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20,000 flee renewed Sierra Leone fighting

A UN agency says 20,000 people fleeing the renewed fighting in Sierra Leone have reached the southern town of Kenema in the past few days and are in desperate need of food.
"The influx in Kenema is just the tip of the iceberg," said Patrick Buckley, a representative of the World Food Programme in Sierra Leone, where West African troops protecting the country's elected president are fighting with insurgents.
"We are gravely concerned about the thousands of people we believe are hiding in the bush," he said.
More and more people are being driven from their homes, mostly in and around the town of Segbwema, 31 miles east of Kenema, the WFP said.
"When you are forced to leave your home at 2am and run for your life, without the possibility of finding food, you're going to be pretty bad shape after a day or two," said Buckley.
President Tejan Kabbah was deposed in a coup in May 1997. West African troops restored him to power 10 months ago. The rebels are trying to oust him again.

Anger at Guevara image of Christ

A NEW church campaign in Britain which uses a controversial image of Jesus modelled on a famous picture of the Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara was attacked yesterday as being grossly sacrilegious.
The dramatic red and black poster, designed to encourage people to go to church this Easter, uses the slogan "Meek. Mild. As if. Discover the real Jesus. Church. April 4."
The campaign is the latest from the Church's Advertising Network (CAN) which has caused controversy with previous adverts including Christmas copyrighted and the Three Wise Men having a bad hair day.
At yesterday's launch at the Methodist Central Hall in London, the Rev Tom Ambrose, of CAN, said the poster was meant to make people think about Christianity and question Jesus.
Guevara was an Argentinian Marxist who helped Fidel Castro overthrow the Cuban dictatorship in 1959 and set up a communist state. He was killed leading a rebel group in Bolivia in 1967.
Mr Ambrose said: "We want people to realise that Jesus is not a meek, mild wimp in a white nightie, but a real, passionate and caring person.
"Jesus was a revolutionary figure and more revolutionary than anyone in the 20th century."
But former Tory MP Harry Greenway, who is still sponsor of the Conservative Christian Fellowship, described the poster as grossly sacrilegious and said that those responsible for it should be excommunicated. He said he would be protesting to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr George Carey.
The MP said: "Jesus was perfect man. Forget about revolutions and forget about Che Guevara. It is grossly sacrilegious to liken Jesus to Che Guevara or anybody else. I feel very strongly about this and those who are responsible should be excommunicated."

Paternity claim results known soon, says Drudge

THE results of the DNA tests on a 13-year-old boy who is claimed to be President Clinton's illegitimate son will be known today, says US investigative reporter Matt Drudge.
He says on his web site that DNA samples provided by Danny Williams and his mother have now been analysed and are being compared to Bill Clinton's genetic code outlined in information contained in Kenneth Starr's recent impeachment report.
The mother, former Little Rock prostitute Bobbie Anne Williams, is under contract to the Star, a US supermarket tabloid magazine, and is not known when the Star will make the results known.
Ms Williams, who claims to have had a series of paid for sexual encounters with president Clinton when he was governor of Arkansas, told the Star she is convinced Clinton is the father: ''I know it's his. He's the only white man I slept with that month.''
Bobbie Williams told a magazine some seven years ago that she approached Clinton after she allegedly became pregnant with his child during a paid sex session.
She said: ''He just laughed. He was rubbing my big belly and then said: 'Girl, this can't be my baby.' But I knew it was... and the older he got, the more he started looking like his daddy, Bill.''
According to Drudge, White House staff have been warned to ''avoid direct denials'' regarding the paternity challenge, at least until the results have been confirmed either way.

Women take centre stage in race for White House

IT is the turn of women to dominate the US political scene, at least until the President Clinton impeachment gets under way later this week.
Elizabeth Dole, wife of 1996 Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole, looks as if she is preparing the ground to run for president next year. And there are growing signs that first lady Hillary Clinton will launch her own political career by running for the Senate in New York.
Meanwhile, Governor Jane Hull and four other women were sworn into office on Monday night, making Arizona the first US state to have an all-female elected line of succession.
Mrs Dole, 62, last night resigned as president of the American Red Cross last night to set the stage for her own run for the White House in 2000. A former secretary of labour and transport she has long been seen as a powerful, potential candidate to become the first woman US president.
Her husband, the former Senate majority leader, has long been urging her to run.
"I'll give it serious consideration along with other options," she said. "We're going to have to talk about it down the road."
One Dole adviser said there were plans to form a presidential exploratory committee within the next month.
Hillary Clinton, while not seeking the highest US office, is reported to be seriously considering leaving the White House before the end of her husband's term to move to New York in preparation for a run at the Senate.
The President is reported to have told a senior Democrat, who said that Mrs Clinton should run, "Well, that's what I think."
In Arizona, Mrs Hull credited the elective first to women working their way up the political ladder.
The women were sworn in by US Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, an Arizonan who was the first woman appointed to the nation's highest court.
The others sworn in were Secretary of State Betsey Bayless, Attorney General Janet Napolitano, Treasurer Carol Springer and Superintendent of Public Instruction Lisa Graham Keegan.
According to Mrs Hull, women may be better suited to politics.
"Most women don't care for lots of confrontation, lots of screaming, lots of yelling," she said.

Clinton impeachment trial starts tomorrow

IMPEACHMENT trial proceedings against President Bill Clinton will begin in the Senate on Thursday, Majority Leader Trent Lott announced last night.
Lott said he had met earlier in the day with Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle and Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who will preside over the first presidential impeachment trial in 130 years.
Lott offered no other details of the trial, in which the Senate will rule on two articles of impeachment the House approved December 19.
But several Congressional sources said Senate leaders are discussing a plan under which Rehnquist will on Thursday administer a constitutionally prescribed oath to the senators, who will sit as jurors.
Members of the House who are designated to present the evidence would formally outline the articles of impeachment later that day, assuming they are authorised to do so in a House vote scheduled for today. After that, a pause in the proceedings is possible, while both sides draft legal papers, sources added.
Clinton is accused of committing perjury and obstructing justice in an attempt to cover up his relationship with Monica Lewinsky.
"We have a constitutional duty here. It is a very serious one," said Lott. "We will do our very best to do this in a proper way." Lott spoke for only a few moments, and took no questions, leaving unclear precisely what events will occur on Thursday, and what the timetable will be for Clinton's trial.
A proposal by one Republican and one Democratic senator for a truncated procedure drew criticism from several Republican lawmakers, many of them conservatives.
"We anticipate that that would start Thursday the 7th and then beyond that will be determined by the discussions with the rank and file," Lott said. The new 106th Congress is scheduled to convene today and the impeachment trial — the first of a president since Andrew Johnson in 1868 — towers over the agenda.
Lott has been struggling to find a formula for a trial, but has been buffeted with criticism from some Republicans who opposed a proceeding that was likely to end after only a few days. "I simply believe we must accept our responsibility to conduct the impeachment trial, followed by a vote to remove or retain the president," Republican Senator Rod Grams of Minnesota told Lott in a letter.
On the other hand, Daschle said yesterday a majority of senators want to expedite the proceeding against Clinton.
Republicans are also mindful of:
Clinton still has the confidence of the nation and is flying high in opinion polls.
They do not have enough votes in the Senate for the two thirds majority to impeach the president.
A drawn-out trial with graphic evidence from Monica Lewinsky could alienate the nation even more and all but destroy Republican hopes of winning the White House in 2000. Impeachment would result in Al Gore becoming president giving him almost two years to become 'presidential' before having to fight an election battle.

© Examiner Publications Ltd, 1998