U.S. Congressman Cites Opportunity in N. Korea
BEIJING -- The leader of a U.S. congressional delegation just returned from North Korea said Saturday that the Pyongyang government demonstrated candor and was willing to resume discussions about its nuclear weapons program.
The delegation chairman, Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.), vice chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, depicted his group's reception as an indication that progress was possible in the long-stalled six-party talks on dismantling the reclusive nation's nuclear arsenal. He said he came away convinced that the talks, suspended during an inconclusive third round in Beijing last June, could resume within weeks if the Bush administration avoided inflammatory rhetoric and put a new foreign policy team in place.
"Clearly, it's a different time," Weldon said at a news conference in Beijing, where he briefed Chinese diplomats on his experience in Pyongyang. "The opportunity is there."
But after indicating a willingness to rejoin nuclear disarmament talks, North Korea returned to anti-American rhetoric Saturday, accusing the United States of being a "nuclear criminal" with double standards, the Associated Press reported.
-- Edward Cody
• MOSCOW -- A thousand retired people tried to block the road to a Moscow airport as 10,000 others jammed the avenues in President Vladimir Putin's home town of St. Petersburg to protest a law that stripped them of key welfare benefits. It was the largest show of discontent since the Kremlin leader took office nearly five years ago.
AFRICA
• QUNU, South Africa -- The grandson of Nelson Mandela heeded the former president's call for more openness about the AIDS epidemic, revealing that his mother had died from the virus that also killed his father.
Mandla Mandela revealed the cause of his mother's death in a speech to mourners at the funeral for his father, Makgatho Mandela, who had been the last surviving son of the anti-apartheid icon.
THE MIDDLE EAST
• TEHRAN -- Nobel peace laureate Shirin Ebadi said she would not obey a summons by the hard-line Revolutionary Court, challenging the powerful body that has tried and convicted many intellectuals.
Ebadi, the first Iranian and the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel peace prize, received the summons Thursday.
The summons, which did not explain why she needed to appear, was issued Wednesday, ordering her to go to the court within three days.
• MINA, Saudi Arabia -- The Interior Ministry has mobilized more than 50,000 troops to prepare for the annual hajj, or pilgrimage, officials said, but they warned that terrorists might still launch attacks. The forces will guard Saudi Arabia's holiest Islamic sites for an estimated 2 million Muslims who are expected to visit Mecca, a once-in-a-lifetime duty of all able-bodied Muslims who can afford it to cleanse the soul and wipe away sin. The event peaks on Jan. 19.
-- From News Services
