World briefs 9/10/02

Nepal army fights rebels blamed for killing 57

KATMANDU, Nepal -- Royal Nepalese Army soldiers launched a counterattack Monday after Maoist guerrillas killed at least 57 soldiers and policemen in a mountainous area overnight, a government minister said.

Devendra Raj Kadel, the junior interior minister, said the army was fighting near Sandhikhara, about 190 miles west of Katmandu, where rebels killed 40 police and 17 soldiers hours earlier in their deadliest assault since the government lifted a state of emergency two weeks ago.

Reports from the scene of the latest attack said the rebels struck government offices in Sandhikhara around midnight Sunday as part of their increasingly bloody campaign to topple Nepal's constitutional monarchy.

Sandhikhara has an army base with 64 soldiers and two police stations with 160 policemen stationed there, officials say.

Austrian chancellor calls for new elections

VIENNA, Austria -- Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel called Monday for early elections to end a government crisis triggered by the resignation of four key leaders of the rightist Freedom Party, the junior partner in his coalition.

Schuessel told a news conference said he would propose holding elections "at the earliest possible date," saying Austria "needs a stable government."

Government officials said elections could be held in November. The next elections had been scheduled for September 2003.

Vice Chancellor Susanne Riess-Passer, Finance Minister Karl-Heinz Grasser and the party's parliamentary speaker, Peter Westenthaler, stepped down on Sunday. Transport Minister Mathias Reichhold followed them Monday.

Mother who left children gets eight-year sentence

CALGARY, Alberta -- A woman who left her two young children to starve in an empty apartment while she partied with her boyfriend was sentenced Monday to eight years in prison.

Rie Fujii, 24, pleaded guilty to manslaughter earlier this year. A Japanese citizen living illegally in Canada, Fujii was expected to be deported after serving her time.

Justice Peter Martin said Fujii was depressed and suffered from a personality disorder, enabling her to deceive herself that the children could manage without her. But he said that she was aware that leaving her children was dooming them to death.

According to evidence in the case, Fujii left 15-month-old Domenic Brown and his 3-month-old sister Gemini alone for 10 days beginning at the end of May 2001 while she left town with a boyfriend.

South Korea nominates new prime ministerSEOUL, South Korea -- President Kim Dae-jung nominated a former justice minister for prime minister Tuesday as part of efforts to revamp his battered South Korean government before December presidential elections.

Kim Suk-soo, 50, was the third nomination in just over a month and must be approved by the opposition-controlled National Assembly.

The parliament had rejected Kim's two earlier nominees for ethical and other problems.

South Korea has had no prime minister since July when then-Prime Minister Lee Han-dong was removed in a Cabinet shake-up.

Military deploys more troops to fight guerrillas

ZAMBOANGA, Philippines -- About 1,000 more troops will be deployed to battle al-Qaida linked rebels on a southern Philippine island where at least 22 soldiers and guerrillas died in a clash last week, officials said Monday.

The offensive aimed at wiping out an Abu Sayyaf rebel group on Sulu Island was focused on a jungle region near the coastal town of Patikul, said Southern Philippine military forces chief Lt. Gen. Ernesto Carolina.

Abu Sayyaf rebels have been loosely linked to Osama bin-Laden's al-Qaida terror network. The main Abu Sayyaf faction in nearby Basilan island was decimated in a months-long offensive that ended recently.-- From wire reports