Iraqi foreign minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf responded that UN officials "keep insisting on the same `nonstarter' approach of casting doubts, building their understanding on assumptions, suspicions, and not on facts and figures."

Chief "inspector" Richard Butler will travel to Iraq June 13-14 to dictate further measures that Baghdad must accept before the sanctions are removed. Richardson reiterated Washington's policy that Iraq should be "contained." An armada of 20,000 U.S. troops, 15 warships, and an aircraft carrier remains in the Arab-Persian Gulf.

Aeroméxico strikers win
One thousand flight attendants at Aeroméxico won a contract after striking in early June, despite government intervention. The 1,000 flight attendants were demanding the hiring of more workers, wage improvements, and pensions, which 97 percent of the workers did not have. Pleading poverty, Aeroméxico officials broke off negotiations, refusing to discuss these demands.

The Mexican government took over the airline June 1 and threatened to deploy soldiers to replace the flight attendants on the company's 300 daily flights. Some workers went ahead with the walkout, while most others went wore pins explaining they were working under protest. On June 6 the employer gave in. The workers, whose union is affiliated to the National Workers Union federation, won a retirement plan and an 18 percent wage increase. It was the first nationwide strike by one of the unions belonging to the new labor federation, founded last year.

U.S. gov't steps up military `antidrug' operation in Colombia
The Clinton administration currently spends about $100 million dollars a year in Colombia ostensibly to fight drug traffickers. But under this cover Washington is stepping up its military intervention against the guerrilla movement in that country. U.S. generals have launched an effort to reorganize the Colombian army. Unnamed senior U.S. officials admitted to the New York Times that Washington is providing military training, sophisticated helicopters and other equipment, and is creating an intelligence center run by U.S. officials in Colombia.

U.S. intervention occurs at a time of labor skirmishes in Colombia. Oil workers in Barrancabermeja, for example, went on strike May 18.

Moscow tries to collect taxes
Trying to reassure International Monetary Fund (IMF) officials, Russian president Boris Yeltsin appointed Boris Fyodorov to head Russia's tax collection service. The IMF has suspended installments of its $9.2 billion loan package to Russia three times in the past two years over the demand that Moscow increase tax collection. Fyodorov, former finance minister and World Bank representative for Moscow, has pushed for "market reforms" for the past half decade, cutting government subsidies to industries, and other measures.

His first week, Fyodorov fired top tax collectors and announced plans to investigate 1,000 wealthy celebrities. Fyodorov advocates jailing those who refuse to pay taxes and is looking to implement a tax code. Big-business commentators complain that most Russians today don't have a "tax culture" and simply refuse to pay taxes.

U.S. gov't, EU conflict over trade
Washington has threatened to retaliate against a European Union move to subsidize barley exports to the United States by providing subsidies on U.S. barley exports to Algeria, Cyprus, and Norway. U.S. agriculture secretary Dan Glickman insisted the move was made not to start "any kind of global trade war" but to "indicate the U.S. will respond to the use of inappropriate subsidies."

European Union farm commissioner Franz Fischler defended the EU subsidy saying U.S. barley is priced too high. U.S. secretary of state Madeleine Albright sent a letter to European Commission president Jacques Santer warning that Washington would respond in an "appropriate" fashion.

Botha claims apartheid `bad apples' killed black S. Africans
Former president P.W. Botha, in a contempt trial organized by the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, claimed a few "bad apples" were responsible for the killings of thousands of black activists under the apartheid state. Botha is on trial for refusing to appear before the commission charged with investigating some of the brutal acts that took place under apartheid. "No, no. We cannot say that these are bad apples," retorted Truth Commission Chairperson Desmond Tutu. "They are people who were sitting on the State Security Council." A former national police commissioner and Eugene de Kock, commander of a notorious police death squad, testified to receiving orders to "eliminate" and "neutralize" antiapartheid activists. Botha, who claims no direct knowledge of the killings, said those commands were meant to merely arrest the activists.

Dock workers in S. Africa strike
South African shipping bosses have been hit by a strike of 3,700 dock workers that began in late May. The Technical Workers' Union, Salstaff, and the Employees' Union of South Africa are demanding that Portnet maintain monthly bonus payments of about $100. The company offered a profit-sharing scheme, which unionists rejected. Ports in Durban, Saldanha, Richards Bay, Port Elizabeth, East London, and Cape Town have been affected. The strike's impact is greater because Portnet was just recovering from a weather-related two-week shutdown. Slowdowns had been in effect since early April.

While Portnet bosses claim "all ports are operating normally" with no customer complaints, Unicorn Liner executive Liam McKenzie reported docking delays of up to 150 hours. Productivity at Durban harbor fell about 50 percent, and dozens of ships were waiting to be unloaded outside Cape Town harbor.

900,000 more thrown off welfare
U.S. president William Clinton, at a White House gathering to celebrate the one-year anniversary of his "Welfare to Work Partnership," boasted his administration threw 900,000 people off public assistance since last September. Some 3.3 million people have been axed from the welfare rolls since Clinton, with bipartisan backing, signed the "welfare reform" law in August 1996. In 1997, according to the U.S. president's figures, only 135,000 former welfare recipients were hired under his $3 billion "Partnership" program and only 94,500 of them had full-time jobs with health benefits.

- BRIAN TAYLOR  
 
 
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