A spokesman said: We don’t react to such gossip

A spokesman said: “We don’t react to such gossip.” The report, which dominated radio chat shows for hours, was the latest salvo against the first lady.
Among the allegations, attributed to unnamed officials and witnesses, was a claim that Sara Netanyahu kept an office in the prime ministry building, two secretaries and a media adviser, at the taxpayers’ expense.The newspaper also alleged that she had fired three nannies and two secretaries since Mr Netanyahu took office 18 months ago, thrown shoes at a housekeeper because they weren’t polished properly and forced erstwhile friends to address her as “Mrs Netanyahu”.Mr Netanyahu, who put his family in the spotlight during an American- style election campaign last year, has portrayed Sara, his third wife, as the victim of a hostile press and a no-holds-barred opposition.- Reuters, Jerusalem. A lot has been done already [to improve human rights] but they have a long way to go.”Ms Albright said the US was determined to help Rwanda come to terms with the aftermath of the 1994 genocide.. The mid-term legislative election was delayed in many of the 28,523 polling stations as authorities failed to find enough citizens willing to serve as inspectors. Chileans hid in bushes, climbed up poles, locked themselves in bathrooms, feigned illnesses and alleged they could not read or write to avoid being pressed into electoral inspection duties yesterday.

Barely a week passes without a rebel ambush or an attack on a jail.Yesterday’s attack coincided with US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s one-day visit to Kigali, where she met President Pasteur Bizimungu and Vice President Paul Kagame.Ms Albright said: “There is clearly room for improvement in the human rights record for Rwanda Given the history of the genocide .. we understand how difficult it must be for them. He refuses to admit that the economy is in decline and sticks to his forecast of 5.5 per cent growth for the coming year.This is treated with incredulity by some local economists. The conservative Hang Seng Bank, for example, is predicting growth of no more than 4 per cent. Sir Donald’s target could be met only by an infusion of Keynesian- style government intervention, which would probably mean a massive public- housing construction splurge, which would lead to high inflation, raising Hong Kong’s already high prices.. Hutu rebels in Rwanda appear to be stepping up their attacks on Tutsi survivors of the 1994 genocide. Brennan Linsley of Associated Press reports from Kigali on the latest atrocity.

Suspected Hutu rebels attacked a camp for Tutsi refugees in north-western Rwanda yesterday, killing as many as 200 people.
The attackers raided about 100 tents in the camp, which houses several thousand refugees from the Masisi area in neighbouring Congo, according to Paula Ghedini, spokeswoman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The Rwandan military put the death toll at 230.The marauders used hand grenades, machetes and guns during the 15-minute, early morning raid, said Colonel Kayumba Nyamwasa, a regional commander of Rwanda’s Tutsi-led army.Col Kayumba said soldiers had been unable to repel the attackers, who fled into Congo after the slaughter.The UNHCR requested medical supplies for about 200 wounded being treated at the hospital in Gisenyi, about 100 km north-west of the capital, Kigali.It was the second attack on Mudende camp since August, when more than 100 refugees were killed during a raid blamed on Hutu rebels.The refugees had fled the Masisi region in mid-1996 to escape attacks by Hutu rebels, who were then based at the refugee camps in eastern Zaire, since renamed Congo.Authorities say the rebels, responsible for the deaths of 500,000 minority Tutsis in Rwanda’s 1994 Hutu genocide, have mixed with more than 1 million Hutu civilians who returned to Rwanda late last year.Rwanda’s Tutsi-led government blames the rebels for a surge in violence in the north-western corner of Rwanda. A medium-sized estate-agent chain went into liquidation.In these circumstances the administration might have been expected to show some appreciation of the problem.But Tung Chee-hwa, the Chief Executive, keeps reiterating that “everything is fine”.Sir Donald Tsang, his financial secretary, recently predicted “the dust might settle down by Christmas”. This is squeezing the business sector and causing pain for holders of modest home loans.The property market has responded rapidly to the interest-rate rise, with transactions practically grinding to a halt and prices plunging by as much as a third. Interest rates are rising to historically high levels as a result of what is increasingly looking like a panicky reaction by the monetary authorities to counter speculation against the local currency. The Japanese owned Yaohan department-store chain, one of the biggest in the territory, has gone into liquidation, throwing 1,000 people out of work.A newspaper poll yesterday showed 75 per cent of employees surveyed feared they would lose their jobs.

A slump in tourism, one of Hong Kong’s biggest currency earners, is producing redundancies in hotels and restaurants. “After October business just dried up; our cash flow disappeared. I’ve never seen it so bad.”Even in the financial sector, where bumper bonuses were the order of the day, lay-offs are gathering pace: one large investment house has laid off a third of its staff. Carrie Lee, who runs a stationery business, said: “We just sit around at the moment, waiting for the phone to ring.

Everyone is being very careful; they don’t even want to spend money on paper.” The owner of a hitherto successful graphic-design business said he had cut staff and moved the rest of the business into one floor He used to occupy three. This is a low figure by Hong Kong standards, because people here tend to be resolutely bullish.The reasons for pessimism are not hard to find, although official statistics have yet to reflect the problems. A sharp recession is already starting to take its toll on Hong Kong, but in government circles there is a pervasive sense of smug complacency.
An opinion poll conducted last week showed a sharp dip in public confidence in the economy. Last summer more than 80 per cent of those polled were expressing confidence. The recent poll showed that 60 per cent still felt able to remain optimistic. Larry Yung, the son of the Chinese vice-president Rong Yiren, is a senior steward of what used to be called the Royal Hong Kong Jockey Club – now simply known as the Hong Kong Jockey Club..