Fighting Stops as Kokang Surrender Arms to Chinese

ighting near the Sino-Burmese border came to an abrupt halt today after about 700 Kokang troops handed over their weapons to Chinese officials following days of clashes that sent thousands fleeing across the border.

Aung Kyaw Zaw, a Burmese military analyst who is close to the Kokang, told The Irrawaddy on Saturday that at least 700 soldiers from the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), an ethnic-Kokang militia, crossed the border into China today and surrendered their arms to local officials.He added that troops from the United Wa State Army (UWSA), a much larger force allied to the Kokang, have been repositioned to Wa-controlled territory.

The Irrawaddy was unable to verify this information with other independent sources.

The sudden end to 0A
The sudden end to the fighting came a day after Kokang and UWSA troops ambushed a convoy of Burmese army vehicles in Kokang territory. According to unconfirmed reports, more than a dozen Burmese soldiers were killed in the attack.

On Thursday, a 20-year ceasefire between the Burmese army and the armed ethnic groups broke down after government forces moved to occupy Kokang territory. Since then, the Burmese army has sent reinforcements into the area from Light Infantry Divisions 33 and 99.

The crisis began on Monday, when tens of thousands of refugees, including Chinese businessmen, started flooding across the border into China from Laogai, a town in Kokang territory. Cross-border trade in Laogai has since come to a standstill and trading at other border checkpoints has decreased, say sources in the area.

The rapidly deteriorating situation caused consternation in Beijing, which has long had close relations with both sides in the conflict. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Jiang Yu said China hoped the Burmese junta would deal with the situation properly and ensure stability along the border and protect Chinese citizens in Burma.

“China is following the situation closely and has expressed concern to Myanmar [Burma],” said Jiang.

Some observers said that junta head Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s decision to send troops into Kokang territory despite China’s concerns showed his determination to demonstrate that he will not be constrained by Beijing.

“The Burmese junta doesn’t care what anybody thinks, so I don’t think the generals are thinking about China’s response,” said Chan Tun, a former Burmese ambassador to China.

But while Naypyidaw showed little concern about the consequences of renewed fighting in the area, Beijing couldn’t ignore the worsening situation, as Chinese living near the border expressed outrage at the Burmese military’s actions.

“I feel upset with the Burmese government. The Kokang people have Chinese blood. And in China, many people are so angry that they are urging the Chinese government to send troops to help the Kokang,” said a Chinese journalist who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Although Beijing appears to have defused the potentially explosive situation for the time being, it remains to be seen if fighting will resume between the Burmese and the Wa, who command a much larger military force uch larger military force than the Kokang.

The current conflict stems from the refusal of ethnic ceasefire groups, including Kokang, Wa, Kachin and Shan militias, to transform themselves into border security forces under Burmese military command.

The 20,000-strong UWSA presents the greatest obstacle to Burmese ambitions to pacify the country’s borders after six decades of civil conflict. Although they were among the first ethnic groups to sign a ceasefire agreement with the current regime in 1989, they have also been the most resistant to any effort to weaken their hold over their territory.

In Rangoon, news of the clashes in the country’s north has revived memories of the insurgencies that wracked the region for decades.

“People here are talking about it at teashops. They are saying that this is the return of civil war,” said an editor of a private weekly journal in Rangoon.

Meanwhile, Burma’s main opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), called for a peaceful resolution of the ongoing conflict in northern Burma.

“We want the junta to resolve the issue in a peaceful way with ethnic groups,” NLD spokesman Han Thar Myint told The Irrawaddy on Saturday. “The cause of the conflict is the Burmese regime’s failure to resolve problems in the country politically.”

3 homes destroyed, many more threatened by Ca fire

LOS ANGELES – Authorities say a wildfire north of Los Angeles has destroyed at least three homes and is threatening thousands more.

Captain Mike Dietrich — the incident commander for the U.S. Forest Service — said at a news conference Saturday night that the fire was "the perfect storm of fuels, weather and topography coming together" and called the situation "very treacherous."

He says firefighters have discovered three burned homes in remote sections of the Angeles National Forest and are looking for more that may have been destroyed.

The fire near the mountain communities of La Canada Flintridge and Altadena had tripled in size Saturday to more than 31 square miles, sent huge billows of smoke over Los Angeles and left three people injured.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check baKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A growing wildfire sending massive billows of smoke into the sky north of Los Angeles nearly tripled in size Saturday, injuring three residents, burning a small number of homes, knocking out power to many more and prompting thousands of evacuations in a number of mountain communities.

Mandatory evacuations were extended Saturday into neighborhoods in the canyons on the northwestern edge of Altadena, Glendale, Pasadena, La Crescenta and Big Tujunga Canyon, Forest Service spokesman Bruce Quintelier said.

The flames crept lower down the slopes of the San Gabriel Mountains despite winds blowing predominantly in the other direction, in the other direction, in the other direction, threatening more than 2,000 homes in the La Canada Flintridge area.

A few homes and about 25 recreational cabins have burned but exact numbers were not immediately available, said Forest Service spokesman Gabriel Alvarez.

An evacuation center was set up at La Canada High School and Jackson Elementary School in Altadena.

The fire was the largest and most dangerous of several burning around southern and central California and in Yosemite National Park.

Flames knocked out power to at least 164 residences in La Canada Flintridge Saturday afternoon, according to Southern California Edison. Repair crews were ordered to stay out of the area because of fire danger.

More than 31 square miles of dry forest was scorched by the fire, which continued to move out in all directions, the most active flanks to the north, deeper into the forest, and east, Quintelier said. The blaze was only 5 percent contained.

At least three residents of Big Tujunga Canyon were burned and airlifted to local hospitals, Quintelier said. The details of their injuries were unknown.

Air crews waged a fierce late afternoon battle against the southeast corner of the fire, burning dangerously close to canyon homes. Spotter planes with tankers on their tails dove well below ridge lines to lay bright orange retardant then pulled up dramatically over neighborhoods, and giant sky crane helicopters swooped in to unleash showers on the biggest flareups.

The amount of smoke was hampering air operations in some areas, officials said.

"It's difficult for water-dropping aircraft to get in there, but they're still trying," Forest Service spokeswoman Jessica Luna said.

The fire was burning in steep wooded hills adjacent to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in northern Pasadena. Nearby, Dawn James, 39, a physical therapist, and friend Leah Evans, 39, watched flames roil on the mountainsides from an equestrian park where they had brought two horses from their stables. James lives in the area and her husband stayed up at the house while she watched the horses.

"We always knew it could come. We knew it was a possibility," James said.

Evans said she watched the flames spread as she spent the night in her pickup truck near her horses.

"Through the night, you kind of watch it diminish, and then flare up," said Evans. "It's just amazing to watch, kind of unbelievable."

In La Vina, a gated community of luxury homes in the Altadena area, a small group of residents stood at the end of a cul-de-sac on the lip of a canyon and watched aircraft battle flames trying to cross the ridge on the far side.

At one point, the flying circus of relatively small propellor-driven tankers gave way to the sight of a giant DC-10 jumbo jet unleashing0 a rain of red retardant.

"We see a drop, we give a big cheer," said Gary Blackwood, who works on telescope technology at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We've watched it now for two days hop one ridge at a time and now it's like we're the next ridge."

A major goal was to keep the fire from spreading up Mount Wilson, where many of the region's broadcast and communications antennas and the historic Mount Wilson Observatory are located, officials said.

A thick layer of smoke hovered over the Los Angeles Basin and San Fernando Valley, and officials issued a smoke advisory for communities near the fire. Residents were urged to avoid exertion and seek air-conditioned shelter.

A second fire in the Angeles National Forest was burning several miles to the east in a canyon above the city of Azusa. The 3.4-square-mile blaze, which started Tuesday afternoon, was 85 percent contained Saturday. No homes were threatened, and full containment was expected by Monday.

A wildfire on the Palos Verdes Peninsula on the south Los Angeles County coast was 100 percent contained Saturday afternoon, according to county fire officials. As many as 1,500 people were forced to flee at the height of the fire Thursday night. Six homes received minor exterior damage, but the only structures destroyed were an outbuilding and gazebo. No injuries were reported.

Southeast of Los Angeles in Riverside County, a 3 1/2-square-mile fire in a rural area of the San Bernardino National Forest was 10 percent contained.

Crews aided by aircraft were working to build a line around the fire, which was burning in steep, rocky terrain in Beeb Canyon, according to Forest Service spokeswoman Norma Bailey. No structures were threatened. Temperatures were expected to top 100 degrees in the region, but winds remained light.

To the north, in the state's coastal midsection, a 9.4-square-mile fire threatening Pinnacles National Monument kept 100 homes under evacuation orders near the Monterey County town of Soledad. The blaze, 60 percent contained, was started by agricultural fireworks used to scare animals away from crops. The fire destroyed one home.

In the southern part of Monterey County, firefighters had 100 percent containment of a 5 1/4-square-mile fire that had threatened 20 ranch homes.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency Friday in Los Angeles and Monterey counties.

"It's fire season, clearly," he said. "There's tremendous amount of heat all over the state."

A state of emergency was declared Saturday for Mariposa County, where a nearly 5.5-square-mile fire burned in Yosemite National Park. The blaze was 30 percent contained, park officials said. No structures were threatened.

Park officials closed a campground and a portion of Highway 120, anticipating that the fire would spread north toward Tioga Road, the highest elevation route through the Sierra. The number of firefighters was expected to double over the weekend to 1,000.

The Mariposa County Sheriff's Office ordered guests and staff at the Yosemite View Lodge, in the town of El Portal just outside the park's western gate, to evacuate Friday due to the fire.

The evacuation was broadened later Friday to include the eastern part of El Portal, with about 100 residents leaving their homes, said Brad Aborn, chairman of Mariposa's Board of Supervisors. He said the remainder of the town, an estimated 75 people, were evacuated Saturday morning.

People without lodging were offered beds in a shelter in Mariposa staffed by the Red Cross.

"I went over and visited. ... Only one spent the night," Aborn said. "They're probably staying with friends."

Police review cases for connections to kidnap case

ANTIOCH, Calif. – Police on Saturday searched the home of a California couple charged with kidnapping a little girl 18 years ago looking for evidence linking them to other open cases in the area, including the unsolved murders of prostitutes.

The investigations are "preliminary," said Jimmy Lee, a spokesman for the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department, east of San Francisco Bay. He declined to discuss what cases were being reviewed.

Police in Pittsburg are investigating whether Phillip Garrido, whose home is in nearby Antioch, is linked to several unsolved murders of prostitutes in the early 1990s. Antioch police are also looking into unsolved cases but declined further details.

About a dozen agents scoured the modest house and the acre of land it sat on Saturday afternoon as the temperature soared into triple digits.

Residents on the once-quiet street complained about the media circus that has engulfed their working class neighborhood since the arrest of Phillip and Nancy Garrido on Wednesday. Television trucks were parked on both sides of the street and about a dozen journalists paced in front of the home, which was cordoned with yellow, crime-scene tape.

Phillip and Nancy Garrido are in jail, suspected of abducting Dugard 18 years ago and subjecting her to nearly a lifetime of torment in a squalid backyard compound. They pleaded not guilty Friday to a total of 29 counts, including forcible abduction, rape and false imprisonment.

Authorities say Jaycee Lee Dugard, the little girl abducted in 1991 who is now 29, has had two daughters with Garrido.

Neighbors in Antioch had complained to law enfohad complained to law enforcement that a psychotic sex addict was in their midst, alarmed that Phillip Garrido was housing young girls in backyard tents. A deputy showed up to investigate, but never went beyond the front porch.

Probation officers showed up at the home, too, but had no inkling that his backyard was actually a labyrinth of tents, sheds and buildings that were Dugard's prison. They didn't even know he had children on the premises.

Garrido wore a GPS-linked ankle bracelet that tracked his every movement, the result of earlier sex-crime convictions in Nevada.

Outrage came as the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department acknowledged it missed an opportunity to arrest Garrido in 2006 after the neighbor's complaint about children living in the yard.

"I cannot change the course of events but we are beating ourselves up over this and continue to do so," Sheriff Warren E. Rupf said Friday.

"We should have been more inquisitive, more curious and turned over a rock or two."

Garrido gave a rambling, sometimes incoherent phone interview to KCRA-TV from the county jail Thursday, saying he didn't admit the alleged kidnapping to investigators and that he had turned his life around since the birth of his first daughter 15 years ago.

Garrido came under suspicion in the unsolved murders of several prostitutes in the 1990s, raising the prospect he was a serial killer as well. Several of the women's bodies — the exact number is not known — were dumped near an industrial park where Garrido worked during the 1990s.

Dugard, now 29, was reunited with her mother, sister and another relative Thursday. She is said to be in good health, but feeling guilty about developing a bond with Garrido, said her stepfather Carl Probyn. Her two children, 11 and 15, remain with her.

"Jaycee has strong feelings with this guy. She really feels it's almost like a marriage," said Probyn, who was there when little Jaycee was snatched from a bus stop in 1991 and has been in contact with her mother since they found out the girl was alive.

"Hi, mom, I have babies," was Dugard's first words to her mother when they were reunited Thursday, Probyn said, adding it appears she never told them she was kidnapped by their father.

She is now free thanks in large part to two quick-thinking police employees at the University of California, Berkeley. Garrido was on campus with his two daughters earlier this week saying he wanted to hold some sort of religious event.

Garrido seemed incoherent and mentally unstable, and the girls wore drab-colored dresses, were unusually subdued and had an unnaturally pale complexion, said Lisa Campbell, a special-events unit manager with UC Berkeley's police department.

Garrido's parole officer was alerted. On Wednesday, Garrido arrived at the probation officer's building with his wife, the two girls and a woman who initially identified herself as Allissa — who was in fact Dugard. Investigators said Garrido confessed to the kidnapping.

Authorities say they do not yet know whether Dugard ever tried to escape or alert anyone of her whereabouts. During her period of captivity Garrido did a stint behind bars.

After his release, Garrido met with his parole agent several times each month and was subject to routine surprise home visits and random drug and alcohol tests, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesman Gordon Hinkle said. The last unannounced visit by a team of local police agencies was conducted in July 2008.

"There was never any indication to my knowledge that there was any sign of children living there," Hinkle said.

The heavily wooded Antioch compound was arranged so that people could not view what was happening, and one of the buildings was soundproofed.

Garrido was required to register as a sex offender because he was convicted in 1977 of kidnapping a 25-year-old woman from parking lot in South Lake Tahoe, the same town Jaycee Dugard lived in when she was kidnapped.

Kennedy laid to rest at Arlington, beside brothers

WASHINGTON – Sen. Edward M. Kennedy was laid to rest Saturday night alongside slain brothers John and Robert on hallowed ground at Arlington National Cemetery, celebrated for "the dream he kept alive" across the decades since their deaths.

Crowds lined the streets of two cities on a day that marked the end of an American political era — outside Kennedy's funeral in rainy Boston where he was eulogized by President Barack Obama, and later in the day in humid, late-summer Washington.

With flags over the Capitol flying at half-staff, his hearse stopped outside the Senate where he served for 47 years. His widow, Vicki, embraced former staff members in the crowd.

Later, at a graveside enveloped in deepening darkness, Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick offered sympathies to Kennedy relatives and "an extended family that must probably include most of America."

A squad of seven riflemen fired three volleys in a traditional military funeral ritual, and a bugler sounded taps. Lightning flickered across the sky.

Hours earlier, Obama delivered the eulogy in Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Boston, packed with row upon row of mourners — including former presidents George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter.

"He was given a gift of time that his brothers were not. And he used that time to touch as many lives and right as many wrongs as the years would allow," Obama said in remarks that also gently made mention of Kennedy's "personal failings and setbacks."

As a member of the Senate, Kennedy was a "veritable force of nature," the president said. But more than that, he was the "baby of the family who became itf the family who became itf the family who became its patriarch, the restless dreamer who became its rock."

Those left behind to mourn "grieve his passing with the memories he gave, the good he did, the dream he kept alive" Obama said.

One of Kennedy's sons, Patrick, wept quietly as another, Teddy Jr., spoke from the pulpit. Teddy Jr. recalled the day years ago, shortly after losing a leg to cancer, that he slipped walking up an icy driveway as he headed out to go sledding. "I started to cry and I said, `I'll never be able to climb up that hill.'"

"And he lifted me up in his strong, gentle arms and said something I will never forget. He said, `I know you can do it. There is nothing that you can't do.'"

Kennedy's freshly excavated gravesite was on a gently sloping Virginia hillside, flanked by a pair of maple trees. His brother Robert, killed in 1968 while running for president, lies 100 feet away. It is another 100 feet to the eternal flame that has burned since 1963 for John F. Kennedy, president when he was assassinated.

The youngest brother died Tuesday at 77, more than a year after he was diagnosed with a brain tumor. An oak cross, painted white, marked the head of his grave, and a flat marble footstone bore the simple inscription, "Edward Moore Kennedy 1932-2009."

McCarrick, archbishop emeritus of Washington, read from a letter from Kennedy to Pope Benedict XVI, hand-delivered earlier this year by Obama.

"I know that I have been an imperfect human being but with the help of my faith I have tried to right my path," the dying senator wrote. He wrote the pontiff "with deep humility to ask that you pray for me as my own health declines."

The Vatican responded with a letter that said "his Holiness prays that in the days ahead you may be sustained in faith and hope."

Morning rain beat down steadily as Kennedy's coffin was borne by a military honor guard into the Catholic church, and again when it was brought back out for the flight to Washington and the military cemetery just across the Potomac River from Washington.

In life, the senator had visited the burial ground often to mourn his brothers, killed in their 40s, more than a generation ago, by assassins' bullets.

Hundreds lined nearby sidewalks, ignoring the rain, as the funeral procession passed.

"I said to myself this morning, 'No matter what the weather, I'm going, I don't care if I have to swim," said Lillian Bennett, 59, who added she was a longtime Kennedy supporter and determined to get as close as she could to the invitation-only funeral.

"The Mass of Christian burial weaves together memory and hope," said the Rev. Mark R. Hession, the Kennedy's parish priest in Cape Cod.

There was plenty of both in a two-hour service filled with references to Kennedy's political accomplishments and personal recollections of his private life. Cellist Yo-Yo Ma and tenor Placido Domingo provided musical grace notes.

Kennedy's widow, Vicki, his sole surviving sibling, Jean, and Robert Kennedy's widow, Ethel, carefully arranged the cloth funeral pall atop the coffin.

Like others, Teddy Jr., touched on his father's legacy.

"He answered Uncle Joe's call to patriotism, Uncle Jack's call to public service and Bobby's determination to seek a newer world. Unlike them, he lived to be a grandfather," he said.

Joseph Kennedy Jr. died in World War II, John F. Kennedy was the nation's 35th president when he was assassinated in 1963 and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was killed five years later as he campaigned for the presidency.

Saturday's events marked the end of four days of public and private mourning meant to emphasize Kennedy's 47 years in the Senate from Massachusetts, his standing as the foremost liberal Democrat of the late 20th century yet a legislator who courted compromise with Republicans, a family man and last heir to a dynasty that began in the years after World War II.

Thousands of mourners filed past his flag-draped coffin earlier in the week when Kennedy lay in repose at the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston. Republicans and Democrats alike recalled his political career in a bipartisan evening of laughter-filled speechmaking on Friday.

Even the church had special meaning for the family. Kennedy prayed there daily several years ago during his daughter Kara's successful battle with lung cancer.

New Mexico governor urges U.S., Cuba to improve ties

HAVANA, Cuba (CNN) -- The United States and Cuba should show some flexibility and take steps to improve relations, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Friday during a weeklong trade mission to the island nation. "There is a good atmosphere [between the two countries]," he said at a news conference in Havana on Friday. "It is the best atmosphere I've seen in many years." Richardson called for "concrete steps from both sides," but noted a "lack of flexibility in their positions" and reciprocity from the Cuban government.

He also called on the United States to "pay more attention to the Cuba issue, though acknowledged more urgent U.S. priorities like health-care reform have drawn attention away from normalizing relations.

In his first trip to Cuba in 13 years, when he negotiated the release of three political prisoners in 1996, Richardson said he is not in Cuba as a special U.S. envoy.

"My main objective is trade and to improve commercial ties with Cuba," he said, though he acknowledged plans to report recommendations to the Obama administration early next week. Watch Richardson discuss goals for Cuba trip »

Despite the near half-century trade embargo, the U.S. Treasury Department allows U.S. states to sell agricultural, medical and IT products in Cuba on a cash basis.

The governor also called on the Obama administration to ease restrictions of biotechnology products, allow Cubans to travel to the United States for academic and cultural exchanges, and implement the changes to Cuban-American travel and remittances announced in April.

He mentioned a proposal to allow diplomats in either country to move more freely and offered to broker a dialogue between the Cuban government and Cuban-Americans.

"If there's going to be a solution for the normalization of relationship between Cuba and the United States, Cuban-Americans must play a role," he said, noting that any such dialogue would not substitute government-to-government talks.

Richardson -- known for his diplomatic resume, including high-level talks with North Korea, Sudan and Iraq -- met with Cuba's National Assembly president, Ricardo Alarcon, and received a personal letter from former President Fidel Castro.

The governor also called on the Obama administration to ease restrictions of biotechnology products, allow Cubans to travel to the United States for academic and cultural exchanges, and implement the changes to Cuban-American travel and remittances announced in April.

He mentioned a proposal to allow diplomats in either country to move more freely and offered to broker a dialogue between the Cuban government and Cuban-Americans.

"If there's going to be a solution for the normalization of relationship between Cuba and the United States, Cuban-Americans must play a role," he said, noting that any such dialogue would not substitute government-to-government talks.

Richardson -- known for his diplomatic resume, including high-level talks with North Korea, Sudan and Iraq -- met with Cuba's National Assembly president, Ricardo Alarcon, and received a personal letter from former President Fidel Castro.

"It was a positive message that I got," he said of the letter.

The former presidential candidate was nominated for Commerce Secretary in the Obama administration, but withdrew amid an investigation over whether CDR Financial Products inappropriately won $1.4 million in state work for New Mexico.

A sister’s special tie with her youngest brother

By Brian C. Mooney In a life lived mostly out of the spotlight, Jean Kennedy Smith had a close bond with the brother she buried yesterday in Arlington National Cemetery.

Now 81, Kennedy Smith is the last living child of Joseph and Rose Kennedy, the final link to an extraordinary constellation of siblings who left an indelible mark on postwar America. Since Edward M. Kennedy’s death Tuesday, Kennedy Smith, along with the senator’s wife, Victoria Reggie Kennedy, has led the extended Kennedy family in mourning.

“Jean, I know you lost your soul mate,’’ Kennedy’s niece, Caroline, told her at Friday night’s memorial service at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. “All your nieces and nephews are here to help you as best we can.’’

Kennedy Smith was the eighth of nine children; Edward Kennedy was the youngest, born four years later. She introduced him to his first wife, Joan, and, when she was 65, her brother prevailed on President Clinton to name Kennedy Smith ambassador to Ireland.

When their sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver died two weeks before the senator, Kennedy Smith stayed with her brother, whose failing health prevented him from attending the funeral.

“Jean always had a special relationship with Teddy,’’ their mother wrote in her 1974 memoir, “Times to Remember.’’

“They were a pair; they trotted around together; she sometimes admonished him and sometimes scrapped with him but mainly was his valiant friend and big sister,’’ she wrote.��’ she wrote. “She still is, though he is now nearly twice as big as she is.’’

Kennedy Smith worked on the campaigns of her brothers John, Robert, and Edward, and she accompanied President Kennedy on his famous visit to Ireland in 1963, five months before his assassination.

She is best known for her service as ambassador to Ireland, from 1993 to 1998, when she played a significant and controversial role in advancing the cause of peace in Northern Ireland. In 1994, over the objections of the British and members of her own staff, Kennedy Smith strongly urged the State Department to allow a US visit by Gerry Adams, the leader of Sinn Fein, the political arm of the Irish Republican Army. The IRA later declared a cease-fire, and the visa is viewed as a factor in that decision.

Two years later, however, Kennedy Smith was reprimanded by the secretary of state of the time, Warren Christopher, for retaliating against a pair of subordinates who had objected to granting Adams a visa.

She also raised diplomatic eyebrows by taking Communion in an Anglican church in support of the Irish president, Mary McAleese, who was being criticized for doing the same in an effort to promote religious tolerance.

“There’s no ambiguity about the Kennedys in Ireland, so doors opened for her,’’ said Maurice Mannin�� said Maurice Manning, who was leader of the Seanad, Ireland’s senate, at the time. “She was a very unorthodox ambassador, at times annoying people in government because she had her own agenda, which was essentially to bring Gerry Adams and company in from the cold. She was hugely successful and hugely influential in doing that.’’ Manning, who is now chancellor of the National University of Ireland, said, “There’s a quietness and charm but also a toughness and single-mindedness to Kennedy Smith.’’ She was also, Manning said, “very socially gregarious and gave the best parties of any ambassadors anywhere. People fought to get into her place’’ at Dublin’s Phoenix Park.

As Kennedy Smith prepared to return to the United States, McAleese bestowed on her honorary citizenship in the country that her great-grandfather, Patrick Kennedy, had left 150 years earlier.

Like her mother, Kennedy Smith was educated at schools run by the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. These included convent schools in the United States and England and her mother’s alma mater, Manhattanville College in Purchase, N.Y. At Manhattanville, her roommate was Ethel Skakel, whom she introduced to her older brother, Robert. Later, she introduced a younger Manhattanville student, Joan Bennett, to brother Ted, and they were engaged not long after.

Kennedy Smith married Stephen E. Smith, who grew up in Brooklyn in a wealthy family that made a fortune in the tugboat and barge business in New York. Smith, who died of cancer in 1990, was a major behind-the-scenes figure in the Kennedy family, managing political campaigns, the family finances, and the effort to build the Kennedy Library. The couple lived in Washington and New York’s Upper East Side and raised two biological sons and two adopted daughters.

Their second oldest, William Kennedy Smith, a physician whose practice focuses on victims of landmines, was acquitted in 1991 of charges he raped a woman in Palm Beach, Fla., after a night of drinking with his uncle Ted and cousin Patrick Kennedy.

While her sister Eunice won acclaim for establishing and promoting the Special Olympics, which has changed perceptions of the mentally challenged, Kennedy Smith in 1974 established VSA Arts, which promotes learning and education through the arts for people with disabilities in more than 50 countries. In 1993, she co-wrote with George Plympton “Chronicles of Courage: Very Special Artists.’’

Besides VSA, she has promoted and raised funds for causes and philanthropies ranging from international peace to Irish immigration.

Tally in Afghanistan Shows Karzai Lead Widening

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — President Hamid Karzai widened his lead in Afghan elections as new vote tallies were released Saturday, inching closer to the 50 percent threshold of votes he needs to avoid a runoff.With ballots counted from about a third of the country’s polling stations, election authorities said Mr. Karzai had 46.2 percent and his top challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, had 31.4 percent.

The country’s Independent Election Commission has been slow in releasing partial results from the Aug. 20 presidential vote, while accusations of fraud have mounted. The United Nations-backed Electoral Complaints Commission has said the number of complaints that could “materially affect” the outcome had soared to 270.

Videos of possible fraud have been posted on the Internet, and Mr. Abdullah and other challengers have made complaints about cheating.

The accusations, along with low turnout in the south because of Taliban threats of violence, could strip the vote of legitimacy in Afghan eyes. Final results are to come in late September.

The lengthy election process has added to strains in relations between the United States and Afghanistan, which had already cooled since the Obama administration took office.

Meanwhile, Britain’s prime minister, Gordon Brown, paid a surprise visit Saturday to British troops in southern Afghanistan, promising more help to cope with the Taliban insurgents who have inflicted casualties on the embattled force and undercut support in Britain for the war.

Mr. Brown, speaking at the British base in Lashkar Gah, pledged to provide more equipment to help overcome roadside bombs, a major threat to NATO forces.

A British marine was killed by a bomb in Helmand on Saturday, the Defense Ministry said in London. And, Reuters reported, an American serviceman was killed by a roadside bomb in the east, NATO-led forces said in a statement that gave no further details.

Last week, British troops cleared 337 roadside bombs from some of the most dangerous roads in Helmand Province, a main focus in the recent fighting.

“Let me pay tribute to the courage, bravery, professionalism and patriotism of our forces,” Mr. Brown told the troops. “This has been a most difficult summer in Afghanistan, because the Taliban have tried to prevent elections taking place.”

He added, “I think our forces have shown extraordinary courage during this period.”

Mr. Brown also called for speeding up the elled for speeding up the effort to train about 50,000 additional Afghan troops, which would bring the overall level trained to around 135,000.

The prime minister arrived with Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, chief of the British defense staff, and met with senior commanders including the top United States officer, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal.

More than 200 British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since the war began in 2001 — more than Britain lost in the Iraq conflict. Many in Britain believe the mission is too open-ended, and its goals too vague.

Mr. Brown’s visit came a day after Britain replaced its top army official, Gen. David Richards, a former commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan. He succeeded Gen. Sir Richard Dannatt, who was appointed in 2006 and frequently clashed with lawmakers over defense spending, particularly relating to delays in providing helicopters.

General Richards, regarded as politically savvy, was able to build close relationships with Mr. Karzai and his ministers while leading NATO troops.

British officials said that they recognized the need for better-armored vehicles and more helicopters and that they would get them here as soon as possible.

As NATO commander, General Richards was a prominent backer of a controversial peace plan in the southern Afghan town of Musa Qala under which NATO, Afghan and Taliban soldiers were not allowed in the town.

The deal collapsed when Taliban fighters overran the area, though foreign and Afghan troops later waged a fierce battle to recapture Musa Qala.

Bush shoe thrower to be freed

An Iraqi journalist jailed after hurling his shoes at George Bush, the former US president, will be released in September.

Muntadhar al-Zaidi's sentence was reduced for good behaviour, his lawyer said on Saturday.

Karim al-Shujairi, a defence attorney, said al-Zeidi will now be released on September 14, three months early.

Al-Zaidi was initially sentenced to three years after pleading not guilty to assaulting a foreign leader, then the court reduced it to one year because the journalist had no prior criminal history.

The act of the 30-year-old reporter during Bush's last visit to Iraq as president turned him into a folk hero across the Arab world amid anger over the 2003 invasion.

The incident, which took place on December 14, embarrassed Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, who was standing next to Bush at the time during a joint news conference.

Neither leader was injured, but Bush was forced to duck for cover as the journalist shouted in Arabic: "This is your farewell kiss, you dog! This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq."

Yemen rebels 'seize army hardware'

Shia fighters in Yemen's north have released pictures of military equipment that they say they seized from government forces.

The images came as the UN on Saturday called for the creation of safe corridors to let people out of Saada city, now practically cut off from the outside world by nearly three weeks of fighting between government forces and the fighters.

Antonio Guterres, the UN high commissioner for refugees, said humanitarian corridors could allow the delivery of much-needed aid to thousands of displaced people in the Saada region.

The UNHCR estimates that about 35,000 people have been displaced by the fighting between the army and the Shia fighters, also known as Houthis after their leader.

Speaking in Geneva, Andrej Mahecic, a UNHCR spokesman, said that Saada, in Yemen's north, had been "practically cut off from the rest of the world".

"The residents, as well as those displaced in Saada city, are unable to leave," Mahecic said, according to a statement on the organisation's website.

There are no reliable reports of casualty figures.

'Operation Scorched Earth'

Some reports said that the Houthis had stopped government troops from advancing in several areas, including Malaheez, and Sufyan district in neighbouring Imran province.The Houthis also claimed to have captured an undetermined number of soldiers, destroying two tanks in an attack on an army point in Maqash, near Saada city.

But a military spokesman claimed that the army killed several fighters in the same clash. The government insists that it has inflicted heavy casualties on the fighters, who are from the Zaidi sect of Shia Islam.

Telehia Islam.

Television footage showed warplanes striking targets in the mountains around Saada and salvos of rockets being fired by a line of launchers.

The Houthis have accused the government of targeting civilians in its attacks.

They have also alleged neighbouring Sunni Saudi Arabia has been sending warplanes to aid Yemeni troops, during the course of the 18-day conflict, which the government has dubbed "Operation Scorched Earth".

That claim has been ridiculed by the Yemeni government which accuses Shia Iran of backing the Houthis.

The government had offered a six-point plan to end the fighting but the rebels dismissed the offer, recalling that a Qatari-brokered peace deal reached in June 2007 had never been implemented.

Japan votes in parliamentary poll

Voting has begun across Japan in parliamentary elections which are widely predicted to sweep the opposition into power.

Opinion polls indicate that the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), led by Yukio Hatoyama, will put an end to more than 50 years of almost continuous rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) of Taro Aso, the prime minister.

Voting booths opened at 7am local time (22:00 GMT on Saturday) and close at 8pm (11:00 GMT on Sunday), with exit polls expected shortly afterwards.

About 103 million Japanese are eligible to vote, with turnout expected to be high.

In advertisements published in major newspapers on Sunday, the DPJ confidently predicted: "Today, a government change."

"A courageous decision by the people will open the door for a historic and major event," it said in a separate statement. "Please join in this big task to change Japan and protect the people's lives."

The LDP has ruled for all but 10 months since it was founded in 1955, but the DPJ already controls the less powerful upper house of parliament following elections in 2007.

'Hope tomorrow'

In its own advertisements, the LDP urged voters: "Don't destroy Japan".

"Hope tomorrow can only come from stability today," it said.

Al Jazeera's Steve Chao, reporting from Tokyo, said that last-minute surveys indicated that the opposition was still on its way to a landslide victory.

"There is still a great deal of dissatisfaction among the public with the ruling government and its ability to govern the country."The economy is in the worst state since the second world war, unemployment is at 5.7 per cent, which means that three and a half million people are unemployed.

"The opposition has been [conducting] on an Obama-style campaign, promising massive changes, to take on the heavy bureaucracy created by the ruling government that is largely blamed for the problems of the country."

Surveys in major newspapers, including the Mainichi and the Asahi, said that the DPJ was likely to win more than 320 seats in the 480-member lower house of parliament.

Hatoyama travelled to the city of Sakai in western Japan on Saturday - the final day of campaigning - where he repeated his call for voters to support change.

"This is an election to choose whether voters can muster the courage to do away with the old politics," he said.

Cash handouts

Under a mantra of "Putting People's Lives First", the DPJ has offered a platform heavy on social-welfare initiatives, including cash handouts for job seekers in training and families with children.

Our correspondent said that Aso had also come out strongly on Saturday, making a his last-minute appeal to urge voters "to reconsider and to question whether they could trust the opposition to run the government at a time of economic crisis.

"He has also stressed that he needs more time to implement the massive economic reforms to deal with the global financial crisis.

"Japan is the world's second largest economy and that's why it matters a lot, not only to the voters down here but to the rest of the world because what happen world because what happens in Japan is often a bellwether for the health of the world’s financial status."