World in brief

Hong Kong remembers Tiananmen

HONG KONG - Tens of thousands of demonstrators crowded into a Hong Kong park Friday to commemorate the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre with a candlelight vigil, songs and exhortations to build a democratic China.

Organizers said 82,000 people attended the event, while police put the number at closer to 50,000. The crowd, which included many families and young people, stretched the entire quarter-mile length of Hong Kong's Victoria Park.

In Beijing, police equipped with metal detectors and nightsticks guarded every entrance to the Chinese capital's main square, but the number of visitors was lighter than usual because of intermittent drizzle throughout much of the day.

No violence was reported in either city.

BERLIN - The United States has yet to complete plans for any troop withdrawals from Germany and is still consulting with its allies over its intention to fundamentally rearrange American forces around the world, U.S. and German officials said Friday.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld suggested changes could begin soon, saying Washington is ready to move forces in Europe and South Korea.

"It was clear that there was not yet a final decision, and that this decisionmaking and discussion process in the United States is still going on," German Foreign Ministry spokesman Walter Lindner told reporters Friday.

WASHINGTON - Two U.S. Air Force officers were among the wounded in last weekend's terrorist attack on a resort complex in the Saudi oil city of Khobar, the Associated Press reported, quoting an unnamed U.S. military official at the Pentagon as saying Friday.

The officers were liaisons to the Saudi government, working with the kingdom's military on training and weapons transfers, the official said on condition of anonymity.

It was unclear how the Air Force officers were wounded, or whether they were working or staying at the compound when the attack occurred.

It was the first acknowledgment that U.S. military personnel were inside the complex, which primarily housed foreign oil workers. Al-Qaida gunmen raided the complex and held hostages for 25 hours at a hotel on the site until Saudi forces raided the site. In all, 22 people were killed.

A federal appeals court in Washington on Friday threw out an award of almost $1-billion won last year by 17 former American prisoners of war for abuse they suffered in Iraq during the Persian Gulf War of 1991.

The former prisoners, from all branches of the military, sued Iraq, its intelligence service and its president, Saddam Hussein, in April 2002, before the more recent war. They said they had endured torture that included severe beatings, starvation and mock executions.

The Iraqi defendants did not appear in court to oppose the suit, and last summer Richard Roberts, a federal district judge in Washington, awarded the former prisoners and members of their families $959-million in a default judgment.

The plaintiffs then tried to collect their money from frozen Iraqi bank accounts. The American government opposed that effort, saying the money was needed to rebuild Iraq. Roberts reluctantly agreed with the government's legal position: that a wartime appropriations law allowed President Bush to void some laws concerning Iraq, including the one under which the plaintiffs had sought to collect their judgment.

The appeals court affirmed that decision in October. Friday's decision vacated the judgment itself.

TOKYO - An all-night debate in Japan's legislature erupted in brawling early today as opposition parties blocked a vote on a pension reform plan.

The melee at the upper house chamber came as government opponents delayed the vote for more than 17 hours, since the previous afternoon, using a range of tactics.

Security guards could be seen trying to separate lawmakers as they shoved each other up against the walls of the corridor, while other legislators hung their heads in their hands in fatigue.

The bill would raise citizens' pension premiums while also cutting their benefits. Opinion polls show some 70 percent of voters oppose the new law because of concerns workers won't receive the benefits they deserve.

World and national headlines

© 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times 490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 Contact the Times | Privacy Policy Standard of Accuracy | Terms, Conditions & Copyright