Israel to Publish Account List

Israel says it will publish lists of unclaimed properties and accounts in the face of charges that it, like Switzerland, held assets of Jews killed in the Nazi Holocaust. Swiss banks Tuesday unveiled a list of pre-1945 account holders who may have been among the six million Jews perished during the Holocaust. Today, a professor from Bar Ilan University told Israel Radio the Jewish state's Custodian General presided over a number of such accounts, which could total as much as $70 million in today's dollars. A spokeswoman for the custodian's office said the lists would contain absentee owners of accounts and land under its supervision.

Ahern, Adams Restart Talks

Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern met the head of the IRA's Sinn Fein political wing today, marking the restart of direct contacts after a new guerrilla cease-fire in British-ruled Northern Ireland. Ahern, Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams and moderate nationalist leader John Hume jointly urged Northern Ireland's pro-British unionists to back a struggling talks initiative. Today's meeting was a major step out of the political wilderness for Sinn Fein, ending a freeze on direct ministerial contacts since the IRA broke a previous cease-fire in 1996. Political sources in Belfast said Sinn Fein leaders might meet British ministers next week.

US Soldier's Car Firebombed

A U.S. soldier's car was damaged in a fire bombing outside his apartment in the Bosnian Serb-controlled town of Vlasenica early this morning, the NATO-led peace force said. No one was injured in the incident, the latest in a series of Serb retaliatory attacks over a NATO crackdown on indicted war criminals. A "Molotov cocktail type" fire bomb hit the civilian vehicle used by an American military observer... setting the car ablaze, NATO said in a statement. The fire was eventually extinguished.

Will Milosevic Halt Crackdown?

Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic has promised to halt a media crackdown and ensure fair treatment for political rivals in campaigning for Serbian presidential and parliamentary elections in September. The voting date was set for Sept. 21 by the acting Serbian president and speaker of parliament, Dragan Tomic. The office of Serbian president has been vacant since Wednesday when Slobodan Milosevic became president of Yugoslavia, which is made up of Serbia and Montenegro.

Narayanan Takes Office in India

Kocheril Raman Narayanan took office today as India's 10th president, becoming the first member of a low Hindu caste to be elected to the highest office of the world's largest democracy. In his first speech, the 76-year-old leader said he wanted Indians to unite in a fight against what independence leader Mahatma Gandhi called "the demon of corruption." Narayanan's rise to the position of India's head of state is seen as a symbol of triumph for low castes struggling for empowerment to undo centuries of discrimination under the Hindu social hierarchy.

Protestors Killed in Kinshasa

Three people were shot dead by soldiers in Kinshasa today during a protest by about 1,000 opposition activists at President Laurent Kabila's banning of political activity, witnesses said. The soldiers opened fire after the demonstrators from the radical PALU party tried to regroup after being dispersed by police, witnesses added. Witnesses also reported five injured among the demonstrators, who had been marching from the central railway station to the presidency of Kabila's renamed Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Africa-African American Summit

President Clinton's envoy to a four-day African-American summit pledged today to convince U.S. businesses of Africa's potential as a trading partner. Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater said his department is already identifying transport opportunities on the continent. Slater cautioned African leaders however that the U.S. government expected them to push ahead with political and economic reform to unlock the promised $650 million in funds set aside for infrastructural and equity investments.

Jiang Says Relations Are Warming

China's long-troubled relations with the United States have warmed steadily in recent months and now see an opportunity for swifter improvement, China's President Jiang Zemin said. "Despite great changes in today's international situation, the common interests between the two great countries, China and the U.S., in maintaining world peace and promoting economic growth and social progress are expanding rather than diminishing," the official People's Daily today quoted Jiang as telling former U.S. president Jimmy Carter.

Boris the First Relaxes

Boris Yeltsin says his heart is working like clockwork and, likening himself to Russia's tsars, has jokingly described himself as Boris The First. The Russian president's relaxed manner after three weeks on holiday is a sign of his confidence and firm grip on power, five months after returning to the Kremlin following a quintuple bypass operation in November. Yeltsin, 66, has temporarily switched the hub of power to the Volzhsky Utyos resort where he is staying in central Russia, summoning one minister after another to discuss policy and issuing decrees from his makeshift office.

Buddhists Mourn Church Leader

Thousands of Buddhist faithful paraded through the heart of Ho Chi Minh City today in a huge memorial ceremony to mark the death of a leading figure in the country's state-sponsored church. Thich Thien Hao, a member of the resistance movement against the U.S.-backed South Vietnamese regime during the Vietnam War, died last Sunday after a long illness. He was 86. As dawn broke today, some 6,000 monks, nuns and other members of the Vietnam Buddhist Church gathered at one of the city's holiest shrines, the Xa Loi pagoda, for prayers and a ceremony.

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