Reuters World News Highlights 1900 GMT Jan 27
www.forbes.com Reuters, 01.27.03, 2:07 PM ET
UNITED NATIONS - Chief U.N. arms inspector Hans Blix sharply criticized Iraq for not giving enough evidence on its past weapons of mass destruction programs but did not corroborate U.S. claims that Baghdad had rebuilt its arsenal. Blix was addressing the U.N. Security Council after two months of inspections, outlining in detail gaps in information Iraq should have delivered in a 12,000-page arms declaration on Dec. 7. But he said the omissions could not lead him to conclude that Baghdad possesed prohibited arms.
UNITED NATIONS - The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said that two months of weapons inspections in Iraq had not proved Baghdad had tried to revive its nuclear arms programme. In an indirect jab at the United States' impatience with the inspection process and threats of war against Baghdad, top nuclear inspector Mohamed ElBaradei also called the inspection process a valuable investment in the interest of peace.
WASHINGTON - Iraq is not cooperating with U.N. weapons inspectors or complying with a U.N. resolution demanding it disarm and it is time for the Security Council to weigh how to respond, a senior U.S. State Department official said.
BAGHDAD - Ordinary Iraqis saw the report by top U.N. weapons inspectors to the Security Council as negative and predicted Washington would use it as a cover for invading the oil-rich country.
DAMASCUS - Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in some Arab capitals to protest against a possible U.S. war on Iraq, labelling U.S. President George W. Bush a "butcher" and his administration "arrogant".
JERUSALEM - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's right-wing Likud party kept its commanding lead in final opinion polls published on the eve of Israel's general election, but looked set to struggle to form a stable coalition.
SEOUL - A South Korean presidential envoy held talks with North Korean officials in Pyongyang in an attempt to ease the crisis over the Stalinist state's nuclear ambitions.
CARACAS - Venezuela's opposition debated scaling back its strike against leftist President Hugo Chavez to ease the burden on a struggling private sector now also threatened by government currency curbs and price controls.
LONDON/SEOUL - "SQL Slammer", a two-day-old computer worm that wreaked havoc on the Internet over the weekend, appeared to slow to a crawl late on Monday, fizzling out as quickly as it emerged.
ABIDJAN - Gangs of youths, some swinging machetes, blocked streets in Ivory Coast's main city and pulled foreigners from cars in a third day of protests at a peace deal they say was imposed by former colonial power France.
THE HAGUE - Former Serbian President Milan Milutinovic pleaded not guilty to crimes against humanity during the 1999 Kosovo conflict as he made his first court appearance since surrendering to the Hague tribunal.
PARIS - Jean-Claude Trichet, the would-be president of the European Central Bank, testified for the first time in a financial scandal trial that could rule the 60-year-old Frenchman out of the top job at the ECB.
Copyright 2003, Reuters News Service