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World in brief

China, Taiwan to allow direct flights

By wire services
Published January 16, 2005

MACAU, China - China and Taiwan agreed Saturday to allow the first direct flights between the rivals in five decades - a major breakthrough that could help reduce tensions in one of Asia's most dangerous potential flash points.

The agreement allows 48 round-trip charter flights to carry Taiwanese working in China home and back during the Chinese New Year holiday next month, Chinese negotiator Pu Zhaozhou said.

Taiwan has banned the direct flights since the Communists won a bloody civil war in 1949 and took over the mainland. The self-ruled, democratic island has banned the flights because of security concerns with China, which has repeatedly threatened to use force to unify the two sides.

Six Chinese and six Taiwanese airlines will operate the flights between Jan. 29 and Feb. 20, Pu said. Planes will fly between the Chinese cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Taiwan's two biggest cities, Taipei and Kaohsiung, Pu said.

FORMER CHINESE OFFICIAL IN COMA: Zhao Ziyang, the Chinese Communist Party leader deposed after tearfully sympathizing with the 1989 Tiananmen Square prodemocracy protests, was hospitalized in a coma Saturday and might be near death, a human rights activist said. Zhao, 85, went into shock from a lung ailment Friday night, activist Frank Lu of Hong Kong said. Lu said last week that Zhao was hospitalized for lung problems, citing Zhao's daughter Wang Yannan.

TOKYO - Japanese researchers on Saturday unveiled the largest earthquake simulator designed to help save lives in future temblors, just days before the 10th anniversary of the devastating Kobe earthquake.

The machine will educate people on how to build homes and offices more capable of withstanding the destructive power generated by the movement of the earth's crust, said Takahito Inoue of the Hyogo Earthquake Engineering Research Center.

Today, the research center will host a symposium on mitigating earthquakes for seismologists from around the globe and demonstrate the power of its simulator.

SEOUL, South Korea - A day after indicating a willingness to rejoin nuclear disarmament talks, North Korea returned to its usual anti-American rhetoric Saturday, accusing the United States of being a "nuclear criminal" with double standards.

North Korea's state-run newspaper Rodong Sinmun accused Washington of "conniving at, patronizing and cooperating with the pro-American forces" in Israel, Japan and South Korea to develop nuclear arms while pressuring North Korea to abandon its program.

ROME - The Nazi commander in Rome warned Pope Pius XII in 1944 of a plan by Adolf Hitler to abduct the pontiff, a newspaper reported Saturday.

Avvenire, an Italian Catholic daily, cited a written statement by Gen. Karl Wolff, the head of the SS in German-occupied Rome, saying that Hitler considered Pius a "friend of the Jews."

The comment would seem to refute claims that Pius did little or nothing to protect Jews from slaughter by the Nazis during the Holocaust.

Avvenire, published by the Italian bishops conference, said the new details emerged during research to help the Vatican determine if Pius XII merits beatification.

Some Jewish groups are opposed the move, the last formal step before possible sainthood. They contend Pius didn't speak out or do enough to save Jews during the Holocaust.

[Last modified January 16, 2005, 00:34:19]