United Nations

Equipment missing from weapons sites

U.N. satellite imagery experts have determined that material that could be used to make biological or chemical weapons and banned long-range missiles has been removed from 109 sites in Iraq, U.N. weapons inspectors said in a report obtained Thursday.

U.N. inspectors have been blocked from returning to Iraq since the U.S.-led war in 2003, so they have been using satellite photos to see what happened to the sites that were subject to U.N. monitoring because their equipment had both civilian and military uses.

In the report to the U.N. Security Council, acting chief weapons inspector Demetrius Perricos said he had reached no conclusions about who removed the items or where they went.

He said imagery analysts had identified 109 sites that had been emptied of equipment to varying degrees, up from 90 reported in March.

South Africa

Court convicts official’s financial adviser

The presidential aspirations of South Africa’s second-highest elected official, Jacob Zuma, suffered a serious blow Thursday when a high court convicted one of his close friends of soliciting an $80,000 bribe on Zuma’s behalf and enjoying a “generally corrupt” relationship with him.

The High Court in Durban did not consider charges against Zuma, the deputy president. But the closely watched trial of his financial adviser, Schabir Shaik, has been viewed here as crucial to whether the popular and charismatic Zuma would become South Africa’s next president. The incumbent, Thabo Mbeki, plans to step down when his second term ends in 2009.

Judge Hillary Squires said Shaik had made illicit payments totaling $180,000 to Zuma and requested that a French arms company provide him with a bribe of $80,000.

Shaik was convicted of two counts of corruption and one count of fraud. There was no sentence immediately issued.

Kazakhstan

Soviet space launch site marks 50 years

The presidents of Russia and Kazakhstan celebrated the 50th anniversary Thursday of the Baikonur cosmodrome – a sprawling and well-worn gateway to the heavens that launched Sputnik and the first cosmonaut, as well as current missions to the international space station.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Kazakh counterpart, Nursultan Nazarbayev, toured an assembly and testing plant on the Soviet-built site on the isolated steppes of western Kazakhstan.

Initially designed as a testing ground for a top-secret Soviet ballistic missile program, Baikonur was a key site in Moscow’s space race with the United States in the 1950s and 1960s and saw many historic firsts in exploration.

Sputnik, the first satellite to orbit the Earth, blasted off from here in 1957, and cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space, was launched from Baikonur in 1961.

Kazakhstan inherited the cosmodrome after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Russia now uses Baikonur, its sole launch site for manned space missions, under a lease agreement.

Tokyo

Romania will still join EU in 2007, leader says

Romanian President Traian Basescu said Thursday he was still certain his country would join the European Union in 2007 as scheduled, but further enlargement of the union would be difficult as a result of Dutch and French rejection of the EU constitution in national referendums.

“We already signed the accession treaty on April 25. All EU member states have agreed and signed with Romania on the accession and it’s a treaty obligation for both parties,” said Basescu, who was visiting Tokyo, referring to the treaty signed in Luxembourg and ratified May 18 by the Romanian parliament.

However, Basescu said the French and Dutch referendums revealed people’s “concern” about EU enlargement and the results “obliged” European leaders to carefully examine the effect of what he called the first wave of enlargement – 10 countries admitted to the union in May 2004 plus Romania and Bulgaria in 2007 – on European citizens’ everyday lives before they can persuade their people to invite more countries to join.

Beijing

U.S. may compromise on textile limits

The Bush administration is willing to negotiate with China to avert a trade war, U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez said Thursday, signaling the possibility of compromise on limits the United States imposed last month on surging shipments of Chinese-made textiles.

“President Bush understands that no one wins a trade war,” Gutierrez said during an afternoon speech to the American Chamber of Commerce in Beijing.

But on the first day of a three-day visit to China, Gutierrez enunciated a tough line on the issue of pirated goods, which are made and sold widely here, and are increasingly exported worldwide.

He emphasized the Bush administration will not negotiate its demands for strict enforcement against the trade, which Washington says costs U.S. companies tens of billions of dollars a year in lost sales.