PERSIAN GULF

BUSH DISMISSES REPORTS AMERICA WILL BOMB IRAN

President Bush dismissed as “wild speculation” reports that the administration was planning a military strike against Iran. Mr. Bush did not rule out the use of force but said he would continue to use diplomatic pressure to prevent Iran from gaining a nuclear weapon or the know-how and technology to make one. “I know here in Washington prevention means force,” Mr. Bush said at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. “It doesn’t mean force, necessarily. In this case, it means diplomacy.”

– Associated Press

WESTERN EUROPE

E.U. SNUBS BELARUS PRESIDENT OVER ELECTION

LUXEMBOURG – The European Union told Belarusian President Lukashenko yesterday that he was unwelcome in the 25-nation bloc after his re-election last month in a vote observers said was rigged. It also imposed a visa ban on 30 other top officials in Belarus seen as having a hand in the government’s election campaign crackdown on the opposition and its supporters. Officials said further measures may follow, including more visa bans and a freeze on assets belonging to Mr. Lukashenko and other Belarus officials. Belarus said it would place a visa ban of its own on EU and American officials. In a statement, the foreign ministry in Minsk, the Belarus capital, called EU and American criticism of Mr. Lukashenko “uncivilized … shortsighted and ineffective.” It did not say which officials would be banned.

– Associated Press

MIDDLE EAST

OLMERT TO COMPLETE PULLOUT PLAN BY END OF BUSH’S TERM, REPORT SAYS

JERUSALEM – Acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will complete his plan to withdraw from much of the West Bank and draw the country’s final borders before the next American presidential election in 2008, a senior Olmert aide said in a published report yesterday. Mr. Olmert, whose Kadima Party won last month’s parliamentary election, had previously said he aimed to complete his plan by the end of his term in 2010. But Yoram Turbowicz, who is slated to be Mr. Olmert’s chief of staff, said it needed to be finished while President Bush remained in office, according to the Yediot Ahronot newspaper.

– Associated Press

WEST AFRICA

BOAT CARRYING 150 IN GHANA SINKS, 110 FEARED DEAD, POLICE SAY

ACCRA, Ghana – An overloaded motorboat carrying about 150 passengers on a vast lake in this West African nation has sunk, and 110 people are missing and feared dead, police said yesterday. Only 40 people are known to have survived the sinking Saturday afternoon on Lake Volta, said Akwasi Anyidoho, a police official in the region. He said hopes for finding more survivors were slim. The motorboat was carrying passengers across the world’s largest artificial lake to the mainland, where they were moving their homes after their island was designated a natural reserve. The boat struck something in the water and sank, Mr. Anyidoho said by telephone. He said the boat had exceeded its legal passenger capacity.

– Associated Press