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Show U.S. DIGEST CIVIL WAR PRISON CAMP SITE OF NEW NATIONAL MUSEUM: On April 9, the Arizona Repubbcan will help dedicate the new National Prisoner of War Museum honoring the estimated 800,000 Americans who have been held as POWs. The dedicat ion, on t he anniversary of the beginning of t he brutal Bataan Death March of U.S. prisoners captured by the Japanese in World War II, li kely will draw many of the estimated 56,000 surviving ex-POWs. Andersonville is the site of a prison camp where Americans held Americans in harsh conditions during the Civil War. ALBRIGHT SAYS U.S. DETERMINED ·~ TO END STALEMATE: Secretary of State Madeleine Albrjght told a coalition of American Jewish leaders that ls rael must realize t he United States is frustrated with th e sta lled peace process but reaffirmed the Clinton administration is " very determined" to break the stalemate. Albright m ade the i.......:~--- observat ions in a conference call to members Benjamin of the Conference of Presidents of Major Netanyahu American Jewis h Organizations. Malcolm Hoenlein, one of th e participants, disputed reports in Israel yesterday that Albright used the conference to urge members to pressure Prim e Minister Ben jamin Netanyahu. COMMUNITY RESPONDS WITH CHARITY AS PASTORS URGE FORGIVENESS: Pastors in Joncboro, Ark. urged forgiveness yesterday and praised the hundreds of behind-the-scenes helpers who had given their time, talents and treasuxes since a deadly school shooting shattered the community1s morale. Youngsters will return to Westside Middle School wday for theLr first fuJJ week of classes since the killings. Plans called for President Clinton to address the gathering at a community memorial service tomorrow evening through a video hookup from Africa. Clinton visits Botswana, takes an African safari CHOBE NATIONAL PARK, Botswana (AP) - In a country that's h ome to 80,000 elephants, President Clinton turned from foreign diplomacy for a safari in one of Africa's premier wildlife refuges. With darkness descending and the mosquitoes rising soon after their arrival, the Clintons spent their first night. There was a 5 a.m . roundup call for members of the presiden t's parry this morning. Clinton's safari was his first and only break fro m an othetwise grueling, 11-day touLof G hana, Uganda, Rwanda, South Africa, Botswana and Senegal to forge a new partnership g with Africa and expand American business investment opportunities. ~ Sprawling over 4,200 square miles, Chobe "'~ Nat ional Park is named after the Chobe River on U.S. President Bill Clinton, center, and Botswana's n ortherly border with N ambia. It i s Botswanan President Ketwnile Masire listen to one of the last unspoiled wilderness areas in the American National Anthem upon Clinton's Africa. Huge herds of elephants and Cape buffal o arrival in Gaborone, Botswana yesterday. come together along the banks of the Chobe. just the last day or so, Botswana inaugurated a C linton flew to Botswana from a three-day digital ly-based cel lular telephone system, and state visit ia South Africa. He stopped in the president took note of that. Gaborone, the capital of Botswana, to meet with The president announced he will establish a President Ketumile Masire, w ho is to step down new radio broadcasting service for Africa to tomorrow after 18 years as leader of one of promote democracy and human rights Africa's most economically successful and throughout the continent. Broadcast 22 1/2 politically s table nation s. hours a week, Radio Democracy for Africa wil l Masire w.as delighted that C linton would visit Chobe because it probably will boost tourism. In be a division of the Voice of America. ~ - - - - - - - - - - - - - . - - - - - - - - - - - 1 1 THE WORLD WORLD DIGEST PERUVIAN PLANE CARRYING MERCHANTS STRANDED BY FLOODING CRASHES: A Peruvian air force plane carrying villagers stranded by flooding crashed into a shantytown in the northern city of Piura yesterday, killing 28 people, President Alberto Fujimori said. Fifteen people survived and seven were unaccounted for, Fujimori told reporters. Some passengers walked £rom the wreckage with minor injuries, he said. The Russian-made Antonov military transport plane was carrying merchants stranded by El Nino-driven flooding from the city of Turnbes to Piura when it plummeted to Earth about 6 miles from Piura airport. POPE REFLECTS ON YOUTH, AGE, ETERNAL LIFE: Pope John Paul II reflected on youth, age and eternal life yesterday during a visit to a working-class parish in Rome. " If you're 80, do you have a future?" asked the pope, who reaches that milestone i n 2000. "Yes, because you see eternal life." The pope said this is the essence of the Easter message: "Christ defeats death with the resurrection Pope fohn and gives us great hope.' ' The 77-year-old John Paul II Paul was hoarse and coughing from a cold but still beamed, as he does when h e meets with young people. INXS SINGER DID NOT COMMIT SUICIDE, PARTNER SAYS: Paula Yates said yesterday she refused to accept a coroner's ruling that her partner, rock star Michael Hutchence, committed suicide and was seeking legal advice to have it overturned. Coroner Derek Hand ruled that Hutchence, lead singer of INXS, had committed suicide by hanging himself in his Sydney hotel room. The coroner ruled in February that Hutchence was in a "severe depressed state" due to his relationship with Yates and her custody dispute with her former husband Bob Geldof. Yates said Hutchence thought suicide was the most cowardly act in the world. Communists tempt Ukrainian voters Nearly half the electorate voted by KIEV, Ukraine (AP) - The Communist Party and other leftist groups tempted Ukrainians voting in midaftemoon, but last minute dedsions and a new electoral system made forecasts risky. parliamentary elections yesterday with promises Ukrainians had high hopes for their country of Soviet-style social guarantees that would ease when it gained independence in 1991, but seven the poverty and worry of post-independence life. years later the nation of SO million is still waiting The message might appeal to millions of for an economic upturn and a stronger sense of retirees and workers tired of waiting months for identity. pension checks and The back wages. Many government have fond conquered memories of low hyperinflation cost housing, free and introduced a health service and relatively stable job security during currency in 1996, the Soviet era. but structural "People see that reforms have the current course been stymied by is a dead end and want a different § the slow-moving .,_ executive branch life" said ~ and its deadlock Ol~ksandr Moroz, :s with parliament. the Socialist 8 Before speaker of the ~ yesterday's ,,. , outgoing election, the Verkhovna Rada, ii t;"*'·, · Communists had Ukraine's 45o-seat Votersul..ca ;;;;s:;;.t:...th _ e_ir_b_all _ o_t_s_in _ th..;:::;e.._U_kr ~ an - ian......;;=:llp"'"ar...;liamentary about 20 percent parliament. . . s·1111,,eropoI , Ukrame · yes t erday. e1ectwns m of the 450 seats in H owever, many the parliament. others, who Combined with other leftist groups, they have remember the suffering inflicted on Ukraine by been able to block many of President Leonid the Soviet regime, decided to vote for the more Kuchma's economic reforms. Many analysts lay centrist and reformist of the 30 parties on the equal blame on tbe president and the government ballot. for the slow pace of reform. "Some people believe that if we return to a But economists have predicted the economy communist system, they will have what they had may grow slightly this year for the first time then. But that's impossible, we don't have the since_independence, and Kuchma insisted in an resources," said Stepan Stemina, 70. "There will election eve address-that the worst is over. be hunger." ! |