MIDDLE EAST

BARGHOUTI SEEKS PALESTINIAN PRESIDENCY

RAMALLAH, West Bank – Marwan Barghouti, a fiery Palestinian Arab leader serving multiple life terms in an Israeli prison, indicated yesterday that he is running for Yasser Arafat’s position as head of the Palestinian Authority, defying the traditional leadership and scrambling the political picture ahead of the January 9 election.

Barghouti, 45, is challenging interim leader Mahmoud Abbas, 69, a pragmatist who appears to have the tacit support of Israel and America. Late yesterday, the Fatah Revolutionary Council formally endorsed Mr. Abbas. Palestinian Arab official Tayeb Abdel Rahim said this was the final approval, making Mr. Abbas “the only candidate of the Fatah movement.”

Barghouti’s candidacy sharpens a power struggle in the ruling Fatah movement, pitting the old guard of politicians, like Mr. Abbas, who returned with Arafat from exile in 1994, against the younger generation of activists who led two uprisings in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Arafat ruled Fatah for nearly 40 years until his death November 11.

The uprising leader is serving five life terms for his role in attacks on Israelis. Israel’s leaders insist he will remain in prison. This week Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom called him a “murderer.” Barghouti’s supporters have said they are counting on international pressure on Israel to free him. Defying his own party, Barghouti informed associates yesterday, through his lawyers, that he would run. He would have to stand as an independent, threatening a split in the Fatah vote that could even propel an outside candidate into the presidency.

– Associated Press

NORTH AFRICA

CHIRAC DECLARES ‘NEW CHAPTER’ IN LIBYA RELATIONS

TRIPOLI, Libya – President Chirac set aside years of acrimony over the bombing of a French passenger jet in the 1980s and yesterday declared a “new chapter” in relations with this former north African pariah state.

Mr. Chirac’s two-day visit, which wrapped up yesterday, marked the first to Libya by a French head of state in more than half a century, and came amid a rush by Western countries to patch up relations with this oil-rich nation. At a news conference at the end of his visit, Mr. Chirac lauded Libya’s efforts to rid itself of the image of a rogue state. “All the conditions are in place to open a new chapter” in French-Libyan relations, he said.

Tripoli, he said, had “made the necessary gestures to turn the page on a past that left painful memories.”

Roughly two dozen French business leaders were on hand for the visit, including executives from oil giant Total, gas firm Gaz de France, combat aircraft manufacturer Dassault Aviation, and defense group Thales.

“France attaches high value to its political, cultural and economic cooperation [with Libya], now that its development has been made possible by Libya’s choices,” Mr. Chirac said.

Libyan compensation for the 1989 bombing of a French passenger jet cleared the way for renewed ties between Paris and Tripoli. The $170 million accord, signed in January, marked a step in Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi’s efforts to end his longtime status as an international pariah and sponsor of terrorism.

– Associated Press

WEST AFRICA

‘THE WAR IS ALREADY ON,’ RWANDA’S LEADER SAYS

DAKAR, Senegal – Rwandan President Kagame yesterday renewed the invasion threat that ignited Central Africa’s deadliest conflict, the 1998-2002 Congo war, saying the continuing presence of Rwandan Hutu rebels in neighboring Congo means “the war is already on.”

“At the appropriate moment, we certainly will take measures,” Mr. Kagame told The Associated Press, calling a 5-month-old U.N.-led campaign to disarm the Rwandan Hutu rebels in Congo a failure. Asked about any deadline for Rwandan action, he said, “It should have been yesterday.”

But a Congo spokesman said Rwanda’s latest complaints are a pretext to resume exploiting Congo’s natural resources, as it did during the civil war. A U.N. Security Council mission visiting the region urged Rwanda to show restraint.

“The mission strongly urges the government of Rwanda to refrain from any action that would violate international law, undermine this region’s fragile stability, or jeopardize the transition process supported by the international community,” it said in a statement from Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura.

While the Rwandan leader has always talked tough about the lingering presence in Congo of militias opposed to his government, a U.N. announcement Wednesday added immediacy to the warning. A senior Rwandan official had advised U.N. Congo special adviser William Swing that Rwanda would attack bases of Rwandan Hutu rebels within Congo “very soon,” U.N. mission spokeswoman Patricia Tome told reporters.

– Associated Press

NORTH AMERICA

AFTER FEDERAL AGENTS KILLED, POLICE ARREST 23

MEXICO CITY – Nearly 1,000 police and federal agents tore through a town outside Mexico City, smashing gates and breaking down doors yesterday in a hunt for the leaders of a vigilante mob that burned two federal agents to death on Tuesday.

The killings have shocked and horrified Mexico, all the more so because they were captured by news cameras, then broadcast on all major networks. A young man, his face bloody and swollen, can be seen struggling to tell a television reporter that he is an undercover federal agent. Then a mob pours gasoline on him and a fellow officer and sets them ablaze. The chilling images put a spotlight on growing vigilante justice in Mexico, where police are viewed as inept at best and corrupt at worst and where many people say they must take security into their own hands as crime soars. With helicopters thundering overhead, a long convoy of government vehicles moved in on San Juan Ixtayopan around dusk Wednesday, bearing 600 members of the Mexican FBI and 300 municipal police officers. They wore bulletproof vests and carried machine guns and huge shields. Within minutes, the forces had sealed off streets and were mounting a house-to-house search for the mob leaders.

About three hours later, authorities rolled out with 23 people in their custody, at least three of them suspected of organizing the mob and helping to carry out the attacks.

It all started with rumors that children had been kidnapped from an elementary school in San Juan Ixtayopan, a neighborhood of 35,000 people on Mexico City’s southern outskirts. When people saw three men taking photos and staking out the school, they took action.

– Associated Press

EASTERN EUROPE

POLICE FREE HOSTAGES TAKEN BY ARMY DESERTERS

MOSCOW – Russian police yesterday freed three hostages held in a home north of Moscow by two army deserters who had fled their garrison armed with assault rifles, police said. The freed hostages were unharmed.

After a siege that lasted for several hours, one of the deserters killed himself and the other was captured by police, said Alexander Alexeyev, a spokesman for the Moscow regional police. The pair – identified as twin brothers Dmitry and Alexander Oparin – fled their garrison in the town of Solnechnogorsk just north of Moscow in the predawn hours yesterday, seizing assault rifles and ammunition. They killed two police officers who tried to stop them, hijacked a minibus, and drove to a private home in the town of Dmitrov, some 37 miles north of the Russian capital, where they holed up with three hostages and were encircled by police. Alexander later shot himself dead and his brother Dmitry was arrested, Mr. Alexeyev said. The brothers, who came from the Chelyabinsk region in the Ural Mountains, had served one and a half years of their two-year conscription term, he said. Desertions, killings and other violent crimes have plagued the underfunded and demoralized Russian military.

– Associated Press

YUKOS OIL EXECUTIVES LEAVE RUSSIA

MOSCOW – A half-dozen executives of embattled oil giant Yukos have left Russia and the company’s chief financial officer said yesterday he will not return until he learns whether the government is planning charges against him.

The company’s six-member management board has been in London this week for a company meeting. The only member of Yukos’s management reachable in Moscow yesterday told Dow Jones Newswires he planned to flee the country Friday for an indefinite time because of the company’s ongoing troubles with federal prosecutors. Yukos and its subsidiaries face a $24.5 billion tax bill, and its former CEO has been imprisoned for more than a year on fraud and tax-evasion charges. In a statement yesterday, Yukos said it had met this week to adopt a “short-term emergency plan” for the next few months, but it is now unsure whether it can operate because of government pressure.

“The actions taken against Yukos and members of the Yukos management team over the last few days by the General Prosecutors Office in Russia are more deliberate than the cycle of raids and demands placed on the company in the recent past,” the company said.

– Associated Press