Los Angeles

Transit worker talks improve strike outlook

Talks were gaining momentum Sunday with bus drivers and train operators whose walkout has forced about a half-million commuters to scramble for alternate transportation, authorities said.

“Things are looking quite optimistic with the drivers,” said Bill Heard, spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. “We are at the table, face to face, and things are quite cordial.”

However, he said there was no apparent progress with striking MTA mechanics, and it was unclear when any agreement would be reached.

About 2,200 MTA mechanics went on strike Tuesday after contract negotiations collapsed over the cost of health care coverage. Nearly 6,000 MTA drivers and train operators then walked off the job in solidarity.

A total of 70,000 grocery clerks went on strike or were locked out Oct. 11 in Southern and Central California.

Bosnia-Herzegovina

Former president, Alija Izetbegovic, dies

Alija Izetbegovic, who led Bosnia’s Muslims during the 1992-95 war for independence then became one of the multiethnic republic’s first postwar presidents, died Sunday, a hospital official said. He was 78.

Izetbegovic died of complications that developed after he was hospitalized for injuries sustained from a fall in his home, said Dr. Ismet Gavrankapetanovic, the head of Sarajevo’s Kosevo clinic.

“The former president of Bosnian-Herzegovina died in the Kosevo hospital today,” Gavrankapetanovic was quoted as saying by state radio.

Izetbegovic’s condition had become critical on Friday when doctors could not stop bleeding in his left lung, the hospital reported. The former president had been admitted to Sarajevo’s main hospital weeks ago after breaking four ribs and injuring his shoulder in the fall.

Moscow

President inaugurated in Chechnya

Akhmad Kadyrov was inaugurated Sunday as president of the war-racked Russian republic of Chechnya, two weeks after winning an election that the Kremlin promoted as a significant step toward stability but that critics called a sham.

The inauguration took place at the local administration headquarters in Gudermes, Chechnya’s second-largest city, news reports said.

The Kremlin appointed Kadyrov as Chechnya’s top civilian official in 2000. Kadyrov, an Islamic cleric, had supported separatist rebels during the 1994-96 war, but he split with the separatists after Chechnya-based insurgents mounted an incursion into neighboring Dagestan in 1999, one of the events that touched off the second war.

Human rights groups have widely questioned the turnout figures given for the Oct. 5 election, saying they appeared to be inflated.