2002

LETTER N° 06

From 02 to 09 February

03

Cambodia

Local elections. Results :

The formerly communist CPP used its clout and entrenched administrative network to win control of 1,600 of Cambodia's 1,621 communes, or clusters of villages. The results stunned even the party leader, Prime Minister Hun Sen, senior party officials said. Preliminary results show the CPP receiving 61 percent of some 5 million votes polled, compared to 22 percent for Funcinpec, and 17 percent for the Sam Rainsy Party. Final official results are expected in a few weeks.

03

Japan

Nago (Okinawa Prefecture)

Mayoral election. Results :

Takeo Kishimoto will continue to govern the city of Nago after garnering 20,356 votes to his main opponent's 11,148 in election. Kishimoto was backed by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's ruling Liberal Democratic Party. Yasuhiro Miyagi, backed by opposition parties and who opposed the base, finished second, according to reports. Mitsuo Matayoshi, the third candidate, polled 80 votes.

Okinawa, located about 1,600 kilometers (1,000 miles) southwest of Tokyo is home to 26,000 of the 47,000 U.S. troops stationed in Japan.

03

Japan

Nagasaki Prefecture

Gubernatorial election. Results :

Genjiro Kaneko, a former House of Representatives member and an LDP-backed independent, won the Nagasaki gubernatorial election. Daisuke Miyajima, an LDP member and former prefectural assemblyman, won the by-election to fill the lower house seat vacated by Kaneko.

03

Costa Rica

In presidential elections, Abel Pacheco of the Social Christian Unity Party wins about 38.5% of the vote, Rolando Araya of the National Liberation Party about 31%, and Ottón Solís of the Citizens' Action Party about 26%. Turnout is under 70%. A runoff will be held April 7.

Pacheco profile : Abel de Jesús Pacheco de la Espriella was born on Dec.22,1933, in the district del Carmen, San José Central canton. Graduated in general medicine from the Universidad Nacional Autónoma in México and psychiatry from the Louisiana State University, U.S, Pacheco worked quite a few years in the Hospital Nacional Psiquiátrico of which he served as a manager in the 60s.

04

South Korea

Choi Sung Hong becomes foreign minister.

Profile : Born : 24 December 1938. Education : Feb. 1962 Graduated from the College of Law, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea. Career : Sep. 1966 Joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs(MOFA). Feb. 1970 Passed High Diplomatic Service Examination. Sep. 1970 Third Secretary, Korean Embassy to West Germany. Dec. 1973 Assistant Secretary, Office of the President. Dec. 1974 First Secretary, Korean Embassy to the Italian Republic. Aug. 1978 Director for Legal Affairs, Office of Planning and Management, MOFA. Mar. 1980 Director, Treaties Division I, Treaties Bureau, MOFA. Feb. 1981 Counsellor, Korean Embassy to the United Arab Emirates. Mar. 1984 Director, International Economic Organizations Division, International Economic Affairs Bureau, MOFA. Nov. 1985 Protocol Secretary to the President, office of the President. Jan. 1989 Studied at National Defence College. Dec. 1989 Consul-General, Korean Consulate General in Montreal, Canada. Jul. 1992 Director-General, European Affairs Bureau, MOFA. Oct. 1993 Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the Republic of Hungary. Jan. 1996 Ambassador, Korean Permanent Mission to the United Nations. Aug. 1997 Research Commissioner, Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security(IFANS), MOFA. Apr. 1998 eputy Minister for Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade(MOFAT). Feb. 1999 Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Apr. 2001 Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Feb. 2002 Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

04 - 06

Paraguay

04 - Silvio Ferreira resigned from the Justice and Labour Departments. Overwhelmed by scandals and a political pressure from the voters, the man highly supported by González Macchi, left the cabinet. Minister of Home Affairs Julio César Fanego, resigned from the post before the President of the Repúblic has named a substitute to succeed him.

05 - President Luis Angel González Macchi appointed Finance minister Francisco Oviedo, as new Minister of Home Affairs and entrusted James Spalding, former Petropar chairman, with the finance portfolio . The only post remaining vacant is the portfolio of the Justice Minister, following the resignation of Silvio Ferreira.

06 - The Partido Encuentro Nacional (PEN) unanimously nominated to the portfolio of Justice and Labour, Diego Abente Brun, an ambassador to the Organization of American States.

04

Malta

Former president (1982-87) Agatha Barbara dies.

Profile : Born in that town, Barbara was known as an education reformer who brought full-time learning to Maltese children, who previously had gone to school only a few hours a day. Her campaign required the hiring and training of hundreds of teachers. First elected to parliament on the Labor Party ticket in 1947, Barbara won every reelection until 1981. Barbara, who had been named minister of education in 1955, was nominated president of the republic in 1982 and completed her five-year term. In 1958, after the Labor Party resigned from office, Barbara was sentenced to 43 days in prison for her role in a national strike called by the party to protest the British government's plan to reduce its presence in Malta.

07

Singapore

Former president (1993-99) Ong Teng Cheong dies.

Profile : Ong Teng Cheong will go down in history as Singapore's first elected president. But for twenty years before that, the Chinese-educated, foreign-trained architect was a stalwart of the nation's People's Action Party government led by its first PM Lee Kuan Yew. Ong, now 64, was minister of communications, of culture, and of labor; he was also deputy PM, secretary-general of the National Trades Union Congress, and chairman of Lee's PAP. By common consent, he was the man who kept the Chinese ground loyal to the party; indeed, his command of the language was such that Lee always asked Ong to accompany him whenever he visited China. In the 1980s, Ong was one of the party's four senior 'second echelon' leaders who were considered as possible successors to Lee. It was Ong's longtime friend, Goh Chok Tong, who got the nod for the job. Ong, who was diagnosed as suffering from lymphatic cancer in 1992, chose instead to run in the first elections for the presidency the following year.

09

United Kingdom

Princess Margaret, younger sister of Britain's Queen Elizabeth, has died peacefully in her sleep at the King Edward VII hospital.

Profile : Margaret Rose was born to the Duke and Duchess of York in 1930, at Glamis Castle in Scotland, four years after Elizabeth. She was imaginative and a natural comic. In 1960, Margaret married Antony Armstrong-Jones, the untitled Eton-educated barrister's son. The Queen supportively awarded Armstrong-Jones the title Lord Snowdon. In 1961, Margaret gave birth to a son, David, Viscount Linley. Three years later, when the Princess's daughter Lady Sarah was born. Differences grew irreconcilable, and in 1978, the couple separated and then divorced.