Turkish court jails 122 zealots

ANKARA: The state security court in Ankara handed down prison terms of between 20 months and four years against 122 members of a fundamentalist sect for membership in an banned organisation and activities meant to topple constitutional order, the semi-official Anadolu news agency reported.

Six members of the Aczmendi sect were jailed yesterday for four years, 113 received three-year prison terms and three others were sentenced to 20 months in prison each. The defendants had also been charged with defaming the founder of the Turkish Republic, Kemal Ataturk. One person was acquitted.

Pillion riding

ISLAMABAD: Authorities banned pillion riding in Pakistan's largest province Punjab today as gunmen riding motorcycles shot dead seven persons in continuing sectarian violence.

More than 60 people have been killed this year in revenge attacks by the militant elements among the Sunni and Shiite Muslim groups in the province.

LTTE men killed

COLOMBO: Security forces killed eight Tamil rebels in two separate incidents in Sri Lanka's northern and eastern parts while an Army captain was killed by the rebels in Jaffna, sources said. At least seven militants of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam were killed yesterday in an encounter with the Army at Morawewa in eastern Tricomalee. Army sources, quoting LTTE transmissions, said 10 tigers were also injured seriously in the incident.

Albania blast

TIRANA: An explosion ripped through an underground Albanian military weapons store outside Tirana today, killing at least 22 people in what police said was probably a looting that went wrong.

The Albanian news agency ATA said the death toll from the explosion close to the town of Burrel, 95 km northeast of Tirana, could rise as many witnesses reported that their relatives had been in the tunnels at the time.

Narrow escape

NEW YORK: All the passengers onboard an American airliner had a miraculous escape after the plane carried one pound block of plastic explosives by mistake on its way to Dallas. The explosives were left inadvertently onboard the plane which took off from San Juan yesterday by security staff training bomb sniffing dogs. Authorities said there was no danger either to plane or passengers as the explosives lacked a detonator and could not explode.

China mishap

BEIJING: Rescue and relief operations were today on at the train accident site in central China where at least 58 people were killed yesterday and the toll was likely to exceed as the rescuers were still clawing through the wreckage. The State-run Xinhua news agency, which had initially put the number of dead at 90 and that of injured over 300, today lowered the death toll to 58 and did not specify the number of injured. However, officials expect the toll to exceed 100 as rescuers were combing the wreckage of the mangled carriages which could not be reached earlier.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.