World News Briefs

February 4, 1996
Web posted at: 9:05 p.m EST (0205 GMT)

Tajikistan resignation may avert civil war

Dushanbe, Tajikistan (CNN) -- The senior deputy prime minister of Tajikistan agreed Sunday to leave his post, to avert civil war in the mountainous central Asian state.

First Deputy Prime Minister Makhmadsayid Ubaidullayev was bowing to demands by renegade warlords. The standoff between President Imomali Rakhmonov and the two warlords erupted a week ago when they took over two towns and demanded the dismissal of key ministers in a government they accused of being corrupt and incompetent.

The dispute centered on the spoils of victory, which the two renegades said had been monopolized by Rakhmonov's southern Kulyabi clan. Both renegades are from the ethnic Uzbek community in Tajikistan, which gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. The country borders Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and China.

Rakhmonov and the parliament also accepted two other resignations , conditional on the warlords disarming their troops by Feb. 7.

Lawyer of executed activist
says Nigerian police accosted him

LAGOS, Nigeria (CNN) -- The lawyer for executed human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa said Sunday that Nigerian police had seized his passport and told him to report to their office Monday.

Olisa Agbakoba returned to Nigeria Saturday night from a two-week tour of Europe and Canada. He told the Toronto Metropolitan Council that Canada should impose an embargo on Nigeria crude oil exports.

Agabakoba, himself a human rights activist, said he went to Europe and Canada to speak to officials in foreign ministries about the human rights situation in Nigeria.

He said that when he arrived at the Nigerian airport, he was questioned for about two hours by Nigerian security police; they then took his passport.

Rebels fire on Kabul, killing two

KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Rebels killed two people and wounded at least eight Saturday night and Sunday when they fired rockets at the Presidential Palace and a residential area.

Two artillery rounds landed inside the compound of the presidential palace that houses the defense ministry.

The government usually blames such attacks on the rebel Taleban militia. The Taleban have vowed to oust President Burhanuddin Rabbani and install strict Islamic rule throughout Afghanistan.

The fighters, entrenched in hills to the south and west, have been besieging Kabul since October.

Former Albanian president arrested

TIRANA, Albania (CNN) -- Albania's former president Ramiz Alia has been arrested again -- this time on charges he deported political opponents to labor camps and had people killed for attempting to flee the country.

Alia had been convicted in May 1994 of violating citizens' rights and sentenced to nine years in prison. But he was freed last July.

The new accusations against Alia surfaced a few months later. The deportation charge dates to a time when Alia was speaker of parliament.

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Reuters news service contributed to this report.