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World in brief

Saudi ambassador calls Holocaust 'fact'; leaders to chastise Iran

By wire services
Published December 16, 2005

WASHINGTON - Prince Turki al-Faisal, Saudi Arabia's new ambassador to the United States, took issue Thursday with the Iranian president's description of the Holocaust as a myth, saying the "horrific genocide" is a "historical fact" no longer in dispute.

And European leaders warned Thursday that patience with Iran is running thin less than a week before envoys from Britain, France and Germany are to resume negotiations with Tehran over its nuclear program.

The comments by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, broadcast live Wednesday on state-run Iranian television, have been condemned by Western countries but Arab and other Muslim nations have remained largely silent.

European Union foreign ministers drafted a statement condemning the remarks and calling them "totally unacceptable." The statement was expected to be formally issued today after an EU summit in Brussels.

"As far as Saudi Arabia is concerned, that's a historical fact, you cannot deny that, and people should move forward from that," Turki said.

The extermination of 6-million Jews by Nazi Germany during World War II "of course has affected our part of the world because much of the European and American sympathy for the Zionist movement stemmed from that horrific genocide," Turki said. "The occupation of Palestine since then has been a consequence of that."

Ahmadinejad's speech expanded on comments he made at a conference of Islamic nations in Saudi Arabia last week, when he suggested that a Jewish state should be carved out of Europe if Europeans felt guilty over the Holocaust. In October, Ahmadinejad declared that "Israel must be wiped off the map."

But Turki said the Arab world has "made our peace" with the creation of Israel. He noted that in 2002, the Arab League adopted a Saudi plan that committed Arab nations to a peace process that would result in the creation of Palestine and an acceptance of Israel, including normalization of relations, once it leaves territory occupied after the 1967 Mideast War.

KABUL, Afghanistan - A U.S. soldier was killed and another wounded in a firefight with insurgents Thursday in southern Afghanistan, the military said.

Afghan and U.S. troops were on a patrol when they came under small-arms fire from enemy forces northeast of Kandahar, the military said in a statement. It said U.S. and Afghan soldiers returned fire, and aircraft and helicopters attacked the enemy positions.

A U.S. soldier and one Afghan National Army soldier were also wounded in the firefight, but were in stable condition at a nearby U.S. medical facility. One insurgent was killed, it said.

The statement did not identify the killed and wounded soldiers.

BOGOTA, Colombia - The United States and Colombian navies will conduct a deep-sea search for wreckage of a U.S. helicopter that crashed during an antidrug operation off Colombia's Pacific coast, killing all three American sailors aboard, officials said Thursday.

Those killed were identified in a Navy statement Thursday as: Lt. Christopher H. Snyder, 28, of Plainsboro, N.J., pilot; Lt. Nicolas J. Juron, 25, of Lexington Park, Md., pilot; and aviation warfare systems operator 2nd class John N. Kaye III, 22, of Waterloo, Iowa.

The helicopter, an SH-60B Seahawk, went down early Tuesday just after taking off from the frigate USS DeWert, according to the U.S. Navy. The cause of the crash remains under investigation and the bodies have not been recovered, it said. The search for the sailors was called off Wednesday.

UNITED NATIONS - The U.N. Security Council voted Thursday to extend the investigation into the assassination of Lebanon's former prime minister but didn't agree to Lebanon's request to immediately broaden the inquiry and establish an international tribunal.

The latest report by chief investigator Detlev Mehlis said new evidence strengthened his belief that the Syrian and Lebanese intelligence services had a hand in the Feb. 14 car bomb that killed Rafik Hariri and 20 others in Beirut.

ASTANA, Kazakhstan - Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev on Thursday ceremonially opened the taps of a new pipeline carrying oil from one of the region's greatest energy powers to one of its hungriest consumers, China.

The 625-mile pipeline designed to carry 140-million barrels of oil a year opens a huge market for the Central Asian nation expected to become one of the world's top oil exporters.

BEIJING - A fire swept through a hospital in northeastern China on Thursday, killing at least 33 people, including patients, state media said.

The fire started about 5 p.m. Thursday at the largest hospital in Liaoyuan city in Jilin province, witnesses said.

[Last modified December 16, 2005, 00:55:10]