Draft statement condemns N. Korea

April 12, 2009

A draft UN Security Council statement condemns North Korea's long-range rocket launch and says it contravened a previous council resolution banning ballistic missile and nuclear tests by Pyongyang. The draft statement, which the five permanent members of the Security Council and Japan agreed to and circulated to the other nine council members, also called on the UN sanctions committee to take steps to enforce existing sanctions against North Korea. The full 15-member Security Council met privately to discuss the text yesterday and was expected to vote on the statement tomorrow afternoon, said Ambassador Claude Heller of Mexico, the council's current president. (Reuters)

CHISINAU - Moldova's Constitutional Court yesterday postponed for one day a hearing on the president's request for a recount in disputed parliamentary elections won by his Communist Party. The result led to violent protests in the former Soviet republic. Opposition parties called a new rally for today to denounce what they described as arbitrary detentions and the mistreatment of demonstrators. President Vladimir Voronin, whose Communist Party ended the elections last Sunday far ahead of its rivals, says the pro-Western and liberal opposition had plotted a coup. But he offered the recount on grounds that it would restore trust and calm. (Reuters)

ROTTERDAM - A man pulled a gun in a crowded Dutch cafe after an argument Saturday and shot a patron, then rushed outside where he shot three more people, one fatally, police said. Panic erupted in the cafe when the first shot rang out, but several people chased the gunman when he ran outside, disarmed him, and wrestled him to the ground until police arrived, said police spokesman Remco Spaninxs. The man, a 44-year-old Rotterdam resident, had gotten into an argument in the bar earlier in the evening and was asked to leave, said Spaninxs. (AP)