Honolulu Star-Bulletin from Honolulu, Hawaii • 4

A-4D Saturday, April 27. 1991 THE NATION lie i kit Associated Press Loren Ward holds his son Corey os he looks for his missing son Casey, who disappeared when a tornado hit their home in Wichita, yesterday. He later found his son who was visiting a friend. Sununu la trcio cvsr ski trip WASHINGTON White House Chief of Staff John Sununu may have accepted a gift through his wife in violation of federal ethics law, Time Magazine reported in its latest editions, i The American Ski Federation, a lobbying group, Raid an $302 round trip air fare for Sununu's wife fancy when the couple traveled aboard an Air Force plane to Colorado last December, i "The federation is a Washington-based lobbying arm for the ski industry, not a nonprofit educational group as claimed on documents released by the White Time said. "For (a trade association) to pay Mrs.

Sununu's expenses, a White House counsel conceded, would be 'tantamount to a gift to the magazine said. "And that would be a flagrant violation of federal ethics law." It said Sununu also accepted free lift tickets, lodging and meals in return for speaking at the annual ski industry conference in Aspen, last December. fitzM presses 7'lss ScJgca' cctrsss I NEW YORK Former Philippines first lady Imelda Marcos, living in New York while she fights to return to her homeland, appeared last night in the audience of the Broadway hit musical "Miss Saigon" and met the leading actress after the show. The Philippines actress, Lea Salonga, stars as a Vietnamese prostitute in the musical, "She did a great job," Marcos said after meeting "with the actress. "I wished her well The last time I piet her was in the Philippines.

I used to bring her jto the palace when she was 9 years old. She used to ing Tomorrow, from 'Annie and that face of innocence was still there tonight." a Salonga urged her to return again, saying: "After all, you started my career." i Marcos, dressed in a black chiffon beaded dress ith silver shoes and purse, arrived in a black stretch limousine and dashed into the theater about five minutes after the curtain went up. With her were her adopted 13-year-old daughter, Aimee, and Luigi Tabulena, his wife and their oung daughter, friends of Marcos, who had Just arrived from Manila to see the show. glitch enefsngers i LOS ANGELES NASA engineers say Galileo's $1 billion mission to Jupiter could be jeopardized by a balky antenna and that a rescue mission may have to be launched to fix it Galileo's 16-foot-wide umbrella-shaped antenna didn't open properly as commanded by its computers on April 11. Without use of the metal-mesh antenna the craft can't send back information from its pending two-year exploration of Jupiter and two of the planet's moons.

It could be a major setback for the 14-year-old project of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. "It's heartbreaking," said Moustafa Chahine, chief scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena. NASA engineers continue to try to get the antenna to open. If they don't succeed, Chahine said, the operation might be salvaged by sending a communications satellite to Jupiter. The satellite could be launched with a Titan 4 rocket, wait at Jupiter and relay signals to Earth when Galileo passes by in orbit.

The satellite would reach Jupiter in three years. There is no cost estimate on such a salvage operation. From Star-Bulletin news services Florida rape victim issue still unsettled By Dana Kennedy Associated Press PALM BEACH, Fla. A Judge tossed a legal hot potato back to prosecutors in the case of a reported rape at the Kennedy estate, saying he lacked evidence to rule on a law barring publication of a rape victim's name. State Attorney David Bludworth had asked Circuit Judge Richard Burk to decide if a law that has never been tested in a criminal case could be used to prosecute media organizations identifying a woman who said William Kennedy Smith raped her.

Smith, the nephew of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, has denied the allegations. No charges have been filed, but police say he is the main suspect. Burk rejected Bludworth's petition yesterday, saying the state attorney would have to give him more information before he could render a decision.

"This court lacks the power to decide the constitutionality of statutes in a vacuum," Burk wrote. "The state attorney is unable to simply ask whether a statute is constitutional in general." Burk gave Bludworth 10 days to amend his petition. Several news organizations ignited a nationwide debate over journalism ethics and the right to privacy of crime victims when they printed the 29-year-old Florida woman's name. One of them, The New York Times, stated in yesterday's editions that it regretted having published an earlier profile on the woman that included her name. The newspaper said the profile, which also delved into the woman's past, gave some readers the impression The Times was challenging her account of the March 30 incident.

The state law against naming rape victims has never resulted in a criminal prosecution. But a civil suit brought against a Jacksonville newspaper that inadvertently named a rape victim led to a 1979 U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning the $97,500 damages verdict against the paper. The court ruled that if a newspaper obtains the name of a victim legally from court records, the paper may be punished for publishing that name only if such publication would violate "a state interest of the highest order." Meanwhile, a Harvard University professor yesterday accused Palm Beach detectives of bungling the case. Professor Alan Dershowitz said detectives should have tried to obtain evidence from the Kennedy estate immediately after the woman reported the rape.

Police did not search the estate for almost two weeks. Twister? rAwm Pfetos, Ed By Michael Bates Associated Press ANDOVER, Kan. Tornadoes ripped across Kansas and Oklahoma, killing at least 28 people and flattening hundreds of homes. "All our neighbors are dead," said a woman whose mobile home park was leveled. The twisters, reported across a wide area of southeastern Kansas and northeastern Oklahoma, chased legislators from the Kansas Capitol and blew apart a hospital wing at an Air Force base.

At least 23 people were reported dead in Kansas and three in Oklahoma. Hardest hit was Andover, a town of 5,000 just east of Wichita. Andover Mayor Jack Finlason reported that at least 16 people were confirmed killed and 500 homes damaged. Earlier, he had put the number of dead in his town at 22. At a briefing this morning, he said that while Just 16 bodies had been located, he believed more dead would be found.

Rescuers searched today for more bodies believed buried under the rubble. Dozens of people shouted out the names of missing relatives. The number of missing was not known early today, authorities said. Finlason said authorities set up a center to try to account for the missing. Most of the dead in Andover were residents of the Golden Spur Mobile Home Park, a 400-trailer park on the southeast side of town.

It was leveled. "All of our neighbors are dead," said Judy Ingalls, who was away when the twister struck. "They didn't go to the shelter. They've always rode them out. We've always rode them out.

We've been here 15 years. They didn't go. They are taking them out." Ingalls, whose mobile home was among those destroyed, was looking for her grandsonwho lived in a different trailer at the park. Scores of people were injured, and ambulances streamed in and out of Andover carrying people to hospitals in Wichita. Authorities and officials at several Wichita hospitals estimated that more than 200 people were treated for tornado-related injuries.

A Wichita TV station reported that a 13-year-old Andover girl was blown 400 feet into a tree. Authorities could not confirm early today whether she lived or died. The Kansas National Guard and Sedgwick County sheriff's deputies pa trolled the town's perimeter late yesterday to prevent looting. "We still have a lot of people to evacuate," said Finlason. "We will arrest people on site as they enter the area." Hospitals confirmed five deaths in Wichita.

Cowley County Sheriff Bob Odell said a 19-year-old woman was found dead in a field. Authorities believed she lived in a nearby mobile home that was destroyed. An elderly woman was killed in Elk County, about 50 miles southest of Wichita, and her husband was critically injured. A tornado tossed a hospital wing about 60 yards across McConnell Air Force Base, causing minor injuries, and the base legal office was blown apart. Kansas lawmakers evacuated the Capitol yesterday before tornadoes hit Topeka.

The Kansas House ended its session in middebate and evacuated the building when a tornado touched down in the northeast part of the city. No damage or injuries were reported. Officials with the National Weather Service said they did not know how many tornadoes touched down. 1 FROM PAGE 110 HUfJU to clean up in Kuivaif 3 IP Associated Press 250 men ere us' CURDS: Guerrillas bar, refugees from 'safe haven' CREATURES: They can be harmful if they are let loose Continued from Page A-1 ideal home for many introduced animal species, he said. "There've been numerous introductions here.

Many of them are dangerous. They're not native here and people aren't aware that they could exist here," Allison said. In rare cases, animals pose a direct threat to people. "If something like a 6-foot alligator is alive in a stream or a pond and kids are playing there, it could be a disaster, if no one has any expectation that it could live there," he said. But Allison downplays the physical threat posed by introduced species.

Instead, he focuses on subtle, hidden dangers that could be just as threatening in the long run. "A good example of an injurious species, of something that's gone dreadfully wrong, is rabbits," he said. Each Easter, hundreds of rabbits are purchased for children who quickly tire of them. Their families let them go, and they breed in the wild. Haleakala National Park on Maui is being overrun with rabbits that are destroying the vegetation, Allison said.

"We've tried to raise the consciousness of people about how harmful some of these creatures could be," he said. Brown tree snakes, he points out, cause power outages resulting in about $300 million in losses on Guam each year. The discovery of the alligator "should be used as an opportunity to remind people of the potential danger of releasing some of these creatures, which are often small when they're released," Allison said. "In the absence of any competitor, they quickly reach a large size, which would, of course, be dangerous." Hawaii has very strict laws against the importation of exotic animals, but, Allison said, "the fact that various species show up from time to time I think indicates that our procedures aren't foolproof. Some things are getting through." According to the World Book Encyclopedia, alligators grow about a foot in length each year during the first six years of their lives, then more slowly.

They probably live 50 to 60 years and are usually found in swamps and lowlands of the southeastern United States. Their diet includes fish, small mammals and birds, and sometimes larger animals such as dogs, pigs and cattle. They rarely attack humans. An alligator's jaw can crack cattle bones, but can easily be held closed once shut. Alligators, a threatened species, rarely grow more than 12 feet long.

Males that length weigh about 550 pounds. Yesterday's find probably does not mean that a colony of the creatures is living in Windward Oahu, said Ernst Reese, professor of zoology at the University of Hawaii. "I doubt seriously that there's a whole bunch out there," said Reese. To breed, there has to be male and female, plus a sandy area where the gators could lay eggs and incubate them, he said. "My guess is that somebody had this thing.

Maybe they left the island and they didn't want to kill it, so they turned it loose in the stream," Reese said. Allison said exotic animal owners should notify plant quarantine officials if they have a pet they want to get rid of. The animals often end up at the zoo here or are sent to the mainland, he said. They're captured alive, if possible, and sent to a better home. They're not killed.

That's the important point," he said. The last time a similar animal was spotted on Oahu was in 1983. A 2V4-foot-long caiman a cousin of the alligator family was spotted in Nuuanu Reservoir. The caiman enchanted Oahu residents, who crowded the reservoir for about a month, hoping to catch a glimpse of the creature. The saga of the caiman came to a sad end in late October when it was found dead, apparently of a gunshot wound to the head.

By David Crary Associated Press KUWAIT CITY One of the biggest, riskiest cleanup jobs in history ridding Kuwait of millions of Iraqi mines and unexploded allied bombs is about to be privatized. No civilian firm has ever been hired to tackle an assignment remotely like it. But within days, the Kuwaiti government is expected to announce its choice of U.S., British and French companies to clear deadly ordnance from huge tracts of its southern and western desert "We're going to be making history," said Paul Sutton, chief executive of States International of Columbia, S.C., one of three American firms bidding for a contract. "It's a once-in-a-lif etime thing." Since Kuwait's liberation two months ago, the cleanup of mines, explosives and undetonated allied cluster bombs has been handled by coalition military units. They have destroyed Iraqi munitions supplies and cleared some beaches and harbors around Kuwait City, but will not extend their ree-of-charge efforts to more remote regions.

Lt. CoL Mike Brooke of Britain's Royal Engineers, coordinator of the allied clearance operation, said detailed maps of mine fields and allied bombing sites have been provided to the private companies. The maps show strips of mine fields stretching across southern Kuwait and along the shore of Kuwait Bay. In all, they extend for about 270 miles, and each field is about 100 to 300 yards wide, Brooke said. Kuwait has been divided into six clean-up sectors.

Soldiers from Egypt, Bangladesh and Pakistan are being hired to work in the three northern sectors, while the private U.S., French and British companies will work in the southern sectors, where the main mine fields are. Kuwaiti officials hope the clean-up can be completed within a year. Western experts say it will take much longer and likely will cost hundreds of millions of dollars. Sutton's team has been in Kuwait for five weeks, hoping to beat out bids from two U.S. rivals, UXB International and General Dynamics.

He said States International has recruited 330 specialists from the United States, Britain and Canada, most of them with extensive military experience and 60 percent of them rated as master bomb technicians. Continued from Page A-1 troops after two revolts were crushed, to return in stages so they can flee again if Iraqi forces break pledges and renew their attacks, spokesmen for allied forces said. The rebels manned checkpoints, set up overnight on the main road leading from the mountain retreats to the Zakho valley where the "safe haven" camps are being located. The returning Iraqis looked thin and their clothes had been reduced to rags during their stay in the primitive camps on the mountains. Lt Col.

Philip Crowley, a spokesman for U.S. forces assisting the Iraqi refugees, said authorities hoped only a limited number of refugees would return to the camp on foot in the next few days. "If all of a sudden, 20,000 people came down out of the mountains and said, 'We're here, we'd be in trouble," said Crowley, who is working out of the air base at Incirlik. He said troops at the camp still needed a few days to set up the water-distribution system and latrines. They will notify the Kurds when the camps are ready for large groups to return, he said.

Today, the 250 men from the Isik-veren camp were shown to their blue-and-white tents and given wa ter, juice and military rations. Some quickly volunteered to help put up tents, and British Royal Marines showed them how. The tent city will eventually house 25,000 returning refugees, authorities say. Women and children will follow the first groups of men to the camp, they said. Turkey has built two camps with water, electricity and sanitation on its side of the border to serve as interim settlements for the refugees returning home.

One of the camps is at Silopi. Another, to house 15,000 refugees, was being built at Gunyazi, near Semdinli in southeastern Turkey, the state radio reported today, quoting Hakkari Governor Sahabattin Har-put. It said 500 of the planned 3,000 tents had already been pitched and 1,000 refugees taken in. President Bush has said he wants to turn the camp over to the United Nations eventually. The U.N.

secretary-general Javier Perez de Cuellar, said the United Nations will soon take over running the Zakho camp. A VS. diplomat at the United Nations said the complete transfer would probably take weeks, but that the first U.N. staffers would be arriving at Zakho in days. Iraq agreed last week to allow the United Nations to oversee relief op- erations in the country, where about 2 million refugees fled failed rebellions after the Persian Gulf war.

Meanwhile, Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz said today that friction with Iraq's Kurdish minority could be eased if the United States and its allies stop meddling in Iraq's domestic affairs. Aziz, on a state visit to Algiers, said the West was trying to destabilize Iraq. Kurdish rebel leaders said after talks in Baghdad last week that the government had agreed in principle to give the Kurds autonomy in northern Iraq under a 1970 accord that was never carried out France today called for a meeting of the five leading U.N. Security Council members France, China, Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union to examine the situa-. tion in Iraq in light of those talks.

A diplomatic source in Paris, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the meeting would concern humanitarian action. Many refugees remain in squalid mountain camps, refusing to return home or take refuge in allied camps under construction for fear of reprisals by Saddam Hussein's army. To help alleviate these fears, the allies ordered out the hundreds of Iraqi security forces in Zakho, except for 50 "indigenous" Iraqi police..