Deutsche Welle English Service News April 23rd 2004, 16:00 UTC ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Today's highlight on DW-WORLD:
Rejection Looms for Cyprus Peace Plan Cypriots from north and south will go to the polls on Saturday to decide on a U.N. plan to reunite the island after 30 years of division. Despite international pressure, Greek Cypriots are expected to vote "no." To read this article on the DW-WORLD website, just click on the internet address below: http://www.dw-world.de/english/0,3367,1433_A_1178080_1_A,00.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Final Round: Go East! The EU Quiz: Europe is expanding East. Embark on a journey through the 10 candidate countries set to enter the EU by playing the fourth and final round of DW-WORLD's Go East quiz. Lots of great prizes are waiting to be discovered. http://dw-world.de/go-east ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Scale of Korean train disaster unclear More than a day after a major accident involving two North Korean trains the scale of the disaster remains unclear. Red Cross officials said 54 people have been confirmed dead following an explosion in the town of Ryongchon. At least 1,200 others are said to have been injured. North Korean authorities are saying that 150 died, including some school children, and around 1,000 were injured. A Japanese news agency has quoted a North Korean official as saying the trains exploded after two wagons packed with explosives hit electricity wires. DW correspondent Martin Fritz recently returned to Seoul from North Korea. He says local emergency services will be overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster. Meanwhile UN officials say Pyongyang has agreed to accept help from UN aid agencies. Bulgarian killed in fighting near Karbala Heavy fighting has been reported between US-led occupying troops and Iraqi insurgents in the town of Karbala. A government spokesman in Sofia has confirmed that one Bulgarian soldier has been killed in Karbala, after his vehicle drove into an ambush. Several Bulgarian parliamentarians have called on the government to pull its troops out of Iraq. Meanwhile, radical Shi'ite Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has threatened to unleash suicide bombers if US forces attack the holy Shi'ite city of Najaf. Al Sadr made the threat during Friday prayers. US forces are poised just outside Najaf and have vowed to kill or capture Sadr and destroy his Mehdi Army militia, which has clashed with foreign forces across south and central Iraq. Chinese woman dies, apparently of SARS Two new cases of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, have been confirmed in China. The official Xinhua news agency reported that both patients had worked in laboratories in Beijing for China's Centers for Disease Control and were probably infected there. Meanwhile, a patient suspected to have SARS has died. She was the mother of a 26-year-old medical student, who is one of the two confirmed cases. It would be China's first SARS fatality since July. Two suspected Saudi militants killed Saudi police have shot dead one suspected militant and another blew himself up after a car chase across the Red Sea city of Jeddah. The clash came just hours after three other militants were killed in a gun battle with police in the city. The violence in Jeddah followed Wednesday's suicide bombing in the capital, Riyadh, which killed at least five people and ripped the front off a six-storey security headquarters. A Saudi militant group with links to the al Qaeda terror network has claimed responsibility for that attack. Five Palestinians killed Israeli radio reports that Israeli troops killed five Palestinians during the night. Quoting the army, the report said three members of the El Aqsa Martryrs Brigades were killed in Kalkilija in the West Bank, while two girls died in a clash between troops and Palestinians in the Gaza strip. The report said Israeli units had earlier been attacked by hundreds of Palestinians with grenades, anti-tank missiles and petrol bombs. Verheugen "disappointed by Greek Cypriots" The European Union's expansion commissioner, Guenter Verheugen, has expressed disappointment that a United Nations peace plan for the Mediterranean island of Cyprus could be voted down by Greek Cypriots. Speaking on German public television, Verheugen said the Greeks had always pressed hardest for a united Cyprus to join the EU. The latest opinion polls, though, indicate that about 65 percent of Greek Cypriots intend to vote no in Saturday's referendum. At the same time, 60 percent of Turkish Cypriots intend to vote yes. If either community rejects the plan, only the Greek south will join the EU on May 1st. DaimlerChrysler pulls plug on Mitsubishi Motors The German carmaker DaimlerChrysler has announced that it is pulling the plug on its stake in Mitsubishi Motors. DaimlerChrysler said it would not inject new funds into a proposed rescue plan for Mitsubishi, after it failed to reach an acceptable deal with other shareholders in the Japanese carmaker. Mitsubishi is more than five billion euros in debt. The decision came at an extraordinary meeting of DaimlerChrysler's supervisory and management boards in Stuttgart on Thursday. Observers say they now expect DaimlerChrysler to try to sell its 37 percent stake in the Japanese carmaker. Mbeki elected for a second term as SA president The South African parliament has elected President Thabo Mbeki for a second term. The vote was a formality, since Mbeki was the only candidate and lawmakers from Mbeki's African National Congress had won an absolute majority in parliament, in elections held earlier this month. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DW-WORLD.DE on Your Desktop. 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