The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, July 05, 1999, Image 6

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    Page 6 • Monday, July 5, 1999
News
The B;
Senior bowl
BRADLEY ATCHISON/Thh Baitauon
Steven Dillingham, a senior management major, smoothes out a bowl during a University Plus introductory
pottery class in the Memorial Student Center Thursday. A bowl usually takes 30 to 45 minutes to mold
and another 24 hours to bake before it is ready for use.
Clinton begins tour
of American poverty
WASHINGTON (AP) — At a time of prolonged na
tional prosperity. President Clinton embarks this week
on an “opportunity tour” exploring patches of stub
born and desperate poverty from Appalachia to Watts.
The president aims to “shine the light on opportu
nity” on the potential billion-dollar profits he says such
places can offer investors while at
the same time unshackling millions
from the bonds of poverty.
“It’s a real dream of mine to show
this can be done,” he said.
Clinton will visit places whose
emblems are boarded-up stores and
unpaved roads, where people live in
crowded shacks without plumbing,
where health care can fall to Third
CLINTON
World levels, where roadside garbage often goes un
collected and where unemployment stands at many
times the national average of 4.3 percent.
In short, these are communities where the clang
ing bells of Wall Street’s economic boom are seldom
heard.
“No matter how good you are with words, you
could not describe this,” Housing Secretary Andrew
Cuomo said, recalling his own visit to Pine Ridge, S.D.
— the poorest census tract in the nation — where un
employment is 73 percent and many people do not
have running water. “You get a sense of a total lack of
hope. ”
Pine Ridge, the Ogala Sioux reservation, is on Clin
ton’s itinerary. The White House says he will be the
first president since Calvin Coolidge to visit an Indian
reservation.
Seeking support for his “New Markets” initiative.
Clinton will travel to impoverished communities in
Kentucky, Mississippi, Illinois, South Dakota, Arizona
and California accompanied by corporate CEOs, local
officials and members of Congress.
Clinton’s trek will take him to Clarksdale, in Missis
sippi’s impoverished Delta region; East St. Louis, Ill.
where a new Ace Hardware store is seen as an economic
boon; South Phoenix, Ariz., where the Hispanic com
munity needs access to capital and finally to Anaheim,
Calif., home of Disneyland, for a conference with CEOs
on finding ways to hire disadvantaged young people.
The president will take with him a stack of an
nouncements on actions his administration — and
corporate America — are ready to take to address
poverty conditions and leverage investment.
Clinton’s pitch: Corporations should treat neglect
ed parts of America as untapped markets and invest
in them just as they invest in foreign countries in the
developing world.
“There’s a lot of money to be made out there,” he
said.
“It may be finally something whose time has
come,” the president said in interviews last week in
which he asserted there are business opportunities in
poor communities that can be measured “in tens of
billions of dollars.”
The challenge is just as imposing.
Of the 49 Appalachian counties in Kentucky, for ex
ample, 44 are listed as distressed based on poverty and
unemployment rates. In several, a majority of the res
idents live with inadequate water and sewer disposal
systems. It is an area where poverty rates approach
close to 50 percent, and fewer than 40 percent of adults
have a high school education.
Parliament starts move to Berlin
BERLIN (AP) — After a weekend
of packing up files and furniture,
the first freight train chartered to
help move the German parliament
from Bonn to Berlin pulls out of
the railroad station Monday for
the 375-mile eastward trek.
The first commuter planes for
1,200 government workers reluc
tant to give up their homes in
quaint little Bonn also take off
Monday — from the airport the
sleepy town shares with its big
city neighbor, Cologne.
The German government’s
long-planned return to its historic
capital is in full gear this summer,
almost 10 years after the fall of
the Berlin Wall.
Over the next two months, 669
parliament members, their 3,400
staff members and 6,000 other
government officials will make the
move.
Parliament, which began its
summer break last week, plans to
reconvene Sept. 7 in the newly
renovated, glass-topped Reich
stag in Berlin.
But first, their stuff has to get
there.
The parliamentary vice presi
dent, Anke Fuchs, was to see off
the first of 24 trains to carry par
liament’s 24 miles of file-filled fil
ing cabinets, 28,000 cartons of
books, 30,000 piece of furniture
and 1,300 computers in overnight
runs during July.
The trains are to leave from the
shipping yard in Cologne, 12 miles
up the Rhine River from Bonn.
Russians accuse U.!
of provoking disput
NATO blocks route for Russian withdra
MOSCOW (AP) — In the latest sign of frayed rela
tions between Russia and the West, Russian troops
were forced to delay their departure for Kosovo on
Sunday after NATO blocked air corridors on their
route. Infuriated Russian defense officials said the rea
soning behind the move amounted to a U.S. “provo
cation.”
A NATO delegation arrived in the Russian capital
on Sunday to hold talks on the impasse, and the In
terfax news agency reported that intense efforts to re
solve the dispute were under way between Russian
and alliance officials.
The billowing controversy came the same day that
American and Russian officials acknowledged that a
U.S. military attache had been expelled from Moscow
after being declared persona non grata. No reason was
given for the expulsion of Lt. Col. Peter Hoffman, but
the timing raised questions about whether it was re
lated to the Kosovo-induced chill.
According to the ITAR-Tass news agency, two
Ilyushin-76 military cargo plans were scheduled to fly
about 100 paratroopers to Kosovo on Sunday, but the
flights were put on standby when they couldn’t get
permission to fly over Hungary, Bulgaria and Roma
nia.
NATO said it would block the peacekeepers’ flights
until disagreements over the Russian role in Kosovo
were resolved.
Russia reportedly wants to change an agreement
reached in lengthy negotiations last month at Helsin
ki, Finland, that outlined Russian participation in a
NATO-led peacekeeping force.
Under terms of the agreement, Russian troops in
Kosovo are to be based in sectors commanded by
French, German and American generals instead of con
trolling a sector of their own, as Moscow had wanted.
NATO officials, speaking on condition of a:
ty, said Saturday that Russia now wanted the
expand its role so that it could send its troop:
ditional sectors of Kosovo controlled by othi
countries. Moscow also wants more controi
own forces in Kosovo.
Russian defense officials were described as
by NATO’s decision to block the flights, and-
assertion that Russia’s role remained t
amounted to “a provocation by the UnitedStaii
Interfax news agency reported.
“All details of the location of Russian peace:
in Kosovo were documented durinjg the talk;
the defense and foreign ministers in Helsinki
fense Ministry representative told Interfax.
The dispute comes against a backdrop ofg:
edgy relations. Russia has been resentful oi
eastern expansion, and strongly opposed thea
recent bombing campaign against Yugoslavia
And while Russia played a key role in neg
a peace agreement in Yugoslavia, its relatioi
NATO since then have been characterized by
mistrust and sharp disagreements.
Although Sunday’s flights were blocked,
is already sending other peacekeepers by la
sea.
A train carrying 144 Russian servicemenan
mored personnel carriers left the western city
on Friday and was bound for the Black Sea por
apse, from where the force will proceed to Ko;
sea. They are expected to reach their position
Yugoslav province July 16.
Another group of soldiers, from the Norther
casus military district, will depart from theBb
port of Novorossiisk aboard four ships on July
terfax said.
India seizes Himalayan pe
DRAS, India (AP) — After a 10-
hour battle in rain and fog, Indian
soldiers captured a strategic Hi
malayan peak held by Pakistan-
based fighters yesterday, marking a
major turning point in fighting in
the divided Kashmir region, mili
tary officials said.
India made its claim before Pak
istan’s prime minister was to meet
with President Clinton in Washing
ton in a U.S. attempt to defuse ten-
sions over Kashmir. India’s leader
declined an invitation for separate
talks with Clinton.
Washington and other world
powers fear the fighting in Kashmir
could turn into a wider conflict be
tween the rival South Asia neigh
bors, who last year became the
world’s newest nuclear powers and
have already fought two wars over
the mountain territory.
“All agreed the situation is dan
gerous and could escalate if not re
solved quickly,” the White House
said in a statement about the visit
by Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan and a
call made by Clinton late Saturday
to Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari
Vajpayee.
India accuses Pakistan of send
ing hundreds of fighters — among
them Pakistani troops — across the
cease-fire line dividing Kashmir be
tween the two countries to seize
mountain positions on the Indian
side in early May.
Pakistan denies that its troops
have crossed the 1972 cease-fire
line.
“We will win this war,” Vajpay
ee told a gathering of party work
ers Sunday, using that term for the
first time to describe what the mil
itary has called a “localized con
flict.”
In fighting late Saturday and ear
ly Sunday, troops seized a major
guerrilla position on the top of
16,500-foot Tiger Hill after days of
surrounding the peak, Indian offi
cials said.
"All agreed the
situation is dangerous
and could escalate
quickly/'
— White House statement
said.
“It will facilitate tbeev
the enemy from otherpos.'
the Dras sector," he said, reiti
to the town closest to the nwin
of the front.
Pockets of guerrillafigbteis
held lower promontories ofj
mountain, he said. Fiercefij
was continuing elsewhere
the 85-mile battlefront, paD
ly in the Batalik sector to fc
he said.
Singh said 251 Indiansd
have been killed and420woi
in more than seven weeksofi
ing. He also has said 467Palii
soldiers and more than
las have been killed. The casi
figures could not beindepenli
verified.
India’s premier, Vajpayee
The 10-hour battle was punctu
ated by the roar of multiple-rocket
launchers and artillery shells burst
ing in the cloudy night sky. Only a
half-dozen guerrillas remained, fir
ing automatic rifles from behind
boulders, when Indian troops
scrambled over the last rock out
cropping and overran the fortress,
local commanders said.
The Indian flag is “absolutely
right on top” of Tiger Hill, military
spokesperson Col. Bikram Singh
told journalists in New Delhi.
The position on the peak al
lowed the entrenched fighters to
oversee the only highway through
Indian-controlled Kashmir, and its
capture “is a turning point,” Singh
Pi
Begi
tudeni
Begi
iored p
ituden
rejected any dialogue with Pi er afte
over the fighting or the wide
of Kashmir’s status until the
ers are ejected from the India: ’hursd
trolled zone. Both countriesf’ool In
the entire Kashmir.
In their 10-minute cornel
late Saturday with Clinton,!
ee turned down theinvitatioi
the president for talks in Waj
ton, Foreign Ministry spolftogethe
Raminder Singh Jassal tcferam,”
porters. The time was “noli
nient” for a visit, he said.
The United States,
Japan, Britain, Germany,
and other Western nation!
dismissed Pakistan’s denial;*
is involved with the fightel
urged it to withdraw the for’
'ea
1 killed in Chicago-area killinj
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) — A gunman who tar
geted minorities in a deadly shooting spree in the
Chicago area struck again Sunday, killing a Korean man
outside a church, police said.
The shooter, linked to a white supremacist group,
had also allegedly fired at Asians and blacks in two Illi
nois cities on Saturday.
“This man is on a spree,” Chicago Police Cmdr.
William Hayes said. “He’s shooting people all over.”
Police were searching for the owner of the light blue
Ford Taurus seen in each of the shootings — Benjamin
Daniel Smith, 21.
The car sped away from the Korean United
Methodist Church on Sunday morning after its driver
fired four shots into a crowd of worshippers, police
said. A 26-year-old Indiana University student was
killed.
Bloomington Police Chief Jim Kennedy said Smith
is member of the World Church of the Creator, an or
ganization that distributed anti-minority and anti-Se
mitic literature in Bloomington last year, when Smith
was a student at Indiana University.
The church, based in East Peoria, Ill., is led by the
Rev. Matt Hale.
Hale told CNN that Smith, was a member of the
church from June 1998 until May.
“He was a thoughtful, dedicated person who be-
High
series
uito a
alley.
Jim (
|exas /
lieved essentially in our creed, our religion,"
“I never had any information or inkling he woi
anything illegal or violent.”
Authorities in Indiana and Chicago said ijeritly
matched the descriptions of the gunman soiMlood-'
connection with several attacks in Illinois onF| Olso
night and Saturday. gheir eg
Hayes said Smith is believed to beaboutCfecbut lay
135 pounds with a tattoo on his chest that reads Until th(
bath Breaker.” His Taurus, which has a blown-odrecent c
senger-side window, has Indiana plates and is boost ir
tered in Bloomington. to.
On Friday, a gunman wounded six Orthodox “it’s
leaving synagogue on the Jewish Sabbath in Chi. fyater a
The same shooter is believed to have killed RickyS I Olsoi
song, the black former basketball coach at North humans
ern University, as he walked with his children in iater b
by Skokie, Ill., and fired at an Asian-Americancf^nceph,
in the nearby suburb of Northbrook. Ifaralysi
Then on Saturday, police said, the same bluff He si
rus was seen at shootings in Springfield andC areas si
paign-Urbana. In the first attack, the gunmanfiifRially ^
two black men, but no one was hit, Hayes said, [hours
In Champaign-Urbana, six men of Asian deft He al
were standing on a corner near the Universityo|ing i n g
nois, when three or four shots were fired, Have;]
One man was hit in the leg but not seriously hiri
contai
app^s
Rayrr