PERSIAN GULF

IRAN: READY TO SUSPEND SUSPECT ACTIVITIES

VIENNA, Austria – Iran has offered to stop some activities linked to uranium enrichment, diplomats said yesterday. America said the move would not stop it from trying to have Tehran hauled before the U.N. Security Council for allegedly trying to make nuclear arms.

The diplomats, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Iran tentatively agreed to re-impose a freeze on making, testing, and assembling centrifuges used to enrich uranium. Uranium enriched to high levels can be used to make nuclear warheads. At lower levels, enriched uranium can generate power, the only activity Iran asserts it is interested in.

Iran last year agreed to freeze enrichment activities but has since resumed testing, assembling, and making centrifuges. American officials are spearheading an effort at an IAEA board of governors meeting opening in Vienna on Monday to have Iran declared in violation of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, a move that could force the U.N. Security Council to take action against Iran.

– Associated Press

MIDDLE EAST

QUREI: RETALIATION FOR AIRSTRIKE ‘JUSTIFIED’

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – Prime Minister Qurei condemned an Israeli airstrike that killed 14 Hamas terrorists in unusually harsh terms yesterday, warning the attack will invite a tough response from the terrorist group and saying retaliation will be “justified.”

Palestinian Arab officials said Mr. Qurei’s comments reflected his people’s outrage as well as his impatience with the political paralysis within the Palestinian Authority. They said Mr. Qurei told Cabinet ministers he was so frustrated he wants to resign. The Israeli attack, which struck a Hamas training camp in Gaza City shortly after midnight, came a week after Hamas suicide bombers blew up two Israeli buses in the Israeli city of Beersheba, killing 16 people. The airstrike was one of the deadliest of dozens Israel has launched since fighting broke out with the Palestinian Arabs four years ago. Thousands of Palestinian Arab mourners in Gaza clamored for revenge, and Hamas vowed to avenge the attack.

– Associated Press

CENTRAL ASIA

18 AFGHANS RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT

KABUL, Afghanistan – Afghanistan’s historic election campaign got under way yesterday, pitting 17 hopefuls against interim leader Hamid Karzai in the race to become the impoverished country’s first popularly elected president. The American-backed incumbent inaugurated a rare new factory and promised to help Afghans out of poverty, while the lone female challenger wowed widows with a tirade against warlords.

But the danger that violence could mar a contest supposed to cement the country’s recovery since the ouster of the ruling Taliban in 2001 was underlined by fresh battles with insurgents in the south that killed at least seven people. Mr. Karzai and his challengers have 30 days to try to impress the roughly 10.6 million Afghans registered to vote. But the start of the campaign was low-key.

Three candidates briefed reporters in a dank government ministry; others were busy preparing for the anniversary this week of the death of legendary anti-Taliban commander Ahmad Shah Massood. Still, Massooda Jalal, the female candidate, won an enthusiastic endorsement for the October 9 vote from widows at a bakery near the capital’s war-damaged zoo.

Mr. Karzai, whose dashing profile in the West has helped raise billions of dollars in aid pledges, remains the favorite. Still, the bewildering range of candidates and the country’s deep ethnic divides could split the vote widely and force him into a runoff.

– Associated Press

EAST ASIA

CHINA FLOODS KILL AT LEAST 143

BEIJING – Floods and landslides triggered by torrential summer rains have killed at least 143 people and left dozens missing in southwestern China, officials and state television reported yesterday.

Thousands of army and navy personnel and other rescue workers were in Sichuan province helping displaced residents, unloading emergency supplies and guiding those trapped in muddy, swirling waters, the official Xinhua News Agency said. Authorities put the enormous Three Gorges hydroelectric project on alert as flood crests passed through the swollen Yangtze River and more rains were forecast, Xinhua said. Every summer, seasonal rains wreak havoc across much of China, especially along the flood-prone Yangtze and Huai rivers, where millions of people have settled. Xinhua said 89 were killed and 41 were missing in Sichuan, while another 54 fatalities were reported in the sprawling Chongqing municipality, upstream from the Three Gorges. Some 16 people were missing in Chongqing, even as some residents in the area’s Kaixian county were being allowed back to their homes, it said.

State-run China Central TV showed footage of people wading through a murky, chest-high deluge, some with children on their shoulders or being towed in plastic washtubs.

– Associated Press