WORLD IN BRIEF

south korea

Oil Spill Reaches Sensitive Coastline

Oil from a damaged supertanker has reached an ecologically sensitive shoreline on South Korea's western coast, a Coast Guard official said Saturday.

About four miles of coastline near Mallipo beach, approximately 95 miles southwest of Seoul, has been affected by the oil, the official said. Some 2.7 million gallons of oil gushed from a 146,000-ton Hong Kong-registered supertanker after another vessel slammed into it.

BELGIUM

Russia Disregards Rice On Policy Toward Iran

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday in Brussels that the United States would continue to pursue a two-track strategy on Iran, pressing for new sanctions and demanding that Tehran tell the truth about its nuclear program while offering talks to sweeten the deal. But Russia ignored Rice's calls to punish Iran.

Despite strong support from NATO allies in the wake of a new U.S. intelligence report that concludes Iran actually stopped atomic weapons development in 2003, the top U.S. diplomat was unable to convince Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov of the urgency of fresh sanctions.

Rice said her talks with Lavrov were "an extension of other conversations we have had," suggesting the two didn't see eye to eye.

russia

Possible Putin Heir Calls For Nuclear Arms Parity

First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov, whom some analysts see as a successor to President Vladimir Putin, said on Friday that Russia must achieve nuclear arms parity with the United States.

"Military potential, to say nothing of nuclear potential, must be at the proper level if we want . . . to just stay independent," the ITAR-Tass news agency quoted Ivanov as saying.

Kremlin-watchers picked the loyal Putin lieutenant as a possible candidate to succeed the Russian leader, due to step down after a presidential election in March.