Russian news agencies all reported that the hostages were the two missing Britons Camilla Carr, 40, and Jon James, 37.The failed mission came only a day after Aslan Maskhadov, the President of the chaotic Caucasus republic, returned home after a four-day trip to Britain in which he met Foreign Office officials to discuss the fate of the two aid workers. The operation, launched in the early hours yesterday by Chechen special services, was called off after the hostage- takers threatened to kill the Britons, sources told the Interfax news agency. By then, one commando and one of the kidnappers had died in a burst of fighting, and several others were injured.
The Foreign Office insisted that there was no evidence that the Britons were the subject of the rescue mission. A senior Chechen official said that the nationality of the hostages was unknown. He was well known for the song “My life is just one cigarette that I don’t like, but drag away at”
– AP, Kavala. THE horror of captivity was set to continue for two British hostages in Chechnya after a team of commandos ran into fighting on its way to rescue them, according to Russian news reports last night. But to attain power, to win over the Muslim vote, for example, it has had to abandon almost everything that made it distinctive.
What remains is an obligation to reward big- business supporters, by offering protection against foreign competition, and its support among small businesses by getting bureaucracy off their backs. The government will also talk tough with Pakistan on Kashmir.. ONE of Greece’s best-known folk musicians went on trial accused of murdering his daughter’s married boyfriend. Akis Panou, 64, fired into the face of Sotiris Yalamas, 29, in August in the village of Lefki.
Yalamas died instantly in front of Panou and his daughter, pregnant with Yalamas’s child Mr Panou said his daughter’s relationship shamed the family. The party’s controversial “re-evaluation” of India’s nuclear policy is likely to be long drawn out.The BJP’s long-term dilemma is that it rose to prominence as the party with a panacea for Hindu grievances. It will govern with the support of 21 allied partners and independents, all of whom will need to be appeased and humoured for the government to stay afloat.Jayalalitha, the South Indian populist leader with an uncanny resemblance to Queen Victoria, who gave the BJP palpitations over the weekend when she failed to send her promised letter of support, is a sign of trouble ahead. Observers will not be surprised if the government falls within months.Mr Vajpayee and his colleagues have already had to put off implementing central BJP ideas, such as building a giant Hindu temple in Ayodhya on the site of the mosque destroyed by a mob in 1992, and the enactment of a uniform civil code, eliminating the discretionary treatment of religious minorities in areas such as marriage and divorce.
The momentum of economic reform, started six years ago, has almost ground to a halt. Economic growth is expected to slow from 7.5 per cent last year to around 5 per cent.But although stability was the BJP’s campaign promise, it is unlikely to provide it. This followed her election to the party’s presidency on Saturday, when her elderly predecessor, Sitaram Kesri, was ejected in a palace coup Mrs Gandhi is thus confirmed as Congress’s absolute leader. Should Mr Vajpayee stumble and fall, she is now the official alternative.After three prime ministers in less than two years – Mr Vajpayee having been one of them, for less than a fortnight – India is in dire need of stable government.
President Narayanan has asked Mr Vajpayee to prove his parliamentary majority within 10 days.
While the BJP celebrated, its deadly rival, the Congress party, took a giant step into the unknown when it elected Sonia Gandhi to the chairmanship of its parliamentary party. “When people negotiate,” the official argued, “both sides have to meet each other half way. If the Europeans come with set ideas of what the outcome should be, the Palestinians cannot ask for less.”In London, a spokesman for Tony Blair said the Prime Minister stood behind Mr Cook’s decision to visit the disputed area.Following talks in Jordan this morning, Mr Cook will fly to meetings with Mr Arafat in Gaza, with Palestinian officials in East Jerusalem, and Mr Netanyahu on the Israeli side of town. He will discuss the Lebanese issue with the Israeli Defence Minister, Yitzhak Mordechai, before continuing to Damascus and Beirut.. THE HINDU nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) yesterday celebrated its victory in India’s general election with sweetmeats, garlands, drums and serpentine trumpets.