Learn with your ears

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PODLESNY, Russia : The fields around this little farming enclave are among the most fertile on earth. But like tens of million of acres of land in this country, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, they literally went to;seed. A decade after capitalism transformed Russian industry, an agricultural revolution is stirring in the countryside, shaking up village life and sweeping aside the collective farms that resisted earlier reform efforts and remain the dominant form of;agriculture.
Now that may be changing. Together, they have created a land rush in rural;Russia.
The transformation is being driven by soaring global food prices (the price of wheat alone rose 77 percent last year) and a new change allowing foreigners to own agricultural land.
As a result, the business of buying and overhauling collective farms is suddenly and improbably very profitable, attracting hedge fund managers, Russian oligarchs, Swedish portfolio investors and even a descendant of White Russian émigré;nobility.
“Where else do you have such an abundance of land?” Samir Suleymanov, the World Bank's director for Russia, asked during an;interview. But the new business model rests on a belief that Russia's long, painful history of collectivization is destined to end in large, corporate factory;farms.

Earlier reformers envisioned the collective farms eventually breaking up into family farms. Some officials have hinted at the prospect of a government takeover of the farming industry reminiscent of the Soviet;era.
These investments are also a gamble in a country accustomed to government control of business. “Russia is very often perceived throughout the world as a major military power,” he said at a food summit meeting in Rome early in his tenure.
And the Russian minister of agriculture, Aleksey Gordeyev, speaks often of food in terms of national security.”
Russia occupies an unusual niche in the global food chain. “At the same time, and perhaps above and beyond anything else, Russia is a major agrarian;power.
Today, roughly 7 percent of the planet's arable land is either owned by the Russian state or by collective farms, but about a sixth of all that agricultural land - roughly 35 million hectares, or about 86. Before the Russian Revolution and the subsequent forced collectivization of farming under Stalin, it was the largest grain exporter in the;world. By comparison, all of Britain has six million hectares of cultivable;land.5 million acres - lies fallow.
Crop yields in Russia, however, are tiny.
Even excluding the slivers of land contaminated by the Chernobyl disaster or by industrial pollution, Russia also has millions of hectares of untouched, pristine land that could be used for;agriculture.85 tons a hectare - compared with 6. The average Russian grain yield is 1.04 in;Canada.04 in;Canada.
If Russia could regain its old title of leading grain exporter, it would significantly relieve strained world markets and reduce prices, Suleymanov of the World Bank said. It could also reduce malnutrition and;starvation.
What is more, a significant expansion of farming capacity could add to Russia's heft as a world power, much as its prowess in oil and natural gas aided its resurgence in recent;years.
“The great story of this land is how big it is,” said Kingsmill Bond, chief analyst at Troika Dialog, a brokerage house in Moscow. Troika is closely watching the transformation of the Russian countryside into an investment opportunity. “You can't buy anything like it anywhere else in the world,” he;said.
Analysts say the new companies dedicated to breaking up and changing collective farms hope to bring huge tracts of land into production - tracts that can take advantage of economies of;scale.
The last attempt at decollectivization, under the government of President Boris Yeltsin, failed in part because collective farms devolved into small holdings. Those who made the leap to become private farmers failed. The rest remained in the collective;farms.
Some trade and agriculture specialists say there is still a danger that a country like modern Russia, which jealously guards its natural resources, could one day renationalize farms or form a cartel that dictates to;landowners.
Clearly, that fear is not foremost in investors' minds. Land prices have roughly doubled in the past two years, according to Troika. The average price per hectare was $570 in 2006 and is now $1,000, Bond;said.
One of the first investors to see value in the Russian countryside was Michel Orloff, a former director of the Moscow office of Carlyle Group and the scion of a White Russian noble family. He said a visit to Argentina in 2004 inspired him. He saw large landowners making profits without government subsidies and envisaged a similar model for Russia that would hark back to the noble estates of his family history, only lubricated by modern;finance.

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MANILA : The authorities have taken into custody a man they contend is one of the founders of an Islamic extremist group who masterminded the bombing of a passenger ship here in 2004 that killed 116 people. It was the worst terrorist attack in Southeast Asia since the Bali bombings in;2002., who the police assert helped form the Rajah Solaiman Movement, was deported Saturday from Bahrain, where he had been detained after his arrest in;July.
Ruben Omar Pestano Lavilla Jr.S.
Officials in the Philippines said Lavilla's arrest was a major breakthrough in the U.
Aside from the bombing of the ship Superferry 14 in February 2004, Lavilla is also under investigation for his role in a series of attacks in Makati City, the financial center of the Philippines, and two other cities in the south on Feb.-supported war on terrorism;here.
Eight people were killed and more than 150 were wounded in those;attacks. 14,;2005.
It is on the terrorist list of both the U.

The Rajah Solaiman Movement, which seeks a separate Islamic state for Filipino Muslims, is composed of Christians who have converted to;Islam. government and the United;Nations.S.S.
In June, the U.”
It said the movement had received financial support from people in Saudi Arabia and from at least one Filipino financier there who channeled funds through Muslim charities in the;Philippines. Treasury Department sought to tighten the financial screws on the Rajah Solaiman Movement by designating the group and its members as “global;terrorists.
Ricardo Blancaflor, spokesman for the Philippine Anti-Terrorism Council, announced Lavilla's arrest and deportation and described the arrest as a “big boost” in Manilla's fight against;terrorism.
Filipino and Western anti-terrorism officials have linked the movement to the Abu Sayyaf group and Jemaah Islamiyah, the Southeast Asian terror network that Western and Asian intelligence agencies have tied to Al;Qaeda.
The Treasury Department said Lavilla “is believed to have taken over as RSM's political, religious and strategic leader” after the arrest in 2005 of the group's leader, Ahmed;Santos.
It was not clear how Lavilla managed to leave the country in the first place, though officials said there had obviously been “intelligence lapses” that might have allowed him to slip;away.
In addition, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the main Islamic separatist group in the southern Philippines, said Sunday that it might abandon the peace process as a result of the government's decision not to sign a peace agreement that had been initialed by both;sides.
Officials also said Saturday that four members of the Philippine Marines had been killed and 10 had been wounded in an ambush, apparently by Abu Sayyaf militants in Sulu Province, in the southern;Philippines.
“We're not only disappointed and frustrated over the government's decision to turn its back on the ancestral domain deal, we've completely lost trust and confidence in them,” Iqbal said Sunday.
“We're not only disappointed and frustrated over the government's decision to turn its back on the ancestral domain deal, we've completely lost trust and confidence in them,” Iqbal said Sunday. “The fate of the peace negotiation rests solely in the hands of the;government.”
Violence has resumed on the southern island of Mindanao as a result of the failure by both sides to sign the;agreement.
More than 300,000 people have been forced from their homes, officials said, and more than 150 rebels, soldiers and civilians have been;killed.

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AZAMGARH DISTRICT, India : When Chandra Bhan Prasad visits his ancestral village in these feudal badlands of northern India, he dispenses the following advice to his fellow untouchables: Get rid of your cattle, because the care of animals demands children's labor. Invest in your children's education instead of jewelry or land.
Prasad was born into the Pasi community, once considered untouchable on the ancient Hindu caste order. Cities are good for Dalit outcastes like us, and so is India's new;capitalism. His latest crusade is to argue that economic liberalization in India is about to do the unthinkable: Destroy the caste;system. Today, a chain-smoking, irrepressible didact, he is the rare outcaste columnist in the English-language press and a professional provocateur.
At a time of tremendous upheaval in India, Prasad is a lightning rod for one of the country's most wrenching debates: Has India's embrace of economic reforms really uplifted those who were consigned for centuries to the bottom of the social ladder? Prasad, who guesses himself to be in his late 40s because his birthday was never recorded, is an anomaly, often the lone Dalit in Delhi gatherings of high-born;intelligentsia.
The past 17 years of new capitalism have already allowed his people, Dalits, as they call themselves, to “escape hunger and humiliation,” he said, if not residual;prejudice. He says he failed in that;mission.
He has the zeal of an ideological convert: Prasad used to be a Maoist revolutionary who, by his own admission, dressed badly, carried a pistol and recruited his people to kill their upper-caste landlords. He calls government welfare programs patronizing.

Prasad is a contrarian. Affirmative action is fine, in his view, but only to advance a small slice into the middle class, who can then act as role models - like a glove able to touch a live wire, is how he puts it. He dismisses the countryside as a cesspool.
Along with India's economic policies, once grounded in socialist ideals if not always socialist in practice, Prasad has moved to the right. He calls English “the Dalit goddess,” able to liberate;Dalits. “They have a hatred for those who are happy,” he;said. He is openly and mischievously contemptuous of leftists, and delights in taunting them. They remain socially scorned in city and country, and they are over-represented among India's uneducated, malnourished and;poor.
There are about 200 million Dalits, or members of the Scheduled Castes, as they are known officially. India's leaders are under growing pressure to alleviate poverty and inequality.
The debate over caste in the New India is more than academic. Moreover, there are growing demands for caste quotas in the private;sector. Now, all kinds of groups are clamoring for what Dalits have had for 50 years - quotas in university seats, government jobs and elected office - making caste one of the country's most divisive political issues. He is conducting a qualitative survey of nearly 20,000 households here in northern state of Uttar Pradesh in an effort to measure how everyday life has changed for Dalits since economic liberalization began in 1991. He is conducting a qualitative survey of nearly 20,000 households here in northern state of Uttar Pradesh in an effort to measure how everyday life has changed for Dalits since economic liberalization began in 1991. The preliminary findings do reveal some;shifts.
The survey, financed by the University of Pennsylvania, finds that Dalits are far less likely to be engaged in their traditional caste occupations - for instance, the skinning of animals, considered ritually unclean - than they used to be, and more likely to enjoy social perks once denied;them.
In the rural district of Azamgarh, for instance, nearly all Dalit households said their bridegrooms now rode in cars to their weddings, compared with only 27 percent in 1990. In the past, Dalits would not have been allowed to ride even horses to meet their brides; that was considered an upper-caste;privilege.
Prasad credits the changes to a booming economy. “It has pulled them out of the acute poverty they were in and the day-to-day humiliation of working for a landlord,” he;said.
To prove his point, Prasad brought journalists here to his home district. In one village, Gaddopur, his theory was borne out in the tale of a gaunt, reticent man named Mahesh Kumar, who went to work in a factory 480 kilometers, or 300 miles, away so his family would no longer have to live as serfs, tending the animals of the upper;caste.
When he was a child, Dalits like him had to address their upper-caste landlords as “babu-saab,” close to “master.” Now it is acceptable to call them “uncle” or “brother,” just as people would members of their own;castes.

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NEW DELHI : At least 3,000 people, most of them Christians, are living in government-run relief camps after days of Christian-versus-Hindu violence in eastern India, government officials;said.
The government said that many people were also living in the jungle without any shelter and security because of the tensions, which erupted in violence after a Hindu leader was killed Saturday.
Christian community leaders say that at least 1,000 Christian homes have been set on fire since Monday, rendering more than 5,000 people;homeless. At least 10 people, most of them Christians, have been killed;since. Dibakar Parichha, a priest at the Roman Catholic church in Phulbani, a town in Orissa State.
Many of those living in the jungle were without food or water, said the Rev. Local officials said the figure was about;20. Father Parichha said that about 90 places of worship, including small churches and prayer halls, had been burned down. The latest conflict started Saturday night, when unidentified armed men stormed a Hindu school in Kandhamal and killed the Hindu leader Laxmanananda Saraswati and four of his;followers.
The violence has occurred in Kandhamal, a district in Orissa State that has a history of communal and ethnic clashes. But Hindus blamed Christians.

The police suspected that Maoist rebels were responsible. All nine towns in the district are under a curfew, and the police have license to shoot. In the retaliatory violence, 500 houses were burned.
“We are supposed to take drastic action against whosoever indulges in violence” said R. At least two people have been killed in violent reprisals in other districts of Orissa, including a woman who died when an orphanage was burned;down. Koche, the police chief in Kandhamal District. P. The district magistrate, Dr. The local police force has been reinforced by 2,500 paramilitary troops, he said.
On Wednesday, during his weekly address at the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI said, “I firmly condemn any attack on human life,” and said that he was “profoundly saddened” by the violence in Orissa. Krishna Kumar, said the situation was tense but under control, and that more then 200 people had been;arrested.”
To protest the violence against Christians in Orissa, more than 40,000 Christian educational institutions across India will be closed on Friday in compliance with a call by the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India and other Christian;denominations. He called the killing of Saraswati “deplorable.

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NUREK, Tajikistan : The inscription just above a tunnel at the foot of the colossal Nurek hydropower dam in south central Tajikistan is succinct: “Water Is Life.” The frigid, frothing Vakhsh River rushing under it adds a visual punctuation;mark. The mountainous state lacks the industry and natural riches that bless other former Soviet Central Asian republics.
In Tajikistan, the source of more than 40 percent of Central Asia's water, this is no mere platitude.
For this reason, President Emomali Rakhmon has pinned Tajikistan's economic hopes - and perhaps even its continued political existence - on developing its hydropower potential. Water is one of the few resources the country possesses in great;abundance. Tajik officials say that they have hopes of building more than 20 hydroelectric plants and;dams. Three projects are either under construction or being considered, including Rogun, a gargantuan structure farther up the Vakhsh River that, as it is now envisioned, will surpass Nurek in height by more than 30 meters, or 100 feet. Tajikistan is in an earthquake zone and the dams must be built to withstand major seismic shocks.
But a number of sizable hurdles must first be surmounted before the plans for a great hydropower future can be realized.
The Tajik government is also heavily in debt and must find shiploads of foreign investment to build the dams. Officials are expected to conduct environmental impact studies to determine whether any flora or fauna will be;threatened. But Tajik officials say that Rogun alone will cost up to $3. On Wednesday, China agreed to build a $300 million hydroelectric power plant, the Nurobad-2, with a capacity of 160 to 220 megawatts.

Further afield, the region's complicated water politics, where upstream and downstream countries have diametrically opposed needs and aims, threatens to boil;over.2;billion. Nurek - the world's highest dam at close toly 300 meters and a prestige project of the Soviet Union - is the difference between light and darkness, heat or no heat, for the majority of Tajikistan's seven million inhabitants, supplying close toly all the country's energy needs.
Here, water irrigates endless fields of cotton, one of the main sources of income in this primarily agricultural land.
Though for the moment it seems to be managing, Tajikistan threatens to become a failed state, say Western observers and diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity as a result of the delicacy of the issue. It also provides cheap electricity to power the Talco aluminum plant, the republic's largest industrial;enterprise. State coffers are virtually empty, while the government is viewed as unable to meet basic;needs. The country still has not fully recovered from a devastating civil war a decade ago. For Western officials working in Tajikistan, the emergency was a disturbing revelation of the government's;dysfunction.
The situation was laid bare last winter when prolonged subzero temperatures overloaded the Soviet-era electrical grid, plunging the entire country into cold and darkness. “The crisis was triggered by the winter weather, but caused by chronic;mismanagement. “The crisis was triggered by the winter weather, but caused by chronic;mismanagement.”
All Tajikistan's power troubles will be remedied by the dam projects, the Rakhmon government hopes. They will not only provide for all of Tajikistan's energy needs but also allow the country to export power to neighboring;states.
“It's a good idea - hydropower is one of the few resources that Tajikistan can exploit,” said John Morgan, an official with Usaid, the American assistance program, and a power specialist. “Power lines could go to Afghanistan and Pakistan, which are both energy-starved countries, and to the rest of Central Asia as;well.”
Rogun, for example, will generate about 13 billion kilowatt hours a year, more than 80 percent of the country's average consumption, officials at the construction site say. In the short term, Sangtuda-1, a hydropower plant that began operating last winter, will take on some of the country's electrical heavy lifting, though its introduction failed to resolve the electricity;crisis.
But outside investors are leery. While individual investors who are more accepting of risk may materialize, international donor organizations and banks have become more circumspect with;Tajikistan.
Besides the dysfunction and corruption revealed by the winter crisis, the International Monetary Fund recently announced that Tajikistan had misreported its finances six times during the last decade, an IMF record. Rakhmon has asked Tajiks to voluntarily forfeit a month's wages, or about $10 million, to finance the initial building;stage.
Water issues must also be resolved. Central Asia's disagreements over how to allocate water resources resemble the Middle East's in their complexity and potential for conflict. Downstream countries, most prominently Uzbekistan, have steadfastly opposed Tajikistan's hydroelectric plans. The two countries are engaged in an undeclared cold war, western diplomatic observers;say.

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DENGFENG, China : Midway through the grand spectacle “Zen Shaolin,” a blue-robed monk on a huge outdoor stage crowded with martial-arts performers appears to banish evil spirits rhythmically with his fists in an artistic meditation of motion and;fury.
The extravaganza, with a cast of 500, is staged after nightfall in a valley that sits before a huge mountain in central Henan Province, one of the cradles of Chinese;civilization.
The outdoor performances are part cultural event, part tourist attraction, with a dash of Hollywood and an intriguing blend of high and pop;culture.
For those who were dazzled by the opening of the Beijing Olympics last month, that ceremony had its roots in shows like this one, which with government backing and private financing are drawing huge audiences to some of China's most scenic or historic;spots.

And an artist can dare to create music with the sounds of stones being slapped, wind whistling through the brush and recordings of monks chopping at water in a tub with their;hands.
In the new China, investors and the government can team up to acquire a mountain, hire the Academy Award-winning composer Tan Dun and the internationally known dancer and choreographer Huang Dou Dou, and produce a spectacle that includes monks from the famed Shaolin;Temple.
The project's investors spent more than $15 million to build a theater set in a valley below three mountains, one rising 1,500 meters, or 4,900 feet, with temples, a wooden pagoda, a martial-arts school, an arched bridge, a stream and a small village with a stone;pathway.
“The most important achievement of this production is that I invented the first rolling-stone orchestra,” said Tan, the Chinese-born;composer.
And that has begun to happen.
One of the hopes of the producers was that “Zen Shaolin,” which opened in May 2007, would bolster tourism in a province that has 100 million residents and has largely been left behind by China's economic;boom. (The production plays most days, except during the coldest winter months. More than 300,000 visitors have seen the show in 16 months. The show employs a mixture of local people and professionals who are brought;in.) NBC came earlier this year to tape a segment that was broadcast during its Olympics coverage.
The government wants China to be seen in a new light (not as the old nation of Mao suits or a new generation of migrant factory workers), so that the country can market its rich cultural heritage and preserve some of its vanishing;traditions.
With China pushing to commercialize its art and cultural industries, state-owned companies, music and theater troupes and even military dance ensembles are being encouraged to be financially independent and to create shows that might be exported to the rest of the;world. Viewers of that spectacle saw a remarkable display of light and color; the magic that thousands of performers working in perfect symmetry can produce; and the rich symbols of China's past - the scroll, the lantern, Beijing opera, ancient Chinese drums and the wizardry of martial;arts.
Zhang Yimou, one of China's best-known film directors and the director of the Beijing opening ceremony, is one of the pioneers behind such shows; that was partly why he was chosen to oversee the Olympics extravaganza. Mei had worked with Zhang to produce “The Impression of Liu Sanjie,” an outdoor spectacular in the Guangxi region, in southwest China, and its popularity led to the creation of a series of shows produced by Zhang in other scenic spots, like Hangzhou, and Lijiang in Yunnan Province, also in the;southwest.
Mei Shuaiyuan, the producer of “Zen Shaolin,” said he was approached by government officials in Henan in 2004.”
“Dengfeng city has the oldest mountain in China, Mount Song,” Mei said.
After Henan officials asked Mei to concoct an extravaganza near the Shaolin Temple, one of the founding places of martial arts, he researched Shaolin and Zen culture in the region and was given a copy of a famous Song Dynasty (960-1279) landscape painting called “Travelers Amid Mountains and;Streams. They wanted to promote it, combining Zen and Shaolin together, to help boost;tourism. “It is the cradle of Zen in China; it has Shaolin; it has a very profound culture.
Tan said that if a scene like the one in the painting could be found in Henan, he would create music for the show.
Tan said that if a scene like the one in the painting could be found in Henan, he would create music for the show. About six months later he was taken to Mount Song, one of the oldest formations in China, dating back more than two billion;years.

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BANGKOK : Thailand's political crisis entered a more delicate and volatile phase Sunday when government supporters took to the streets as a counterforce to the anti-government protesters who have occupied the prime minister's compound for almost a;week.
A small minority of demonstrators on both sides were armed with sticks and golf clubs, heightening fears of violence between the two groups, who on Sunday were separated by only a few hundred;meters.
“If today's talking didn't work, we must use the law to take care of this problem,” said Ronrittichai Khanket, a member of Parliament from the governing;coalition.
Lawmakers began an emergency session of Parliament on Sunday but there were few signs that it would resolve the crisis engulfing the government of Prime Minister Samak;Sundaravej.

“We need a revolution,” said Amorn Amornratananont, a leader of the People's Alliance as he signed autographs on the lawn of the prime minister's compound, where thousands of protesters are camped in a carnival-like;atmosphere.
The protests against Samak's government are being led by the People's Alliance for Democracy, a group that has loose ties to the opposition in Parliament but that also harbors skepticism about the electoral system and democracy in Thailand;overall.
“For example, if there are 30 million farmers in the country, first they would have to register their profession and then they would be able to choose their representative,” Amorn said.
Amorn said he and his fellow leaders wanted to implement a “new style of elections” where voters would be represented according to their ;professions.
The People's Alliance is backed by powerful members of Thailand's elite and Amorn's comments highlight the distrust that many upper-class Thais have toward rural;voters. This would dilute the voting power of lesser-educated voters, he;said. “We're a democracy but we're not really ready for;it.
“It's too easy to manipulate poor people,” said Phloenphit Likitikul, 34, a protester who sought Amorn's autograph and who has spent the past few days in the prime minister's compound. Many in rural areas still strongly support Thaksin, who has fled to ;Britain.”
The split in Thailand between the haves and have-nots was exacerbated by the military coup two years ago that ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who championed the cause of impoverished rural voters. “One day our great prime minister will come back,” she;said.
At the pro-government demonstration on Sunday, Suchada Ruamsin, the leader of a group called Women for Democracy that is allied with the governing party, alluded to the possibility of Thaksin's return. “We got here through;elections.
“We can't be quiet anymore - we have to stand up,” she shouted.
Suchada said that since the police could not stop the anti-government demonstrators it was “time to use our hands and our;feet.”
Suchada spoke from a stage erected by pro-government supporters outside Parliament to a crowd of about 2,000 people, many of whom responded with cries of “Fight!;Fight!”
The governing coalition, which commanded widespread support in the countryside in elections in December, controls about two-thirds of the seats in;Parliament.
Monday marks the 100th day of protests by the People's Alliance against the Samak government but it was only last Tuesday that the group's members adopted more aggressive tactics.”
Nearby, Chaleuw Noiwatee, a motorcycle taxi driver, said he and a group of volunteer “guards” had a stash of sticks to defend;themselves.
Since then, tens of thousands of protestors have slept in the parking lots, on lawns and under canopies beside the elaborate government buildings, which have remained shuttered. They overcame the police units guarding the prime minister's compound, climbed over the gates and forced civil servants to;flee.
“I haven't been home in four days,” said Pongsakorn Sangnapachai, 48, the owner of a cosmetics factory, who stroked his stubble-covered ;chin.
“I haven't been home in four days,” said Pongsakorn Sangnapachai, 48, the owner of a cosmetics factory, who stroked his stubble-covered ;chin.
Pongsakorn said visitors from upcountry were thrilled at being able to walk through the compound with no security guards to stop ;them.
“We're not usually allowed to go into these places,” he said. “People from the provinces come here and take a lot of;pictures.”
The streets surrounding the compound were packed with protesters, curious Bangkok residents out for a stroll and dozens of vendors of fried chicken, noodles, T-shirts and ;souvenirs.
Pongsakorn says he will stay in the compound until the prime minister resigns. “How long? I don't;know.”
Samak, who has insisted he will not resign, met during the weekend with King Bhumibol Adulyadej to explain his;position.
The People's Alliance, which shut three airports in southern Thailand on Friday, is threatening to expand its protests if Samak does not step;down.

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BEIJING : Chinese police officers investigating a spate of attacks the previous month in the far western region of Xinjiang shot and killed six suspected rebels and arrested three, state media reported over the;weekend.
An exile group, meanwhile, accused the police of gunning down the suspects - members of the Xinjiang region's Muslim Uighur ethnic minority - after they had;surrendered. The suspects had knives and tried to resist arrest, putting up a “desperate struggle,” Xinhua;said.
Xinhua, the state-run news agency, reported that police officers had encountered nine suspects in a corn field close to the far western city of Kashgar on Friday night. The police told Xinhua that its initial investigations had linked the suspects to attacks on Aug.
A policeman and a local militia man were wounded in the fight, the report said. 27. 12 and Aug.
Dilxat Raxit, spokesman for the World Uighur Congress, a group in Germany, said that armed police officers surrounded the corn field and asked the Uighur men through a loudspeaker to surrender themselves, promising to provide them with;lawyers. The report gave no other;details.
An official of the Xinjiang government - speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media - said that six suspects had been shot and killed.

The suspects did not resist arrest and the police opened fire with submachine guns after they had surrendered, Raxit said in a statement Saturday, citing accounts by local;Uighurs.”
On Aug. But he denied that the men had been shot after surrendering and called the allegation “nonsense. The assailants escaped. 12, Xinhua reported, attackers jumped from a vehicle and stabbed civilian guards at a roadside checkpoint in Yamanya town, close to Kashgar, killing three of them.
No one has claimed responsibility for any of the attacks, though government officials have suggested that terrorism is behind the;violence. On Wednesday, it was reported that two police officers had died and seven were wounded after a clash in a village in Jiashi County, a Uighur;town.
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Critics accuse Beijing of using those claims of terrorism as an excuse to crack down on peaceful, pro-independence sentiment and expressions of Muslim Uighur;identity

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KUALA LUMPUR : Malaysia has pulled the plug on a popular news portal that often criticizes the government, bringing protests from a resurgent;opposition.
Malaysia's telecommunications regulator ordered Internet providers to block access to the Malaysia Today (www.net) Web site because it had posted comments that could incite the country's multi-racial society, a government official said ;Friday.malaysia-today.
“We do not intend to curtail people's freedom or right to express themselves.
Home Minister Syed Hamid said Malaysia Today's editor, Raja Petra Kamaruddin, had ignored warnings from the regulator to abide by the;law.
It is believed to be the first time such curbs have been used against Web site for reasons other than pornographic content. Everyone is subjected to the law, even Web sites and blogs,” the Star newspaper on Friday quoted him as;saying.

The ruling came as Anwar Ibrahim was sworn in Thursday as a member of Parliament and took his seat as the new opposition;leader. Malaysians have been flocking to the Internet for independent news as an alternative to tightly controlled mainstream;media.
The opposition derided the Web site ban as another example of power abuse by the government of Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad;Badawi.
His return after an enforced 10-year absence could reduce the government's ability to form policy and increase confrontations between the government and the;opposition.
Raja Petra said the action had come as a surprise to;him.
The action ran contrary to the government's pledge to keep cyberspace uncensored, said Lim Kit Siang, leader of the Democratic Action Party, part of Anwar's opposition;alliance. “This is the first time they officially blocked my Web;site.
“I didn't think that they would go ahead because their own charter guarantees no-censorship,” he said.
Last week, the police raided his house and seized a laptop, a scanner and some documents, the domestic media;said.”
Raja Petra has drawn a huge fan base as well as lawsuits for publishing articles and sensitive documents on his Web;site.harapanmalaysia.
The Web site was not available in Malaysia on Friday, but a message directed readers to a mirrored site (http://mt.
.com/2008/) which could be;accessed

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BEIJING : A major Buddhist monastery in Tibet reopened this week five months after being shut by the authorities during anti-government riots that rocked the region's capital, a staff member said;Friday.
The Drepung Monastery, on the outskirts of Lhasa, reopened to dozens of visitors earlier this week and has been “fairly busy” since, said a staff member who gave only his first name, Luobu.
The 15th-century monastery had been closed to the public since March 14, when protests led by monks against Chinese rule turned violent and businesses, shops and vehicles were looted and;burned. He said the monastery would hold ceremonies Saturday as part of a larger religious;festival.
Beijing banned foreign visitors and journalists from traveling to Tibet for months after the;riots.
Since then, the Chinese authorities have sent investigative teams into the monastery to determine which monks took part in the protests and to carry out purges of suspected supporters of Tibetan;independence.
Drepung was one of the three historic Buddhist monasteries in the Tibetan capital where monks commemorated the March 10 anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule.

China has said that 22 people died in the violence, but Tibetan supporters have said that many times that number were killed in the protests and the subsequent military;crackdown.
The Lhasa protests and later sympathy demonstrations that spread across a wide area of western China inhabited by Tibetans posed the most significant challenge to Chinese rule in close toly two;decades. But after several days of quiet protests, tensions exploded March 14 and the monasteries were ringed by troops and monks were not allowed to;leave.
China poured tens of thousands of troops into Tibet and surrounding provinces to quash the demonstrations.
In 1989, similar mass demonstrations in Lhasa were also cut down by military;force.
China repeatedly accused the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan religious leader, and his followers of instigating the unrest and trying to derail the games. Its harsh response brought worldwide criticism, and several world leaders even threatened to boycott the Beijing Olympics, which ended last;Sunday.
However, Beijing has continued to vilify the exiled Tibetan leader, most recently for a trip to France that ended last week. Bowing to international pressure, Beijing agreed to hold talks with the Dalai Lama's representatives two times after the;violence.”
During his trip, the Dalai Lama accused Chinese troops of firing at a crowd of Tibetans in China last week, and said people may have been killed during the;incident. An editorial by the official Xinhua News Agency excoriated him, saying, “The more surprising the lies, the easier they are to;expose.
The Dalai Lama has said that despite China's harsh crackdown on the March demonstrations, he still supports a solution of meaningful autonomy for the Tibetan people under China's rule, not;independence.
In an interview with the newspaper Le Monde, he accused Beijing of imposing a new, long-term “plan of brutal repression” and building new military camps in Tibetan;areas.
“Drepung, the largest Tibetan monastery and once home to as many as 10,000 monks, is now a re-education camp for monks involved in the March 14 uprising,” she wrote.
Catherine McLoughlin, one of the few foreign journalists allowed into Tibet after the protests, wrote for the Far Eastern Economic Review in late July that Drepung Monastery remained under heavy guard by military;police.
The Tibetan authorities said earlier this week that they would hold a forum Saturday to seek suggestions for reviving the region's tourism. As many as 1,000 monks inside are being forced to undergo “patriotic education” in which they are required to denounce the Dalai Lama and embrace Communist Party directives, she;wrote.
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