World briefs 11/22/02

N. Korea: Agreement with U.S. has collapsed

SEOUL, South Korea -- North Korea said Thursday that a 1994 nuclear agreement with the United States collapsed because of the U.S.-led decision to suspend fuel oil deliveries to the country.

But in a vaguely worded statement, North Korea's Foreign Ministry appeared to leave open the possibility that the deal might be salvaged. It said an earlier appeal for a nonaggression pact with the United States was aimed at preventing the nuclear agreement from being "derailed at any cost."

It said such a pact was the only "realistic solution to the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula" and did not say it had any plans to restart a suspected nuclear weapons program that was frozen under the 1994 deal.

Last week, the United States and its allies, South Korea, Japan and the European Union, suspended deliveries of fuel oil to the energy-starved North to punish it for violating the 1994 pact by embarking on a second nuclear weapons program.

Blix to brief Security Council on Iraq Monday

UNITED NATIONS -- Chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix will brief the Security Council on Monday about his talks in Baghdad with Iraqi officials and the impending resumption of inspections, a U.N. spokesman said Thursday.

The council is also expected to extend the U.N. humanitarian program in Iraq for another six months on Monday, diplomats said.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Blix's briefing would take place at a closed council meeting Monday afternoon.

"We are all very much concerned with what's happening there," said China's U.N. Ambassador Wang Yingfan, the current council president.

American missionary killed in south Lebanon

SIDON, Lebanon -- A gunman shot an American missionary Thursday at the clinic in what was believed to be the first targeted killing of a U.S. citizen in Lebanon in more than a decade.

Bonnie Penner, 31, was slain at the Unity Center, which houses a Christian chapel and the clinic where Penner worked as a nurse.

Investigators said they believe the gunman knocked at the door of the clinic shortly after the center opened and shot Penner in the head with a 7mm pistol. A colleague found her dead, police said.

The clinic provides medical care and help to locals and Palestinian refugees in a nearby camp in southern Lebanon.

AIDS leading death cause among S. African women

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- AIDS is the leading killer of women in South Africa and is claiming increasing numbers of lives every year, according to a government study released Thursday.

AIDS-related illnesses were responsible for 9.8 percent of female deaths in South Africa in 2001, up from 5.6 percent in 1997, the survey by Statistics South Africa showed.

The percentage of AIDS-related deaths among all South Africans rose to 8.7 percent in 2001 from 4.6 percent in 1997, the report said.

Pakistani president's ally wins prime minister post

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- President Pervez Musharraf's candidate was elected prime minister Thursday, easily defeating a pro-Taliban candidate in a signal Pakistan will keep supporting the U.S.-led war against terrorism.

Parliament's election of Zafarullah Khan Jamali to lead the first civilian government since Musharraf's bloodless 1999 coup relegated a coalition of hardline Islamic parties to opposition benches, where they likely will be fierce critics of the pro-U.S. stance.

Jamali, 58, said that Pakistan will continue supporting the fight against terror.

-- From wire reports