The world in brief

Compiled from Times wires

© St. Petersburg Times, published December 6, 2000

Canada holds smuggling suspect

TORONTO -- The suspected central figure of a huge Chinese smuggling ring must remain in a Canadian jail until his claim for refugee status gets settled, an immigration adjudicator ruled Tuesday.

Lai Changxing and his wife, Tsang Mingna, face deportation to China, where Lai would likely be executed, if Canada denies their refugee claims, their lawyers say.

The case is sensitive in Canada, which prohibits capital punishment and has tried to avoid deporting people who face obvious political persecution or a death sentence in their homeland.

Lawyers for Canada's immigration department say that the alleged crimes are non-political and that Lai should be deported. Immigration and Refugee Board adjudicator Daphne Shaw-Dyck on Tuesday ordered the couple to remain in custody pending another detention hearing Dec. 21.

Chinese prosecutors accuse Lai of running a ring that smuggled $6.4-billion in cars, oil, cigarettes and other products through the port of Xiamen in China's Fujian province, avoiding $3.6-billion in import taxes.

The couple were arrested Nov. 23 for allegedly giving false or incomplete information when they first entered Canada in August 1999.

Cohen tells Europe: Spend more

BRUSSELS -- Defense Secretary William Cohen got tough with his European colleagues Tuesday, telling them if they don't start spending more on their military, NATO "could become a relic of history."

The 15-nation European Union is developing its own rapid-reaction force, separate from NATO but with plans to share some NATO planning facilities, intelligence and communications. Cohen stressed the American concern that the EU not duplicate NATO's extensive planning capacity.

"Every European member of NATO has only one set of forces and one defense budget, not one force and one budget for NATO and another force and military budget for the EU," Cohen said.

Court voids Pinochet house arrest

SANTIAGO, Chile -- A court of appeals on Tuesday suspended Gen. Augusto Pinochet's house arrest while it studied a judge's explanation for indicting the former dictator on homicide and kidnapping charges.

The court of appeals panel voted 3-0 to suspend Judge Juan Guzman's arrest order until it decides whether to uphold or repeal his indictment of the 85-year-old general.

Guzman submitted his explanation Tuesday, but its contents were unknown. The court is to reconvene today or Thursday to hear arguments from lawyers on both sides.

S. Africa voting mostly peaceful

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- A violent shootout that began near a polling station killed six people Tuesday during South Africa's second all-race municipal elections.

A seventh person was killed at another polling station, though officials doubted the death was election-related.

Despite the shootings, election officials and analysts said the poll was orderly and relatively free of the widespread violence and intimidation that marred previous elections.

"In previous elections, we've had voting stations overrun by panicky mobs, and there's been a bit more obvious intimidation," said Paul Graham of the Institute for Democracy in South Africa.

The ruling African National Congress is expected to win control of a majority of the nation's towns and cities, but it is receiving a strong challenge from the main opposition Democratic Alliance in some areas.

'Little Nut' convicted in drug case

MIAMI -- A Miami federal jury Tuesday convicted former U.S. federal witness Charles "Little Nut" Miller on narcotics charges.

Miller was found guilty of conspiring to send hundreds of pounds of Colombian cocaine from his native island of St. Kitts to the United States in the 1990s. His defense attorney, John Howes, said he will appeal the verdict, which ends the reign of one of the Caribbean's most notorious figures.

Miller spent hours on the witness stand trying to navigate loopholes in U.S. drug laws. He said he was merely a businessman -- the "tax man," he called himself -- who took millions of dollars in "fees" from Colombian drug cartels for safeguarding cocaine shipments as they passed through tiny St. Kitts.

But Miller also claimed the drugs were destined for Europe, not America, and thus he violated no U.S. law. Assistant U.S. Attorney Russell Killinger called this claim "absurd."

U.N. loosens Iraq oil restrictions

UNITED NATIONS -- After a day of hard bargaining, a divided Security Council agreed Tuesday night to give Iraq new leeway in spending the billions of dollars in oil proceeds.

At the center of the package, incorporated in a six-month renewal of the Iraqi "oil for food" program, is a provision pushed by France and other supporters of Iraq that will allow the release to the Iraqis of 600-million euros, or $525-million, to spend locally on repairing and maintaining their oil industry. Council members also agreed unanimously to expand the list of goods that Iraq will be allowed to import without seeking approval from a sanctions committee.

But Iraq will remain under U.N. monitoring and supervision, especially in deciding how the cash will be spent on oil installations. Those guarantees allowed the United States, the last holdout Tuesday night, to support the resolution.

In a compromise, electrical equipment and housing supplies were added to the list of approved imports. Telecommunications and transportation equipment were mentioned as something to be considered in the future.

Fox: Give indigenous people more rights

MEXICO CITY -- President Vicente Fox on Tuesday submitted a bill that would dramatically expand the rights of Mexico's indigenous people, addressing a key demand of the Zapatista rebels in Chiapas state.

Passage of the bill, which is not assured, would revise the constitution, allowing indigenous communities to elect local authorities and exercise forms of local government according to their traditions, as long as women's rights are respected; acquire their own communication media; and participate with education officials in designing bilingual school systems.

Government development plans would have to take into account indigenous people's needs, and state legislatures could redraw municipal boundaries to reflect traditional Indian community lines.

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