Anthrax scare prompts evacuation of Philippine building

MANILA, Oct 17 (DPA) More than 100 people were evacuated today from the administration building of a northern Philippine freeport due to an Anthrax scare triggered by a suspicious letter received by an employee, officials said.

Police and medical teams immediately cordoned off the building at subic bay , a former US naval base in Zambales province, 90 kilometres north of Manila after the employee from the treasury department reported receiving the letter.

The Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBAM) said the employee was about to open the letter when she became concerned because "names of prominent international personalities were written in attached documents as other addressees".

Imelda Montemayor, deputy administrator for Health and Welfare, said eight employees were "taken to a secluded area for disinfection processes and a series of medical examination for possible Anthrax contamination".

"So far we found no evidence or manifestation of AAthrax bacteria infections, including skin itchiness and body lesions," she said.

Other employees were allowed to return to their offices after two hours, but the treasury and mail departments remained closed.

Sbma said two similar letters addressed to other employees were found at the mail room.

All three letters, which were mailed from singapore, have been turned over to the police crime laboratory and would be sent to the department of health in Manila.

In past days, letters containing promotional materials by the economist magazine, which were sent from Singapore, have also cause alarm among Filipinos in other areas, such as Manila and the southern city of general Santos.

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and health officials appealed for calm amid the scare, which followed reports of several cases of Anthrax infections contracted through letters containing powder in the United States.

"We should remember that Anthrax is already in the Philippines," Arroyo said.

"We have had Anthrax for several years and we know how to deal with Anthrax." She, however, cautioned the public to remain vigilant.

"If you get mail from a stranger, then get suspicious and bring it to a government hospital," she said.

"If you get mail from an old friend and then you see powder inside, bring it also to a department of health office." US thanks Russian for couring Anthrax MOSCOW, Oct 17 (UNI) The United States thinks highly of Russian scholars eagerness to help deal with Anthrax cases, US ambassador to Russia Alexander Vershbow told reporters today.

Should the US fail to resolve the Anthrax problem on its own, it may well ask Russian friends for assistance, the ambassador said when asked about American authorities opinion regarding a related proposal by researchers of the Saratov microbiological institute, reports Novosti.

French journalist held by Taliban, says he knew risks ISLAMABAD, Oct 17 (Reuters) A French journalist arrested and accused of spying by Afghanistans ruling Taliban today said in remarks broadcast that he was aware of the risks when entering the country illegally.

But Michel Peyrard, who works for Paris match magazine, told a BBC reporter that he had intended to apply to the Taliban for permission to work there once he reached the eastern city of Jalalabad.

A Pakistani newspaper, meanwhile quoted a Taliban official as saying that Peyrard, who faces charges that can carry the death penalty, would not be shown the same leniancy as a British woman reporter freed by the Taliban on October 8.

"I knew perfectly the risk to be arrested, that the probability was high," Peyrard said, adding that he had been treated well.

Peyrard, 44, was arrested on October 9 near Jalalabad after entering the country disguised under a head-to-toe Muslim womans veil, or Burqa.

He was charged with spying, an offence punishable by death, and told he would be tried.

He said he had chosen to use a disguise because he felt it was the only way he could cover the story properly.

"I applied for a visa many times.

You know I am covering this kind of crisis for many years , in Bosnia, in Kosovo, in Chechenya," he said.

"I didnt plan to hide when I got to Jalalabad.

I intended to work, to try to get in touch with the Taleban authorities and to try to get an official permit," he added.

A BBC journalist conducted the interview during a Taliban-organised trip to Jalalabad.

Peyrard is being held with two Pakistani journalist who were arrested with him.

Pakistani daily, the news, said one of its reporters also met peyrard in detention Jalalabad.

"We have recovered certain machines and documents from Michel Peyrard which showed he may be on a spying mission," it quoted Mullah Taj Meer, Taliban intelligence chief for Nangarhar province, of which Jalalabad is the capital, as saying.

"We wont show leniency in this case as we did earlier while releasing British female journalist Yvonne Ridley on compassionate grounds," he added.

Ridley, from Britains Sunday express, was held for 10 days and freed the day after US,led strikes on Afghanistan began.

The two Pakistani journalists, Irfan Qureshi and Mukarram Khan, who had accompanied peyrard, had also been charged with spying and were being held in the same complex, the news said.

Qureshi, who worked for the statesman newspaper in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar, had previously been warned by the Taliban against attempting to smuggle foreign journalists across the porous border into Afghanistan, it said.

A Taliban guard who said he took part in peyrards capture, told Reuters on Tuesday the French reporter was almost killed by Arab militants on the first day of his detention.

"The Arabs wanted to kill him," said the guard, referring to some of the Arabs in Saudi-born militant Osama bin Ladens Al Qaeda network in Afghanistan.

"We had guns too and warned them not to shoot." French president Jacques Chirac has rejected the spying charge, saying peyrard was a journalist "known internationally, recognised for his ability and for the quality of his work carried out solely in the name of public information".

Thousands Filipino Muslims sign up to fight with Taliban CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY, Oct 17 (DPA) Thousands of Filipino Muslims have signed up to help Afghanistans Taliban regime fight the United States and its allied forces, an Islamic non-government organisation said today.

Abdullah dalidig, chairman of Islamic Movement for Electoral Reform and Good Government (IMERGG), said some 101,000 Filipino Muslims have already signified their intention to go to Afghanistan to join in the fight against the US.

Dalidig said imergg has been recruiting Muslim men since last week for combat duty in Afghanistan "to defend their fellow believers" who have been the main victims in the US,led war against international terrorism.

"Never underestimate US," he said.

"Lets see what happens." he accused the u.S.

And its allies of ganging up on the mostly innocent people in an impoverished Muslim country".

Dalidig claimed that Muslim men in other southeast Asian countries were also being recruited to fight with the Taliban regime.

Thousands of Muslims today gathered in the nearby city of iligan to denounce the US and British air strikes on Afghanistan, which have victimised Muslim civilians.

The protesters burned replicas of US and British flags.

It was the second anti-US rally organised by Muslims in the southern region of Mindanao in one week.

National security adviser Roilo Golez Belittled Dalidigs claim that thousands of filipino Muslims would go to Afghanistan, noting that it was already very hard to go there since all seaports and airports in that country were already closed.

US ground operation imminent in Afghanistan DUSHANBE, Oct 17 (DPA) US forces are poised to launch a ground offensive in Afghanistan, military observers in neighbouring Tajikistan predicted today.

This was apparent from patterns of air strikes in recent days and sorties by aircraft like the AC-130 which are designed to rake whole areas clear with blanket gunfire ahead of ground forces, an unnamed staff officer told the Russian news agency Interfax.

"Future landing zones for ground troops are already being identified near Mazar-e-Sharif, Kandahah and Kabul," he said.

Operation plans were being coordinated by the US military and representatives of the Afghan Northern Alliance, he added.

"A group of American military experts has also been present in the Panjir valley for several days." Suspected Palestinian gunmen kill Israeli minister JERUSALEM, Oct 17 (Reuters) Suspected Palestinian gunmen today assassinated far-right Israeli cabinet minister Rehavam Zeevi, dealing a serious blow to US,led peace efforts.

The radical palestinian popular front for the liberation of Palestine group claimed responsibility for the first Arab assassination of an Israeli cabinet minister since the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948.

The PFLP said it carried out the attack on Zeevi, a 75-year-old former general, in retaliation for the assassination of its leader, Abu Ali Mustafa, by Israeli forces in August.

"The Israeli government, by killing Abu Ali Mustafa, has opened the gates of hell on itself and now the fire is approaching it," PFLP spokesman Ali Jaradat said in the west bank city of Ramallah.

As news of the shooting broke, dozens of Palestinians in the Ain el-Hilweh refugee camp in south Lebanon rushed into the street carrying pictures of Mustafa and dancing.

Zeevi, who tendered his resignation as tourism minister from Sharons cabinet on Monday after it eased a blockade in Palestinian areas, was hit by two bullets at the door to his room in the Hyatt hotel in Jerusalem.

Police said Zeevi did not have a bodyguard from the shin bet internal security service in line with official policy to assign personal protection only to cabinet members deemed to be at risk.

"The minister Zeevi arrived at the hospital dead, with no pulse and not breathing.We resuscitated him.And the heart began beating again.But all the efforts afterwards failed," Avi Rivkin, of Hadassah hospital, told reporters.

Israeli government spokesman Avi Pazner said the shooting showed that the Palestinian authority "had done nothing at all to stop terrorism or to arrest terrorists".

Fuel dumps hit at Kabul military base KABUL, Oct 17 (Reuters) Huge columns of smoke today rose above the Afghan capital after US jets dropped bombs on a military base, setting alight a Taliban fuel dump, witnesses said.

"Jets dropped at least four bombs on buildings of the base and one of them struck the fuel store," said a witness of the air strikes near the populated residential area of Khair Khana.

Several tanks were seen leaving the base, set up by the Soviet Union in the 1980s, as firefighters failed to extinguish the flames.

Witnesses said another bomb hit a second base further away and two more hit northwest of Kabul, although no details were yet available.

Six bombs explode on outskirts of Afghan capital KABUL, Oct 17 (Reuters) Six bombs rocked the Afghan capital Kabul today as the city was struck by another US air raid, witnesses said.

"I have heard six bombs exploding , they seemed to be on the outskirts," a witness said.

It was not immediately possible to determine what the target of the raid was or whether there was any damage or casualties.

Kabul awakes to more bombs, key city may fall KABUL, Oct 17 (Reuters) The Afghan capital of Kabul awoke to powerful explosions today, one day after a red cross warehouse was mistakenly bombed, as United States stepped up attacks on the ruling Taliban, and the opposition advanced on the battlefield.

Jets swooped over a foggy Kabul, dropping bombs that triggered five or six powerful explosions near a road leading south out of the city after a series of overnight raids by US forces hunting down Saudi-born militant Osama bin Laden.

"There were five to six bombs, the planes disappeared quickly," one witness said, adding that the bombs landed on a graveyard at the base of a mountain used in the past by foreign Islamic militant groups.

With the US-led forces starting to use special forces attack planes and focusing their strikes on the Taliban stronghold in southern Kandahar, smoke was rising from part of the city, the Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) said.

The attacks on Kandahar have cut electricity in the city, and sources close to the Taliban said leaders and officials were in hiding or moving rapidly from place to place to try to evade the strikes, intended to punish the hardline Taliban for sheltering the millionaire bin Laden blamed for the devastating September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

In Kabul, residents unable to flee because borders to neighbouring Pakistan are closed, tried to go about life as normal.

Workers started to poke through the remains of the destroyed warehouse used by the International Committee of the Red Cross (CIRC).

In Washington, a Pentagon statement said 454 kg bombs had inadvertently hit one or more icrc warehouses, adding,"US forces did not know that ICRC was using one or more of the warehouses." It was the second facility belonging to an aid group to have been hit during the us-led onslaught against Afghanistans ruling Taliban and bin Ladens Al Qaeda network, now in the middle of a second week of air strikes.

"It is marked on the top with a red cross.

People should take all necessary measures to avoid such things," said Robert Moni, head of the ICRC delegation in Kabul, who like all international aid workers in Afghanistan was evacuated to Pakistan last month.

Aid groups involved with Afghanistan have called a news conference in Islamabad for today.

The Taliban also appeared close to losing the key northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif to the opposition Northern Alliance, which says its troops are about six km from the strategic base near the Uzbekistan border.

"Our troops are fighting very hard in Mazar-i-Sharif and weve got the Taliban running," said commander Abdul Mumira in the northern frontline town of Deshtiqala.

Opposition officials said the appearance of one of the most devastating US air weapons, the AC-130 gunship, was a sign that the first stage of the war was complete.

"It means there is already substantial damage to the military capacity of the Taliban, and so to use other types of aircraft is safe," Northern Alliance foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah told reporters from his base in the north of the country.

The low-flying plane equipped with a devastating array of cannon and rapid-fire machine guns pulverised targets around Kandahar yesterday.

A Taliban official said some of the barrage from an AC-130 had struck a hospital in Kandahar, killing five people, Qatars Al-Jazeera television reported.

The report gave no other details and it was not possible to confirm the report independently.

Two of the turbo-prop air force special forces AC-130s that can carry five gunners and have "surgical firepower" for precision hits were used in attacks yesterday, US officials said.

More than 2,000 bombs and missiles had been dropped on Afghanistan since the campaign began on October 7, significantly weakening the Taliban, Marine corps lt.

General Gregory Newbold said in Washington.

Abdullah Abdullah also said the alliance would coordinate its attacks with the United States.

"The aim would be to coordinate efforts on all fronts to move against the Taliban where they are the weakest.

There will be more coordination," he said without elaborating.

In Kandahar, famed for the graceful minarets of the Ahmad Shah Baba Mausoleum, the attacks were so intense that residents were enveloped in a lung-racking cloud of dust, AIP said.

The city is the powerbase of Mullah Mohammad Omar, the hardline Islamic movements reclusive leader.

Washington blames him for sheltering bin Laden.

At least nine people were killed and 22 wounded in the raids on Kandahar yesterday, AIP said.

Four civilians were killed and eight wounded in strikes on Lal Mohammad village, 30 km northwest of Kandahar, Taliban information ministry official Abdul Hanan Himat told Reuters.

AIP quoted Taliban ambassador to Pakistan Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, currently visiting Afghanistan, as saying there were no divisions in the ranks of the Taliban and that Mullah Omar was alive and unscathed.

The Taliban have not given an overall death toll, but a compilation of their reports from across the country showed the figure rising towards 400, about one-third of them from a single village near eastern Jalalabad hit last week.

US officials have rejected Taliban reports of large numbers of civilian casualties.

US may waive China sanctions to aid war WASHINGTON, Oct 17 (Reuters) The Bush administration is considering a waiver on sanctions barring the sale of military-related equipment to china as another weapon in its war on terrorism, the Washington Post reported today.

The White House was reconsidering the sanctions imposed after the 1989 Tiananmen square crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators to promote exchanges of intelligence with Beijing, government officials told the newspaper.

President George W.

Bush had been focusing on China as a potential partner in the US war on terrorism since the September 11 attacks on the United States, the Post said.

Since the attacks, China had tightened patrols of its border with Afghanistan and offered to share intelligence information, US military officials were quoted as saying.

The report came just hours before Bush was scheduled to depart for a meeting of the Asia pacific economic cooperation group in Shanghai.

Bush and Chinese president Jiang Zemin were to meet for the first time on Friday on the sidelines of the APEC summit.

A waiver on sanctions would clear the way for the sale of spare parts for black hawk helicopters the United States sold to China during the 1980s, the newspaper said.

It could also pave the way for a further thaw in chilly relations between the United States and china, the post said.

Tensions in the already strained relationship flared up six months ago after China detained a US navy surveillance plane crew that made an emergency landing after colliding with a chinese fighter jet.

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