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Israel says it may remove some settlements

JERUSALEM - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, whose popularity has slipped over his failure to end the conflict with the Palestinians, floated the idea of unilateral steps Sunday, with officials telling Israeli media this may include drawing a border and removing some settlements.

In the weekly Cabinet meeting Sunday, Sharon said he remains committed to the U.S.-backed "road map" peace plan, which envisions a negotiated deal, with a Palestinian state as a centerpiece, by 2005. But Sharon added that he does not rule out unilateral steps, presumably if efforts to revive the road map fail. The prime minister did not elaborate.

BRUSSELS - The United States may have only one more week - 10 days less than expected - to lift steel tariffs that were declared illegal by the World Trade Organization or face stiff retaliation on American products.

A deadline announced by Norway and a report from Japan indicate that the WTO is set to finalize its decision declaring the U.S. tariffs on foreign steel illegal on Dec. 1 unless Washington acts before then. That means punitive measures totaling billions of dollars would automatically take effect five days later.

Although Dec. 1 is the regular meeting of the WTO's dispute settlement body, many expected a special meeting to be called Dec. 10, the last day possible, to give President Bush more time to comply with the Nov. 10 ruling.

MOSCOW - A fire ripped through a Moscow dormitory housing foreign students early today, killing at least 28 people and injuring 78 others, the government said.

The fire raged through part of a five-story dormitory belonging to the Patrice Lumumba Friendship of Peoples University, where many foreigners study, the Emergency Situations Ministry said. The university, named for a Congolese revolutionary and prime minister, was founded by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in 1960.

The university declined as the Soviet Union collapsed, and its buildings have become decrepit.

TURKISH ANTITERROR SERMONS: The Turkish government on Sunday ordered the nation's mosques to deliver an antiterrorism message as authorities pieced together evidence to determine who was behind a string of suicide bombings that killed 57 people and wounded hundreds more.

The Directorate for Religious Affairs, which controls all mosques in Turkey, said the antiterrorism sermon should be preached Tuesday, the first day of Eid al-Fitr, the three-day Muslim holiday marking the end of Ramadan.

PAKISTANI TRUCE: Pakistani troops patrolling the volatile frontier dividing Kashmir will begin a cease-fire within days, the prime minister said Sunday.

The cease-fire will coincide with Eid al-Fitr, which starts Tuesday or Wednesday in Pakistan, depending on the sighting of the moon.

YANGON, Myanmar - Myanmar's military government released four top opposition party members on Sunday, but prodemocracy leader and Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi remained in detention.

Nyunt Wei, the treasurer of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party, said police guards who had been camped outside his house for nearly six months dismantled their post and left.

CROATIAN NATIONALISTS LEAD: Nationalists who led Croatia to independence - and later to international isolation - were leading against the pro-Western government in Sunday's parliamentary elections, partial results showed.

Returns released by the state-run electoral commission with about 50 percent of votes counted gave the nationalist Croatian Democratic Union's bloc about 72 seats. Prime Minister Ivica Racan's Social Democrats were projected to win 55 seats with their partners, and could get about 68 seats if smaller parties rejoin the coalition.

HONG KONG REBUFFS BEIJING: Voters punished the territory's top pro-Beijing party in local elections Sunday, an apparent backlash against unpopular leader Tung Chee-hwa that raises the stakes in next year's legislative contests.

The opposition Democratic Party picked up 93 of the 326 contested seats, government-owned radio station RTHK said. Jasper Tsang, the chairman of the pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong, said today that he had offered to resign after his party's showing.