SOUTHEAST ASIA

SIX KILLED AS THAI FORCES CRUSH RIOTERS

BANGKOK, Thailand – Security forces firing guns and tear gas quashed a riot by about 2,000 Muslim youths in southern Thailand yesterday, leaving six people dead and dozens injured. The trouble in Narathiwat province began with a protest at the district police station demanding the release of six men accused of stealing weapons belonging to the local self-defense volunteer force, even though officials said they had been transferred to the provincial capital. A crowd, estimated at 2,000, began throwing rocks and debris at the building, and overturned a military truck. The rioters tried several times to storm the building and a nearby district office. Police and soldiers fired water cannons and tear gas into the crowd, while also shooting in the air to scatter the rioters. Six people were killed, said Sirichai Pattananutaporn, Narathiwat’s public health officer. The official Thai News Agency said about 44 were injured, 14 of them security personnel. Defense Ministry spokesman Major General Palangun Klaharn said 200 to 300 people were arrested and would be prosecuted.A curfew was announced for Thailand’s three southernmost provinces – the only ones in the Buddhist-dominated country with Muslim majorities.

– Associated Press

WESTERN EUROPE

VATICAN LAYS OUT TEACHING ON SOCIAL ISSUES

VATICAN CITY – A Vatican handbook released yesterday laid out Roman Church teaching questioning preventive war and denouncing the “horrendous crime” of abortion. But Vatican officials sidestepped questions on whether the war in Iraq was illegal or if Catholics can vote for candidates who back laws permitting abortion. Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls quickly intervened at a news conference when a top Vatican cardinal was asked if the faithful can cast ballots for a candidate who supports legalized abortion. “The Holy See never gets involved in electoral or political questions directly,” he said. Senator Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate, is a Catholic who has said that while personally opposed to abortion, he upholds the right of women to have one. Pope John Paul II has vigorously championed the Vatican’s long-standing opposition to abortion, which was denounced as a “horrendous crime” in the Vatican document released yesterday. Officials at the news conference described the 524-page compilation of doctrine as a kind of handbook which could help business, political, and cultural leaders. Under the heading “legitimate defense,” the compendium stated that “engaging in a preventive war without clear proof that an attack is imminent cannot fail to raise serious moral and juridical questions.”

– Associated Press

EAST ASIA

S. KOREA TIGHTENS SECURITY AFTER INFILTRATION

SEOUL, South Korea – South Korea’s military tightened roadblocks and traffic checks north of Seoul after finding signs of possible infiltration by North Korean agents today, officials said. The increased security along the roads between the tense border and Seoul came as Secretary of State Powell was visiting South Korea to discuss a strategy for restarting stalled talks on North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs.

South Korean border guards found a hole in the wire fence that forms the southern boundary of the 2.5-mile wide Demilitarized Zone that separates the two Koreas, said Major General Hwang Joong-sun of the South Korean Office of Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The 16-by-12-inch hole, which was cut through two layers of wire fence meters yards apart, was discovered early today near Yeoncheon, a border town 40 miles north of Seoul. North Korea had no immediate comment, but it has a long history of staging border infiltration and other military provocations in apparent attempts to hike tension and increase its leverage at times of crucial negotiations.

South Korea imposed “Jindogye-1” around Yeoncheon, the highest level of vigilance the military can issue before an actual sighting of a communist infiltrator, said another ministry spokesman, who also refused to be named.

– Associated Press

ASYLUM SEEKERS TRY TO ENTER SOUTH KOREAN BUILDING IN BEIJING

As many as 19 people believed to be North Korean asylum-seekers tried to climb a fence and enter a South Korean consulate in Beijing yesterday, but only three succeeded, a diplomat and a news report said.

Such asylum bids have become common in China, with North Koreans who are fleeing famine and repression in the communist nation rushing into embassies, schools, and other foreign facilities. Chinese officials have allowed many of the asylum-seekers to leave for South Korea.

In yesterday’s bid, three made it into the consulate, while some of the rest were taken away by Chinese guards and others fled the scene, an Asian diplomat in Beijing and South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency said. It wasn’t clear how many were caught by police. Yonhap said 18 North Koreans were involved, while the diplomat, who asked not to be identified further, put the number at 19.

The people scuffled with Chinese guards as they tried to climb a fence outside the consulate, Yonhap said. South Korean TV showed the North Koreans climbing the fence before dawn. Once inside, they unfurled a South Korean flag and shouted, “Let us live!” The three people who entered the consulate building were two women and one child, Yonhap said. It said they asked to go to South Korea.

– Associated Press

EAST EUROPE

CHECHEN PRESIDENT OPEN TO NEGOTIATIONS WITH REBELS

MOSCOW – The Kremlin-backed president of Chechnya said yesterday he was open to negotiating with rebel leaders if they could ensure that their followers make good on any commitments undertaken in peace talks.

Alu Alkhanov said he welcomed “any initiative that brings us closer to peace,” and that he would urge the federal authorities to support talks with rebel commanders if they can guarantee their men will follow their orders to lay down arms.

Some 5,000-7,000 former rebels have already laid down arms and returned to peaceful life in Chechnya, Mr. Alkhanov said during a news conference in Moscow.

But he said radical rebel leader Shamil Basayev could not be engaged because he is “recognized as an international terrorist and, naturally, no one is proposing to hold negotiations with him.”

Mr. Alkhanov also said Aslan Maskhadov, the rebel commander who was elected president of Chechnya in 1997 after Russian forces withdrew, “is not capable of making any commitments and fulfilling them.”

Mr. Alkhanov’s comments echoed the Kremlin’s contention that Mr. Maskhadov does not control a large number of the rebels, who are divided into a number of factions. Mr. Alkhanov also said Mr. Maskhadov was morally unfit to lead negotiations since his policies as Chechnya’s separatist president had led the republic into a “dead end.”

– Associated Press