HAITI
Mob attacks and kills
radio news director
PORT-AU-PRINCE - A mob stoned and hacked to death a journalist yesterday in the same town where opposition members faced off recently against government supporters. Brignol Lindor, news director of Radio Eco 2000, was ambushed as he was on his way to another job as a customs official near the town of Petit-Goave, 40 miles west of the capital, Port-au-Prince, Police Chief Alix Alexandre said. ''We don't know if it was politically motivated,'' Alexandre said. Radio Eco 2000 journalist Junol Casimir alleged that his co-worker was killed by supporters of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's Lavalas Family party. Casimir said Lindor had received death threats from Aristide supporters after inviting opposition leaders to speak on his radio show. (AP)
INDIA
Shantytown fire leaves thousands homeless
NEW DELHI - Several thousand slum dwellers faced a chilly winter night out on the streets after fire raced through their shantytown late yesterday. ''This is the third time in the past year this place has gone up in flames,'' said Abdul Reham, a ragpicker sitting on the pavement with his wife and two children. ''What can we do?'' Firefighters battled for several hours to control the blaze, which broke out around suppertime in the southern part of the city. One person was injured and several thousand people lost their homes, said P. Kamraj, deputy commissioner of police in South Delhi. Fires in the slums, known in India as jhuggis or bastis, occur frequently because of sparks from kerosene cooking stoves. (Reuters)
U NITED NATIONS
Iraq agrees to extend oil-for-food program
Iraq signed a memorandum of understanding with the United Nations yesterday, agreeing to terms of a new six-month phase of the UN oil-for-food humanitarian program. Iraq's UN ambassador, Mohammad Al-Douri, signed the agreement extending the program until May 30 on behalf of the Iraqi government, spokesman Fred Eckhard said. The program was created in 1996 to ease the suffering of 22 million Iraqis living under sanctions imposed after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait. It allows Iraq to sell unlimited amounts of oil to buy food, medicine, and other humanitarian supplies, and to pay war reparations. The Security Council passed a resolution Thursday extending the program and setting the stage for an overhaul of sanctions, which the Iraqi government has rejected. (AP)
