US NEWS SOURCES - August 2&3, 2003 (Weekend)

TOP STORIES
*	India wants U.S. to approve anti-missiles
	Aug 2, New Delhi -- India will ask the United States to drop its objection to Israel selling it Arrow anti-missiles, the Calcutta Telegraph reported. An Indian delegation will make the request when it arrives in Washington next week for a meeting of the two countries' Defense Policy Group. The United States has allowed Israel to discuss the sale of the Phalcon air-borne radar system, but it is reluctant to approve the sale of the Arrow anti-missile system, a joint U.S.-Israeli project, the Telegpraph said. The objection to the Arrow sale comes mainly from the U.S. State Department, the newspaper said.

	http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/r.htm
*	Pakistan accuses Indian consulates in Afghanistan of involvement in espionage, terrorism
	Aug 3, Islamabad -- The Foreign Ministry on Friday accused India of using consulates in Afghanistan to organize espionage and terrorist operations in regions along Pakistan's western border. Without offering evidence of the alleged activity, Pakistan said that Indian missions in the Afghan cities of Jalalabad in the east and Kandahar in the south were bases for India's spy organization, called the Research and Analysis Wing or RAW. ``India must restrain its intelligence agencies from organizing, financing and abetting acts of terrorism, sectarianism and violence in Pakistan,' the statement said.

	http://www.hoovers.com/free/news/detail.xhtml?ArticleID=NR_6cabf
	http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,BT_CO_20030803_000921-search,00.html
*	Pakistan says India has agreed to talks to revive air links between the rivals
	Aug 2, Islamabad -- Pakistan said on Saturday that India has agreed to meet August 27-28 to discuss resuming air links severed more than 18 months ago during a flare-up of tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors. Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the ``technical-level talks' between civil aviation officials would be held in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. The announcement was the latest sign of easing tensions. The two countries nearly waged a fourth war last year when each side rushed hundreds of thousands of troops to their mutual border. The hostilities were triggered by a Dec. 13, 2001, attack by suspected Islamic militants on India's Parliament that killed 14 people. New Delhi accused Pakistan of backing the attackers, a charge Islamabad denied.

	http://www.hoovers.com/free/news/detail.xhtml?ArticleID=NR_20d900027fd011f0
	http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,BT_CO_20030803_000922-search,00.html
*	Pakistan PM: Kashmir conflict can be resolved
	Aug 3, Singapore -- Pakistani Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali has said that the long-standing conflict over Kashmir between India and Pakistan can be resolved if compromises are made by both sides, the BBC reported on its Web site late Sunday. But India would have to make the bigger sacrifice as it controls a larger chunk of Kashmir and was also the larger and more powerful country, Jamali added. Jamali was answering questions from Indian and Pakistani audiences of the BBC's Talking Point program. The prime minister's comments came amid recent peace overtures between India and Pakistan, nuclear neighbors that have fought two of their three wars over Kashmir since they gained independence from Britain in 1947.

	http://www.hoovers.com/free/news/detail.xhtml?ArticleID=NR_e4780008ac5bfb68
	http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,BT_CO_20030803_000942-search,00.html
*	Ally asks Indian prime minister to clarify stand on temple dispute
	Aug 2, New Delhi -- A key ally of Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee on Saturday asked him to clarify his stand on a Hindu-Muslim dispute over the site of a demolished mosque, a news report said. On Friday, Vajpayee promised construction of a Hindu temple at the site of the 16th century Babri Mosque while addressing devotees at the funeral of Ramchandra Paramhans, a Hindu priest who pioneered the campaign to build a temple there. His comments were at odds with the stand of his 19-party governing coalition, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which says the dispute must be settled through court.

	http://www.hoovers.com/free/news/detail.xhtml?ArticleID=NR_fe7
*	Indian premier says temple will be built
	Aug 2, Ayodhya -- India's Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee promised that a temple for Hindu god Ram will be built on a disputed site in the town of Ayodhya. The prime minister made the promise in Ayodhya in the state of Uttar Pradesh where he went to attend the funeral of prominent Hindu holy man Ramchandra Das Paramhans who led the campaign for the temple, the BBC reported. The campaign is to build the temple on a site where a 16th Century mosque once stood. Thousands of people died in religious violence across India after a crowd of Hindus demolished the mosque in December 1992. More than 80 percent of India's population is Hindu but India also has the world's second largest Muslim population.

	http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/r.htm
*	Tamil rebels refuse to dismantle disputed camp in Eastern Sri Lanka
	Aug 2, Colombo -- Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels have for a second time rejected a call by European cease-fire monitors to evacuate a disputed camp, saying it is in their territory, a Web site reported on Saturday. Sri Lanka's military claimed in June that the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam had encroached on their territory and built a camp in violation of a Norway-brokered cease-fire agreement. The truce monitors subsequently inspected the Wan Ela camp in Trincomalee, 230 kilometers (140 miles) northeast of the capital Colombo, and ruled it was on government land. The monitors asked the rebels to withdraw, but they refused.

	http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,BT_CO_20030802_000062,00.html
	http://www.hoovers.com/free/news/detail.xhtml?ArticleID=NR_d9120008cb2e559d
*	Syrian President calls for more active Indian role in Middle East
	Aug 2, Damascus, Syria -- Syrian President Bashar Assad called Saturday for a more active Indian role in the Middle East and praised Delhi's ``wise stand' toward the U.S. military involvement in Iraq. Assad's comments came during his meeting with Indian External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha, who arrived in Damascus Friday on a three-day official visit. The official Syrian news agency said the two discussed the situations in Iraq and the Palestinian territories, plus ways to bolster bilateral relations.

	http://www.hoovers.com/free/news/detail.xhtml?ArticleID=NR_c070000435aa8377
	http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,BT_CO_20030802_000039,00.html
*	Gas explosions in Surat, India, kill 23
	Aug 3, Surat -- Explosions of gas cylinders killed 23 people and destroyed three residential buildings Sunday in India's western port city of Surat. At least 40 people were injured in the explosions that leveled the three-story buildings, the Press Trust of India news agency reported. Surat accounts for much of India's lucrative diamond exports. PTI said the liquefied petroleum gas cylinders were stored on the main floor of one of the buildings that housed a business making special diamond cutting instruments.

	http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/r.htm
	http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-India-Blast.html
	http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apasia_story.asp?category=1104&slug=India%20Explosion
	http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/AAug3.html
*	Blast in Northern Pakistan kills 45
	Aug 3, Gilgit, Pakistan -- Explosives used for road-building detonated in a northern Pakistani village, killing 45 people and injuring 150, officials said Sunday. The explosives were in the home of a contractor, Waris Khan, who died in the blast, police official Hussain Khan said. He said a short circuit caused a fire that ignited the blast, and it was apparently an accident. Villager Ghulam Sakhi told The Associated Press by phone that the home, made of wood, caught fire about midnight, and more than 200 neighbors, including women and children, rushed to help extinguish the blaze.

	http://www.hoovers.com/free/news/detail.xhtml?ArticleID=NR_8b520001fa782644
	http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,BT_CO_20030803_000538-search,00.html
	http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/ap/ap_story.html/Intl/AP.V2753.AP-Pakistan-Explos.html
	http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Pakistan-Explosion.html
	http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/AAug3.html
*	Bangladesh protests Indian water project
	Aug 2, Dhaka -- A government minister said today that a multibillion-dollar Indian project to connect 37 of India's rivers could threaten lives in Bangladesh, which is at the mouth of India's major waterways. Bangladesh plans to lobby India to halt the project, he said. "Definitely we will lodge a protest with New Delhi against its proposed plan," Hafizuddin Ahmed, the water resources minister, said at a strategy meeting ahead of a global symposium on water management issues and international cooperation to be held in Sweden next week. Mr. Ahmed, who said India had not officially informed Bangladesh of the plan, said Bangladesh's government would also ask donors not to finance the project.

	http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/03/international/asia/03BANG.html
*	Group seeks probe of Sri Lankan minister
	Aug 2, Colombo -- A Paris-based media watchdog has urged the Sri Lankan government to investigate a Cabinet minister's alleged death threat against a newspaper editor. In a statement issued Friday, Reporters Without Borders called on the government to "disown" Fisheries Minister Mahinda Wijesekera for allegedly threatening to kill the editor of the independent Sunday Leader, Lasantha Wickrematunga, after he published articles accusing the minister of corruption. "We deeply deplore the minister's behavior and ask you to take action against him," the statement said, adding the group had sent a letter to Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. It said the newspaper reported last Sunday that the minister made the threat in front of another Cabinet member, who later confirmed the incident with the watchdog.

	http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-sri-lanka-press-freedom,0,905233.story
	http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/ap/ap_story.html/Intl/AP.V1539.AP-Sri-Lanka-Press.html
	http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/AAug2.html
*	More serious charges possible in 'Virginia jihad network' case
	Aug 2 -- The U.S. government is considering upgrading the charges against the 11 Muslim men indicted as part of a "Virginia jihad network," a prosecutor said in court yesterday. Assistant U.S. Attorney Gordon D. Kromberg told a judge in U.S. District Court in Alexandria that one of the defendants had told investigators that the men's ultimate goal was "to fight American soldiers" and not just support a Pakistan-based militant group fighting India. U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema seemed surprised at the statement. "Is there a superceding [indictment] coming down the pike?" she asked. "I certainly hope so," Kromberg said. The 11 men are charged with supporting Lashkar-i-Taiba, which opposes Indian control of the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir, which has a mostly Muslim population. They all have pleaded not guilty.

	http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/AAug1.html
*	Nepal Maoists agree to bargain
	Aug 2 -- Nepal's Maoist rebel leader, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, said in a statement Thursday that his party would participate in the third round of talks with King Gyanendra's government to find a peaceful solution to the 7½-year-old insurgency launched by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) to establish a people's republic. "We have decided to resume peace dialogues in accordance with the desire of the major political parties and the expectations of the people," said Mr. Dahal, who is widely known as Prachanda, in a statement. He also said the five political parties agitating against the king, demanding restoration of parliament and formation of an all-party government must be included in the peace talks.

	http://www.washtimes.com/world/r.htm

EDITORIALS / OP-ED
*	Afghan political violence on the rise
	Instability in South Grows as Pro-Taliban Fighters Attack Allies of U.S.-Led Forces Aug 3, Kandahar, Afghanistan -- There is an armed guard in the house of God. At the front gate of the Abdurrad Akhunzada mosque, a turbaned watchman paces warily in the dusty twilight, hiding his Kalashnikov beneath an outsized scarf so he doesn't frighten men arriving for evening prayers. A remote-controlled bomb exploded at the mosque last month, injuring the mullah and 24 worshippers as they knelt, hands outstretched in supplication. Two days later, a mullah, who had hung the Afghan flag in his mosque and said good Muslims support the nation's central government, was shot to death as he sat praying, a bookin his hand. A third Kandahar mullah was attacked this week, executed outside his mosque by gunmen on a motorcycle. All three clerics served on a religious council that recently decreed that, contrary to pronouncements by the Taliban Islamic movement, there is no legitimate jihad, or holy war, against the central government or the foreign troops that support it.

	http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/AAug2.html
*	U.S. exporting 'good' jobs to India
	Aug 3 -- A decade ago, a wag famously warned of the giant sucking sound from Mexico, which threatened to steal America's working-class jobs. Today, the giant sucking sound comes from a different spot on the globe, and it menaces a different type of worker. India increasingly is landing high-skilled, highly paid positions for engineers, accountants and financial analysts formerly employed in the United States. West Palm Beach-based Ocwen Financial Corp. offers a case study in how companies are cashing in on India's allure. Seeking to cut labor costs, Ocwen quietly has hired hundreds of workers during the past two years in India, where skilled workers are plentiful and wages are low.

	http://www.palmbeachpost.com/business/content/auto/epaper/editions/sunday/business_f3928e69430531cd10e0.html
*	Religious tensions test India's democracy
	Aug 3, New Delhi -- Indians are rightfully proud to call their country the world's largest democracy. But it is a democracy that is seriously undermined by the scourge of religious extremism. Tensions between India's Hindu majority and its significant Muslim minority burst into thelast year in the western state of Gujarat, where rioting claimed the lives of at least 2,000 people. That ugliness has been compounded by the failure of the state and national governments to deliver justice for the victims of violence. Even worse, political parties have eagerly played upon religious and communal tensions in the wake of the riots to gain support.

	http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/opinion/6448496.htm
*	Recognition of Israel faces rigorous test in Pakistan
	Aug 2, Islamabad -- Under pressure from the Bush administration, President Pervez Musharraf has broken with 50 years of tradition by suggesting that Pakistan might consider officially recognizing the state of Israel. "We have had three wars with India, but nobody makes any fuss about having diplomatic or trading ties with them, so why not have ties with Israel?" Musharraf asked nonchalantly last month before a visit to Africa, one of several hints he has dropped over the past six weeks. But judging from the highly charged responses to Musharraf's words, that may be too much to ask in a country where the vast majority of people sympathize deeply with the Palestinian quest for a homeland. "Whoever supports Israel supports tyranny," said Syed Munawar Hasan, secretary general of the Jamaat-e-Islami, Pakistan's largest religious party. "He is following an agenda dictated by the interests of Jews and Americans. It is anti-Pakistani, anti-people and anti-Islam."

	http://www.dailycamera.com/bdc/nation_world_news/article/0,1713,BDC_2420_2154333,00.html

OTHER STORIES
*	Hip-hop is a guest at the Indian wedding
	Aug 3 -- Every now and then, a song bursts into the atmosphere with its own gravitational force and manages to pull even the most resistant music fans out of their usual orbits. Run-DMC's cover of Aerosmith's "Walk This Way" did it in 1986, winning over rock skeptics and persuading hip-hop fans that good beats are where you find them. Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" did in 1991, convincing millions of punk, pop and metal partisans that they could find common ground. And now, "Beware of the Boys (Mundian to Bach Ke)" by Panjabi MC and Jay-Z is doing the same thing for the hip-hop nation and members of the Indian diaspora. If you've heard the song (and at this point, it's almost inevitable) you might have thought it was two songs at once, perhaps blaring out of two cabs pulled up to the same light. In the space of four fierce minutes, "Beware" conveys both the stylish sang-froid of hip-hop and the physical jubilation of an Indian wedding.
	http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/03/arts/music/03FRER.html

*	His is not quite the career his parents had in mind
	Aug 3 -- In the photographs that adorn his new album "Beware," the English-born producer and rapper Panjabi MC, a k a Rajinder Rai, resembles a stylish software engineer. Pictured in a variety of unsmiling yet sincere headshots that make him seem more serious than street-tough, he wears neat, zippered turtlenecks; his look is surprisingly devoid of the flashy bling-bling and designer track suits that most hip-hop impresarios sport. The only reference to Mr. Rai's Punjabi background is one added by the designer of the CD's packaging. On the cover, Mr. Rai's swarthily handsome countenance is framed by a silhouette that recalls the curvy portals found in classical Indian architecture. Speaking on the phone from his manager's office in England between stops on a European tour, he sounds entirely British — unremarkable, save for the excited staccato rhythm of his words.
	http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/03/arts/music/03JANA.html

*	HIV cases on rise in India
	Aug 3 -- The number of people in India infected with HIV has been climbing steadily; India is now second only to South Africa in the number of infections. The concupiscent traveler should take careful heed of this and practice self-restraint, or at the very least, safe sex when indulging in temporary liaisons.
	http://www.cleveland.com/living/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/living/.xml

*	Kite flying banned in Pakistani city of Lahore
	Aug 3 -- Brightly colored kites used to swoop and loop in dogfights in the skies over this eastern Pakistani city. Lately, though, the skies have been free of kites, and they will be for at least three months. Officials have imposed a temporary ban to decide the fate of the popular pastime in Lahore, which has been blamed for injuries and deaths. Some also argue that kite flying is un-Islamic. The main cause of concern is a type of kite string that's designed to cut other kites during aerial combat. The cord is reinforced with metal and sometimes glass powder, making it sharp enough to slice through skin or even electrical wires.
	http://www.startribune.com/stories/484/4022065.html

	http://www.boston.com/dailynews/214/world/Pakistani_city_bans_fighting_k:.shtml

*	A D.C. children's party for tea and suffrage
	Aug 2 -- Six-year-old Zoe Malhotra looked sweet and shy as she nibbled on a sugar cookie decorated with the D.C. flag and tugged on her pink dress. But a moment earlier, she was feisty, leading a group of eight children and their parents in a chant promoting voting rights for the District. "What do we want?" "Senators!" "When do we want 'em?" "Now!" Zoe shouted and the group responded, walking back and forth in front of the White House along Pennsylvania Avenue NW. Though small in size, the group attracted the attention of tourists passing by the White House yesterday morning. Some even filmed the diminutive protesters.
	http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/AAug1.html

*	India pops into U.S. culture
	Aug 2 -- It wasn't too long ago that Aroon Shivdasani would hear an irritated complaint from her now 22-year old daughter: "Mom, not your Indian music again." Of late, says Miss Shivdasani, her daughter is sampling CDs from artists such as the Coventry, England-based Panjabi MC and the London-born DJ Rekha. Both are DJs who have helped create a new vogue in pop music: a fusion of traditional bhangra rhythms from India's Punjab region and Western hip-hop. "Now I hear, 'Mom, have you heard this?' " says Miss Shivdasani, executive director of the Indo-American Arts Council in New York City. "It's part of her culture." That would be American pop culture, an arena in which Indian influence has expanded considerably in the last few years, if not through actual Indian-born musicians and filmmakers then through the vast global Indian diaspora, big chunks of which are found in the United Kingdom and in America. In England, the old British colonial presence on the Indian subcontinent has long produced fruitful Anglo-Indian connections, especially in literary fiction, with contemporary novelists such as Salman Rushdie and V.S. Naipaul, an ethnic Indian from Trinidad.
	http://www.washtimes.com/arts/r.htm