www.heraldtribune.com The Associated Press

Venezuelan authorities said Tuesday a man arrested for carrying a live hand grenade at London's Gatwick airport showed a British court this week a forged Venezuelan identification card. The man who identified himself as Hasil Mohammed Rahaham-Alan, 37, held up the card during a court appearance in London on Monday and said he lived in Caracas, Venezuela. But Venezuela's Immigration Director Alfredo Gil said the card's number is registered to a woman living in Venezuela. Gil said authorities are investigating to determine if the man's passport is also false. Rahaham-Alan was arrested last week during a huge security alert when the army placed more than 400 troops at Heathrow airport west of London and stepped up security at other airports. Rahaham-Alan had a Venezuelan passport and arrived on a flight from Caracas, police said. Officers said they found a grenade in his luggage and shut Gatwick's North Terminal for several hours. He was charged Sunday night with possession of an explosive, possession of an article for terrorist purposes and carrying a dangerous item on a flight. His next hearing is scheduled for Feb. 24.

www.vanguardngr.com By Victor Ahiuma-Young Wednesday, February 19, 2003

LAGOS—PETROLEUM and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN), and its National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) yesterday in Lagos dissociated themselves from the scarcity of petroleum products currently being experienced across the country. But a top management staff of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) told Vanguard on condition of anonymity that the scarcity was due to an alleged stoppage of supplies by NNPC contractors used to augment local supplies who are pushing for a re-negotiation of terms of contracts following rising prices of petroleum products in the international market. However, officials of the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) will this morning meet with its striking workers in a bid to resolve the five-day-old strike as NUPENG branch of DRP yesterday joined the strike to press for the payment of their outstanding 2000 till date allowances as well as the granting of autonomy to the DPR.

In an interview with Vanguard, General Secretary of PENGASSAN, Comrade Kenneth Narebor, said: "The action is embarked upon by our DPR branch only. It is not a national action. The DPR branch has some grievances with their management and the supervising ministry over issues of outstanding salaries and allowances owed some years back and up to date.

And also, the issue of the delay in the passing of the autonomy bill for the DPR at the National Assembly. They gave a 14-day ultimatum which expired on February 14, I know that effectively on Saturday, February 15, they embarked on the strike action. It has nothing to do with the distribution and supply of fuel for local consumption at all. It is not yet a national action. There is no way it should affect fuel supplies in the country. This current scarcity could be as a result of a breakdown of the supply system. I cannot say categorically. It has nothing to do with the strike by workers of DPR. The strike can only affect the export terminal and not local supplies. It is just a unit of PENGASSAN that is on strike. If it were to affect the general public, we would have given enough notice.

"We would look at the events as they unfold . Presently, the management of DPR has called for a meeting for today (yesterday) but we asked for the meeting to be moved to tomorrow (today) for logistics reasons so that our branch officials in DPR will be able to make it to Lagos from their different locations.

We are hoping that, that meeting would be fruitful. The issues are straight forward.

Payment of outstanding salaries and allowances. It is our hope that DPR will be able to meet those demands. As for the autonomy, we are also hopeful that the National Assembly will expedite action on the passage of the bill.

"But if for any reason, the outcome of the meeting with DPR management is not fruitful, we have our processes in the association. We have to take the matter to our National Executive Council (NEC) for review. It’s only then after, we would know whether the action can extend beyond what it is."

On his part, the general secretary of NUPENG, Comrade Joseph Akinlaja declared: "It is not true that NUPENG is responsible for the scarcity of fuel being experienced in the country. What is responsible for this, I think, is the low quantity of products available. NUPENG is like the proverbial tortoise. Once there is no fuel, the first point of call is NUPENG. NUPENG has 140 branches. The DPR is just one. So, if NUPENG branch of DPR joined the strike this morning (yesterday) that could not have been responsible for the scarcity of fuel that started last week. The solution to the problem lies with NNPC. Our branch in DPR only joined the strike today."

But a senior management staff of NNPC told Vanguard on condition of anonymity that the scarcity is as a result of an alleged stoppage of supplies by NNPC foreign contractors used to supplement local supplies who are said to be currently pushing for a review of terms of contract as a result of rising prices of fuel in the international market.

He said: "look the problem is the foreign contractors that the NNPC uses to boost local supplies. Since the problem in Venezuela and the face-off in the gulf region between Iraq and U.S which has made prices of fuel to be on the increase in the international market, the contractors have been asking for re-negotiation of terms of contracts. But the NNPC has not yielded. I think they have not been supplying as required. That is the problem for now. Until it is resolved, this scarcity may persist."

www.news-journal.com By CHRISTOPHER TOOTHAKER Associated Press Writer

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP)--The bodies of three soldiers who had called for ``civic disobedience'' against President Hugo Chavez's government have been found with their hands tied and faces wrapped with tape, forensic police said Tuesday.

No arrests had been made and authorities were still trying to determine a motive behind the killings of the three soldiers, Erwin Arguello, Angel Salas and Felix Pinto.

The bodies were found in Guarenas, 18 miles from Caracas, said Cesar Hernandez, chief of forensics homicide division.

Hernandez said investigators have information linking the three soldiers to a group of over 100 dissident officers who seized a Caracas plaza on Oct. 23 and declared it ``liberated territory,'' Hernandez said.

``We know they visited the plaza. We also know they were missing since Thursday. We presume they were slain the same day in different locations,'' said Hernandez.

Dissident officers supported a nationwide strike called Dec. 2 to demand Chavez's resignation or early elections. But its leaders _ business groups, labor unions and leftist and conservative politicians--agreed to end the protest Feb. 3 in all areas but the crucial oil industry.

Some of the dissident officers participated in a mid-April coup last year that briefly ousted Chavez. Loyalists in the military returned Chavez to power two days after the uprising.

Chavez, a former paratrooper, accuses dissidents of attempting to provoke widespread lawlessness in an effort to spur another rebellion against his government.

Over 300 dissident officers were discharged, suspended from their posts or transferred to rural garrisons after the April coup.

Chavez was first elected in 1998 and re-elected in 2000. He promised to wipe out the corruption of previous governments and redistribute the country's vast oil wealth to the poor majority.

His critics charge he has mismanaged the economy, tried to grab authoritarian powers and split the country along class lines with his fiery rhetoric.

sacramento.bizjournals.com 3:14 PM PST Tuesday 

Sacramento-based CalPERS, the nation's largest public pension fund, ruled out stock investment in Malaysia, Thailand, India, Russia, Morocco, Sri Lanka, Egypt, Pakistan, Indonesia and Venezuela.

The fund, which has about $133 billion in assets, also cleared the way for future investment in emerging markets like South Korea, Poland, Israel, Czech Republic, Hungary, Taiwan, South Africa, Chile, Mexico, Jordan, Peru, Argentina, Turkey and Brazil.

CalPERS began in 2002 to consider civil liberties, press freedoms and political risk in making investments after board members argued that investing in more stable countries with more liberal practices would yield better long-term results. The countries that were dropped scored lower than the threshold imposed by CalPERS, which were based on studies by an outside consultant.

www.forbes.com Reuters, 02.18.03, 5:12 PM ET

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Gold closed sharply lower on Tuesday, erasing all of its gains for 2003 as the dollar rallied and many investors bet that the timetable for any U.S.-led attack on Iraq would be pushed back. But oil markets held their focus on war fears with crude oil prices setting 29-month highs late after the United States said it would propose a new United Nations resolution on Iraq but was prepared to move against Baghdad without one. In other commodity trading, grains closed quietly mixed in Chicago. But coffee, cocoa and sugar trading in New York never got started as snowstorms prevented many traders from reaching the New York Board of Trade. At the COMEX, gold futures fell to a seven-week low, playing catch-up with overseas markets after U.S. financial markets were closed on Monday for Presidents Day. Gold for April delivery closed $7.90 lower from Friday at $344.30 an ounce after trading as low as $343.00, the lowest since December 31. Estimated volume was 40,000 contracts. "Investors are going to the exits and booking their profits right now," said the head of one bullion trading firm. "If we break $340, then $300 will be the target." Spot gold bullion closed at $343.45/344.45, down from $350.50/351.50 at Friday's New York close. Tuesday afternoon's London spot gold reference price was fixed at $344.10. Conditions were extra thin on Tuesday with many COMEX traders prevented from returning to work as New York dug out from a blizzard that dumped up to 2 feet of snow on the city. The storm earlier prompted the New York Board of Trade to call off trading on Tuesday in its five agricultural products: cocoa, coffee, sugar, cotton and orange juice. Aside from the lower gold trend overseas on Monday, other factors worked against gold demand on Tuesday. The dollar has edged up from four-year lows against the euro, eroding the bullion buying power of European investors. At the same time the Dow Jones industrial average was up 132 points at 8,041, diverting money from gold. Gold futures had surged 12 percent this year, reaching a 6-1/2-year high this month at $390.80 as geopolitical jitters, the weak dollar and spiking oil prices kept investors interested in the precious metal as war insurance. "Just the hint of a possible delay of a war with Iraq was enough to turn investor psychology negative and to create an absolute avalanche of selling pressure," Leonard Kaplan, president of Prospector Asset Management, wrote on Tuesday. At an emergency summit of European Union diplomats in Brussels on Monday, a relatively positive assessment of Iraqi cooperation by U.N. weapons inspectors last Friday and support for France, which wants more time for inspections, blunted a U.S.-British drive for a new U.N. resolution authorizing war. April platinum at the New York Mercantile Exchange also saw a wave of profit taking, tumbling $26.20 to close at $653.20 an ounce. Platinum's recent advance to 23-year highs on hopes for new fuel cell technologies made it ripe for profit taking given gold's decline and the thinned-out ranks of traders. NYMEX crude oil, however, ended just below new 29-month highs after the United States said it would push for a new U.N. resolution on disarming Iraq and was prepared to move ahead against Baghdad even without one. "We don't need a second resolution. It's clear this guy could even care less about the first resolution. He's in total defiance with (Resolution) 1441. But we're working with our friends and allies to see if we can get a second resolution," President George W. Bush told reporters on Tuesday. NYMEX crude oil for March delivery on Tuesday peaked at $37.05, the highest level since September 2000, and barely four dollars below the highs of the 1990-1991 Gulf War. March crude closed 16 cents higher at $36.96 a barrel. In London, Brent North Sea crude rose 63 cents to $32.55 a barrel. News that the Pentagon had ordered a further 28,000 troops to the Middle East Gulf region as the United States builds a military force of more than 200,000 for a possible war with Iraq helped fuel a flurry of buying in crude near the close. Traders fear military conflict in Iraq could disrupt oil flows from the Middle East Gulf, which pumps nearly a third of the world's daily crude exports. An 11-week strike in Venezuela has already depleted U.S. oil supplies. NYMEX March heating oil closed higher, buoyed by demand from the blizzard in the Northeast. March rose 0.47 cent a gallon at 106.54 cents, while other contracts closed lower on profit taking. March gasoline fell 2.78 cents at 99.45 cents. At the Chicago Board of Trade, grain prices closed narrowly mixed. Soybean prices edged higher on talk of inquiry from China while nearby wheat prices firmed on tight supply. Corn prices eased as winter storms improved moisture for planting. March soybeans closed one cent higher at $5.74 a bushel and March wheat rose 1-1/4 cents at $3.35-1/2. But March corn closed 2 cents lower at $2.38-1/4.