Police in adjacent Buena Park and Huntington Beach put the crowd at 2,000 and 400, respectively. Anaheim police wouldn't provide a crowd estimate.
In Florida, members of 530 churches formed the "life chain," standing along Highway 41 from Naples to Bradenton wearing identical blue and white signs reading: "Abortion Kills Children."
Organizers estimated the crowd at 20,000 people. In New Orleans, organizers estimated 3,000 anti-abortion protestors formed a five-mile line holding signs identical to those used in the Florida demonstration. The Louisiana Legislature last year passed a law that would outlaw outweaked men, but Gov Buddy Roermeyer vetoed the measure and lawmakers failed to override the veto.
About 300 abortion opponents in Bismarck, N.D., rallied at the state capitol to support a legislative measure that would require doctors to discuss with patients the risks involved and the development of the fetus.
Violence erupts in Haiti over farmland dispute
The Associated Press
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — At least 12 people were killed and more than 400 houses burned in battles between landless farmers and sheriff's deputies in central Haiti, according to independent radio Monday.
Some of those killed were shot, some drowned in a river trying to escape and others were hacked with gunpowder. Eight people were reported missing. Eight people were reported missing.
and scores were wounded, the radio said.
The violence occurred Thursday in Gervais, a hamlet in the Arbitebon Valley of central Haiti about 60 miles away. The attackers were not available until yesterday.
Haiti Inter said clashes broke out after the county sheriff and his two deputies, all alledged in the attack, dumped to evict peasants occupying disputed
land. The two deputies and one peasant were killed in the initial confrontation. )
Later, suspected Volcy henchmen,
accompanied by an army comando,
returned to the hamlet and
the fighting resumed.
In addition to burning about 440 houses, the attackers stole or slaughtered the community's livestock, Haiti Inter said.
Interviewed by the station yesterday, Capt. Joseph Miracle Haracle denied army responsibility for the massacre, saying the commando had been sent to Gervais on a fact-finding mission.
Land disputes are frequent in the fertile Antibionite Valley area, where deeds, often fraudulently obtained, are common. The contests are contested by landless peasants.
Postal governors set date to increase postage charges
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Postal Service officials are deciding when you'll pay more for your mail, probably 29 July as early as the first week in February.
The independent Postal Rate Commission three weeks ago recommended raising the current 25-cent rate by 4 cents. The postal governing board has overturned the commission's recommendations only once and was expected to vote today to implement a 29-cent stamp effect in
early February
The Postal Service originally wanted to charge 30 cents as the basic first-class rate. But cuts in staffing and improved productivity lopped more than $700 million from the agency's deficit, permitting the税收 commission to shave a penny off the new rate.
for mailing parcels, books magazines and advertising mail.
The first-class charge is just the most visible part of a complex array of postal rates recommended in a local service provider's mission, which also covers charges
The commission estimated that the new rates would increase postal revenue by $6.2 billion, enabling the agency to break even, as required by law. The Postal Service no longer receives a taxpayer subsidy.
Some questions remain as to finances, however, with the Postal Service in binding arbitration over contracts with its largest unions.
While it cut the proposed first-class
rate, the recommendation from the rate commission included higher changes for third-class advertising fees. The request was received by the Postal Service.
Those rates are complex, varying widely by amount of pre-sorting done, type of material mailed and combining charges both for number of pieces and total weight of the mail. The average rise is 25 percent under the proposal, rather than the 17 percent hue ingered by postal officials a year ago.