Regional News in Brief<\/p>\n
Lee to visit
\nNZ, Australia<\/p>\n
SINGAPORE (AFP): Singapore's former prime minister Lee Kuan
\nYew was scheduled to leave yesterday for a two-day official visit
\nto New Zealand and Australia, the Sunday Times newspaper
\nreported.<\/p>\n
Lee, who stepped down in 1990 and is now senior minister in
\nPrime Minister Goh Chok Tong's cabinet, will be accompanied by
\nInformation Minister George Yeo.<\/p>\n
The trip, his first to both countries since 1988, is aimed at
\nreaffirming close ties, the Times said.<\/p>\n
While in Wellington, Lee will call on Prime Minister Jim
\nBolger, Governor-General Dame Catherine Tizard and opposition
\nleader Helen Clark, and address the New Zealand Business and
\nParliament Trust.<\/p>\n
In Canberra, Lee will call on Australian Prime Minister Paul
\nKeating and Defense Minister Robert Ray, and speak at the
\nNational Press Club.<\/p>\n
NZ campaigners
\ninvestigated<\/p>\n
WELLINGTON (AFP): New Zealand's two leading anti-apartheid
\ncampaigners are being investigated for racism, the Sunday Star-
\nTimes newspaper reported yesterday.<\/p>\n
John Minto and Dick Cuthbert were key figures in the now-
\ndefunct Halt All Racist Tours (HART) and have since launched a
\nnew group called SWAT (Stop White South Africans Today).<\/p>\n
Their aim was for a strict screening of the increasing numbers
\nof South African immigrants to ensure that they did not hold
\nracist views.<\/p>\n
The Sunday Star-Times reported that the Race Relations Office
\nhad received complaints about the new organization and quoted one
\nof its managers, Tuck Waaka, as saying those complaints were
\nbeing treated \"very seriously\".<\/p>\n
The origin of the complaints were not disclosed but the report
\nquoted Waaka as saying they had gone through initial
\ninvestigation and had been put in front of the Race Relations
\nConciliator, John Clark.<\/p>\n
Keating begins
\nvisit to Vietnam<\/p>\n
HANOI (AFP): Prime Minister Paul Keating arrived in Hanoi
\nyesterday for an historic visit aimed at raising his country's
\nprofile in Vietnam and pressing forward with Australia's
\ndiplomatic and economic push into Asia.<\/p>\n
Keating, the first Australian leader to visit Hanoi, is to
\nmeet with top Vietnamese leaders today, including his counterpart
\nVo Van Kiet, President Le Duc Anh and Communist Party General
\nSecretary Do Muoi.<\/p>\n
He is expected to discuss human rights but Australian
\nofficials suggested Keating would take a low key approach to the
\nproblem despite calls from Vietnamese Buddhist groups and members
\nof parliament in Australia for a firm stand.<\/p>\n
Australia has insisted it wants a dialog on the issue and
\nofficials said they hoped the Vietnamese would finalize
\narrangements for a human rights delegation to visit here later
\nthis year.<\/p>\n
Suu Kyi barred
\nfrom politics<\/p>\n
BANGKOK (Reuter): A constitutional forum steered by Myanmar's
\nruling military junta has adopted guidelines seen by diplomatic
\nand rebel sources as intended to bar opposition leader Aung San
\nSuu Kyi from politics.<\/p>\n
Myanmarese state radio monitored in Bangkok said on Saturday
\nnight the national convention had adjourned until Sept. 2, after
\nsetting constitutional guidelines on the name of the state, its
\nleadership and structure.<\/p>\n
The guidelines say the country will be called the Republic of
\nthe Union of Myanmar, it will be divided into 14 regions and its
\npresident must be free of foreign connections, according to the
\nradio.<\/p>\n
The junta's ruling body, the State Law and Order Restoration
\nCouncil (SLORC), had earlier changed the name of the country from
\nBurma to the Union of Myanmar after seizing power in a bloody
\ncoup in 1988.<\/p>\n
\"The third clause about the head of state was directly
\nintended to disqualify Aung San Suu Kyi from becoming involved
\nagain in politics in Burma,\" a diplomat based in Yangon told
\nReuters in a telephone interview.<\/p>\n
Missing penis
\nreopen death case<\/p>\n
BANGKOK (Reuter): Police in southern Thailand were forced to
\nreopen an alleged suicide case after the victim's relatives said
\nhis penis was missing and that foul play was suspected, police
\nsaid yesterday.<\/p>\n
The relatives of Somchai Chanwong, 20, a former singer who was
\nfound hanged, discovered that his penis was missing when they
\nwere about to cremate the body on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Police in Sichon district of Nakhon Si Thammarat province
\nabout 900 kilometers south of Bangkok said that since the man's
\nbody had been fully clothed at the time of death they had not
\nbeen aware of the missing organ.<\/p>\n
'Schindler's List'
\nneeds to be cut<\/p>\n
KUALA LUMPUR (Kyodo): The Malaysian government has agreed on
\nthe need to cut several scenes from the Oscar-winning movie
\nSchindler's List before it can be shown to the public, a senior
\nofficial said on Saturday, effectively wiping out its chance of
\nbeing screened in the country.<\/p>\n
\"Now it is up to the film producer to decide,\" Deputy Home
\nMinister Megat Junid Megat Ayub was quoted as saying by the
\nnational Bernama news agency.<\/p>\n
The movie's director, Steven Spielberg, has said he wants it
\nto be either shown uncut or not screened at all.<\/p>\n
Megat Junid said he agreed with Deputy Prime Minister Anwar
\nIbrahim to support a decision by censors to cut one scene of
\nviolence and five or six scenes depicting \"immorality.\"<\/p>\n
Malaysia arrests
\ntreasure hunters<\/p>\n
KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): Twelve men, including an Indonesian and a
\nSingaporean, were arrested after the Malaysian navy uncovered an
\nillegal salvage operation on a sunken 18th-century Dutch galleon,
\nofficials said yesterday.<\/p>\n
Several boxes of china, porcelain, jugs and vases were
\nrecovered from an unregistered trawler, Puteri Anjasmara, which
\nthe men had been using to salvage the galleon lying in the seabed
\noff Malaysia's Malacca state, they said.<\/p>\n
The two foreigners and 10 locals who were arrested during the
\ndiving operation had been handed over to the police, who were
\nawaiting museum officials from Kuala Lumpur to determine the
\nstatus of the treasure.<\/p>\n
No details on the galleon were available but news reports said
\nit was believed to have sank while on its way to India.<\/p>\n
Thai-Cambodian
\nborder on alert<\/p>\n
ARANYAPRATHET, Thailand (AFP): Officials in this Thai
\nbordertown put their troops and police on alert yesterday as
\nfighting between Cambodian government and Khmer Rouge forces
\nescalated a few kilometers (miles) away.<\/p>\n
Some 300 Cambodian government soldiers reinforced an offensive
\nyesterday on a Khmer Rouge village in Sisophon, some 15
\nkilometers southeast of this Thai bordertown, Thai police and
\nmilitary officials here said.<\/p>\n
The troops and four T-54 tanks took up positions around Koop
\nvillage where government and guerrilla forces had been engaged in
\nheavy fighting since Saturday, they said.<\/p>\n
Thai army and police officials in Aranyaprathet were
\nimmediately placed on full alert, one officer said.<\/p>",
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